Beats News

The first Prestige release for 2021 is delivered by London-based, Italian bred HLZ! Emilio has been on the map for a min, and we are more than thrilled to finally lock in a project in the form of a versatile 3-track EP offering. As his talents have been revered with all the top labels and DJs across circuit, Prestige is chuffed to deliver this unquestionable slapper of a 12".

As the Lead track, 'IN BETWEEN' takes listeners on a journey thru a deeper palette, HLZ is able to turn out with casual grace. Liquid gold best describes such a superb composition. Rolled out drums + classic bassline hook = sure fire integrity.

Riiing the alarm! 'DUB SUNRISE' hits different and not what you'd typically expect from mans. Only meant to be heard on a proper rig, HLZ channels the natty spirit and nails this iteration of the dub wise vibrations.

Third tune might as well be a title cut, 'NEON UNDERWATER' is simply pure rudeness. The track perfectly fits its title, as you instantly catch that murky, immersed feeling upon first listen. Another sound you may not be accustomed to hearing from HLZ off rip, from a label that frequents the roads less traveled.

PMG017 will be a vinyl feature with full color sleeve on March 5th, digital to follow suit 1 week after release. The heaviest of players showing full support; likes of Doc Scott, Craze, Flight, Ulterior Motive, and more. We're very excited to finally share with you all, such an astounding drop from the renowned Prestige Music Group.

Serious sound system pressure on this one! Select tracks from Natalie Slade's debut album 'Control' have been completely reimagined and transformed into Jungle, Footwork, Garage, Broken Beat and Hip Hop by some of the most exciting talent around, including Tek-Life affiliate DJ Taye, Azymuth producer Daniel Maunick, Garage young blood Holloway and Chicago's DJ Hank amongst others.

The cat is back! 4 breaky jungle cuts to walk your cat to.

São Paulo’s own, Cesar Pierri (CESRV), is one of Brazil’s most trusted and versatile producers, widely respected in the electronic and hip hop scenes throughout Brazil and beyond. He is co-founder of the label Beatwise Recordings, specializing in experimental production, and resident DJ of seminal beats & bass party Colab011.



Earlier this year, CESRV spearheaded and produced the EP “BRIME” alongside rappers Febem and Fleezus. The project mixed UK Grime with Brazilian Baile Funk and was a big hit on the underground scene, generating respect and new fans throughout Brazil, the UK and the US. He’s also released 2 Footwork inspired EPs this year “Bela Vista” and “Twenny Twenny” which has garnered radio and press support from BBC, KCRW, Okayplayer, Bandcamp and others.

São Paulo in the early 2000s was a perfect place for the Drum n Bass scene. The city had tons of clubs with well known DJs from all over the world playing music for a sweaty and enthusiastic crowd. CESRV's 4-track release is a crossover between contemporary electronic music and 90s Dn’B / Jungle rooted in São Paulo’s electronic music scene.

Western Lore, headed up by Dead Man's Chest / Eveson launches the second round in their 'Blunted Breaks' compilation series. Featuring regulars such as Sonic, Eusebeia, Dead Man's Chest, Response, Double O, Thugwidow and more.

The nutty barrage of jungle, footwork and electro-chaabi badness in ’All Caps’ forms the long overdue followup EP to ZULI’s world-taking debut album ‘Terminal’, overcoming delays due to the robbery of his laptop to unleash his most deadly dancefloor moves yet.
After a pair of standout EPs in 2016-17, ZULI’s debut LP ‘Terminal’ was hailed an album of the year by The Wire magazine and lit up playlists across the world. He was due follow up with a club-focussed EP but, shortly before it was ready to be sent for mastering, some chump robbed his laptop and repository of recordings, so he was forced back to the drawing board, rebuilding all his soundbanks from scratch. A few years later he’s prepped ‘All Caps’; a hot-blooded and witty brace of breakbeat chicanery intersecting voices of local MCs, his friends, and randomers at gigs, with traces of electro-chaabi - the road-level sound of Arabic North Africa - for an utterly thrilling new side that makes up for lost time.
Acknowledging inspirational cues from UK jungle via his peer and label boss Lee Gamble, ZULI performs a sort of genetic manipulation of jungle’s amen and subbass building blocks, adapting their codes to noisy,
lush, and playfully aggressive, mutant ends resembling sections of DJ/Rupture or Mutamassik mixtapes from 20 years ago. Coming hot and furious with the red-lining amens and gibber-jawed vocal chops of ‘Tany’, he flings bodies between gasping footwork recalling Ueno Masaki or Rian Treanor in ‘Bassous’, to cyberpunkish steppers grot on ‘Penicillin Duck’, while taking wickedest aim at Afro-fetishists in the straightjacketed computer funk and electro-chaabi bursts of ‘Bro! (Love it).

The second 10” vinyl release from the label and this time Mr Time (from Krome & Time fame) hooks up with Missing to fuse together their 90’s roots into a fresh jungle soundclash. Missing was an artist that use to record on Krome’s Tearin Vinyl label back in the mid-90s and both of them hail from London’s Hackney borough, an area infamous for jungle pirate radio. These guys breathe those original vibes. After the duo signed a tune to Hospital this year, they wanted to make another jam for Sub System to reflect their youth. The flip side - ‘X Amount Of Dubs’ - Missing helps cement the Sub System Sound; Bouncy ragga riddims, sound tape MC liks and heavy, melodic bassline’s set over unmistakably jungle breakbeats. Two heavy slabs of riddim!

Repress

A brand new decade and Valve Recordings returns with the release of one the biggest drum & bass dubplates of the last few years. Now a staggering 22 years old the original ‘Hard Noize’ is classic Dillinja who brought in Bristol’s finest Break for the remix and the result is an absolute show stopper. Instantly recognizable, it gets the rewind every time. Also included is a new belter from Break, the Valve sound inspired ‘Tubes’ that thumps seriously hard.

incl. dl code

Premieres from Data Transmission and Bolting Bits. Early support from Hospital, Huey Morgan, Rupture, Fanu, Rob Luis, Anthony Kasper (Fokuz), Red Rack'em, Bandcamp Weekly, etc.

150 copies pressed on 180 gram vinyl. Picture shows the HF021VFELT edition which comes with 'Nuthin' But a Jungle Thang' die-cut felt sleeve insert (in assorted colours), with Heard and Felt embroidered fabric tag. HF021V edition is the same 180g vinyl without the felt sleeve insert.

With music from Jonny Faith's recent Night Lights EP appearing in Grand Theft Auto and best of 2020 lists including Gilles Peterson's, you might think Jonny would continue to mine his take on hip hop and broken beat. Well, all in good time. He's been ready to enter the jungle for 20 years, and he's not waiting any longer.

Now based in Melbourne, Jonny first got involved in music in Edinburgh as a DJ and turntablist in the 90s, getting hooked on jungle, drum & bass, hip hop and the hybrids of these championed by the Mo'Wax label. Formative experiences included hearing DJ Hype spinning in Newcastle, seeing the Roni Size/Reprazent live show with two drummers and hanging out at cult Edinburgh club night Manga, where residents G-Mac and DJ Kid hosted the likes of Marky, Grooverider and J Majik.

Jonny was keen to start making his own sounds, signing up for an electronic music production course. But it wasn't quite what he was after.

'The course turned out to be more house-oriented,' Jonny recalls. 'Sampling wasn't on the curriculum, and the students weren't allowed to touch the Akai S900, the sampler used in lots of the early jungle classics.'

When Jonny did start releasing his own productions a few years later, he was starting to explore the experimental beat scene around the time Flying Lotus and Hudson Mohawke (another Scottish turntablist) were starting to make their mark.

Jonny continued to widen his sonic palette, adding elements of dub, jazz, funk, electronica and broken beat, and picking up fans like Radio Nova Paris, KCRW, Vice and Clash Magazine along the way. But he's never been more than one degree of separation from his jungle/D&B roots. He continued to buy and play the music, did the odd D&B remix and snuck sonic elements and techniques into his tracks at various tempos. Over the years his releases have shared labels with the likes of Peshay, Om Unit, Drumagick, Reso, Kid Drama and Danny Scrilla.

Now, more than 20 years after those early experiences in Edinburgh, Jonny unveils his first jungle/D&B EP, On Lock. And it sounds like he's been making this music the whole time. In a way, he has.

The single 'Open My Eyes' bursts out the gate, chopping not only the breaks and the soul for a tune that sounds like Amerie's '1 Thing', or some Just Blaze chipmunk soul, reimagined for the 174 BPM crew. Jonny started this one as a hip hop beat for a live routine on his MPC, but it only really came together when he reframed the groove around a D&B rhythm. Next up, Jonny tries a similar trick on his own boom bap tune 'Stay in Your Lane' from the 'Night Lights' EP. His new Step Off Mix totally recontextualises US MC Lady K's slinky soulful rap and hooks with a tough and funky junglist groove. One for fans of the old Roni Size/Bahamadia collab. 'Create' then spaces things out just a touch, with atmospheric but propulsive drumfunk. Vinyl bonus track 'Nuthin' But a Jungle Thang' layers cascading amen breaks, timestretched vocals and a massive double bass-line over the wah guitars and synth whistling of a G-funk era classic.

With early support for Jonny Faith's take on jungle/D&B coming from Hospital Records, Rupture (Rinse FM) and Fanu (Metalheadz), Jonny is ready to be welcomed (back) into the scene.


b A2: Stay in Your Lane (Jonny Faith Step Off Mix) feat. Lady K


b A2: Stay in Your Lane (Jonny Faith Step Off Mix) feat. Lady K

*Repress*

Ruffhouse dropped their debut on Ingredients in October with 'The Foot / Bypass' to much acclaim. Already touted as a force to watch, their follow up is as good if not better!
'Demand' really shows their ability to make progressive, forward thinking music and it's the unpredictability of 'Demand' that makes it a stand out track. 'Division III' is equally as impressive, room shattering drums & almighty stabs. Pressed onto 300 limited edition white vinyl.
* DJ support comes from Break, dBridge, Loxy, Skeptical, Dub Phizix, Fracture, Doc Scott TRACKLIST: A: Demand || B: Division III.

light purple vinyl

"Music to a point is directly associative and always carries stereotypic and archaic values. In opposition to real life physical sounds electronically created sounds and music throw you back to the beginning of sound - the sine wave. To go from there is a welcome challenge and a lot of fun which both expresses well in the album."
- Current Value

A defining member of the hardcore techno scene in the early nineties and stretching his influence across a range of sub genres, from jungle to house music, there’s not one section of the cultural shifts since then which Nookie hasn’t seeped his influence into. Whether it’s been pivotal moments on imprints such as Labello Blanco, Reinforced, Moving Shadow or Good Looking, he’s proven the span of his creativity with every track he’s released across a plethora of labels. This continues with a brand-new single on Metalheadz, extending across an array of styles and a natural progression from his acclaimed remix of Goldie’s ‘Inner City Life’.

The Rage mix of ‘Kaeya’ has already received support from radio icon Pete Tong as his 'Essential New Tune' which sets the standard for this release. With deep, heavy sub bass and pounding kick drums skipping underneath the track, softened slightly by its vocals this is a formidable record which speaks of the current climate and proof that club-orientated tracks are still having a seismic effect on listeners. The D&B mix flips the tempo, dipping between each note sequence with a lulling sense of security, meanwhile closing the single is its ‘96 rework, standing out through its rolling breaks and reminiscent feel.

They each pull together a seminal standalone offering from Nookie, and one which will reidentify fans with his commitment to musical

exploration as well as the impression he’s had throughout his three decades worth of history, now proudly displayed under the Metalheadz banner. And this is just the start.

It's been a very long time coming, but finally I can say the joint Skeleton release from Antidote and Threshold is here and it exceeds all expectations.

This project started way back in the Summer of 2019 after a long chat with Antidote about him having his own Skeleton EP. To say he was excited and felt honoured is an understatement.

He immediately started working on something fresh that he thought would be a good fit for the label, but unfortunately, in October 2019, before he could fully finish the track he was sadly and unexpectedly taken from us. As well as leaving a void in our lives, he also left a void in the release schedule and I still somehow wanted him to be part of it.

3 months on from the release of his debut album, Friske returns to Metalheadz for a one-off single showcasing some of his best work yet. Set to be released this October, Friske displays his much-loved production traits and attitudes towards drum and bass music via the amen-riddled 'Untitled Killa' and the intergalactic journey that is 'Persevere', this is a part of Friske's discography too good to miss.

A long-time friend of Goldie and a staple of the Nordic dance music scene, Agzilla's eclectic debut album is set for release this February.

Blurring the lines between the rough with the smooth and delving into various genres including jungle and drum & bass as well as leftfield techno, house and bass music, 'Cats Can Hear Ultrasound' is a genuine melting pot of contrasting sounds covering a diverse range of BPMs.

La Sabbia is a group of friends who share the passion for music. In the last five years we succeeded in building and developing our own studio, where nine people are working and researching. We see music as a universal language to connect people, telling stories and creating new life shapes and patterns accessible to everybody, without boundaries of any kind.

Voltage Controlled Fingerz is Alessandro Paolone's first album, the synthesis of his trip in the various forms of electronic music. From the obsession for the Yamaha DX7's and Roland 707's raw sounds, through the complexity of jungle drums and poly-rhythm, to an almost maniacal analysis of the '70s progressive rock scene, you will taste these classic ingredients mixed in the new recipe of Doc Pavlonium.

Red Vinyl

All star lineup on Plasma Audio! Skeptical, Zed Bias, Safire, Morph & DRS.

Red Vinyl

All star lineup on Plasma Audio! Skeptical, Zed Bias, Safire, Morph & DRS.

Repress

Inhabited Shadows” is the new album by pioneering, Berlin-based techno artist Headless Horseman. This is his most daring and emotional release to date: the culmination of live performance, studio experimentation, and global exploration.

A total sonic experience, “Inhabited Shadows” takes listeners on a deeply personal journey through Headless Horseman’s creative brain. Dark industrial synths and broken beats form the spinal chord. A spirit of lightness and compassion guides the way forward.

From its opening, the album sets hard edges and metallic surfaces against dense and delicate textures. A-tonal figures and percussive attacks merge with melodic flights and soulful rhythms. Classical counterpoint and cinematic soundscapes conspire together. The result is discordant joy.

Headless Horseman’s vitality comes from his determination to remain open and vulnerable as an artist. “Inhabited Shadows”, recorded over eight months in 2019, reflects a period of intensive growth. Each of its nine tracks ventures into uncharted territory, embracing many moods, changing climates, old ghosts, and new risks.

“Over years of trials and tribulations, music has been the antidote”, says Headless Horseman. “I’ve learned to live in shadows and darkness. Now I’m chipping off pieces of my shell and portraying directly how I feel without compromise. I still inhabit shadows, but I can move back and forth between darkness and light.”

* The original sister label to Ram Records from the old Ram HQ studio in Essex, Liftin Spirit Records now celebrates its 25th year with a special ‘RELOADED’ limited vinyl series of remastered classics, alongside rare and previously unreleased tracks since the beginning in1992.

* DATs from artists such as Andy C, Ant Miles, Shimon, Joint Venture, Interrogator and Red One have been located in the archives. Also from the Ram & Liftin HQ came tracks for the Deep Seven label in 1993 and all these rare DAT masters have been located and now re-cut by Simon, the original Ram & Liftin vinyl masterer at ‘The Exchange’. Initially, Deep Seven remasters will present on a printed white label and unreleased tracks will have a black label.

* The 1994 track 'Cold Fresh Air' by Higher Sense pushed Liftin Spirit Records firmly into the developing Jungle/dnb scene and is re issued and remastered here on 180g black vinyl. Both tracks remastered and enhanced from the original DAT.

Quartz has been constructing some of the most cutting edge and enjoyable drum and bass we have heard in recent times and we've been eagerly anticipating the day we can follow up his 2018 'Hall of Mirrors EP'. That day is fast approaching as we proudly reveal the 'Coercion EP' set for release on 19th February.

Comprised of 4 technical achievements propped up by a persistent underlying quality this is Quartz demonstrating a raw yet refreshing sound we can promise a lot more of in the coming years. Key elements of Quartz's character have seen him develop a relationship with Goldie who has been ever-present in both refining his technique and carving out a new journey that doesn't comprise in the slightest. Also featuring Artilect on 'Folding Water', the 'Coercion EP' is a fantastic reflection of Quartz's intricate approach to making music the way he wants to.

Award-winning International DJ and Producers The Prototypes release their third album ‘Ten Thousand Feet & Rising’. The Brighton based Drum & Bass duo were previously signed to tastemaker label ‘Viper Recordings,’ home to Matrix and Futurebound.

The Prototypes’ potent, hard-hitting production and broadsword body of work on seminal labels such as UKF, Viper Recordings, Shogun Audio, Ram Records, Technique Recordings and Formation. Anthems that have been supported across the entire D’N’B scene such as ‘Pale Blue Dot’, ‘Pop It Off’ and ‘Kill The Silence’.

Their expansive and versatile remixes of acts ranging from Ed Sheeran to Avicii to Friction by way of their sought-after bootlegs of Fisher and Knife Party and unreleased dubplate remixes of Bad Company and Pendulum. Not to mention their extraordinary debut album ‘City Of Gold’ that exploded in 2015, took them around the world several times over and elevated them to headline status.

‘Shadows’ is the first single from the new album, which they explain as ”a throwback to the Hardcore scene from the late 90s, with a piano line influenced by pivotal names through the history of the UK’s rave scene such as Vibes & Wishdokta, DJ Dougal, Slipmatt, and Nookie, to which we added a straight up banger of a bassline”.

Featuring Ulta Music’s singer Lily McKenzie, known for her collaborations with industry heavyweights including Giggs, Conducta and Wiley, as well as featuring on Crazy Cousinz’s 2017 smash hit, ‘No Way’, alongside Yxng Bane and Mr Eazi signed to Ultra Music.

Previously supported by the likes of Zane Lowe, Annie Mac, Andy C, Roni Size, Friction, J Majik & Wickaman, Pendulum, DJ Fresh plus many more.

Villem introduces a new VA EP series, UNISON. Showcasing his own productions alongside new and more established artists.

After his hugely successful “Unite EP” in 2019, we are excited to present Fracture’s second EP on 1985 Music - the “Velocity EP”. It features the awe inspiring Nah Eeto on Shada Shada.

Dance music icon Netsky has taken the drum & bass scene by storm
since the announcement of his highly anticipated return to Hospital
Records for his fourth studio album.

* BCee & Villem’s ‘The Vanguard Project’ finally release a long player in the form of self titled ‘The Vanguard Project’
* The album showcases the many sides to The Vanguard Project’s flavours, with the full on Ragga vibes of ‘Liberty’ to the happy summer stylings of ‘Get Up’ and back to the deep rollers with ‘Everyday Is Stolen’.
* Not content with their own work, The Vanguard Proejct have drafted in Charlotte Haining, Dynamite MC, DRS, Phoebe Freya, YT & Leo Wood on vocal duties.
* Support from Hybrid Minds, DJ Marky, Etherwood, Whiney, LSB and more...

Holsten delivers an absolutely stunning debut four-track in the form of the ‘Sealed in Time’ EP on the DROOGS imprint. The EP follows a barrage of blistering singles, cutting through the noise of a busy genre. Holsten’s definition of modern jungle draws on over two decades of refinery of the sound, summoning the spirit of the dancefloor.

Dom (and his Roland s760 sampler) was once described by seminal magazine NME as the “Ridley Scott” of drum and bass. His epic early records helped form the blueprint of the scene today.

Originally releasing on No-U-Turn in 1994 and credited as one of architects of “Tech-step”. Dom was signed by the legendary Moving Shadow label in 1996 where he released 3 solo albums and a plethora of singles becoming their most prolific and influential artist in the history of the label.

Well known for his early alliances with school friends “Optical” and “Matrix”, Dom started his own label DRP (Dom & Roland Productions) in 2006 to collaborate with like-minded artists. Now 15 years in with an enviable roster from “Noisia” to “Amon Tobin” it is now the main home of Dom’s work.

Both of these tracks play to Dom’s music’s hypnotic nature and have been highly sought after since their initial clips were released late last year on instagram. Search for Meaning is the aural equivalent to being strapped to the front of a train and Abbott and Costello is Dom’s visualisation of how the octopod aliens in the film “Arrival” march about, hence the use of their names.

DJ PLAY: What? In their bedrooms? These people regularly play DRP tracks… Rene Lavice, Laurent Garnier, Giles Peterson, Jerome Hill, Digital, DJ Bailey, DJ Lee, Bryan G, Fabio, Grooverider, Loxi, Andy C, Break, Kasra, Doc Scott, Dbridge, Goldie, Ant TC1, Gridlok, Ulterior Motive, Noisia + More.

Following on from the huge success of 2019's 'Access' EP on Livity Sound, Two Shell return to Livity Sound with the 'SoulCity' EP.

This new EP expands their sonic utopia, injecting early dubstep and grime influences with their signature optimistic digital futurism for maximum dancefloor effect.

Livity Sound is a label set up by Peverelist in 2011 as a vehicle for a raw and exploratory strain of UK techno, rooted in the heritage of UK dance music and sound system culture. It has since become one of the UK's foremost protagonists for cutting edge underground electronic music.

In collaboration with Brooklyn-based artist RDO/ATK, Sophia Saze makes her long-awaited return to her Dusk & Haze imprint with four slamming cuts on a release entitled ‘Stalker’.

Born in Tbilisi and now residing in Philadelphia after years living a nomadic lifestyle, Sophia Saze began her creative journey in her formative years with classical music and dance training. With a solid and natural musical foundation, Sophia became engulfed by electronic music leading to the launch of her Dusk & Haze imprint in 2017, before dropping a remix of Heathered Pearls on Ghostly International and the release of her much lauded debut album on Kingdoms. ‘Stalker’ sees her team up with old friend RDO/ATK who has been soaking up the dancefloor since the early 90s. With much of his influence stemming from the early east coast rave and club scene, his sound maintains a homage to the past without getting stuck in it. A sucker for a dirty 303, a breakneck amen, or a crushed 909, RDO/ATK’s style spans across genres from jungle to acid to broken beat and everything in-between.

The EP kicks off with a dynamic, jungle roller entitled ‘Stalker’ featuring old-school, amen breaks, stirring yet intriguing synths and hefty bass shatters balancing styles of glitch and funk together with pure class whilst ‘Fucking Crazy B’ lays focus on cold, syncopated grooves, chopped up shrieks and screams from a video of a traumatic personal incident and shimmering pads moving into ominous territories.

On the flip, ‘Talk To You In Your Brain’ delivers relentless kicks and spiralling acid squelches peppered with chilling vocal samples and frazzled fx that pulsates strikingly throughout until ‘Acid B’ rounds off proceedings with an effervescent, warehouse techno cut as the electrifying modulations bounce gracefully off the menacing percussion and slashing, 303 tones.

3x12"

A special project from the archives as Goldie celebrates 25 years in the game with 6 unreleased and re-mastered tracks on vinyl.

James Bangura debuts on Mister Saturday Night Records with a six track ep of diverse sounds and emotions.

From the far off sounds of drum 'n' bass absorbed through headphones in Alabama and onto his first experiences of parties during the blog house Ed Banger era whilst living in California, all the while hearing the sound of New York house sound at home, this is the sound of an artist taking it all in.

For their DNO debut, The Untouchables blend their signature thrumming junglism with the Brighton imprint’s own sub-obsessed foundations — utilising a decade of percussive mastery to merge the two so immaculately as to make them one. Take the title track ‘Culture Clash’, where ricocheting polyrhythms bound around like particles gone berserk, giving the impression of rapidity — but take a closer look and it clocks in at a cool 140bpm.

*Repress*