My first set of the year will be next month, as I’ve very kindly been invited back to join the freeform contingent of the Lucky Lotus festival. With things being a bit fraught these days I haven’t had time for a full set’s worth of prep, so instead I’m really excited to be putting together a b2b with Shimotsukei. We’ve started work on it and already there are a few surprises in store…
The rest of the event looks like the best LL so far, with a fabulous roster on the freeform/NRG side. Nomic, Alabaster, Guld, B.R.K., Lab 4, Raqhow, Hyphen, Evolutionize, and Solvynt – you couldn’t ask for much more than that. Other highlights would be a new Byproduct set, Dark by Design, and a very rare recorded set from Kanon.
The facebook event page is the place to check the full lineup and eventual timetable info, but we’ll of course find room for it here too, as and when.
I know, it’s already April and still no release – but it’s pretty good news once again as the ‘to-do’ list gets shorter by the week. A couple of days ago I received the mastered version of the CD2 mix, as well as the final master of one track that underwent some tweaks to boost the feeling of speed. I’m really happy with both, and now that the admin rabbit-hole of the liner notes has been dealt with too, we’re back with only the design work to be finished up.
Some fun stuff I’ll be doing in the meantime is deciding where the track markings should be placed in the mixed set, and chopping up the unmixed track preview clips that’ll go online before too long. The plan is to get both jobs finished before the end of the weekend, and then be poised to throw all the necessary at the CD production folk as soon as the graphics are ready.
Sorry about the late start to the year – an especially busy/stressful January has meant that a few posts haven’t quite made it to the fully-written stage, but now things are calming down and the Top 3 Tracks of 2015 will be here in the next couple of days, along with a roundup of 2015 mixes. Lots of compilation stuff has been going on too, and the next week will be an important one. More on that soon then, but rest assured I’m doing my best.
In the meantime, let’s reach for one of TYFTH’s specialist subjects – misty-eyed nostalgic looks at bygone times. I’ve talked before about how much I miss Tokyo’s Studio Cube (home of NRGetic Romancer, Tokyo Hardcore Construction, and plenty of other harder/psychedelic events), and it only takes a quick YouTube rummage to find some examples that bring back lots of memories and atmosphere.
At the top of this post we Decchi doing his thing at THC, surrounded by plenty of the usual suspects. This video’s a brilliant example of what Cube was like during any big event, but happily Decchi himself and plenty of the other dancing crew here can still be spotted at harder events around Tokyo.
Next here’s another typical example of Cube’s atmosphere – Yumi and Soham with some coordinated glowing, during what sounds like one of Cogi’s sets.
Of course Cube was the home of Betwixt & Between, and a look back at the club wouldn’t be complete without him. Especially in the days of his hannya mask, stepping onto the main floor during one of Betwixt’s sets was like walking into another dimension. Here’s one of my old videos, taken from up on the balcony.
This THC preview starts with a nice guided tour of Studio Cube, as well as featuring some giants of the scene. From Betwixt to Lunch and Kanon, the lineups were always impressive – and a special mention of LALA, one of my favourite Tokyo DJs. He’s still active, and his mixcloud has some good examples of his oldskool gabber/hardcore sets.
Hard not to mention the classic NRGetic Romancer DVD in a post about Studio Cube, so here it is one more time.
Finally, Cube will of course be extra special to me as the place I played my first club set. Behold a fresh-faced me in 2008, on my debut at Hell’s Gate – note the awe-inspiring stage presence and the wipe of some nervous sweaty palms before the next transition.
I’m not sure we’ll ever see these sorts of atmospheres again, but R-Lounge is forging a decent harder-event reputation these days alongside the other Tokyo staples. I’ll try to get back into the habit of taking video, so we have more memories to bask in a few years from now…
The original schedule has taken a little bit of a hit, so I thought it time for an update to let you know what’s going on. With so many people/companies involved it was inevitable that some admin issues would rear their heads, and so it’s proved this month – nothing major at all, but things haven’t progressed quite as quickly as I would have hoped.
Most importantly the tracks are almost definitely at the ‘final product’ stage of mastering, so no problems there. The delays have mainly been in the design department, but they’re mostly sorted and should mean a more ‘official’ presence on SoundCloud and all the usual social media suspects before the end of the month. Although the CD2 mix was close to complete at the start of December, I decided to use the limbo-time to look into licensing some other bits and pieces that would comfortably get the set up to the hour mark, and I’m continuing to tinker with it while everything else settles into place.
Still coming along very nicely though, and next month remains a very realistic goal for production. Look out for the next update, where we’ll hopefully be taking a first look at the label logo.
It’s almost enough to end the post there – but we first all owe Solvynt a massive thanks for rediscovering Betwixt & Between’s 2005 Live PA, and Matthew Lancaster for the mixcloud upload.
[update: Thanks to DY we now have a downloadable version too – check here for the mp3]
Listening again over the past few days, I’ve been trying to recall the feelings I had a decade ago when the darkness, aggression and eerie, emotional melodies of this set completely changed how I thought about hardcore. Without it I wouldn’t have discovered Alek’s sound either, and nothing from NRG Monogatari to In Praise of Shadows would have happened – it’s no exaggeration, then, to call this a life-changing set.
Those who haven’t heard it before are still in for a real treat. The set is the perfect illustration of Betwixt’s style as he absorbed FINRG influences and took his complex melodies and track structures in a darker direction, and the fact that many of us are still playing these tunes 10 years later really says it all.
1. Betwixt & Between – East of Eden 2. Betwixt & Between – Eternaly 3. Betwixt & Between – Liberation 4. Betwixt & Between – Mirage 5. Betwixt & Between – Reincarnation 6. Alek Szahala – Supriya (Goa Edit) 7. Betwixt & Between – 4321 8. Betwixt & Between – Don’t Stop 9. Betwixt & Between – City of Solitude 10. Betwixt & Between – Disturbed Mind (Live Edit) 11. Betwixt & Between – The Awakening (East of Eden Part2) (Live Edit)
The general CODEX6 roundup is still to come, but after Soham was kind enough to send over 25 minutes’ (!) worth of video I couldn’t resist jumping the gun a bit and putting it online with some Set-Planning Thoughts.
This was another set where I started with NRG, but expecting a lot of very fast sets from the rest of the crew (and playing right after AB) I upped the bpm to begin at 167bpm. Soham caught the whole intro, during which I tried to build up a dark atmosphere with brief emotional moments – I think it worked quite well, but the tracks aren’t the hardest and I maybe paid for it in ‘get the floor moving’ power. I wasn’t too worried about that though, as the plan was for more to come later.
Following one of the upcoming (and now mastered) TYFTH tracks, I sneaked the bpm up slightly with a two-track combo that was a proper honour to play. I made very sure to clear it with Proteus beforehand for obvious reasons, and thought that my first ever use of an Epilim track would mean even more if mixed with one Proteus’ own tunes. Rapid Fire still sounds glorious, and giving the CODEX crew (and me) the chance to enjoy Epilim’s proto-FINRG through a PA for the first time was very special.
The next video follows right on from Rapid Fire, when I tried to give the crowd a long break before a pretty intense semi-freeform section. Brionac’s breakdown never gets old, and Gozenzeuna is just a superb tune for some driving mid-set twistedness. It was the first time to try Rougher Than You in a mix, and while the connection wasn’t the cleanest it didn’t really need to be – angry and filtered were the keywords by this point. Worth mentioning that I followed it up with Betwixt & Between’s Phaedra, another first to use that one.
You’ll notice that real melodic tunes were pretty thin on the ground so far, as the idea was to save them, and some melancholy, for the very end. The last video shows most of this section – Nomic’s Rule Breaker, followed by a big current favourite in Like a Flame. I’ve never tried Hydra as an outro, but after a fair bit of work I’ve got some good candidates to follow LaF and it felt like the right set for it this time.
Overall I was really happy with how things went, and even if the set didn’t flow as well as my effort for the previous CODEX I hope the videos are an enjoyable watch. Another great experience to play as part of such a huge lineup, of course, and it’s pretty encouraging that so far all the In Praise of Shadows tracks have well and truly done the business through R-Lounge’s PA.
Away from Label News there have been a few things to catch up on lately, including a look back at CODEX6 that’ll be on its way when I have more time. For now though, you should definitely check out Asahi’s rerecorded set from the event, one of his best so far.
It’s quite an unusual one for him in some ways, as he’s made a bit of a name for himself by supporting newer NRG artists as well as melancholy-heavy freeform. This time he started at a high bpm, and rattled through one heck of a freeform tracklist. There were plenty of oldies and NRGetic Romancer anthems (Last of the Mohicans, Dirtier Worlds) as well as the always-wonderful Eternal and a great/unusual opening combo of Pink Magic and Red fraction.
Asahi’s take on harder/psychedelic freeform is always good to hear, with its occasional drift into uplifting Hybridize style, and this one is a must-listen.
01. Alek Szahala – Pink Magic
02. MELL – Red fraction (fictitious remix)
03. Aryx – Nephila
04. Nightforce & Substanced – Operation Stardust
05. Twisted Freq – Dirtier World
06. Alek Szahala – The Last of the Mohicans
07. Raver Rose&Themal Force – Eternal
08. Proteus – Venla
09. Grimsoul – Lightshaft
10. Epyx&Cyrez – Polyhedra08
Dark Dimension’s compilation will be released tonight, but some very nicely presented previews of all the tracks are up now on YouTube. TYFTH interest probably centres on Guld’s remixes – great to hear the tidied-up version of Lamento della Sirena, while his NRG version of Dryad Machine works really well, complete with Genshi Kurage-style chiptune interlude.
There’s a lot of other interesting stuff up there (especially if you’re a dark psy fan), so the other videos are very worth checking out. If I make it to the event tonight I’ll try to get some decent video – it has been a while, and definitely something I should do more often.
Sorry that posts have been thin on the ground once again – something that’s long overdue a mention is the next installment of CODEX, now a mere month away and featuring another quality lineup.
A quick glance will show you that this is one for the UK freeform fans, with A.B. from Stamina Records and Cyrax of Project Badass headlining as guests. There’s a sizeable UK freeform following in Tokyo, which should make for a lively atmosphere of a different sort than during Alek’s appearance in August. I’m also looking forward to Le Dos-on’s set under his ‘Hyphen’ alias, and raqhow’s b2b with Sige on his CODEX debut.
Hopefully there’ll still be some interest in the dark side, as I’m aiming for melancholy aplenty this time around. Great to see Asahi on the lineup too, nicely balancing out the sounds on offer with some more Finnish support.
CODEX6 with STAMINA Records & Project Badass
Place : R-Lounge 6F Shibuya
START : 2015 / 11 / 01 (SUN) 13:00 ～
Door:2500YEN(+1Drink)
W/F or Guest :2000YEN(+1Drink)
/_/_/ Special Guests DJs/_/_/
A.B (STAMINA Records,UK)
If you’re reading this then you’ll surely be familiar with the sets of long-time Horser and darker freeform specialist Alderz, and so next month’s Sinistry should be firmly marked into your calendar.
Alderz has been booked to play the freeform floor, guaranteeing some quality tracks from the dark side (which you’d think is what a Sinistry on Halloween should be all about, after all). Massive congrats to him, and there’ll be even more TYFTH-friendly sounds from Smiling Corpse’s Olly Addictive, representing his label and our corner of the scene.
Headlining a strong-looking hard dance floor is Lab 4, presumably with an old-skool set of the sort that did the business at Ageha last year.
