HardWaxFindings - 3

Following a debut appearance on the reverse label in 2020, Bristol-based artist Ido Plumes is back on Livity Sound with four tracks of experimental dance music for soundsystems. Plumes established his sound with pointillist drums and echo chamber atmospherics the first time around, and now he builds on that premise with a more dense and dramatic approach.
Plumes’ layered tracks follow non-linear narratives, switching lanes and exploring unusual, evocative landscapes while retaining a fundamental physicality. Longer form tracks like ‘Afloat’ cover a lot of ground across their run time, while the likes of ‘Been Here’ revel in audacious plot twists to create strikingly confident and original variations on the UK dance music tradition.

Balancing EP

Waiting 4 Us

Ido Plumes - Waiting 4 Us

After heavy-duty releases on self-administered imprints Low End Activism and Sneaker Social Club, as well as London’s beloved graffiti-laden mutant-bass stronghold Seagrave (RIP), the almighty Low End Activist makes a welcome debut with the ESP Institute. No stranger to mining distant regions the hardcore continuum and the residue of soundsystem culture at large, his relentless traversing and assembling of U.K.-specific rhythms demonstrates there is no end in sight when it comes to evolving the region’s musical gene pool. The 5-track 'Gossip Is The Devil’s Radio' strings together a smear of dystopian instrumentation—ghostly pads wrapped in melancholy, percussion that marries bleep with low resolution shrapnel, and vocal fragments that resemble a control tower’s two-way radio on the fritz—all imperfectly focused through a damaged lens of dancehall. We’re drawn to a dull moan that pervades throughout the record, reminiscent of the nihilistic moments in Abigail Meade’s score to 'Full Metal Jacket' where the sonics resemble a slow churn of molten steel occasionally punctuated and pierced by crystalline shards. The depth between the bone dry immediate foreground and distant wet background creates an exquisite sense of longing which isn’t inherently dark or menacing, but seductively bleak. As voyeurs, we may certainly appreciate the aesthetic LEA portrays, but we can’t fully comprehend the sense of escapism rooted within this music without having come of age in the damp and restless confines of England on the cusp of Thatcher’s abuse. Its a reminder that the light at the end of a tunnel, while it may be dim and grey, is still a light after-all, and the only way out is through.

[ESP115] Gossip Is The Devil's Radio

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B1 - Strings of Sorrow

Weighing in heavy with murderous intent across three guaranteed dance levellers, Trends & Boylan land on Sneaker Social Club with a bang. The pair have been slugging out grime-leaning gear for the past five years, causing a ruckus with their truly evil ‘Norman Bates’ beat, releasing also on Trends own Mean Streets label and linking up with Slimzee’s foundational stable Slimzos for some dubplate action.

They bring that street-level swagger to the tracks on the Ninety Nine EP, but here their punchy 8-bar flex is embellished to blend in with the Sneaker surroundings a treat. ‘Carnage’ tips towards chopped up Think Breaks while ‘Nocturnal’ doubles down on the dirtiest of b-lines. Confirming their allyship from dubplates gone by, Slimzee links up with Trends & Boylan for the double A side slammer, ‘Ninety Nine’, weaving dread-side D&B stabs around a tightly-wound beat with devastating results. There’s not an ounce of excess on these cuts precision tooled to smashup the dance good and proper. Need we say more?

https://sneakersocialclub.bandcamp.com/album/ninety-nine-ep