Jamie C – SUF Projects 015 (SUF Projects)

Jamie C’s Shitbag is a monster tune, one of my favourites in recent years, but I have to admit I wasn’t too fond of the follow up, SUF Projects 010, which felt a wee bit ponderous by comparison. Now, after a stonking remix of Chemical Generation for Acid Test, he’s back with a gleaming newie on SUF Projects and is once more fleet of foot and nimble of finger, producing a bit of a bloody classic in the process. The A-side, Bakers Butchers is where it’s at for me, with two, maybe three acid lines blasting away so sharp they might as well be wielding flick knives, and a filmic vocal sample that should get all you sci-fi acid heads moist with desire. More to the point, it rocks like a bastard. Totally essential.

Get it from:  909
Jamie C Soundcloud

OB1 – SUF Projects 012 (SUF Projects)

New from OB1, aka Olly Berry, comes this double-drop from SUF Projects, and it’s the business. As ever, Berry delivers a commanding, dirty-but-funky 303 experience, announced with a rush of far-off sirens and the main vocal line ‘Basic Chemistry’,  a sample from Breaking Bad. It’s used brilliantly here, too; rather than simply lift it, Berry’s attacked it with a pair of garden shears, buried it in the garden for a week, then exhumed it*, so it’s got a real distorted, decayed sound, and when the track breaks down at 2.50 into an extended sample it’s as though we’re hearing it from within the depths of a nightmare trip. Fantastisch!

Clearly Berry’s been caning the Breaking Bad, cos the flip The One Who Knocks rolls out a second quote, this one with an even more fearful edge to it. Pair it with a more ravey, drum and bass vibe and this is choice material. So choice that there’s very little to choose between this and Basic Chemistry, but if you forced me to choose, if you really forced, like, if you threatened to take away my eyeholes, then I’d pick The One Who Knocks.

Get it: 909 London

Hear it:

* Because that’s how you achieve that effect, right?

Steve Mills – SUF Projects 005 (SUF Projects)

Cat no: SUF Projects 0045
Release date: 24/08/11

AVP**
BPM: 148
AVP’s a cracking track. Plundering the original Predator for its sound-effects, rather than as the name suggests the wretched Alien vs Predator, it’s full of menace from the beginning. A low-slang acid line burbles and a higher one whipcracks away while Dutch and the boys venture deep into the jungle looking for something that’s out there, that ain’t no man. But for once the true magic lies not in build-and-release or bruising power but in the atmospherics. Mills has integrated Predator breathing, then war cries and even synthesised speech with the music itself to supremely shattering effect, creating a piece of work that’s as creepy and immersive as it is banging – and what’s more, truly original.

No Turning Back
BPM: 148
You can’t have everything, and in this case you can’t have a B-side that matches up to the majesty of the A-side. Maybe I’m bored of The Matrix samples or maybe I’m just wrung out by the essential AVP, but No Turning Back seems to lack a certain dynamism. It’s a great tool, no doubt, and the echoey vocal is really effective in the mix, but it’s not the main event.

Get it from: 909 London

Meanwhile, the magnificent AVP appears in this mix…