The frenetic world of electronic music is full of distractions and diversions, hindering the ability to find transcendent music. Let Oggie James be your guru and lead down the path to musical Enlightenment.
Album, song and event reviews, mixtapes, and radio shows, light the way to Enlightenment, conveyed by Oggie James.
Yesterday, Kölsch shared his epic open-to-close set from the legendary REX nightclub in Paris. Spanning nearly seven hours, the 2019 mix allows the Danish DJ to showcase his musical multitudes through stacks upon stacks of tracks, released or otherwise.
Literally welcoming listeners with Château Flight's "Welcome" as the third track in, Kölsch keeps things quite cool for the first half-hour before Frank & Tony's "Bring The Sun" begins to warm things up. Shortly after crossing the hour mark, we're greeted by the familiar sound of Austra's Katie Stelmanis as part of the Patrice Bäumel remix of Claptone's "La Esperanza." Continuing to climb this mountain of music, the essence of Kölsch really starts to take shape in this second hour as we're treated to a masterful mix of all kinds of progressive house/melodic techno. In that section alone, there are massive, moving cuts from Carl Craig in "Futurelovetheme" and Bawrut in "Pronto Arpeggio."
Not long into the third hour, Kölsch begins to lay out his recently released album Now Here No Where, starting with its title track. While I'm hesitant to say this hour is the hardest hitting, as the fifth features Alex Gopher's "Aurora" and The Stooges' "I Wanna Be Your Dog," it is perhaps the most taught and driving techno section with all kinds of acid and tension. With a couple brighter and more uplifting all-time classics in Donna Summer's "I Feel Love" and Kölsch's own "Cassiopeia" coming in the fourth hour, the up and down nature of this audio odyssey becomes unmistakable. And while that fact ought to have been clear from the jump, it's important to remember that this was a live DJ set, so presumably, Kölsch was playing to the audience and not merely curating in a vacuum. That said, I think it's clear that the club was absolutely bumping by the four and a half-hour mark as the Dane dives into an incredible run of tracks ranging from his all-time classics "Opa" and Grey/KIRto Circuit Breaker's "Systematic" and the KiNK remix of "Acid Track."
Closing with the laidback likes of "Rose Rouge," his own jazzy offering "Remind You" and the grand finale, Galaxy 2 Galaxy's "Amazon," Kölsch's nearly seven-hour journey through sound is a wonderous ride that reminds us of both his captivating catalogue and of the majesty of an open-to-close set. Stream it below, find a partially complete tracklisting here, and follow Kölsch's socials at the bottom.
For this week's installment of my Throwback Thursday series, it gives me great pleasure to re-upload and host, one of my favourite episodes from one of my favourite podcasts ever, the UK's Push Music.
While scrolling through my iTunes playlist looking for inspiration for last week's Throwback Thursday, I came across an incredible grouping of tracks. Wondering what it was that had encouraged me to download these tracks, I headed to google, searched for a tracklist and was instantly reminded of the Push Music Podcast. Bill Shephard, the man behind the Push Music moniker, always seemed to find the perfect balance between electro, house, new disco and indie dance, crafting some of the most forward thinking mixtapes, with just the right amount of retro throwbacks from the Talking Heads to 10cc/Godley and Creme. While many of the Push Music mixes still sound as fresh as ever, it is the third installment of the series that really does the trick for me.
Despite being a Halloween themed mixtape, I believe it could easily be consumed anytime you are looking to turn up. It's also the Halloween style atmosphere that makes this mix such a cinematic movement and journey. The track selection couldn't be anymore awesome and is only magnified by the incredible mixing that Shephard always injects into his podcasts. Starting with the line from Dawn Of The Dead, and a quick taste of Tears For Fears "Head Over Heels," the atmosphere is immediately established as we fall under the spell of Fake Blood's "The Dozens." Obviously Fake Blood's aesthetic is a perfect fit for such a dark, brooding mix and serves as a tremendous foundation to build upon.
Seamlessly, Goshi Goshi's "Ravin Cru," rises from the ashes of "The Dozens." It is Ravin Cru's combination of rough electro vibes and disco tinged guitars that so perfectly play the middleman to Fake Blood and Duck Sauce's "aNYway;" just another example of the organic, flow of Push Music's mix. Being such an electro head myself, I just wish there was a version of "aNYway" that had that raucous Ravin Cru bassline throughout. Regardless, Shepard improves upon the original of "aNYway" adding some depth with his smooth scratching. This helps to move us into DJ Zinc's "Blunt Edge" which is again amplified by some additional scratching.
As the mix continues with D.I.M. & Tai's "Lyposuct," we hear another film clip this time from Watchmen, the ominous and gory entry from Rorschach's journal, adds an even more evil flavour to the mix. Shephard continues to thurst the mix forward with scratching leading so superbly into the turntablist inspired, Riva Starr remix of Malente's "I Like It." Continuing to flow so naturally, Grum's "Heartbeats" seems to come out of nowhere. This section for some reason always reminds me of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video, invoking some sort of unholy rave. This is only magnified by the fact that the next track is A-Trak's legendary remix of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Heads Will Roll."
Furthering the cinematic horror motif, the mix delves further into the darkness of Designer Drugs' Saw aided "Drop Down." Ingeniously, Shephard mixes into Light Year and Jimmy 2 Sox remix of Toecutter's "Best Party Ever," making John Kramer happy by making his listeners grateful for being alive. "Best Party Ever" is a much need reprieve, a breath of funky fresh air. This funk continues through the classic sample in The Count's remix of Trevor Loveys' "Organ Grinder," and into the inescapable magic of Boys Noize's "Jeffer." This is followed by one of my favourite transitions, and while it isn't the most smooth flowing of the mix, there's something about the intoxicating tones of Boy 8-Bit's "Spells Of Deception" remix. It so perfectly mirrors the vocals "cause you're so cold," that the seemingly cold drop in and invasion of "Jeffer," that so wonderfully underscore the next level genius of Push Music's mixing.
Aided by another horror film sample, this time from The Evil Dead, Shephard moves into DJ Mehdi's remix of the Sebastien Tellier track "Oh Malheur," which seems evaporate into thin air. Rather, it evaporates into INXS' "Never Tear Us Apart," which at the classic silence drops into "Hell With Gravity." This time it'sa line from Donnie Darkothat accents the thumping evil of Just A Band, before the incredibly awesome transition into the second Fake Blood track of the mix, "Fix Your Accent." It too plays a perfect middleman between "To Hell With Gravity" and Alex Gopher's remix of the Kid Sister track "Get Fresh." The combination and overlapping of tracks gives the mix more of it's inescapable continuity, tied together so perfectly with the continuous scratching. Pushing through Zombie Nation's percussive "Worth It" and the bleepy Herve and Kissy Sell Out "Everybody," the mix is beginning to feel complete as it reaches the depths of Pepe Bradock's "Deep Burnt." But as a kind of cherry on top of the mix, Shephard blesses us with one final twisted track, in the form of VNNR's room shaking remix of Depuis91's "Erothiq."
It's been such an awesome experience reliving this masterful mix, and I highly encourage you check out more of Push Music's podcasts, and they are plentyful and always live up to his incredibly high level of ability. I've added the m4a file, complete with chapter markings, to my dropbox folder so you can download and listen at your leisure, link here. Get more from Push Music below.
