Fully Sik Tunes

2013 is barely two months old, yet I've already had my mind blown by some amazing albums – Vulgar Display Of Power, Blues For The Red Sun, Countdown To Extinction, Meantime, The End Of Silence, and a stack of other LPs that lay a solid case for 1992 being the greatest year of heavy music that ever was.

But a funny thing happened amidst all the dusting off of old CDs, hungover listicle writing, Bowie peen discussion, ruminations on national identity, and Kyuss worship. As is often the case at the dawn of a new year, I've been darkening the odd nightclub door while I wait for football season to start, and discovering some cracking music in the process.

So rather than get all high concept about life and the universe and shit, this fortnight's missive will take the unusual step of being about (relatively) new electronic music. Think of it as the gurning, slightly less cultured idiot half-brother of my mate Dan Condon's regular Sick Tunes blog (hi Dan!) 'round these parts if you will.

So after that tastefully programmed and well-paced warm-up, into the rabbit hole we go…

Grizzly Bear – Gun Shy (Lindstrøm Remix)

Norwegian beardo disco boffin Lindstrøm first came to my attention when John Digweed was opening with the now classic I Feel Space on his to-this-day-unparalleled series of bombing raids through the clubs of Australia and New Zealand in 2005. Space rock fans could also do worse than to wrap their ears around his 2008 long-player Where You Go I Go Too – it's about as close to Pink Floyd as dance music gets.

His output varies widely in style but he's never less than prolific, dishing out two albums in 2012 and numerous remixes already this year, this effort for Grizzly Bear being one of them. It was a worthy opener to his stunning set at Sydney's Town Hall on Australia Day, and though some churlish pundits have questioned why he would “waste” such a delectable disco-funk tune on Grizzly Bear, the original features so sparingly you can consider it on its own merits.

Free download, so  everybody wins, unless you don't dig the tune in which case we can move along…

Eelke Kleijn @ The Abercrombie Hotel, Saturday 2 February, 2013

Two gigs of a vaguely progressive nature on successive weekends in Australia? Inconceivable! Yet that's what we had when Eelke Klein rolled into Sydders shortly after Lindstrøm. Technically, Sasha played the previous weekend as well, but it was much more bassline-driven tech house than prog, and I was far more celebratory than analytical on that particular occasion, but I digress…

So this Eelke set was one of those gigs, where the long wait for his Australian debut combined with a four hour slot in an intimate setting on a Saturday arvo/evening brought out the best in everyone involved. I was there when Hernan Cattaneo made his Brisbane debut to 250 devotees at Family on a Sunday night in May 2009, later declaring it his favourite set of the year in Mixmag – I suspect Eelke's feelings about this one will be the same.

The full four hours of power will be featured in Eelke's Outside The Box podcast, but you can make do with him dropping Jokers Of The Scene – It's A Small Line Between Nowhere And Now Here in the above video for now. Also keep an eye out for the dickbag using charades to request The Lone Ranger for a second time…

Dersu Uzala – Tempus Fugit

From much closer to home and far less hands-in-the-are realms comes Tempus Fugit, the debut long-player from Victoria's Dersu Uzala. It's also the first album release on new Brisbane imprint Buxton Records, helmed by local man about town Adam Swain – if you've ever worked the dancefloor at a Subtrakt or Kana party in Vegas, chances are you've caught his shirtless frame delivering the quality deep/tech/disco vibes from behind the decks.

While Buxton's catalogue of 12s is generally of a similar musical ilk, with releases from CJM, James Hunter and Swain himself on the menu, Tempus Fugit is more intent on moving your mind than your body. The Burnell brothers (and occasional vocalist Malky Taylor) took three years to record these dreamy, dubbed-out songscapes, and every note is struck to perfection. It's a slow-burner of a release that's well worthy of your hard-earned when it drops in March, if only to help Swain start a t-shirt collection…

DJ Butcher - $werve [Live Edit ft. Nic Lalot]

Also out of Brisbane comes this blog's show-stopping finale. DJ Butcher has been round his home town's hip hop traps (pun unintended, no shit of a lie!) for some time as the main man of Born Fresh Records and part of Crate Creeps with Tom Thum, but of late he's been striking out on his own with some pretty special results. (Disclosure: our paths have crossed through our mutual involvement with an energy drink company that occasionally funds guys who want to skydive from space.)

The video above is a new live interpretation of the title track from 2012's $werve EP, which you can download in full here. Why is it such a winner? Because A) anything with a $ in its name is awesome by default, and B) add a drum kit to trap, brostep, d'n'b, or other any form of heavy electronic music, and it automatically sets its phasers to “DOMINATE”.