Sometimes there are moments and sets in London clubland where the stars align, certain artists are in the building and the energy is LOOSE.

Skee Mask at the HVYWGHT 4th Birthday back in February was one of those moments.

Following on from a South London Digital Mystikz homecoming at peak time to a fever pitch Brixton Electric. Playing a dubstep party for the first time, alongside legends of the scene - Skee Mask proceeded to play one of the hardest sets we’ve ever seen, effortlessly mixing classic grime into dubstep into techno into breaks and beyond.

A flurry of MC’s were in the wings, none of whom were booked to host the set but had no choice but to jump on. The energy was infectious - Flowdan B2B Trim B2B Chunky B2B SP:MC over Skee Mask on the Sinai Soundsystem. We can guarantee you will never get this combination of artists on a set EVER again.

Listen back as we jump into the set roughly 10 minutes in. Flowdan has just jumped on and Trim is lurking.

Skee Mask w/ Flowdan, Trim, SP:MC & Chunky - Recorded Live at HVYWGHT 4th Birthday

A song made as a resident artist at Primary Studios, Nottingham, supported by a-n the artist's information company. 

My proposal is to re-interpret Brian Eno's classic ambient album, Music for Airports, for the budget airline experience. Songs made on a budget are sampled and over-inflated with digital sound elements, comparing the mixed joys of budget travel to lived experience of bipolar 2; from the manic grandiosity of the 'priority lane' to the depressive torpor of a delayed or cancelled flight. Accept the Voucher was inspired by a radio show about the frustration of budget airline passengers when their flights were cancelled after lockdown.

Accept the Voucher

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Sweetpea presents The 'PeaPod' Cast (Deeper Sessions) - 16/1/24

Downstream

Downstream (feat. John Anderson)

To celebrate the Metalheadz back catalogue Remasters series Randall has kindly supplied us with this mix. As a Metalheadz crew member from the off there was no better choice.

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Twitter @randallmac2

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Randall- Metalheadz Re-Mastered History Mix

I made this jam in my room on Fordham Street in Whitechapel, London, in 2004. It was a hot summer day and I was totally manic. I was between 1st and 2nd year of an MA in sculpture at the Royal College of Art. I had just come off a course of Seroxat, an anti-depressant drug, a year earlier, and I had been in a terrible depression for a year. The withdrawal symptoms from the Seroxat were awful,  but I survived it. Then in my second year at RCA I moved house, from Brixton to Whitechapel, with new friends from my year at RCA. I think the mania was a delayed reaction to coming off Seroxat, triggered perhaps by being in a much better house situation - i'd needed a change of scene and I got one. The flat was just off Commercial Road near Tayabs restaurant, above a little carpet and corner shop. From the roof you could clearly see the minaret at Whitechapel mosque and hear the call to prayer. All the shops in the area would close their shutters during prayer times.  In my bedroom I had a Yamaha A3000 sampler, an Alesis drum machine, a Korg electribe rhythm machine, a mic, an electric guitar. I made a beat on the Alesis drum machine and fed it live through the Yamaha A3000 sampler, which was on 'record' mode. This enabled me to set a high sample rate and to channel the beat through a powerful three-way effects unit. One effect is that the sampler will remix a beat randomly. I messed around with the pitch of the beat on the Alesis and had lots of effects on it through the sampler. I messed about with the dials on the Yamaha so much whilst making this track - changing effect parameters and so forth - that a few of them snapped off. I need to fix it still. The electribe kept switching itself off too so I found a really simple bass sound and jammed on it gently by tapping on the korg keypad, being careful not to knock the power cable out and turn the whole thing off. I played around with the beat for ages and worked out ways in which I could manipulate it live that might sound interesting. I saved up for the sampler and a korg CS1x keyboard by working day shifts at the very noisy metal pressings factory in Donnington where my dad worked, then nightshifts at a dodgy cinema in Loughborough, ripping tickets. I saved up and got myself a basic studio. I ran cubase off either an amiga 500 or an Atari - I forget which. The korg keybord was a good midi controller that came as part of a bundle when I bought the sampler (£1200 I think). I had bought a Roland Juno 6 in Manchester a year previously when I was in clover from an end-of-school party I threw, which I raised lots of door money on. I also bought an Alesis drum machine. So I jammed it all together and tried to push all the machines as far as I could. I was listening to a lot of Arthur Russell and ODB at the time, and I was obsessed with DIY and post-punk music. There is also the influence of Reinforced records, which I collected a lot as a teen - sonar circle, nasty habits, arcon 2, alpha and omega, nucleus and paradox, procedure 769, G-Force & Seiji...). All great breakbeat records that I bought from Selectadisc in Nottingham, spending all my money on d&b and attempting make it myself, but always improvised within certain parameters and recorded live.

ACCURIST2

Rob C Trax - Flat Earth Life
Electronic / Deep House
5'08''

Congo

Simon Raven

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