Short Tracks Dec13

Receiving the baton from label head Stacey Pullen, Spain’s David Herrero steps up to the Blackflag plate to deliver a double-thick package of dancefloor crushing techno.
A standout favourite of Pullen’s in recent years, Herrero is an industrious beatsmith whose issued cuts on labels such as Defected, VIVa Music and Monza Ibiza Records and garnering the support of Loco Dice, Marco Carola and Richie Hawtin, along with the Detroit legend of course. It’s this sharp form that’s seen him play a succession of heavy-hitting gigs everywhere from Japan’s heady temple of techno, Womb, to Toronto’s iconic Footwork and Space in Miami. 

Over three tracks, his debut EP for Blackflag Recordings highlights his versatility as a producer and continues the label’s growing reputation for showcasing the rich vein of talent coming from Spain skilful techno Armada.

‘Maybe Someday’ kicks the release into gear with the kind of punchy, muscular techno that shakes with an cutting industrial vibe and is the kind of weapon you can imagine the masses loses their collective faculties to at Music On when the sun starts to seep into Amnesia’s famous terrace. 

Herrero approaches things from a different standpoint with ‘The Frogman’, the cut mixing up bouncy basslines in the intro that lead into the mother of all groove-driven techno workouts; relentless, hip-lashing and impossible to listen to without getting a case of twitchy dancefloor feet. 

Proving his sonic dexterity, ‘They Tell Me’ is the plump, drum-heavy roller crafted thick with tribal percussion and thick smoky atmosphere and makes the perfect compliment to its more up-tempo accomplices. 
“David Herrero is no stranger to our label because I personally love his sound and many of his tunes are in rotation in my sets. With so many new and young producers out nowadays, David's productions and tracks standout with his signature sound. Some melodic, some groovy, and some are just plain funky. I’m very pleased to welcome him to the label.” – Stacey Pullen

BFR013 - David Herrero - The Frogman

Side 1

Shaun Reeves, one member of the Visionquest power force, teams up with good friend and industry veteran Alexi Delano for the next release on the label with two solid cuts that are deeply mystifying and hypnotic while packing plenty of groove for the dance floor. Title track ‘The Breeze’captures the senses with warm, dubby synths flowing and rippling throughout, evoking a sense of melancholy enhanced by Charlotte Carter-Allen’s vocals, while ‘The Mistral’ rides with a deep chugging bassline as the mesmerising vocals float and echo through the deep vortex. Over on the B-side, one of Visionquest’s favourite producers, the highly respected Thomas Melchior aka Melchior Productions Ltd is proudly welcomed onto the label to remix ‘The Breeze’, adding his unmistakable groove and distinctive percussive patterns. This is certainly a package not to be missed.

Born in Chile, raised in Sweden and later adopted by New York, Alexi Delano now lives in London. Over his two decades in the industry he has developed a style, which combines the heavy compressed Swedish sound with the vibrancy of the creative music scene in Brooklyn. Releasing on established labels such as the historic SVEK, Plus 8, Minus, Drumcode, HProduction and many more.  Now in 2013 Alexi Delano is finalizing his 6th album “The Art Of Collaboration” for the Swedish Techno label H-productions as well as relaunching his own record label AD Limited whilst continuing to write original pieces for a string of projects.

Hailing from Detroit where he ran parties booking the likes of Magda and Dan Bell, Shaun Reeves has now lived in the techno city Berlin for the past nine years. Playing at all of the top venues and parties in the world on a relentless touring schedule and spending every spare second in the studio, Shaun’s dedication to the job is second to none.

Thomas Melchior is well respected as a solo artist and as a duo alongside Baby Ford under the moniker Soul Capsule, releasing on the likes of Perlon, Playhouse, Smallville and a:rpia:r. Earlier this year they rereleased the classic ‘Overcome Ø Lady Science’ with smashing results.


TRACK LISTING

A1. The Breeze feat. Charlotte Carter-Allen
A2. The Mistral
B1. The Breeze (Melchior Production Limted Remix)

B1. The Breeze (Melchior Production Limted Remix)

'Toolroom Knights Mixed By Prok & Fitch' is out now on Beatport: http://btprt.dj/1aAUV6a
And iTunes on 2nd December.

Since forming six years ago, Brighton based production duo Prok & Fitch have taken the House world by storm. Ranging from Tech to Progressive to House, Prok & Fitch's dynamic DJ sets are becoming highly sought across the globe. Productions boast a multitude of A-list DJ's and producers, having worked with Kraak & Smaak, Todd Terry, Roger Sanchez, Laidback Luke and Moby, with their tracks gaining support from well-respected DJ's Mark Knight, Axwell, Carl Cox and Fedde le Grand. 

Hotly tipped as one of Toolroom's "future stars", Prok & Fitch return to the label with a welcome edition in the Toolroom Knights catalogue. Pure peak-time House featuring warm, rolling basslines, rock solid rhythms and unmistakable vocals. Boasting the works of Mark Knight, Tom Staar, Kraak & Smaak, Jay Lumen, Adrian Hour and showcasing an impressive 10 exclusive tracks from the musical workings of My Digital Enemy, Ruben Mandolini, Filthy Rich & Prok & Fitch.

Jam-packed with 30 massive tunes, an essential full-length DJ mix and a number of handpicked Toolroom classics spanning a multitude of genres, 'Toolroom Knights Mixed By Prok & Fitch' is a true reflection of the duo's mixing mastery and technical creativeness and is a sure-sell for Toolroom and Prok & Fitch fans the world over.
 
http://www.toolroomrecords.com/
https://www.facebook.com/toolroomrecords
https://twitter.com/toolroomrecords
https://www.facebook.com/ProkFitch
https://twitter.com/prokfitch

https://www.facebook.com/iammarioochoa
https://twitter.com/mario_ochoa

https://www.facebook.com/VladaAsaninOfficial?fref=ts
https://twitter.com/VladaAsanin

Mario Ochoa, Vlada Asanin - 'The Ladies' - OUT NOW

Donato Dozzy has long been a revered figure in the global electronic music scene, known for his rare ability to craft hypnotic soundscapes that linger in the mind. Whether in contemporary clubs or classical settings, his sets consistently conjure deep moods and immersive atmospheres.

With this being his first mix release in over 5 years, we’re treated to an early insight into what he’ll bring to Continuum on February 1st. 

RA tickets: https://ra.co/events/2051095

051 - Donato Dozzy - fabric podcast

Regis and Function's first mix in over 10 years is a unique paean to Silent Servant, heavy on unreleased material.

When it came time for RA to compile our Albums of the 2010s, one record with a tauntingly limited availability of 500 copies was never in doubt: Sandwell District's era-defining 'Feed-Forward'. Encompassing Karl O'Connor (Regis), Peter Sutton (Female), David Sumner (Function) and Juan Mendez (Silent Servant), Sandwell District had the underground in a vice grip for over a decade.

The collective imploded in 2013, with Sumner and O'Connor's relationship appearing beyond repair. And yet, an unlikely second phase is here, featuring imminent comeback LP 'End Beginnings' and their return to the RA Podcast after 16 years. In 2023, the trio of Function, Regis and Silent Servant had been performing and laying down new material before the latter's shock death last January. It's in the shadow of loss that this unique mix was forged.

Founded in 2002 as a spiritual sister to seminal Downwards, Sandwell truly began to hit its straps in the late '00s, as shadow-stalking cuts sliced through clubland orthodoxy like a switchblade. In parallel, the label's artwork—a noir recombination of Burroughs cut-ups, DIY zines and arthouse amour that Silent Servant made his own—helped fortify a movement which placed an aesthetic premium on grit, grain and sadism.

By the early 2010s, this fixation on the dark arts had utterly permeated the mood inside techno's masonic temples. Labels like Blackest Ever Black, Stroboscopic Artefacts, Avian and Modern Love were in their pomp, razorwire legends like Severed Heads and Chris & Cosey benefited from second winds, and it was briefly a jailable offence to not have a press photo in black and white. 'Feed-Forward' was the exceptional coronating statement.

RA.978 features a stack of unheard recordings from each of the trio, as well as close allies Stefanie Parnow and Tropic of Cancer, while also gathering many of Silent Servant's all-time favourite songs, including Psychic TV, Grace Jones and Galaxie 500. It's a strikingly vulnerable listen, one without many parallels on the Podcast. We're glad to run it. – Gabriel Szatan

Read more and find the tracklist here: ra.co/podcast/978
Read our new feature with Sandwell District here: https://ra.co/features/4426

RA.978 Sandwell District

A clinic in minimal from the elusive Acting Press boss. 

Why do certain sounds cultivate a cult following? Simply put, it's often because they resist easy consumption. PLO Man and his imprint Acting Press lean into this. 

Searching for the Berlin-based DJ and producer, you won’t find much online presence, interviews or conventional PR. What you will find, if you look hard enough, is a catalogue of records and mixes with a kind of tape hiss charm (a spiritual successor to Basic Channel and Chain Reaction, but scuzzier and lighter on its feet).

Founded in 2015, Acting Press once seemed to belong to the short-lived "outsider house" trend, but is now synonymous with a certain strain of modern minimal, one that is analogue, spacious and pointedly opaque. PLO Man's output is equally sparse by design: this week, he joins the RA Podcast with a characteristically elusive style, accompanying the near two-hour mix is a one-answer Q&A that gives almost nothing away.

Stripped-back, ever-so-slightly sleazy and coated in dust, PLO Man's RA Podcast continues that lineage in style. Opening with the featherlight microhouse of Margaret Dygas, RA.988 unfolds into a carefully curated spectrum of minimal, dub and deep techno. Among familiar names—look out for the blinding Rhythm & Sound and Moodymann blend—are deep cuts and left turns alongside the odd outlier, like lovers' rock pioneer Gregory Isaacs.

Like the best of his forebears, PLO Man wants RA.988 to take time for you to settle in. But once you do, you won’t want to leave. 

@p_el_oh

Find the tracklist and interview at ra.co/podcast/988

RA.988 PLO Man

Eamon Harkin and Justin Carter back to back at the opening Sunday of Mister Sunday's 2025 season. May 11, 2025. "We wanna see this every week."

Justin Carter and Eamon Harkin at Mister Sunday, May 11, 2025

I’m sharing my set from @nowadaysnyc from February, closing out the Sunday evening of the Nonstop party after Ayesha's crazy set. This was one of my favourite moments DJing ever I think. Pure synergy in one of my favourite places to play in the world.

The first track is something new from me, keep your eyes peeled more info soon. 👀

Theres a load of genre hopping over the four hours but everything felt quite natural and seamless, taking things from peak time bass music down to a soft house music landing with a few twists and turns along the way.

Beautiful and affirming moment dancefloor moments are not to be taken for granted! Much love to everyone who danced.

Batu @ Nowadays Nonstop - NYC [16th Feb 2025]

Three hours of sun-kissed-bliss, made for endless beach days, long sweaty nights and dancing until sunrise. This year arriving right in time for solstice and the official start of summer.

Featuring music by Pianoman, Alex Kassian, The Trip, Spray, Wigs, Aldonna, Masalo, Di After, Clint, Sam Alfred, Match Box, Aiden Francis, Mixolydian, Baldo, Demi Riquísimo, Man/Ipulate, André Zimmer, Vince Void, Lewis Taylor, Kara Okay, Chicane and many more.

Dagen Van Diamant Vol. 3 (Summer Mix '25)

"Designing clubs is about understanding psychology." The famed architects talk about bringing emotions, durability and hidden logic into era-defining nightlife spaces.

How do you design the world's best clubs? Studio Karhard, the architecture firm started by Thomas Karsten and his wife, Alexandra Erhard, in 2003, know exactly which ingredients go into a successful nightlife space. The Berlin-based duo are the visionaries behind Berghain and ∄ in Kyiv, as well as a number of private residences, businesses and smaller venues around the world. Their specialty, they say, is salvaging forgotten spaces and resurrecting them to serve a new purpose. 

In this RA Exchange, Karsten talks about first coming across the building that's now Berghain and working tirelessly with engineers and city planners to preserve its neoclassical facade. As he explains, creating a memorable atmosphere goes beyond just designing for aesthetics. There are countless hidden design features that serve to make venues like Berghain comfortable. 

But according to Karsten, Studio Karhard's masterpiece is ∄, which they began designing in 2018. He describes the special experience of first visiting the abandoned  brewery—which was then in extreme disrepair—and bringing the lessons they took away from building Berghain to make this Ukrainian space their most successful project yet. 

This episode takes a look under the hood of the psychology, anthropology and emotional study that inform the venues that have shaped underground electronic music culture. Listen to it in full. -Chloe Lula

EX.775 Studio Karhard

For RA.1000, DJ Sprinkles' first mix in over a decade is a powerful meditation on the genocide in Gaza.

Dance music often relies on simple narratives: release, escape, unity. But those narratives can often feel inadequate, and even at times, hollow. Or, as Terre Thaemlitz might bluntly put it, just "shitty."

For her first mix in around 15 years, Terre Thaemlitz AKA DJ Sprinkles, challenges us to think differently. "I felt this 1000th podcast should reflect the moment in which it was made," she told us in her Q&A.

And what is this moment? Every day since Israel's 2023 assault on Gaza began, an average of 28 children have been killed. That's an entire classroom, every day, for over 600 days (at the time of writing). It's a staggering figure that only captures a fragment of the listless cruelty imposed on the strip.

Faced with such a genocide, what can music really do? How political can it truly be?  For their RA.1000, Thaemlitz gives us an unflinching rebuke to the idea that music should provide escapism. The mix weaves ambient fragments and jazz passages, woven around samples from Israeli media and the voices of outspoken Jewish critics like Gabor Maté and Norman Finkelstein. 

The result is not just a protest, but a document of our time. For Terre Thaemlitz, music is never just music. Her RA.1000 serves as a reminder that in an age of relentless suffering, the most political act is to reject the illusion of escape, and search for something greater.

Read the interview and find the tracklist at ra.co/podcast/1013. Listen to all RA.1000 mixes, as well as the complete history of the RA Podcast, at 1000.ra.co.

RA.1000 Terre Thaemlitz (AKA DJ Sprinkles)

One of the enduring powerhouses of our era returns for RA.1000 with a riotous mix.

When Helena Hauff made her first RA Podcast appearance back in 2013, she was on the eve of releasing her debut production on Actress' Werkdiscs imprint. In the 12 years that have elapsed, she's become not just a household name within electronic music, but the kind of rare talent that lives in seclusion from industry tumultt.

(Hauff, enviously, has never even owned a smartphone.)

Her calling card continues to be her penchant for rough and ready EBM, electro and new wave. Her unique ability is creating a singular listening experience from disparate or out-of-favour tracks, with a raw immediacy that functions as a redress to over-choreographed modern DJing.

Her outsider approach is on show once again for RA.1000. Threaded together by strobe-lit DIY electronica, old-school acid house and corrosive machine funk that chews up the ear, the nearly two-hour set raises the bar once again.

In the sci-fi themed first half, Hauff drops two Cybotron tracks, nodding to Juan Atkins' blueprint for electro. You'll also hear "Riot" by Underground Resistance, the definitive mission statement for a world ablaze. This is musical anarchism, executed to the highest degree.

Find the tracklist and interview at ra.co/podcast/1017. Listen to all RA.1000 mixes, as well as the complete history of the RA Podcast, at 1000.ra.co

RA.1000 Helena Hauff

Known as one the most adventurous promoters in New York, Eamon Harkin has cultivated something more than mere parties. Mister Saturday Night and Mister Sunday (nee Sunday Best) are the stuff of legend. Great music on a great system, in a great space. IIt’s a party put together by Eamon & his partner Justin Carter, gents who understand atmosphere, who bring more than a flash drive full of digital promos to set off the dancefloor.
Harkin’s devotion is evident. In addition to a busy schedule of parties in Brooklyn, he’s taking MSN to Chicago and London in early 2012 as well as doubling down in the studio. Following several collaborative singles and remixes as Harkin & Raney (Throne of Blood, Wurst Music Company, On The Prowl), “Rigor Music” is Harkin’s first ever solo EP of orignal material. A brand new label based on his long-running parties is also in the works.
“Electric Light” is nothing if not confident. Expansive without feeling overblown, the song’s build-up is matched only by the dubby subterranean stomp of the Brendon Moeller's (Deep Space/Mule Electronic/Rekids/Steadfast/Throne of Blood) dub mix. On the reverse, Harkin toughens up the proceedings. “Rigor Music” is a propulsive acid track that feels classic without staying utterly beholden to its predecessors. Unsurprisingly, the Roman Flugel mix closes out the single in a storm of snarling synths, snares and speaker-shaking bass.

The digital version of the Rigor Music EP also includes “Electric Light” (Brendon Moeller Reshape) as an exclusive bonus track. 

Electric Light

Mister Sunday, Mister Saturday Night, Planetarium & Nowadays. NYC.

Electric Light

Eamon Harkin

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