Last great track: Babe Rainbow
Vancouver artist Babe Rainbow twists beats and hazy noise into dark atmospheric forms. His debut ‘Shaved’ EP for Warp was released early last year, showing a ghostly, nightmarish take on bedroom production. He’s DJing at our party at SXSW on March 19th, so we asked him to tells us something of his recent listening.
Richelle – Mascotte (Original Mix) by pelicanfly
Richelle – Mascote [Pelican Fly, 2011]
“About a month and a half ago I was hanging out with my buddy just sitting around listening to music. He was adamant that I hear this mysterious new song he knew nothing about but was certain I’d love. As predicted, I was blown away. The track was Richelle’s 5-minute epic “Mascotte”, but we didn’t know who or what that was at the time so we just called it ‘Pelican Fly’, a reference to the song’s screwed Lil’ Wayne sample. I don’t usually care about who or where a track comes from but this was such a huge, genre-bending song that I was pretty intrigued.
With the repetitious vocal sample, skittering pitched toms, and enormous half-time claps, my first thought was that Mascotte was kind of a club-friendly version of footwork. But after a few more listens I found it had just as much in common with some of the hip hop production coming out of southern US right now, particularly the ominous death march-like horns used by Lex Luger. The song has about 20 different parts so I’m sure I’m missing some key references in there somewhere. I don’t know, it doesn’t matter. In the end, despite the very liberal use of a flute synth, this track is certified neck-spraining banger.
As it turned out, Richelle is two DJs from Brussels, Mascotte is their first single, and Pelican Fly is the track’s hook and the name of the new label it will be released on. Mystery-solved! Yawn. Boring. No matter, the song is still one of the best tracks I’ve heard in 2011 and I couldn’t be more excited for this EP to come out.”
Babe Rainbow will DJ at our SXSW party on Saturday 19th Of March
RSVP to events@grandlifenyc.com
