P043: Cabeza de Vaca – Dub techno special.

It has been a long time since we had a dub techno show on Cabeza de Vaca, but that is the subject of this weeks show over at Scanner FM .

Though it must be said that several of the artists on the show this week approach the sound, rather than really recapitulate it to its true definitions and indeed this has been one of the advantages and disadvantages of dub techno over the years. It has been a limited genre in many ways in that it necessitates adhering to a particular formula to work at its best and its esching of dance floor for atmosphere has often led it to be marginalised from the clubs to home listening. While this dependence on formula is necessary to maximise the advabtages of its particular mechanisms, it has also lead to a lack of innovation at times. The opposite is also true however, that the lack of club expectation allows it to grow in different directions and its dependence on atmosphere instead of rhythmic mechanisms also gives it greater scope for silene, experimentation and even emotion.

There is a little bit of everything on this weeks show.

Freund der Familie are a good case in point. Their recent album “Alfa” on their own label almost totally ignores the dance floor and looks only to mine a lot of atmospheric space at low BPM and using a different array of beat templates. The track we play is more dub step in approach, but the album is a diverse affair with plenty of other highlights like the vocal lead “Goldie Wilson”.

One thing that FDFs album has in common with S|EXP (Shaded Explorer) is a good balance between long and short tracks. One of the mistakes of dub techno in the past ahs always been of the notion that longer equals better when quite often the tracks have said all they need to say after 4-5 minutes. Of course there is nothing like a long, monged bliss out to dub techno, but you still need special tracks to go long distances and it is nice to see a few artists try and piece their albums together in a more considred way. “Shade’s Journey” (Eclipemusic, 2013) has one long track, “Atlantis” and the rest come in at much less. The flow is thus a bit faster and also varied, with a constant flux of textures and beat pressure.

There is also a few Spanish artists and/or labels on the show today. Exium also deliver a short and sweet track to open the show, also the opening track off their recent album “A Sensible Alternative to Emotions”. The album is a lot more vigorous than the more atmospheric opener “Dronid” as we also saw last week.

There is also something new from BLD an otherwise unknown Barcelona-based artist. His track reminds me a lot of the early Basic Channel track “Lyot (Maurizio mix)” for the rhythmic interaction, but BLD is a bit smoother and modern, whereas the original has that classic crashing warehouse drum sound.

Barcelona’s Subwax BCN label also continues its steady release run. We feature at rack from their dub techno label by SAM who has connections to the Fathers and Sons Productions label.

Orlando Voorn also had an album out recently on the Subwax house sublabel Subwax Excursions.

Sweden's Skyscaper  (Anders Peterson) also has a recent and fascinating album called “Atmospheric Stratification” of which we will play another track in the near future. Again, a little unconventional as far as albums go, with five original and five remixed tracks.

Skyscaper – Atmospheric Stratification album preview

Number	Artist	Track	Label	Year
1	Exium	Dronid	Pole Recordings	2013
2	S|EXP (Shaded Explorer)	Distant horizon	Eclipsemusic	2013
3	BLD	Before deep	BLD Tape Recordings	2013
4	Subjected	Concept 3	Vault Series	2013
5	SAM	Nangilima	SubWax BCN	2013
6	QY	Hokus	Blank Slate	2013
7	Freund der familie	Colombia	Freund der familie	2013
8	Skyscaper	Atmospheric Tide (Mindspan Remix)	Ghost Sounds	2013
9	Refracted	Along a ghostly trail	Silent Season	2013

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