SFO024 – Kuoyah»

25/02/13

Frijsfo Beats’ Kuoyàh, aka Marco Donnarumma, is making a return to the label in 2013 having taken some years out to work on his award-winning and internationally-respected “biomedia research, musical and theatrical performance, participatory practices and subversive coding” (http://vimeo.com/marcodonnarumma). Now based in London, Marco’s activity in these areas is ongoing but lately he’s managed to make a lot more time to produce new Kuoyah material.

His last appearance on Frijsfo was in late 2011 remixing Point B’s ‘Fossils’, and before that was with the Aurorae EPs in 2010 – some of his warmest productions to date. Aurorae deservedly drew  glowing comparisons with the likes of T++, Pole, Kontext, Vladislav Delay and the Chain Reaction label, whilst maintaining Kuoyah’s trademark methods of beat programming and sound design.

With ‘Freight’ and ‘Rejo’ Marco takes yet another new approach experimenting with bass, 2step, and techno but this time resulting in colder, harsher, and stranger tracks. Our expectation is that these tracks will get heard more often through headphones and hi-fi than nightclub sound systems – at least at first. However we have been wrong before and these tracks are already garnering interest from such well respected taste-makers as West Norwood Cassette Library, Geiom, Bunzero to name a few.

Aside from this, Kuoyah has some darker and heavier tracks deservedly coming soon on Stormfield’s well-respected Combat Recordings. We can also say with confidence that there is plenty more to come from Kuoyah on Frijsfo Beats in 2013, and as always with new music from him you should expect to hear the unexpected.

**preview on soundcloud**

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SFO023 – The Veld RMX»

28/01/13
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SFO016 – Point B – The Veld (released January 2012)

****see also: frijsfobeats.bandcamp.com/album/the-veld

“Richard Bultitude AKA Point B is an unsung hero of electronic music. He has quietly but meaningfully honed his talent over almost a decade of releases, for labels including SCSI-AV, Erratica, Combat Recordings and Frijsfo Beats. While he has sensitively shifted the shape of his work the whole time, his identity as a producer has never faded from view. The Veld is his third full-length album, and the first by anyone to be released on Frijsfo.

The immediately noticeable fact about The Veld is that it’s a Point B record. That’s why it can sound sharply contemporary almost without the listener noticing. Think about it, and it’s clear a number of today’s more desirable influences are there, but without a hint of gimmickry. Bultitude handles the weight of classic and revitalised dubstep with intuitive balance, populating the music’s customary space with snatches of fascinating, exotic texture. Elsewhere he remoulds the low-end growl and frigid rhythm composition of darkside neo-electro, or he adapts the sound Frijsfo has effectively made its own – a radically updated and remixed form of 2step garage.

The point is that all this is sublimated into a consistent, one-of-a-kind voice across the album’s trajectory, which is primed for deep headphone listening and more meditative DJ sets. Fans of labelmate Kuoyàh’s post-dubstep concrète will no doubt be on board straight away, as will followers of Vex’d and recent solo projects from members Roly Porter and Jamie Teasedale AKA Kuedo.

Even admirers of the more free-ranging experiments on Mala’s Deep Medi label should find much to love here. Uncompromising and accessible at the same time, it may well prove to be the Point B record that wins the producer more new listeners than any to date.

Highlights include the title track, which plays off the muzzled threat of a bassline against skewed gamelan tones. “The Closure” and “Fen” both paint wide, eerie landscapes with acoustic source sounds, the former juxtaposing frigid machine funk with simple piano figures and strings snapping. “Fossils” admits a tidal influx of warmth, washing in snatches of vocal melisma, before “Jetsam Collector” sets lumbering low
-end mechanics in motion, embellished with resonant fiddle or violin.

Looked at from a distance, The Veld draws on anything but a homogeneous palette. But up close it manages to be faultlessly coherent, demanding to be judged as a precisely conceived and sequenced whole.”

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Frijsfo Treats 7 – Various Artists»

19/12/12

Happy xmas or whatever it is you’re up to… please help yourself to this pack of beats from us at Frijsfo. Thanks for your support this year.

1. Lewis Hunter – Daph

2. Planes – Likely Bright

3. Clueless – Shaky

4. Sully – Moment4Life

5. Kuoyah – Icicle

6. Point.B – Diatribe

7. *video: Hem – Keir n Cleef

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FRJ014 – Glesprin EP»

04/12/12
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In the past our releases have had a lot of support from excellent DJs – but never so much as with Geiom’s Glesprin EP. This year Ben UFO, Sully, Beneath, The Black Dog, Brackles, Midland, Spatial, Al Tourettes, Hackman, Happa, West Norwood Cassette Library and of course Geiom have all played tracks from the EP.

On 12th November Frijsfo Beats is releasing the Black Screen CD, Geiom’s first album in half a decade. But as we favour vinyl over all other formats for DJing, we had to put something on wax too. This EP contains tracks specially selected for mixing in the club, none of which feature on Black Screen. Read More »

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FRJCD01 – Geiom – Black Screen»

12/11/12
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Average producers take rhythms straight off the shelf. Geiom takes their prefabricated units apart and builds improbable machines, capable of transforming, interlocking and changing speed. The second striking feature of his music is the signature melodic style, a strange, sweet and sour tonality that can’t be mistaken for the work of anyone else. Already he has released nearly 20 12″s with unique strains of dubstep, UK garage, house, funky and drum ‘n’ bass running through them, interwoven with a fabric of microtones and strange harmonics.

This is Kamal Joory’s third album as Geiom, not counting two (in 1999 and 2000) as Hem and 2002′s Magic Radios with Morgan Caney. 2007′s Island Noise continued his association with the dubstep scene, which included releases on the Skull Disco, Deep Medi and Planet Mu labels, and appearances on Tempa’s Dubstep Allstars and Rinse mix CDs. But before that was 2001′s Sellotape Flowers, a freeform collection of electronica for Neo Ouija (a label which Metamatics, Xela and Apparat have also called home). On Black Screen this whole history comes together – but the album certainly doesn’t showcase Geiom’s repertoire in a museum-like sense. Instead it’s a fertile cross-pollination of his work’s many different facets, fully combining for the first time. The title doesn’t seem to suggest shutdown or dead ends, but rather the sense of possibility you felt before powering up an iPad or a Commodore 64 for the first time.

This is just an outsider’s interpretation, however. Geiom himself says the title came out of the dying moments of a mobile phone, when he imagined its “digital life flashing before its eyes” and lost conversations leaking into the ether. Read More »

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SFO022 – Martin Kemp»

01/10/12
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OUT NOW.

DJ support from Oslek, Robn, Dusk & Blackdown, Kingthing, Ghosts On Tape, Deep Teknologi….

Download Martin’s Frijsfo Treats mix here.

‘Terr’ on Youtube.

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SFO021 – Yllw Grn EP»

03/09/12
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This three-track EP continues Geiom’s fruitful relationship with Frijsfo Beats. It comes ahead of an album to be released on Frijsfo later this year, the follow-up to 2007′s Island Noise. In a recent interview, Geiom reveals it will “represent all the different aspects of my work”.

This EP is tightly focused. Across previous 12″s and downloads for Frijsfo, Geiom has developed a signature sound – busy and colourful, a vivid contrast to his slower-paced work. Here it progresses in new ways. Read More »

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Frijsfo Treats 6 – Martin Kemp»

21/08/12

Martin Kemp generously offers one of the best Frijsfo Treats yet in this ace DJ mix, which is packed with upfront and unreleased music from the likes of Beneath, Shy One, his brother Brackles, and more – including Dusk & Blackdown’s ‘Wicked Vibes’. All three of the bloody delicious tracks from Kemp’s new vinyl, the ‘German Salad’ EP feature too.

The mix is short at just over 30 minutes, but Martin prefers it this way – “I think mixes are better shorter. Who really needs an hour. I could do another”, he says.  Surely he will, meanwhile you should download and enjoy this one.

Martin Kemp – Closer [Frijsfo Beats]

Shy One – City Roots [forthcoming on DVA music]

Beneath – Blaze [unreleased]

Martin Kemp – Cracks [Frijsfo Beats]

Brackles – 2012 [unreleased]

Martin Kemp – German Salad [Frijsfo Beats]

Shy One – Lickle Rascal [forthcoming on DVA music] Read More »

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SFO020 – Buzzin10 – Dubbed Out»

06/08/12
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In May this year, Frijsfo Beats introduced Buzzin10 with his debut EP Basement Mood. His microsampling of UK Garage cassette tapes caught the imagination, with The Wire magazine, Sonic Router, Boomkat and others all commenting enthusiastically. So did his way with a melody, leading to justified comparisons with Aphex Twin, Zomby and Drexciya. His very individual style found support from noteworthy DJs Sully, Dusk and Blackdown, Warlock, Robn, Kingthing, and Cardopusher to name a few.

Oli Marlow, of Sonic Router writes: “His touches aren’t subtle…Buzzin10’s quite heavy handed with his effecting but that works as a roughness and gives a Read More »

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FRJ013 – Martin Kemp»

23/07/12
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There’s not much to say about Martin Kemp, once you ignore distractions such as his talented brother (Rob, aka Brackles) and a certain namesake. That’s fine with us, as his tunes can do the talking.

One thing we will say is that he’s an under-recognised pioneer. Proclaiming love for classic House and Garage, there’s now an army of producers who blend the influences with Dubstep and UK Funky. Martin was one of the first to explore the territory, heard on his 12″s for Blunted Robots from 2009.

After a two-year break, the German Salad EP puts him back at the centre of the map. So far, DJ support has come from Brackles, Geiom, Oslek, Robn (Wifey/Deja Vu) and Beneath, Dusk & Blackdown, Shy One, and Scratcha DVA.

Martin’s sound is still distinctive, avoiding superficial references in favour of its own constants: gritty, broken-up drums, penetrating bass for soundsystems, and contrasting qualities of warmth, iciness, sweet and sour. While it’s all intact here, the EP shows off more range than before.

The title track plays on the aesthetics of European Minimal Techno: it’s typical that Martin works with a minimalist’s efficiency, squeezing the maximum from a limited palette, but here he restricts himself to clipped, angular percussion and precise counterpoint. Instead of walking a straight line, however, he opens floods of delay and skids into rudeboy-style Garage drops, erratically cutting the drum track and bouncing Read More »

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