In the age of DJ mix as promotional tool, the curious and dedicated music fan could probably listen to freely available music during every waking hour and never be at a loss for something new to listen to. For those who aren’t willing to dedicate the entirety of the day to listening to new podcasts, keeping up is basically impossible, though I certainly try. Resident Advisor, Fact Magazine, XLR8R, Numbers, Sonic Router, Electronic Explorations, Datatransmission…to name just a few…radio rips from BBC or RinseFM only add to the neverending stream. In the face of all of this, anything that’s going to get played repeatedly (or, let’s be honest here, all the way through even once) has to be pretty remarkable. Occasionally I might even be moved to write a sentence or three about something and recommend that the discerning (but somewhat more casual than I) music fan give it a listen.
Sometimes I think I could be content listening to nothing but music that is in some way connected to Hessle Audio. For the last couple of weeks this mix by the producer behind their latest 12″ has been just about all I want to hear. It’s the kind of mix that makes me want to seek out nearly every track on it, except when I look at the tracklist I see that half of it is as yet unreleased, and some of the most captivating tracks aren’t even credited, so all I can do right now is just press play again. Grab the mix and check out an interview with Blawan over at Sonic Router.
Ramadanman for Mary Anne Hobbs Experimental
Mary Anne Hobbs recently announced her retirement from BBC Radio, leaving a void that is going to be essentially impossible to fill, but on her way out she’s promised to deliver us mixes from some of the biggest names in (post-)dubstep. Last night’s show featured Skream (and I’m sure you can find it elsewhere if you care about that sort of thing), and next week brings Joker (check this space in a few days for linkage and, most likely, overexcited ravings from yours truly), but the farewell shows got started off right last week with Ramadanman’s 36 minute session. Not as face-meltingly awesome as the Blawan mix up above, but it’s packed with new and unreleased tracks by the obscenely prolific and criminally consistent producer, sprinkled with everything from Burial to Joy Orbison.
I’m not gonna put much effort into describing or explaining this one. If you didn’t react like I did upon seeing the words in that link up there (basically, screaming like a little girl, then bouncing off of the walls and ceiling of my bedroom until the download was finished) then I can only assume that you haven’t heard young Guy Middleton’s incredible debut LP, Anidea, in which case you should probably do something to rectify that situation. Until such a time as you’ve done that you might as well tide yourself over with this mix of melodic purplish delights.
