Robi Suss, Nesbit & DevilFishFury – AER006 (London Style EP)

Robi Suss’s Trip Back is a worthy A-side for this release. A slyly addictive tune I like the more I hear it, it evolves from a series of hammer blows and tik tok rhythms, the bass drum and hats building for a full three minutes before a series of effects introduces the acid drop. It’s a great technique and means the 303 sounds extra meaty when it arrives, landing like an axe to the head when you open the door to a stranger on a rainy night.  Sounds of Acid, meanwhile, is an SUF tribute, complete with a geezer vocal and some mega-squirly acid. Its great in the build  but ultimately promises a wee bit more than it delivers, and drops out just when you want it to really wig out, although I guess that has a lot to do with personal preference, mine being at the exploding eyeballs end of things.

Meanwhile, Nesbit’s Toxic Afterparty is an absolute cracker, boasting a funtabulous hardgroove opening. Chikka-wikka tribal drums jostle with effects for a couple of minutes before several kegs of Watney’s Red Barrel arrive and the Toxic Afterparty begins in earnest. For the main event two seriously scuffed-up and down-pitched acid lines take centre stage and batter the house into submission, but – and this is the really cool bit – without sacrificing the loose, funky feel of the tune’s first section. This is a very neat trick if you can do it. Mobile Dogwash do it a lot. And Nesbit’s absolutely on point with this.

Lastly DevilFishFury’s Around the Bend, which is Nesbit and ‘Tom & Riff’.  Not being very technical, I’ve no idea what the Devil Fish mod actually does, but it sure sounds tasty. What I really love about Around the Bend is the experimental feel to it, especially during the truly mental breakdown, where so much is chucked into the mix I half expected Gregorian chanting to start up. It’s noisy, for sure, but personally I love noisy. I live for busy. And I suspect you do too, so we should all be happy.

Get it from: Audio Eargasm Bandcamp

Benji303, Nesbit, Owen Acid & Dixie – AER 005.2 (Audio Eargasm)

Benji303’s tracks are usually marked by a healthy respect for Acid Techno’s beginnings, and though I’ve always liked the results I sometimes felt they lacked the kind of heaviness you’d want for a here-and-now 303 throwdown. Here, though, his old skool custodianship is employed to phatter-than-usual effect, producing what for me is his best tune yet, in Crunch. Likewise, Jared Blyth, aka Nesbit, is on a roll. Bitta Rough brims with confidence, featuring the kind of brooding riff that lurks in shadows in alleyways, building beautifully, speeding up, slowing down, and an acid line, like a psychotic dog, twisting at its feet.

Meanwhile Fuck Regretamine by Owen Acid & Dixie is a blast. The drums roll, and the acid has a great old-skool arcade feel. (Which reminds me, I never got round to reviewing Soitiz 004, which is unforgiveable because it’s a cracking release, with Owen Acid’s Swift Assault a total highlight.) Back to Audio Eargasm 005.2 and Step 3 rounds out the EP with two acid lines, once low and growling, one high and persistent, and a drop at around the 4.30 mark that’s an absolute beaut.

Get it from: Audio Eargasm at Bandcamp

Benji303 & Nesbit – Stella Act a Twat EP (AER003)

A great EP, this, from a label that gets better with every release. Four tracks, all of them different and all of them ace, are kicked off by Nesbit’s Stella Act a Twat – Nesbit & The Welder’s 2012 Mix and the beat bounces, acid pans and flicks from speaker to speaker. A riff powers things along in tandem with impish pulses that flit around the grid before things drop down into a break then accelerate into a showstopping end.

Elsewhere Nesbit changes up for my favourite of his two, Crushed, where rather than bedded in percussion, the beat is aloof and isolated, deliberately so, in order to work with an ominous vocal sample. The BPM remains high but the mood darkens, and it brings a welcome extra texture in to a set.

Acid Glitch from Benji303 is a gem, a playful puppy of a tune, with a beautifully developed Acid line climbing the register then suddenly dropping into grumbly burbles, all of it powered along by spry-sounding drums and the whole thing pleasingly raw and stripped-back.

AFT, meanwhile, from Benji303 feat Nesbit sounds like a darker, moodier cousin of Acid Glitch, less bright, the drums more grungy and dirty, the 303 scuffed up accordingly. Tremendous stuff.

Get it from: Bandcamp

Lady Sybil’s Last Words Mix

In memory of the lovely Lady Sybil Crawley, I present a mix of a few recent favourites, a couple of old ones…

Tracklist

Chris Hawkins – Canarian Island (Trevor Benz remix)
Mobile Dogwash – Usual Pharmacology – Mobile Dogwash Remix
Temperature Drop – Mosquito’s Tweeter 2012 Remix
OB1 – Random Act
Osmo – Fuck Your Lies
Starsky & Hutch feat Fazmo – Bitches from Brighton
Chris Liberator & Sterling Moss – The Swarm
Tassid – It’s Ridiculous
Jye Feelgood – Acid Swamp
Tik Tok – 303 Brotherhood
Nesbit – The Game
Fantompowa Meets The Geezer – Dadawas
Convection Criminals – Fajitta Swing
Mobile Dogwash – Lucy Int Sky Wi Dogwash

Convection Criminals, Owen Acid, Jye Feelgood, Nesbit – Analogue Juice Extraction EP (AER02)

An excellent second helping from AER records (their first is reviewed here). It’s all good, but for me a standout is Jye Feelgood’s Acid Swamp where I’m even prepared to forgive the ‘kiss my acid’ sample because the rest of it is so frickin’ good. With a loose feel, like it’s about to come apart at the seams any second, and 303 so deliciously stewed you can taste it, it’s like, if Rob Zombie made acid techno records he’d probably make this one.

Fajita Swing by Convection Criminals is another highlight. It’s got all the roll and bounce you’d expect from anything involving Fil Devious (Convection Criminals is him and Gav Feedback), as well as a vocal sample from The Big Lebowski that the Criminals have had the wit and style to mess with till it’s all pulled out of shape. The result is a track with proper tension and depth. As Nesbit, Jared Blyth’s Prephaser builds from a restrained, grid-friendly opening until a breakdown around the 4.15 mark when the acid fireworks into life, and Owen Acid’s Naughty Control mixes up hard, reverb-heavy drums with an old skool acid line and a masterly, fuzzed-up breakdown at 3.40. In all, cracking stuff.

Get it from: Audio Eargasm at Bandcamp