In Strict Tempo, vol. 84: News Round-Up
Apologies for the radio silence last week, my closest friends Alan & Irene got married in a beautiful countryside festival location, which ended up with the groom (one of the best DJs I know) playing a set of absolute hard tekno belters to end the night.
So what’s gone on in the world of dance music whilst I’ve been away?
We sadly lost Ozzy Osbourne a couple of weeks ago. I can’t claim to be much of a fan of Black Sabbath if I’m honest, but I will say they’ve got a handful of cracking songs, and their influence on heavy metal can’t be understated. I guess in a way Black Sabbath will have influenced a lot of the ‘Birmingham Sound’ techno artists, if not so much musically, but in a way to make music without compromise and without giving a fuck. Already the tech-house edits are starting to come out… give it a rest, eh lads?
A tribute compilation to DJ Alfredo is being released, featuring some thirty-odd tracks from the usual suspects like Jose Padilla, 808 State & Mr Fingers. It also features some less obvious cuts from the likes of Nitzer Ebb, The Woodentops and Weatherall’s Woodleigh Research Facility. Of course it ends, as all good DJ sets do, with Smokebelch II. That should be law, really.
Sony Music have sued Napster for $36,000,000. LOL what is this, 1999? Apparently Rhapsody who run the Napster-branded streaming service haven’t been paying their royalties.
They’re a bit of an easy target sometimes, but the Resident Advisor DJ Mix series is actually pretty decent. They’re about to hit 1000 episodes since it started back in 2006, and to mark the occassion they’ve uploaded all the back editions of the series, some of which have been offline for a while. They’ve put them up on Soundcloud, quite why they didn’t do it on Apple Music, where they’d be properly licensed and creators would be paid I don’t know…
Staying on a Weatherall tip, a second volume of the Sounds From The Flightpath Estate compilation is being released later this month, featuring an unreleased Sabres track plus new music from Richard Fearless, A Certain Ratio, Red Snapper and Richard Norris. Somewhat worryingly there’s a Sleaford Mods cover of a Two Lone Swordsmen track, but I’ll give it a full and fair review when I get my hands on a copy.
Lastly Weatherall-wise, next week I’ll be interviewing Jagz Kooner and Gary Burns from The Sabres of Paradise, who are back on the road this year as part of a reissue campaign of Sabresonic & Haunted Dancehall. Stay tuned for that one.
New Music
Burial - Comafields / Imaginary Festival [Hyperdub]
It’s mad to think that South London Boroughs dropped twenty years ago. There’s still little that sounds like it really. It’s always a nice surprise to get new Burial music and these two new ones are… alright. I think it’s probably hard to be Burial these days when everyone expects something genuinely world-changing with every release, but sometimes it’s good to just put out good Burial tunes. After all, a good Burial record is still better than a lot of other stuff that passes for post-dubstep or whatever you want to call it these days.
Semtek - Elements VIP [Don’t Be Afraid]
It’s good to have Semtek back isn’t it? Benji Lehmann has bought us a couple of releases under his DJ Persuasion alias already this year, but those of a housier errr…. persuasion will enjoy this one. Big kicks are the order of the day here, with the tightest drums this side of… whereever there’s tight drums. Floating above it all, a vintage organ lead paying tribute to those from Chicago, Detroit & NYC. It also marks the return of Don’t Be Afraid, which let’s face it, did as much for pushing UK house & techno forward in the 2010’s as any of the labels that got all the plaudits. Probably a good time to revisit some of that old DBA catalogue too, folks.
Angel Hunt - Globelight [Short Span]
Another new one from Matthew Kent’s Short Span, fast becoming the essential label of 2025. Moving away from the dub-techno sound that influenced the first two releases on the label this is a collection of tracks ranging from the ethereal to the broken and none the worse for it.
Adrian Sherwood - The Collapse of Everything [On-U Sound]
No one does dub quite like Adrian Sherwood, and this - his first album since 2012 - is a masterclass in low end vibrations. You know what you’re getting here, beautiful rolling basslines, tracks hand-made for a summers evening.
Mark Grusane - The Witch Is Back (High School Party Promo Mix 1992) [Death Is Not The End]
Available as a name-your-price download or limited edition cassette this new one from Death Is Not The End captures a timestamp of early 90’s Chicago. This mixtape was originally made by Mark & friends to promote their parties to the kids at High School. An utterly essential download if you ask me.
Carrier & Gavsborg - The Fan Dance [Modern Love]
Guy Brewer’s Carrier alias has been putting out buy-on-sight records for a couple of years now, and on this new Modern Love 7” he teams up with Equiknoxx man Gavsborg for a low-slung, sexy slice of industrial dancehall.
Raime - You Wouldn’t Believe It If I Told You [DDS]
No digital on this one, but you didn’t think I’d let a new Raime mixtape go without mention did you? Truth told, my copy hasn’t arrived yet, but if it’s anything like the others they’ve done it’ll be a proper head-melter.
April Magazine - Sunday Music For An Overpass [Tough Love]
Think I mentioned this a while ago, but it’s out now on vinyl and it’s perfect. RIYL if you like Shoegaze/Spacemen 3/Belle & Sebastian/all that kind of stuff. Mellow. Stunning.
The Sabres of Paradise - Sabresonic/Haunted Dancehall [Warp]
Regular readers will know my love of all things Weatherall, and I’ve mentioned the reissue of these two first Sabres albums before, but they’re out now, remastered, and still utterly essential. Weirdly Sabresonic doesn’t seem to be on Apple Music, only Sabresonic II? These cost a fortune a short while ago, so get them whilst you can. Stay hungry and ill prepared!
