#dkmntl

Nu Guinea came together over a love of studio jam sessions. The Berlin based Italians fuse live instrumentals and synthesisers that journey to far corners fo the musical world, from weird disco to exotica, world grooves via ethno rhythms. Their most adventurous work has come in the form of albums on their own NG Records as well as Early Sounds Recordings, one of which found them rewire original Tony Allen drum recordings with their own jazz-funk vibes. In the mix for us this week they stir up a steamy summer session of boogie bass, township funk and squelchy synth goodness. It’s 90 minutes of storytelling music that speaks of a lifetime of digging deep into local sounds and scenes and stitching them all together with the sort of underlying grooves that transcend boundaries and bring people together under the sun.

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: Mickenik Second hour: Lauri Soini

DJ Python - Derretirse Dekmantel (DKMNTL067) - 12" Release date: 10/06/2019 A1. DJ Python - Lampara A2. DJ Python - Tímbrame A3. DJ Python - Cuando B1. DJ Python - Espero B2. DJ Python - Be Si To B3. DJ Python - pq cq https://shop.dekmantel.com/release/6339 Enter a world of post-IDM, ambient and reggaeton, with a progression of deep synths, reverb, and percussion whose rhythms are born from the southern hemisphere. This is the world of DJ Python, a.k.a. New York based producer Brian Piñeyro, who also sometimes goes by Dj Wey, Deejay Xanax, and Luis. Making his Dekmantel debut with an extended EP of contemporary electronica, fashioned in his cult unique style, Python brings his deep-reggaeton style to the Dutch imprint. With his first LP Dulce Compañia released in 2017, Python extended his cult status in the electronic music sphere with motives of ambient, and tropicale, all the time keeping his music deeply rooted in classic underground dance music. Along with a Breaking Through feature on Resident Advisor, an almost legendary appearance on Boiler Room — in which he ignited the room in Santiago with bellowing reverbs —, extensive touring, and a residency at New York’s Nowadays (healthy programmed by the team behind Mister Saturday Night), Python has dutifully snaked his way in today’s cult artist category. Making his next step with this six-tracker on Dekmantel, Python aggrandises his prestigious drum sequencing, merging the world’s of drone-driven electronica, cerebral synths, and steely out-of-this-dimension-dancehall. The EP’s pening track 'Lampara' snakes and twists, like a rugged 90s London broken-beat, electronic exploration, evoking nostalgic feelings a la Boards de Canada. The retro aesthetic flows through with second track 'Tímbrame', where the tropical reggaeton percussion floats through wafty, deep synth melodies and chimes, like a vibey, emotive, come-down, get-down, post-party dancefloor filler. 'Cuando' steps up a gear, as the digital percussive rhythms go into overdrive, while 'Espero' goes all Gaussian, by offering a transportive, meditative expression. 'Be Si To' pulses into full Phython territory, chops-and-cuts-and-slices across a sleuth of Warping, proto-drones. The record’s final track 'pq cq' is a singular question mark about darkness, feeling, and trans-dimensional thinking, as the track shifts in-between kicks that feel one and the same between past, present, and the dub.

OKO DJ is a core member of a few key collectives: the first is the Brothers From Different Mothers label she has been signed to, and the second is LYL Radio, where she heads up the Paris department and hosts the monthly Synchronisme ou Barberie with the Bruits de la Passion crew, as well as her own women-only show Pu$$y Nightmare. She is utterly diverse in the music she plays, which ranges from doom laden psych to 80s synth to cold body music via futuristic soundscapes. Mixing with a focus on vibe and feeling rather than scene or style, she is freed up to go wherever the music takes her. And so it is that her mix starts with an energised spoken word monologue then transitions to experimental beats, spooky synth tracks and jungle all within the first fifteen minutes. Dark and foreboding passages are often offset by more exotic moments of calming ambiance and for every frazzled synth and blizzard of drums there is a restorative dub moment to reset the mood. Such a series of highs and lows, darks and lights is not often found in the same set, and what’s what sets OKO DJ apart.

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: DJ+ Second hour: Frits Wentink

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: Fafi Abdel Nour Second hour: Sapphire Slows

A true student of world music, specifically scenes across West Africa, Auntie Flo’s music is an always authentic distillation of afro drums and rhythms. His latest album was the finest example of that and featured collaborators from Senegal, Cuba and London who all added a true sense of character to his meticulous production. The tracks ranged from broken beat to string laced soul and featured found sounds from Moroccan markets and bustling townships that took you on a truly global adventure. His mix, of course, travels just as far and wide and plays out like an audio diary that tells a thousand stories. There's gorgeous instrumental fair setting the scene and sojourns into heavy drums that’ll have you in a trance psychedelic melting pots of intoxicating synths and wind instruments and steamy and menace, it takes you places you’ll likely never have been before.

Jex Opolis - Earth Boy Dekmantel (DKMNTL064) - 12" a1. Earth Boy b1. Desolation (Dub) b2. Desolation (Vocal) https://shop.dekmantel.com/release/6252 Electro, disco-chic, doused in gooey pop, sultry silk, and retro synth-boogie. Dekmantel welcomes the good time vibes of Canadian selector, and retrotastic, vibe-poppin’ producer Jex Opolis. Cult figure, obsessive Discog-er and Good Timin’ boss, the Brooklyn-based, Canadian has etched out a global reputation with his exotic taste of lo-fi, party productions, with this — his Dekmantel debut — not straying far from the formula. On Earth Boy, the hit making powerhouse turns up the synth furore to maximum, with electro and Italo all blending together, in a powerful melee of beachtime house, and crushing sunset disco. Leftfield soul that’s not just for the diggers, and the perfect introduction for his summertime debut at Dekmantel’s galant showcase festival in Amsterdam later on this summer. Title track 'Earth Boy' pays homage to the classic electro of the early 80s, with its 123bpm rolling breaks, and throbbing synth basslines. It’s as if Drexciya has a disco-baby with Spacer Woman. With its cliquey stomps and robot pulses, and nods to the wave-style records that empties so many of Jex’s sets, 'Earth Boy' is classic future disco. 'Desolation' is bridled with greater depth and emotion, with Italo-pomp and a certain rhythms digitales flare. Braver souls may embrace the vocal mix when it comes to playing out, with its compassionate overtones and soft celled-bassline. Its time to brush aside the winter hue, and say hello to those good-time blues, and frolic along to the jetset, neo-Balaeric house stylings of Jex Opolis.

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: Umwelt Second hour: Loma Doom

Chinese born Tzusing has spent time in Chicago, Singapore and Taiwan and “this condition of dislocation” is what informs his music. It is a brash mix of industrial textures, harsh broken techno and subversive pop, trap and rap that is all blurred into one borderless offering that mirrors his own personal intersections. That music has come on LIES since 2011 and has given rise to standout LP 東方不敗 in 2017 that lead to shows on Boiler Room, Dommune and at Berghain. He was quiet on the release front in 2018, but has started this year with a new split EP on Pan, and now offers us a musical catch up ahead of him playing at Dekmantel Festival later in the year. Over the course of seventy minutes he jumps around restlessly, but somehow his sounds remain united by shiny metallic surfaces whether he’s mixing in Asian pop, whirring computer sounds in meltdown or horror-core. To us, it sounds like a futuristic soundtrack to some hyper urban metropolis that’s on the brink of collapse, and it’s genuinely compelling.

The Dekmantel Selectors podcast series became tradition. Each year, we ask 6 artists from the line-up to deliver a mix in anticipation of the new edition. After Palo Santo & Coco Maria's stunning mix, it's time for Sacha Mambo to take care of the next podcast. Sacha Mambo stays busy heading up the Macadam Mambo label (perhaps best known for their nice run of edits) and occasionally producing under the alias MZKBX. The Lyon resident has also put in plenty of time as DJ as well, having served as the resident of his hometown club Le Sucre for a handful of years where he developed his taste for piecing together disparate sounds sources, often utilizing bits of cosmic Afro, dub, new beat, early rave, post-punk, and all sorts of weird electronics in the course of his infectiously oddball sets. That being said, we're happy to have Lyon's Sacha Mambo continuing our globe-traversing Selectors podcast series, bringing an alt history of French music to your door. Minimalist wave, proto-electronic gurgles and a typically laissez-faire attitude abound. Bon voyage! 🇫🇷

Territroy - Skulls & Plants Dekmantel (DKMNTL-UFO8) - 2x12" a1. Delirium Vivens a2. Wax Smiles b1. Non Sayers b2. Sleeping Fury b3. Instar c1. Upside Down Sinner c2. I Meant You, Not You c3. Their Menads d1. Bold Like A New Sun (ft. Olympia) d2. Prosopagnosia https://shop.dekmantel.com/release/6351 Panagiotis Melidis is a singer-songwriter also known as Larry Gus on DFA Records, and Stathis Kalatzis is a techno mainstay formerly known as Mr. Statik. Together they are Territroy, and this spring they release their debut album, Skulls & Plants, on Dekmantel’s UFO label. The duo has a very specific starting point for their music, and that is the AGET Heracles Cement Factory Plant in Volos, Magnisia, Greece: You’re climbing the Goritsa Hill and the moment you get to the top, you look over to the sea view, but the cement factory dominates the landscape. It lays there almost like a window into the future, where nature, corporate ethos, plant and stone based materials and biochemical extensions all exist as one. The factory is a metaphor that processes the land itself, ignites it in a cancerous way then dumps it into the sea and the atmosphere. It’s a combination of all possible scenarios of optimism and negativity, the essence of trying to do the best for everyone, but accidentally killing everyone in the process. That contrasting duality is mirrored in Territroy. Each half comes from two separate worlds: graphic novels vs illustration, literature vs empty pages, the functionality and the sheer craft of sculpting sound into feeling vs taking that feeling and analysing it until it no longer exists. More simply put, it is a sports field that is a basketball court at one side and a football pitch at the other, but somehow everyone finds a way to play the same sport, even though one uses his hands and the other his feet. When one half of Territroy starts a phrase, the other one finishes it, but they speak different languages, and will never be sure if the finished sentence is technically correct, even though they can be certain that it’s definitely finished. What ties them is a constant rhythmic element that is persistent and comes from growing up in Greece and absorbing the rhythmic specificities of Southern Europe and unique Mediterranean attitudes. Importantly, there is also a lot that separates the pair. The result is music that brings together two very different personalities and perspectives but allows them both to coexist, intertwine and unfold in untold new ways.

The recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: Yu Su Second hour: Ribeka

Mike Parker, you would assume, is a perfectionist. His techno is meticulous, his grooves as hypnotic as any. Over the course of two decades he has honed in on his vision with ever increasing accuracy. He manages to get huge amounts of detail into his tunes that elevates them above purely functional material and lands him on labels like Semantica, Prologue and Tresor in both EP and LP format. The American is just as deep and powerful as a DJ, even without the use of kick drums. And that’s the path he follows over the course of one absorbing hour here, laying out a cinematic journey into space that is propelled by ambient synths and sci-fi motifs that set real scenes and have a real sense of narrative. At times it is blissful, at others more unnerving, but rarely will you hear an ambient mix as coherent and compelling as this.

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: MYN Second hour: Jamie Tiller

Detroit’s Patrice Scott is a lifelong student of the deep who brings something fresh to his more techno orientated hometown. His smoky, atmospheric house lays low and rolls on endlessly, getting you in a meditative state and keeping you there with spine-tingling vocal motifs and beautifully delicate keys. His own Sistrum label has been on a similar mission since 2006, and you’d be hard pushed to find deep house as raw and emotionally charged anywhere in the world. His podcast is a two hour masterclass in smooth and seductive house that explores plenty of different moods. Selections exude the sort of class and quality that Scott has made his trademark: he’s not afraid of a jiggy drum pattern, or a vulnerable female voice, but the kicks always remain rooted to the floor and impossible to ignore. Come rain or shine, outdoor stages or indoor sweat boxes, this is the sort of mix that will always make a mark.

Recording of our weekly Dekmantel Radio show at @redlightradio. First hour: SlickChick (Salamanca) Second hour: Ofra (Operator)

Has anyone toyed with the rules and subverted expectation quite as much as DJ Fett Burger in recent years? We can’t think of many people who are more thrilling to listen to than the Sex Tags co-founder. Whether viewing ambient through a dubby house lens, getting wilfully weird with time signatures or wonderfully wonky with his grooves, the Norwegian is in a class of one. He’s fairly prolific too, with more than 22 EPs to his name since 2012, yet each and every time he steps out, he manages to sound more fun and freaky than before. It’s the same story with his DJ sets. The one we have here is a three-hour ready-made party: it starts with ass-wiggling funk and joyous disco before things begin to unravel into tumble-down house and heavily percussive afro drums. Fett Burger isn’t afraid to suddenly switch up the tempo or roughly blend in a new tune, either, just so long as the energy remains. And it does, with things ending up not far from where they started with a classic slice of Prince that will leave you wanting to do it all again.