Oblique Saturdays

A series for Saturdays in 2026 inspired by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt's set of cards, Oblique Strategies (Over One Hundred Worthwhile Dilemmas). Eno and Schmidt created them to be used to unblock creative impasses and approach problems from unexpected angles. Each week I'll turn over an Oblique Strategy card and post a song or songs inspired by the suggestion. 

Last week's card said 'Disconnect from desire'.

Disconnection from desire came via Gala, The Beastie Boys and Scritti Politti. From the Bagging Area readership pool, Ernie was in first with Alessandro Moreschi, L. Braynstemmmmm suggested Kraftwerk's Computer Love, Rol offered Claudie Frish- Mentrop and Expendables' Man With No Desire and Jase gave us Sinead and I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got. Chris also offered Sinead's second album and suggested the Apple Brightness Mix of I Am Stretched On Your Grave which has a sample of How Soon Is Now buried within it.  

This week's card said this- Breathe more deeply.

Good advice. Useful for dealing with stress, increasing mood and focus. 

In the studio breathing more deeply could be interpreted as an instruction to let the music breathe, to slow it down, leave more space between the notes, focus on what you're not playing as much as what you are. It makes me think of Basic Channel, the Berlin techno duo who made dub- techno so minimal, so stripped down that it almost became something not music- just pure sound, a breathing exercise. 

This one is fifteen minutes long and from 1994. The dull thud of a muffled kick drum, a ball of barely there static, a repeating synth sound. Inhale exhale.  

Quadrant Dub I

I also thought of this from Deanne Day, a mid- 90s pseudonym used by Andrew Weatherall and David Harrow on three 12" singles. D and A. Andrew had dropped out of view a little post- Sabres, a choice to shun from the bright lights and the greasy pole. Blood Sugar was a deep house/ dub techno night he put on and Deanne Day fits in very well with that sound- kick drum, hiss of hi hat, lots of space, that vocal sample, 'I can hardly breathe', and a bassline to groove to. Another nearly fifteen minute long track.

Hardly Breathe

Inhale exhale. Calm in repetition. 

Later on the vocal becomes, 'When you stand there/ When you stand naked/ Looking at you'. Less calming perhaps. 

The synths swirl, the drums drop out, the bass bumps away, the snare rattles. A few minutes later (and nothing happens in a rush in Hardly Breathe, everything plays out for bars, unfolds in its own time) a long two note chord moves in. 

Andrew had a thing when making records around this time, as Deanne Day or Blood Sugar. There could only be four elements going on at once. If you wanted to add a new sound, you had to remove one. It kept it minimal and focused. Restrictions as a creative tool- which sounds like an Oblique Strategy. 

Feel free to make your own Breathe more deeply responses into the comments box. 

Accelerated Life

The internet was abuzz yesterday with news that the rapture is due today. Not the New York punk- funk band (although they are reforming and re- appearing later on this year so their timing is both good but also bad depending on how things turn out) but the actual End Of Days when Jesus Christ re- appears and all good Christians alive and dead will ascend to heaven. The rest of us are done for at that point I think. If by any chance this does come true as foretold by a South African preacher then the post I've scheduled for Wednesday may be horrifically out of date but that's a chance at the moment I'm going to have to take. 

In the meantime, rapture notwithstanding, here's some outstanding new music from David Harrow. David cut his teeth in the early 80s with Anne Clark and then as part of the On U Sound studio and live band team. In the 1990s he recorded as Blood Sugar with Andrew Weatherall and the pair also recorded the fantastic dubbed out, chilled out beauty of Message To Crommie for the first War Child album. Andrew and David called themselves the Planet 4 Folk Quartet, a name they used just once.

I met Crommie a couple of summers ago, a real person living not far from me, at an event in Chorlton. He's a sound engineer/ live sound expert who's worked on sound rigs in Manchester since the late 80s, with a slew of bands including 808 State and The reformed Stone Roses. Andrew regarded him as the best in the business and when he and David Harrow were recording their track (all the tracks for War Child were recorded in one day) they were looking for a title for the song- at the same time Andrew asked for a message to be got to Manchester's sound engineer par excellence... 

Message To Crommie

Since the mid- 90s David Harrow has moved to LA and recorded under his name and as James Hardway. In the last few years he has been a Californian cottage industry, recording and releasing dozens of tracks and EPs. The latest has just come out on Exeter's Mighty Force label, a four track EP called Accelerated Life. David's music takes in modular synth ambient explorations, dub, acid, techno and almost every point in between. 

On Accelerated Life the sound is electronic, a deep house/ techno/ bleep/ braindance melting pot. The first track on the EP is a co- write with singer Sandy Mill, Catch Me, a track that pushes out of the speakers straight away and keeps bouncing, Sandy's voice cruising on top of the drums and synths. Macro keeps the bpms and kick drum active, a deep sea bassline bubbling away and piano/ synth stabs and a sense of perpetual momentum. Meso's jackhammer kick drum is matched by a speaker rattling synth bassline and more bleepy topline fun. Finally there is Supra, another four four drum machine rhythm, lovely warm bass tones and synths, a hi- hat and a cricket chirruping in time. All in all, more superb stuff from Mr Harrow and Mighty Force. Accelerated Life can be found here. 

Twenty Five Minutes Of Sounds From The Flightpath Estate Volume 2

Our second album, Sounds From The Flightpath Estate, went on sale for pre- orders last week (as announced here on Monday and on various Flightpath Estate social media platforms). We are pressing 1500 copies. We did 1000 of Volume 1 and sold them all, something that still amazes me although it shouldn't- the music was so good it should have been no surprise we'd sell out. Flightpath and Rude Audio main man Mark Ratcliff has done a taster mix of all ten tracks for Volume 2, deftly sequenced and mixed, with the unreleased Sabres Of Paradise track making its presence known more than once. 

The unreleased version of Lick Wid Nit Wit stands alongside anything else Sabres recorded and released. It got it sole airing when Andrew Weatherall played it as part of his legendary 1993 Essential Mix at the BBC and even then that version is not the same as the one we have. 

As well as that track Mark has mixed in the nine other brand new tracks, music by Richard Fearless, Red Snapper, A Certain Ratio re-worked by Number, David Harrow, Bedford Falls Players, Dicky Continental, Richard Norris, Unit 14 and a cover of Two Lone Swordsmen's Sick When We Kiss by Sleaford Mods. Mark's mix, featuring excerpts from all ten tracks, can be found here. Mark has adeptly brought together mid- 90s dub/ techno skank, 21st century machine techno, Manc noir, North African percussion, chuggy cosmische, thumpy acid house, clattering Notts post- punk and much more into one sequence- you can play guess which track is which.

Sounds From The Flightpath Estate Volume 2, double vinyl clad in a beautiful sleeve courtesy of Personality Crisis, can be pre- ordered from Golden Lion Sounds and/ or the GLS Bandcamp. There are still some copies left but don't hang around- as with Volume 1 there will be no repress. When they're gone, they're gone. 

Platonic Solid

David Harrow put out a release a month last year to celebrate his 60th birthday and his work rate remains prodigious- in May he released an eight track EP under his James Hardway guise and has followed it this month with an EP under his own name, five tracks collected under the title Platonic Solid. David does all sorts of music- dub, acid, techno, ambient. Platonic Solid is modular synth ambient, five pieces that span the gamut of ambient music- the opening track Dodecahedron is a languid seven minutes of gentle burblings, rising and falling synth chords and tinkles of piano, a lovely way to spend a few minutes sitting and thinking about not very much at all. 

Hexahedron is livelier, with drum patterns and melody lines skittering about. Tetrahedron cuts the tempo, sounding like some of the Fourth World sounds of Brian Eno and John Hassell. Octahedron is more jittery, the modular synths dancing and what sounds like a clarinet floating around. As it plays imagery from the 1982 film Koyaanisqatsi flashes through my mind and then Platonic Solid finishes with Icosahedron, the synths and drums pitter pattering, glassy notes dropping in and out, a dub sense of space and everything being pushed along, all sorts of sounds bouncing around. It's all very evocative, experimental but accessible, five tracks that soundtrack something I can't quite put my finger on- the film playing right in front of us every day maybe. You can get Platonic Solid here. 

Define, Take A Minute And The Ghosts Of Dawn

Friday this week is a bumper post, new music from three artists old and new- OBOST, James Hardway and Reverb Delay, between them all showing electronic music- techno, acid, dub, house, whatever- is in good health and flourishing. 

The very young and very talented Bobby Langfield, who records as OBOST, released an album and some singles/ EPs last year and played live at The Golden Lion in March. Today sees the release of a two track EP- Define/ Redefine. Define is led by a robotic stutter and squiggle, a voice, distorted toplines and piano kicking in and out. The vocal eventually reduces to the title, just the word 'define' repeated as keyboard notes rising and falling. 

Redefine is a tougher, muckier and heavier take on the original, some serious acid techno at play, the rhythm thundering away, the sequencer caught in an endlessly addictive groove and the vocal several octaves deeper. Define/ Redefine are both available at Bandcamp.  

Half the world away in Los Angeles David Harrow has resurrected his James Hardway persona for brand new tune and an eight track EP packed with versions and some remixes courtesy of the very much in  form Rude Audio. Take A Minute appears in DnB version, a TikTok Mix, a 3Step one, the Footwork Mix and here as the House Mix where it feels like a crossover, some long lost futuristic 90s house playing in the  third decade of the 21st century, the vocals by DangerRed beamed in from the aftermath of a party. 

Rude Audio's remix reworks the tempo and the rhythm, dropping the vocal down (as OBOST did too) and adding some typically South London dub to the LA dubstep. All eight versions/ mixes/ remixes are at Bandcamp. 

Reverb Delay is Marcus Farley whose EP Horizontal Rain came out on Mighty Force last month. A new thirteen track album, The Ghosts Of Dawn, is out today, an album that is in part a tribute to Berlin, its techno and dub sounds- for Marcus, the album is about the thrill of 'chasing the dawn', the ride on public transport to the centre of the city, entry to the clubs, immersion in the dancefloors, and then the journey home. 

The Ghosts Of Dawn starts as it intends to go on- with an eight track dub techno excursion, rattling drums and gliding synths called Into The Night. As well as the music of Berlin, Detroit is very much  present as is the Birmingham techno scene much loved by Marcus, Sandwell District and Surgeon, plus the mid 90s speaker shaking sounds of Bandulu. On One Four the kick drum hammers onward while synth stabs and arpeggios dance away at the top end. 

The title track comes into the second half, a sense of calm and space, a slight lessening of the tempos and tension. Underground Overground is a nine minute wait for the train home, the night's adventures still running the mind and then Train Three brings station announcements, train noise and ambient techno chill. It's very much an album to be listened to in full, a piece and not just a collection of tracks, a journey into and through the night- you can find it at Mighty Force. 

Hot Flushes

Red Snapper's tour reached Yes in Manchester last Saturday night, a celebration of the 30th anniversary of their debut album Reeled And Skinned and their forthcoming album Barb And Feather. The Pink Room at Yes is close to full with ACR's Martin Moscrop on DJ support duties. Red Snapper are on at 8.30, an early start due to the room converting to a club night not long after 10pm and they waste no time getting the room moving. 

The core duo/ rhythm section of Rich Thair (drums) and Ali Friend (stand up bass) are very talented musicians. If you had a functioning time machine you could drop them into 1920s Harlem, 1940s New York or 1960s Soho and within a few bars of music they'd have everyone rocking, Ali's deft basslines and Rich's on it drumming the bedrock to a set that takes in jazz, dub, surf, trip hop, rocking blues, all points in between and a fusion of all of those. Their set spans the years 1995 to now, everything sounding like the work of a band very much in the present but with one eye on the music of their past that has led to here, now, tonight. Along side Rich and Ali Red Snapper is Tom Challenger playing sax, clarinet and melodica, plus keys and laptop, and youthful guitarist Tara Cunningham who flicks between jazz, angular post- punk/ punk- funk and surf. On opener Lobster, Ali plays his bass with a bow and everyone joins in softly, a low key start to a set that ups the tempo straight after with newer cuts like B- Planet (from 2022) standing alongside the sounds of their mid 90s trip hop. Hold My Hand Up, a collaboration from last year with David Harrow, is a mid- set highlight, the ambient soundscape of the original turned into a dubbed out anthem. 

The room is bouncing, the area near the stage full of dancers and the rest of the room bobbing up and down and left and right. New track Ban- Di- To kicks up a storm, pile driving horn riffs and sharp funk, raucous, infectious fun. They close with Hot Flush, a live version of the Sabres Of Paradise 1995 remix, Ali playing the circling jazzy bassline and the distinctive horn riff ringing out, future jazz crossed with dance music, time travelling music. 

Ali Friend is a presence centre stage, head tipped back while his fingers dance around the strings, occasionally spinning his bass round, leaning into the mic to utter some encouragement to the dancers, a man lost in the sounds, as Rich Thair drives everything from stage right. They come back sharpish for a two song encore, the amped up Wesley Don't Surf sending the punters young and middle aged out into the Manchester drizzle happy. 

Barbed, Feathered, Reeled, Skinned, Snappered

Red Snapper have an exciting and busy 2025 ahead of them. The band Ali Friend and Rich Thair started with David Ayres in 1993 celebrate the 30th anniversary of their 1995 album Reeled And Skinned, an album that was one of '95's highlights from Beth Orton's voice on Snapper and the extended ten minute guitar freak out In Deep to the endless groove of Sabres Of Paradise remix of Hot Flush. The re- issue on vinyl and digital is on Warp and expands the album out to ten songs, with the extra track Area 51. The re- issue is out this Friday- find it at Warp's Bandcamp. 

Reeled And Skinned's fusion of electronics with live double bass, drums and percussion, guitar and keys/ synth saw them cross between smoked out trip hop, rocking jazz, funk, Afro, surf, dub, sci fi blues and all points in between. They head out on tour this week, starting in Swansea on Thursday and finishing in Glasgow on the 29th March. I saw them at The Golden Lion two summers ago, a venue they're playing again this time around, and they rocked the house, the full band sound bouncing round the pub, Ali's double bass and Rich's drums always leading the way. 

They also have a new album coming out in April, Barb And Feather. Last year they released an EP called Tight Chest, four tracks led by a collaboration with David Harrow, the superb dubbed out sounds of  Hold My Hand Up...

Those four tracks are going to be on the new album along with four other new ones, recorded by the rocking and raucous Red Snapper live outfit. The breadth and power of the four new songs shows a band not just trading on former glories but in the flow of a creative period, new songs to stand alongside the old ones. Opening track Ban- Di- To is a riot, the sound of 1940s jump blues welded to fuzz guitar, horns and Zoot suits a- go- go, punchy and funky, infectious, pounding rhythms. Tolminka slows things down, basement blues, a cinematic noir sound with echo, sax and spindly guitar. It's followed by Sirocco, the groove coming together slowly, clipped guitar and jazzy percussion and then a wonderful snaking, descending sax line. The EP closes with a cover they played live on the last tour, Bowie's Sound And Vision, the stand up double bass bubbling away, a stew of instruments providing the song's famous melody lines and Ali's vocals playing off against the horns. Lovely stuff. Hear Ban- Di- To and find Barb And Feather at Bandcamp. 

As a bonus here's The Thin White Duke, David Bowie himself, in Tokyo in 1990 playing Sound And Vision, teeth gleaming white and hair in a perfect quiff and Adrian Belew on guitar, for the enjoyment of a stadium of Japanese Bowie fans. 

NYE 2024 Mix

Staying in has been proclaimed as the new going out many times now. New Year's Eve is often the most overrated night out of the year but in the past we had fun going on NYE and I'm sure they'll be loads of people who do tonight. We have no plans to do anything major and hence will be in by the time 2025 comes around at midnight. In place of a crowded dance floor here's a Bagging Area NYE 2024 mix, starts out dubby, then goes Tricky, and then thumpy before calming down slightly and finishing with the return of a long gone 60s icon. 

Everything on it was released this year and it's quite David Holmes and Hardway Bros heavy (which probably explains a lot of what I've listened to this year). I wanted to find room for several other tracks but also wanted to keep it down to under 80 minutes for those of you who still burn things to CD to play in the car (that may just be me). I tried to fit Acid Klaus in but couldn't make it work, Hardway Bros' Murky didn't find a place (and should have) and there's one segue where it's a bit off- Audacity isn't really for mixing more sequencing, and sometimes my patience gets replaced by my 'it'll do' attitude. But if you want a shuffle to some chuggy, leftfield, acidic, dubby, thumpy and ultimately life affirming electronic music at some point tonight, it might do the trick. 

NYE24 Mix

• Red Snapper and David Harrow: Hold My Hand Up
• Theis Thaws: Fly To Ceiling (David Holmes Mix)
• Silvertooth: Shut Um Down (A Dub From Outer Space)
• Ammonite: You Don't Know Me (David Holmes Remix)
• C.A.R.: Anzu (Hardway Bros Remix)
• Peak High: Dance Hall Days (Hardway Bros Remix)
• Causeway: Dancing With Shadows (Marshall's Club Mix)
• Ben Hunt: Shimmering Lights (Rude Audio Remix)
• Lisa Moorish: Sylvia (David Holmes Remix)
• Raxon: Your Fault
• Puerto Montt City Orchestra: Hey You (10:40 Remix)
• 100 Poems: Dubmobalearicswithmybreaksman

David Harrow celebrated turning 60 in 2024 by releasing music every month. One of those releases was a four track EP called Tight Chest with jazz/ techno/ dub/ surf legends Red Snapper. This was the lead track, a wonderful piece of 2024 dubbiness that should have got more attention than it did. 

Theis Thaws was an album that saw the return of Tricky (Adrian Thaws) with French producer Mike Theis and singer Rosa Rocca- Serra. David Holmes' remix, as everyone said when it came out, was approximately three minutes too short but even at only three minutes eighteen seconds it packs a powerful if slightly paranoid punch. 

Silvertooth, from South London, released Shut Um Down in November, a cover of  Gil Scott Heron song, partly inspired by Sean Johnston's continuing ALFOS parties. It came in a variety of versions with two ALFOS aimed dubs- rolling pianos, chuggy dubby beats, and a lovely low slung groove.

Ammonite makes very ethereal music, layers of voice and gossamer drones. She remixed Holmes' Emotionally Clear into an ambient track. Holmes returned the favour by pumping Ammonite's You Don't Know Me up into an electronic banger. 

C.A.R.'s Anzu lit up late 2023. The remixes came out in 2024, courtesy of GLOK and Hardway Bros. Sean's Hardway Bros remixes have been in full flow for the last few years and the standard is uniformly high. This one and the Hardway Bros Dub were on heavy rotation at Bagging Area back at the start of the year.

Peak High's cover of Wang Chung's Dance Hall Days was a delight, coming after the equally superb Was That All It Was in 2023. The Hardway Bros remix dubs things down, turning the 80s pop down a bit, and finds that BPM sweet spot that Sean knows very well.

Causeway are on Chris Massey's Manchester label Sprechen but the duo (Marshall Watson and Alison Rae) are based in California,a world away from South Manchester. Dancing With Shadows is the 80s teen film anthem you missed, the sounds playing in the disco where Molly Ringwald has a revelation while dancing with the wrong boy. It came with a slew of remixes- the one here is Marshall's own. 

Ben Hunt's Shimmering Lights came out last month on Paisley Dark with a range of remixes, all of which hit the spot. Rude Audio remixes are often in the 98 BPM dub area. This one whacks it up and heads for end of the night Underworld vibes, the vocal sample, 'I see patterns in everything', twisting around like Karl Hyde in the mid- 90s. 

Lisa Moorish's comeback single in April was a beautiful electro- pop tribute to Sylvia Plath. David Holmes' remix did exactly what you'd want from a Holmes remix. 

Raxon's Your Fault was an autumn '24 highlight although I didn't catch on until later. It is fabulously wonky dance floor euphoria from Cologne, sounds shifting in and out, everything shifting and moving as if the floor is giving way. 

Puerto Montt City Orchestra's Hey You came out on Brighton's Higher Love label, the home of many, many good releases. It's a cover of 80s indie band 14 Iced Bears Hay Fever with original singer Rob Sekula returning to do the vocals. On the 10:40 remix Jesse sent this woozy 2024 c86 song through a Spiritualized filter, everyone involved laid back in the sun. 

100 Poems have released three albums this year, each one stuffed full of beautiful, brilliant tunes and a open minded anything goes attitude to making music and to life. Mike Wilson named the band after a collection of Seamus Heaney poems and the inscription on Heaney's headstone- 'walk on air against your better judgement'- is what the music is all about. On the third of the three albums, Balearic As A System Of Belief, Mike used the voice of Jim Morrison, a late 60s interview where he was talking about the future of music and how it would be electronic. And there may be a better way to see 2025 in than by listening to the utterances of the Lizard King repurposed for 2024/ 5 but I can't think of one at the moment. 

Happy New Year everyone- in or out, have a good one. 

2024 In Dub

The list making has started. Some of my blogging compadres have already pressed the Best Of 2024 button. At some point before Christmas I will post an end of year review and list. In the meantime, here's some of 2024's highest quality dubwise sounds wrapped up in an hourlong mix- there's much more that could have fitted into this mix too but in the end I wanted to keep it to under sixty minutes. Repetitive, bass heavy, echo- laden and spacious sounds for Sunday. 

2024 In Dub

• Coyote: Living In Heaven
• BTCOP: Sabre 540 (Rude Audio Remix)
• Five Green Moons: Garbage Van Exhaust
• Uj Pa Gaz: Roxy (Hardway Bros Meets Monkton Uptown)
• David Harrow and Little Annie: End Of Times (Rude Audio's Immutable Remix)
• Hugo Nicolson and David Harrow: Revolvalution (Dan Wainwright and Rude Audio VIP Remix)
• Justin Robertson's Deadstock 33s: In Minus Shadows
• The Woodentops: Dream On (Rolo's Dub)
• Richard Norris: Fever Dub
• Coyote: OMG

In early December Coyote released a dub 12", two huge dub tracks,Living In Heaven and OMG,  that are in their own description 'light as a feather- heavy as lead'. 

Living in Heaven sounds like it be from side six of Sandinista!, a massive compliment in this household- it also has a touch of the Sabres Of Paradise Ysaebud single. Rattling bassline, echo and vocal sample. Coyote add some strings. Lovely deep stuff

Rude Audio's remix of BTCOP's Sabres 540 came out on Tici Taci in February, a remix that Rude Audio's Mark Ratcliff thinks his among his best work. He's right. 

Five Green Moons is Justin Robertson's latest venture, a post- punk/ pagan dub excursion, an eleven track album that continues to reveal new depths with each play. Justin appears later on too, with a track from the EP he released on the excellent Pamela label in April, four tracks all to some extent infused with dub. 

Uj Pa Gaz is from Tirana, Albania, a Tici Taci recording artist, producer and DJ. Roxy came out in late July and appears here in Hardway Bros Meets Monkton Uptown remix , heavy duty dub action from Sean Johnston and Duncan Gray. There is a very beguiling Middle Eastern melody line that plays out from the start, tumbling percussion, rimshots, delay and the deep hit of dub bass.

David Harrow has turned sixty this year and has celebrated with a release every month, a treasure trove of music emanating from his LA studio. His EP with On U legend Little Annie, the New York post- punk/ dub poet, had the original version of End Of Times, an instrumental, an acapella, and six remixes, two by Rude Audio- the Immutable and Protean Remixes. The Immutable is the dubbier of the two, a dubbed out rhythm underpinning Little Annie's poetry, 'this is not a happy hour'.

And Rude Audio turn up again, their third appearance here, now with the assistance of the wonderful Dan Wainwright. They took a track recorded by two former Andrew Weatherall cohorts- David Harrow and Hugo Nicolson and spun out into psychedelic dub complete with a brain melting ukulele solo. There are Sabres Of Paradise sounds scattered throughout it.

The Woodentops released a new album in April this year, Fruits From The Deep, a deep and rewarding trip under the sea. Dream On was one of the highlights, remixed in dub style by main Woodentop Rolo McGinty. Dream On (Rolo's Dub) starts and ends with an airplane taking off. Flying off to somewhere warm seems like a dream right now. 

Richard Norris' Bandcamp subscription service rewards on a monthly basis, a project that started with his Music For Healing ambient project but has blossomed into other areas, not least his Oracle Sound series of albums. Oracle Sound is (currently) three albums of superb, home grown dub. Fever Dub is from 2024's Oracle Sound Volume Three. 

Hold My Hand Up

This EP comes out next week, a collaboration between Red Snapper and David Harrow. Red Snapper are riding the crest of a wave after last year's Live At The Moth Club and a tour. They're touring again next year. David Harrow is celebrating his sixtieth year by releasing music every month from his Los Angeles home- modular synth ambiance, dub, techno and whatever else he fancies. The EP, Tight Chest, was made in a sweet spot somewhere between London, Wales and LA and is led by this wonderful piece of dub flavoured music, Hold My Hand Up...

David's modular synths form the base layer. On top Red Snapper add Ali Friend's double bass, some sweetly drifting melodica, percussion and a sleepy eyed vocal, everything smothered in some lovely dub bass and delay. 

The other three tracks follow with similarly expansive feel. Modsnap has North African grooves, Rich Thair's bubbling percussion and an addictive rhythm. Lucky Strike is led by finger picked acoustic guitar, a loop of bass and Rich's signature drums, David's synths adding textures. Final song and title track Tight Chest glides in on synth twinkles and FX with the Red Snapper rhythm section bringing the jazz- dub vibes and at the mid- point more whispered vocals. The Tight Chest EP can be pre- ordered at Bandcamp with Hold My Hand Up ready to download straight away. 

Fifty Minutes Of Rude Audio

Rude Audio are a shadowy South London musical collective, specialists in dub techno and sleek chuggy cosmic disco. Based around the core of producer Mark Ratcliff, they've been pushing music my way for some time after I stumbled across some tracks in 2017. Since then Mark has become a friend, one of The Flightpath Estate team, and someone I've shared a DJ booth with on several occasions. Mark can actually do all the technical stuff, beat matching and mixing, and it's a pleasure to watch him play records/ CDs. Especially when in the middle of a set when he'll do something like randomly drop in Walk On by Neil Young from 1973's On The Beach amidst a bunch of dubby dance music and cosmic disco tunes. 

Mark's music as Rude Audio has been picking up the right kind of support in recent times. Andrew Weatherall was playing it in 2019 and early 2020. Don Letts has featured Rude Audio tracks in his sets. David Holmes played his and Dan Wainwright's recent remix of Hugo Nicolson and David Harrow at NTS last week, a show you can listen to here. Much of the Rude Audio back catalogue and the tracks below plus the ones mentioned but not included in the mix can all be found at the Rude Audio Bandcamp. 

Fifty Minutes Of Rude Audio

• Revolvalution (Dan Wainwright And Rude Audio VIP Remix)
• Early Morning
• Big Heat
• Big Heat (Bedford Falls Players Remix)
• Railton Ruckus (Bedford Falls Players Remix)
• Rumble On Arab Street
• The Grinning

Revolvalution came out on Higher Ground recently, a seven track EP from the combined talents of Hugo Nicolson and David Harrow- both former Andrew Weatherall right hand men. Rude Audio and Dan Wainwright turned in two very long dubbed out, Sabres style remixes, the VIP the further out there of the pair. Dub bass. Space echo. Bubbles. Backwards ukulele. Dan and Rude Audio have worked together a lot, most extensively on their Psychedelic Science album from 2023, an eight track dub odyssey with Ram Das, The Grateful Dead and David Bowie all featuring as part of their blissed out, widescreen vision. The VIP Remix has the ability to make you feel like you've been up all night and imbibing even if you haven't. 

Early Morning, another Dan Wainwright and Rude Audio collaboration, came out in 2021 on Tici Taci. Slo- mo dub splendour. 

Big Heat was the title track of a 2022 EP that came with two remixes, one by the superb Bedford falls Players, and one from Rich Lane. It also featured Rudely Fresh and an Al McKenzie (from D:Ream) remix of Dust Devil. Big Heat turns up the tempos and the heat, a throbbing, chugging dub techno delight with squelchy bass. Rude Audio have tunes to spare and there are several digital/ CD EPs with B-sides and extra tracks that could easily have made the cut here- but then this mix would have been three hours long. The Bedford Falls Players remix is a joy, full of some of BFP man Mark Cooper's signature sounds and touches, a remix that keeps giving and keeps rewarding.

Bedford Falls Players also remixed the title track from the Railton Ruckus EP, from 2021 (a track also remixed by Hugo Nicolson). Railton Road runs between Brixton and Herne Hill. In the 1970s and 80s the Brixton end was the front line, a hotbed of radicalism, activism, squats, and bass culture. 

Rude Audio have a long standing interest in Middle Eastern sounds and scales. Rumble On Arab Street came out on the Rude Redux EP in 2018 and then again in remixed form on Street Light Interference. The tracks on Rude Redux were the ones that first really captured my attention, To The Sun, To The Half Moon and Pipeline Screaming along with Rumble On Arab Street. 

The Grinning was a vinyl only 7" release on Golden Lion Sounds in 2023, a split single backed with Richard Norris and Findlay Brown. It is a rumbling, tumbling, thumpy piece of dub techno with echo- laden timbales and intense synths quiggles, the musical equivalent of being blinded by the strobe (in a nice way). 

Revolvalution

Hugo Nicolson and David Harrow are both former Andrew Weatherall collaborators. Hugo was Andrew's number one studio right hand and engineer on almost all the early remixes and on the Screamadelica- era Primal Scream songs and One Dove's Morning Dove White album and attendant singles, the words 'ably assisted by Hugo Nicolson' appearing on the sleeve notes of a multitude of Weatherall remixes and productions. David Harrow worked with Andrew a few years later, writing, recording and producing with Andrew as Blood Sugar, Deanne Day and Planet 4 Folk Quartet and releasing in his own right as Technova on the Sabres Of Paradise label. They've come together (arf!) now to release a mammoth, genre busting seven track EP on Brighton's Higher Love- two versions of the track Revolvalution and a slew of mighty remixes. 

Revolvalution is a ten minute epic, a sampledelic, kaleidoscopic riot of electronic psychedelia, with sounds whizzing by in a blur of arpeggios, fizzing synths, lasers, and cartoon- like snatches of voices, underpinned by a non- stop sequencer bassline and four- four drums. Occasionally it shifts, a key change and bass drop accompanied by whoops, and then another shift, a breakdown into squiggles and snares, and then that bassline comes back in, Moroder banging at the door and a helium voice chanting. 

David Harrow provides two of the remixes, the heavy and acidic Square Circle Remix and the percussive, deep dub Circle Squared Remix. Rule Six bring their own take with their remix, some disco stylings and mirror ball action and a sprung bassline straight from the early 80s. 

Hugo and David both spent significant periods of time with Adrian Sherwood and On U Sound, a large part of the reason Andrew was so keen to work with them I'm sure. It's no surprise therefore that dub is present and correct on the EP. Rude Audio and Dan Wainwright put out an album together last year, the dub splendour of Psychedelic Science, and they bring a pair of dub remixes of Revolvalution, cutting the tempo and finding the echo and the space. The Original Remix is a ten minute psychedelic dub excursion, with an opening four minutes of bass, reverberations and FX, that eventually falls apart into a raga, with a lovely sitar solo, shakers and blips and boings. The bass comes back, the rhythm picks up, the springs and whoops return, a Hawaiian guitar glides on top, tropical birds call- its all very lovely and very early 90s Weatherall in spirit.

The Rude Audio and Dan Wainwright VIP Remix is slower and lower, supremely spaced out, with a lazy hip hop drum break, loads of delay and echo, and a reel to reel feel that goes on and on. Grin inducing, head nodding stuff. 

Fifty Five Minutes Of Mighty Force

Mighty Force began life in 1990 as an Exeter based record shop and then label run by Mark Darby, created largely to put out the music on a tape passed to him by one Richard D. James. Said cassette contained Analogue Bubblebath, the first appearance on vinyl of Aphex Twin. The label ran to 1999, from '95 in London, and then closed its doors. Mark began releasing music again in summer 2019 and since then had put out album after album of outstanding electronic music- ambient, techno, dance music, acid and all points in between and around, releases by David Harrow, Boxheater Jackson, M- Paths, Golden Donna, Myoptik, Long Range Desert Group, Yorkshire Machines, WRNR, Shrieky, SubDan, M- Paths, D'FunK, Fluffy Inside, AP Organism, Paddy Thorne, KAMS, Sven Kossler, Solipsism, and dyLAB plus several compilations of MF Acid and this year has already released two further compilations to celebrate the label's thirty three years. MF33 Volume 2 can be found here. The most recent Mighty Force release appeared ten days ago, an hour long mix of music by Boxheater Jackson containing music from his Indigenous State Of Mind album and some previously unreleased Boxheater tracks. Find it here. There is nothing on Mighty Force that isn't worth listening to, Mark's quality control is ridiculously high. Today's mix is a celebration of the label, nine tracks long with eight from the reborn Mighty Force. 

Fifty Five Minutes Of Mighty Force

• Aphex Twin: Analogue Bubblebath
• AP Organism: Moon Rocks
• Fluffy Inside: Nylon Corner
• KAMS: Website Rave
• Long Range Desert Group: Lutheran Burglar
• Yorkshire Machines: LS3 03
• M- Paths: M- Paths By Name, Empaths By Nature
• Boxheater Jackson: Let It All Go!
• David Harrow: Jitter

Analogue Bubblebath is a perfect piece of electronic music, a track Mark heard in his shop over the shop's sound system and was 'like nothing (he'd) ever heard before'. It took a while to convince Richard/ Aphex Twin to release it, Richard eventually agreeing while under the influence of LSD. Analogue Bubble bath is otherworldly, emotive, inventive, ambient dance music that keeps shifting shape, and still sounds like the future. 

AP Organism released Space Docks And Moon Rocks in May 2023, a two track EP of dubby/ cosmic/ ambient electronica from Andy Pitman.  

Fluffy Inside's Nylon Corners came out in July 2023, a ten track album that works as both headphone and dancefloor music. The title track is a beauty, acid melodies dancing about over rattling 303 percussion.

Website Rave is from KAMS Described Spaces album, a twelve track delight. Website Rave sounds exactly like its title suggests it should- acid basslines, thumping machine drums, squiggles, sirens, the occasional sampled vocal shout. 

Long Range Desert Group's album Pro- oxidant was one of my favourites back in 2022, drawing its influences not just from electronic music but from post- punk, from ACR, 23 Skidoo and Talking Heads. Heads down, absorbing and cinematic, the whole album is  an essential Mighty Force release. 

Yorkshire Machines put out their Firing Up EP in late 2023. It is thumpy acid dance music. LS3 03 samples Sean Bean from the TV adaptation of David Peace's deeply unsettling Red Riding quartet of novels. No one made the construction of a vast shopping centre sound more like a threat than a promise.

M- Paths have had two albums out on Mighty Force, Hope in March 2023 and Submerge in April this year. The track here is from Hope. On the whole M- Paths make chilled out ambient and ambient techno. The one here is pretty thumpy though, dance music as a thing of optimism. 

Boxheater Jackson has had two full length albums out on Mighty Force, the first We Are One in 2022  and the second this year's Indigenous State Of Mind from September last year. Both albums are superb, Big Vern creating widescreen, stripped down, consciousness raising, awestruck dance music. Boxheater Jackson is otherwise known as Big Vern Burns. He who DJed alongside Andrew Weatherall at the Double Gone Chapel and before that was an engineer at Sabresonic and then went onto Rotters Golf Club. 

David Harrow's road to Mighty Force takes in a past that includes time spent with Psychic TV, writing and producing with Anne Clark, being a key member of the On U Sound crew, playing with Jah Wobble, recording with Andrew Weatherall as Blood Sugar and then on Sabres as Technova, writing Billie Ray Martin's Your Loving Arms, moving to LA and releasing music as James Hardway and more recently putting out modular synth/ ambient/ dub recordings under his own name. Jitter was the title track on a two track EP from 2023, a slice of mighty, jittery acid techno to finish things here. 

End Of Times

David Harrow has been featured at these pages many times before, a slew of tracks and releases taking in modular synth ambience, dub, acid and music from his time in the ON U Sound collective, recordings with Andrew Weatherall and previous to that with his album with Anne Clarke. His back catalogue is rich and varied. David has been a resident of Los Angeles since the early years of the 00s. This year David turns 60 and is celebrating with monthly releases. Last week he put out a nine track with Little Annie, titled End Of Times, and it already sounds like a 2024 highlight.

Little Annie (aka Annie Anxiety) is an American artist- singer, poet, writer, actor- and has a similarly rich musical background, including recordings with Adrian Sherwood's On U Sound, with Crass, three solo albums and appearances with Nurse With Wound, Finitribe, The Wolfgang Press, Swans, Kid Congo Powers and Coil among many. She hasn't made much music since 2011, so End Of Times with David marks a real return.

End Of Times is tense, throbbing electronic dub with Annie's spoken word/ poetry pointing fingers and pointing realities, taking down notes and asking questions. It's a strongly worded, poetic and vehement response to the world of 2024, kicking off with the lines, 'This is the sound of one hand slapping/ This is the edge of the cliff we're nearing' and adding a little later, 'This is a typeface of a mass nervous breakdown'. 

Annie's conclusion, 'We've all lost our fucking minds', followed by the realisation we might not be at the bottom of the barrel yet- 'How low can we go?' 

There is more, much more, memorable lines, expertly delivered in a low drawl, 'This is the death knell of critical thinking/ This is tinnitus from the Tower of Babel/ This is your misery rendered a hashtag/ This is the sun burning your crops'. 'This', Annie concludes, 'is not the happy hour'.

There are six remixes including two from South London dub- techno kings Rude Audio, both rattling with percussion and chugging drums and acres of echo. The Protean Remix romps by over eight and a half minutes, gathering pace and tempo, with mini explosions going off in the background behind Annie. The Immutable Remix is slightly shorter but no less intense, plenty of dub business going on. There are three other remixes, all sending Annie and David off in different dub influenced directions, from Martini Bros, Misled Convoys and Ono- Sendai. To wrap things up there is an instrumental version and an acapella (which could well find itself popping up all over the place). 

Versions for every occasion. Listen to and buy the whole EP at Bandcamp. 

In 1992 David and Annie worked together at On U, recording I Think Of You, a co- write with Doug Wimbish with Adrian Sherwood at the controls, a superb piece of sultry early 90s sci fi dub.

Rare Earth Technology

David Harrow's new album Rare Earth Technology is out tomorrow, nine tracks that are experimental and explorative by nature but accessible and open too, rattling with ideas and the possibilities of sound. Throughout Rare Earth Technology there are bleeps, thuds, echoes, twangs and whooshes on top of the slo- mo rhythms and bounce of dub.  Opener Noiseword is a ten minute ride of synths, noises, waves, chatter, melodies, pattering drums and percussion. At six minutes it picks up the pace, the birdsong and tropical noises suddenly pulled into focus by the kick drum. Canyon Sound is rocking, slow mo dub. Third track Concrete And Water is somewhere between the two, dub and experimental sound design playing off against each other, a melodica heard faintly over percussive clunks. Forwards Backwards, all echoes and reverberations, picks up a chuggy rhythm, more dub space and sounds bouncing around. A guitar line surfaces in the middle and then vanishes again as the drums pull back to the fore. Ghostwalking is in a similar place, abstract rhythmic dub. The sounds on Ikiga seem to come from somewhere near the Fourth World music of Jon Hassell and Brian Eno, primitive urban electronics. On Illusion Control the tempo is cut in half, the drum machine joined by blasts of air, crashes and then a synthline, futuristic and filmic. Rare Earth Technology is here to buy/ listen, available from tomorrow.  

David's musical background is deep. He was a mainstay in On U Sound, wrote and recorded with Anne Clark and Jah Wobble in the 80s, released as Technova in the 90s, wrote and produced with both Andrew Weatherall and Billie Ray Martin in the 90s, and has had a subsequent musical life in Los Angeles as James Hardway and in more recent years making ambient/ acid/ experimental modular synth music infused with dub. Earlier this year David released Jitter, a two track acid house EP on Mighty Force and Full Circle, a seven track celebration of Roland synths, chuggy, deep, acid house electro. On his birthday at the end of June David played the album live in Tokyo. The title track is lovely, six minutes of shuffly, squelchy fun. 

Jitter

David Harrow's back story goes way back to the early 80s and his work with Anne Clark followed by time served with among others Jah Wobble, On U Sound, Psychic TV and Andrew Weatherall. In the 90s he moved to Los Angeles and found a second (or maybe third musical life) as James Hardway while penning Billie Ray Martin's Your Loving Arms. His releases in recent years take in ambient and dub, modular synths and deep bass.

His latest release is a two track EP for Mighty Force, two pieces of sweet sounding electronic grooves in a space somewhere between dub, acid and techno. Jitter is a five minute slice of dark dub grooves that twist and turn, never quite doing what you think it might. Quite jittery in fact but deeply rewarding too, music to get lost in. Jitter is followed by '97, a six and half minute dubbed out ride with squiggly bass, echoic synth sounds, clicking percussion and some real bounce to the rhythm. Jitter can be bought at Mighty Force's Bandcamp page. 

Slipping back three and a half decades, Anne Clark's Sleeper In Metropolis, with David's spectacular analogue keyboards and synths, electronic drums and Anne's conversational/ spoken word vocal was recorded in 1985 and sounds utterly contemporary.

Monday's Long Song

David Harrow, formerly resident of the On U Soundsystem house band now resident of Los Angeles, continues to write, record and release music. His most recent piece of work was a seven track album called By The River, inspired by the 'concrete lined trash tube known as the LA river'. David has often headed down to the river and a concrete amphitheatre near Frogtown to play and record modular synths outdoors. By The River takes parts of those recordings as its starting point and then heads out into a beautiful ambient, experimental space. Opening track Icelander is eight minutes of gorgeous drones, synth sounds, delay and filters and echo, and some piano notes dappled over the top. It floats and enchants and is as good a way to start Monday morning as any other I can think of. 

Icelander and the rest of By The River can be bought at Bandcamp. The following six tracks are just as good, from the twelve minute odyssey of Birdsongs to the distortion and gossamer haze of closer Across The Lavaflow. 

Straight To Your Heart

It is two years ago today that Andrew Weatherall died aged just 57 and it seems right that this blog pays tribute to him on the occasion- his work and music has contributed to 602 posts here, well over 10% of my postings. At The Flightpath Estate (a Facebook group that I'm co- admin of) there is a semi- regular feature called Sunday Social, a Sunday evening comment thread with a theme where anyone can chip in. A few weeks ago there was an event at the (real) Social in London with David Holmes DJing, a launch party for the pair of Heavenly compilations of Andrew's remixes of the labels acts. Many of the Flightpath's membership attended and on the Sunday night the Social was a thread where we suggested and posted links to songs and tracks that might make the ideal accompaniment for a hangover/ sore head/ comedown. The mix below is a group effort, the suggestions on the thread from the Sunday night. I've stitched them all together into one mix, an hour and a quarter of songs and tracks produced, written or remixed by Andrew plus one from Radioactive Man, Andrew's collaborator in Two Lone Swordsmen, Keith Tenniswood, in solo mode. It's slow and low, a downtempo mix, ambient in places, dubby in others and song based in yet more, laid out maybe rather than laid back. I hesitate to say it's Weatherall in chill out mode but it's definitely one for contemplation and reflection.  And I hope in some way it pays tribute to a man who is very much still missed. Stream at Mixcloud or download below. 

The Flightpath Estate Sunday Social Mix February 2022

• Andrew Weatherall and Keith Tenniswood: The Crescents
• Two Lone Swordsmen: Tiny Reminder No. 3 (Calexico Remix)
• Calexico: III (Two Lone Swordsmen remix)
• Percy X v Blood Sugar: -3 (Emissions 2)
• Beth Orton: It’s This I Find I Am
• Two Lone Swordsmen: It’s Not The Worst I’ve Ever Looked… (Lali Puna Remix)
• Sabres Of Paradise: Siege Refrain
• Radioactive Man: Goodnight Morton
• Woodleigh Research Facility: Somnium
• The Liminanas Ft. Peter Hook: Garden Of Love (Lundi Mouille Mix)
• Peace Together: Be Still (Sabres Of Paradise Remix)
• Two Lone Swordsmen: The Big Clapper (CPIJ Remix)
• Two Lone Swordsmen: As Worldly Pleasures Wave Goodbye
• Primal Scream: Carry Me Home
• One Dove: Why Don’t You Take Me

Monday's Long Song

The existential dread of Monday morning is a difficult thing to beat. Sunday evenings are overcast by it. Waking up to the alarm in the dark with that crushing sense of inevitability. Makes me long for the days of July and sitting on holiday in the Wye Valley overlooking the river. David Harrow, dub and experimental sounds as standard after service spent in the On U Sound band, recently dragged his modular synth set up down to Ocean View Park in Santa Monica and played on a blanket on the grass. 

Modular synths will always sound like the soundtrack to 1970s sci fi, late night horror, the Radiophonic Workshop and weird post- punk singles. The music David makes in the September Californian sunshine refashions those sounds into something else, a different soundtrack in a different context. You can buy Ocean View Park, all twenty four minutes of it, at his Bandcamp page for one US dollar. 

Lost And Found

Hugo Nicolson, the man who engineered/ co- produced most of Andrew Weatherall's early works and who joined Primal Scream to do all the electronic stuff live when they toured the world playing Screamadelica, has been working on new dance music sounds. The first fruits of this are the Lost And Found EP, a three track release led by the pumping, trancey, sunny day sound of Finally Fading (vocals by Jillian Cainghug). 

Second track Fly Pie is slightly less full on and more experimental/ cosmische, rippling synths and melodic toplines but the BMP count remains high. I can't find a video to embed for Fly Pie but you can find it the EP at Bandcamp for the price of less than a pint of lager at your local pub. Finally Fading has been remixed by fellow Los Angeleno David Harrow, the Flaneur Mix taking things more downtempo and stretching it out over eight minutes, the bassline burbling away, repetitious, hypnotic bliss. 

Hugo has also remixed South London Balearic chug kings Rude Audio which we will almost certainly come back to at some point this summer, a remix which I heard an early version of last year and which is on point (as the folk say). And while we're considering all things Hugo I'll take this moment to remind you of his album as Spark Sparkle- Crank- which came out last summer and full of experimental exotica, Beach Boys through the looking glass, soundtrack stuff.