Thursday 15 January 2009

Zomby – Zomby EP (Hyperdub) 12”

Zomby has to be insane just check out Gloop and Aquafre5h on this EP for starters then go and read his interview about Parrotte’s with Blackdown here.

What more proof do you want?

I have been so excited about this mad wonky / bleepy stuff coming out, loads of his tracks in this vain have been played on the radio for what seems like an age to me. Then he decided to drop a full length album of throw back rave tunes, Where Were You In ’92? that has had a lot of good press but didn’t really get me hooked. I wanted the mad stuff!

Hyperdub came up with the goods on that front by dropping the Zomby EP late last year, two times the 12” as well. Spread across its disc’s are some varied productions from Zomby he covers a lot of basses from all out fucked up bleepers to sublime 2-step rollers. He fuses some sort of Aqua-Crunk mixed with chip tune hybrid on Aquafre5h and Gloop, that just sound like nothing else I’ve ever heard.

The tracks are so inventive and messed up yet they will still keep you moving on a dance floor, that is a mean feat to achieve at times but it’s one that Zomby pulls off time after time. He comes off like a wacked out nut job even compared to his nearest contemporise like Ikonika’s deep and bleepy sounds and Rustie’s off the wall Zig Zag.

The 2-steppa’s are really soulful and melodic and the bleepers are pure swaggering badman space funk with grime and dirt all over it.

The first 12” kicks off with Spaceman, which is a sublime off-kilter bleepy track not to dissimilar to something Starkey might make if he got a pet parrot and went a bit mad. It has sci-fi bleeps and bloops, hardcore horn stabs and just a general air of spacey goings on.

Kaliko is yet another highlight a very hard to explain highlight at that, you really have to hear some of these tracks to believe them. Skipping arpeggios and electro style beats ebb and flow in strange directions making it sound like a mad grime track beamed in from space via Africa.

Test Me For A Reason finishes the first 12” in subtle rolling 2-step style with heaps of soul and melancholy. You can get lost in this one so easily it’s such a ncie departure from the fucked up tracks. Gorgeous vibes, what a sweet tune.

Flip onto 12” number two for the really deranged bangers. Aquafre5h is the track that made my ears prick up a while ago now. It flows like a digital liquid soup with grit in it that makes it all the more dirty. My head nods so hard to this track.

Gloop is also in a very similar vain to Aquafre5h with its dirty slow-mo bass and gloopy soup bleeps. This time there are some mad arpegiated synth lines that up the tension a little, badman stuff.

1 Up sounds like a gameboy gone into deep space hyper drive and its not to happy about it. Its murky, doom drenched and just generally a bit fucked up.

The final track is Diamonds and Purls and it comes across like a dirty R&B track fed through the dark side of Sluggabed and Rustie by Zomby on a dark night. The classic sample peaks through the grime and gives the track a strange detached air with a bit of soul. It’s very strange indeed I love it.

For more brilliant stuff from Zomby check out his offerings on Ramp and Werk records to name but a few.

http://www.myspace.com/zombyproductions

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