Palm Skin Productions

As Palm Skin Productions, British producer, musician, and DJ Simon Richmond has been fusing jazz, hip-hop, house, and dub since the early '90s. An early staple of the Mo Wax roster, his first four EPs moved from flute- and sax-heavy acid jazz to moody breakbeat excursions. His cinematic debut full-length, Remilixir, arrived in 1996, and the 2000 follow-up Künstruk was a mixture of playful left-field electro and psychedelic downtempo. During the second half of the decade, Richmond concentrated on more club-driven material, collecting highlights from this period on 2009's Selected Singles. He focused on other projects during the 2010s, including collaborations with John Metcalfe and Sheema Mukherjee under his own name, but Palm Skin Productions returned the following decade, releasing the instrumental hip-hop beat tape Other Times in 2022 and the resistance-themed Trickle Up EP in 2023.Originally from London, Simon Richmond played percussion in acid jazz group the K-Creative, which released a full-length on Talkin' Loud in 1992, as well as other ensembles such as the Big Cheese Allstars. Palm Skin Productions made its debut with the 1992 EP Getting Out of Hell, the third release on James Lavelle's highly influential Mo Wax label. In a Silent Way and Time & Space, both featuring saxophonist Chris Bowden, appeared in 1993; Richmond also released a Mo Wax single under the one-off alias Bubbatunes. The drum'n'bass-influenced The Beast arrived in 1995, along with a remix EP featuring interpretations by Autechre, Roni Size, and Global Communication. Throughout the decade, Richmond produced, remixed, or played on records by artists such as Neneh Cherry, Jhelisa, United Future Organization, and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. He signed to Hut Recordings/Virgin for the release of his first album, 1996's Remilixir, which incorporated fusion, spaghetti Western, Afro-Cuban, and classical influences. During the second half of the '90s and the beginning of the new millennium, Richmond worked with another wide-ranging list of artists, including R.E.M., Frente!, Gabrielle, and Youssou N'Dour. After remixing a track by Howie B's Daddylonglegs project, Palm Skin Productions' second album, Künstruk, was released by B's Pussyfoot label in 2000. Richmond spent time playing in the improvisational electronic group the Bays, who recorded sessions for John Peel's revered BBC program and headlined several major festivals. When Palm Skin Productions resurfaced on Freerange Records in 2005, with the So Bad EP, its sound had shifted to a much more dancefloor-ready blend of house and disco. The project continued to explore deep house and tech-house on several further EPs, and Freerange released the digital compilation Selected Singles in 2009, while additional EPs appeared on Primaudial Records (Big Bear) and Dark Energy Recordings (Done). Richmond became a member of the international folk all-star collaboration the Imagined Village, as well as the associated Fresh Handmade Collective. He additionally contributed to Afro Celt Sound System's 2016 album The Source, and released the neo-classical album Set in Stone with John Metcalfe. He collaborated with sitarist Sheema Mukherjee (Transglobal Underground, the Imagined Village) for the 2019 full-length Karma. Palm Skin Productions returned after more than a decade's absence with "The Sword Will Die," an 11-minute experimental piece released by Tru Thoughts in 2021. The instrumental hip-hop album Other Times appeared in 2022, sequenced as 26 individual tracks in addition to a continuous 54-minute mix. Trickle Up, a politically informed EP touching on acid house, Detroit techno, and dub influences, was released in 2023.
© Paul Simpson /TiVo

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