CCL – A Night in the Skull Discotheque

Beginning a lot of talking about what a incredible year CCL had, this mix is a awfully close perfect — depth when you need it, works as a warmup and as a banger, heavy joints when you need them, etc etc etc. I continue to be very late on “bass music”, but I am still pretty happy about it.

Fauzia – RA 926

Lush, lush, and then lush again; lots of her own work, and all of it is luminous and wonderful and downtempo and still luminous again.

Full Circle – Back To Disco Valley (The Slow Goa Mix)

Recorded something like 12 years ago, this surfaced in 2023, and snuck into rotation pretty much instantly — draws the lines between Italo weirdness and psy weirdness, and “slow nrg” of pretty much every sort.

JD Twitch – All Arthur Russell DJ set, live at The Barbican, London

Another sign that I’m in middle age: I’m starting to get Arthur Russell. But for real, this set is wonderful because it is hopeful and uptempo without crushing the high end — enough so that when a lone Talking Heads track comes in at the end, it feels like an EDM banger.

Objekt – Live @ Nowadays, April 7

Yep, another one of these, if anything deeper than the last one.

Tom Moulton – The Sandpiper Mix

This is it, maybe the first disco DJ mix ever, and the one that launched Moulton’s career, which helped shape the course of disco history — and it’s just on the internet, and it’s kind of great, and of course it was made literally by hand, by splicing tape.

The Deep Ark – The Deep Ark

One hell of an achievement, maybe a little bit much, but my goodness, the apotheosis of the 1990s? Maybe, maybe.

Honorable honorable honorable mentions to CCL – Live at Freerotation, Nono Gigsta – The House Of Crocodiles Part 2 (Live at Freerotation), (Freerotation?!), Loidis – RA965, Haruka – XLR8R 845, KRN – RA951, and Laurel Halo – Awe on NTS – 05-21-2024.

(What on earth are these podcasts series going to do for episode 1,000? I well remember the conceit of record labels doing CAT001, say — it’s spectacular that a few places are going to do it).

Some quick words about Anz’s two hours closing Mr. Sunday and Avalon Emerson’s three, and Akanbi’s deep afro morning set:

• Anz and Florida breaks, huh — a lot of Miami in her current sound, but also the Fixate record, as well as Clearly Rushing and a whole quasi-dancehall section.
• Avalon Emerson started in “John Digweed vs Nick Warren 2001” territory, and I was deeeelighted — though I think the correct comparison for her for the prog veterans is clearly Sasha.
• Akanbi, on the mic! A really nice run through afrobeats, dancehall, r&b, and the patience to let a a pop track play out at a much lower volume — and keep the dancefloor there through force of personality.

There’s also been this … thing happening, which is interesting: people are dancing. Like, really going for it dancing. There was a moment near the end of Theo Parrish where we had about six people doing fairly formal house dancing, moving in and out of each other’s spaces, and very much not just standing and facing the DJ and doing the standard two-step shuffle. This has also happened at Anz, especially later in the evening when there was a bit more space, and earlier on at Avalon Emerson (I saw a woman doing a half-time candy skip!) — it’s not quite 1976, but it is something. I am, of course, mostly at Nowadays all the time, but I am interested to see if this is happening elsewhere (or at Elsewhere, even).