It’s looking to be a fruitful year for electronic music here in the capital, with every genre from frenzied voodoo electronica to sugarcoated ambience, getting its due. Here’s a look at some of 2017’s newest releases including the latest from Zaliva-D, Noise Arcade, Punx, and Easy Mind.
Grab some ayahuasca and head to the hills with the Do Hits crew’s latest – Story – a hallucinatory, often dark take on tribal music from the twisted mind of Beijing producer Zaliva-D. It really is a match made in heaven as Zaliva-D’s dank witch house vibes find the perfect home in the Beijing’s Do Hits! crew’s reappropriated traditional Chinese music. A fever dream of epic proportions – one that pits you smack in the middle of a ceremonial gathering gone topsy-turvy – the EP digs deep and doesn’t let up. And while some made fall to the floor gasping for air, it’s best to just keep your cool, give in, and embrace the bewitching melodies at hand here. Bandcamp/Xiami
Noise Arcade, the Beijing based producer whose drone-heavy layered soundscapes has been a staple of the underground electronic scene for years continues to explore new territory in his latest – Filtering Out The Rest which finds the artist finding more melodic footing as well as a more keen atmosphere that trades in slickness and airy transcendence for an almost dingier, club house vibe. The bass is fuller, the beats echo off the walls, and there’s a hive-like gathering of sounds here that feels dangerous. At the end of the day, it’s still Noise Arcade, but there’s a stronger sense of forward momentum rather than perpetual motion. Color me intrigued. Bandcamp/Xiami
Techno gets its due on first EP from Beijing electronic artist Punx entitled Post Human Sports. Part of the first recently released batch of EP’s from the newly established Beijing label prajnasonic, who ‘explore the deeper corners of the electronic music spectrum’ it’s an icy cool intoxicating labyrinth of electronic world building that’s as immersive as it is effortless. It’s ominous in its patience, persuasive in its style – the type of music that works just as well in the bedroom as on the dancefloor. It might be a bit pretentious to call it the thinking man’s techno, but there’s something invigorating about prajnasonic’s slate that has me ahold. Bandcamp/Xiami
Indietronica artist Xianda Wang aka Easy Mind, based out of Beijing, has been a constant presence in some of the smaller music circles here in Beijing since he began performing in 2011. Downtempo music ‘from a light heart’ – the artist who’s currently at NYU as a grad student in New York recently released his latest album Cloudland this month. Tranquil, retrofitted, sugar-coated ambience and as relaxed as a feathered pillow, Easy Mind’s music may lack the edge of most contemporary underground electronica, but that’s the point. Like the artist himself, this is some pretty damn easy going stuff and the perfect sunny afternoon appetizer. Bandcamp/Xiami
Be the first to comment