Each week, FACT trawls through the untamed world of free mixes, radio specials and live blends so you don’t have to.
Happy 2017! Whether you’re in hibernation lock-down or celebration mode, for the first week back to school we’ve picked from a cosy palette of stay-at-home delights, freewheeling jazz and funk greats, while there’s also a big room mix from underrated Detroit producer K-Hand.
Elsewhere, Joakim scratches that itch with his “best of music you can dance to in 2016” and SKY H1 once again reps the underground firestarters. Dive in!
Toro Y Moi & The Mattson 2
Thump mix
Last year, Chaz Bundick enlisted the help of Southern Californian jazz duo (and identical twin brothers) Jared and Jonathan Mattson, aka the Mattson 2, for a concert film recorded in a small Mojave Desert town three hours from LA. The trio now have a full-length album, Chaz Bundick Meets the Mattson 2, on the way and have got together ahead of its release to craft a mix for Thump. It’s as gnarly as you’d expect from a mix with roots in the psychedelic mecca, kicking off with the gorgeous folk of Kathy McCord and soaring through Gary Pacific Group, before landing on The Beatles. And there’s no chillwave in sight.
Ben UFO with Athens of the North guest mix
Rinse FM Podcast
Returning to his small throne in the Rinse studio, Ben UFO rings in the new year with the first in a series of guest mixes handing the reins to label bosses rather than DJs. First up is Euan Fryer of Athens of the North, the Edinburgh label behind tasty reissues of forgotten punk and funk outfits who seem plucked from Chris Morris’s imagination: The Fruit Band, Boots For Dancing, Rasputin’s Stash. It’s a cosy, dog-eared mix of vintage nuggets and it marks, we would guess, the first Rinse outing for Steeleye Span. Grab a tartan blanket and a dram and get into it.
K-HAND
Dekmantel Podcast 103
Detroit’s K-Hand has been releasing records since 1990 for labels such as Underground Resistance, Warp and Tresor, but it’s only recently that she’s been getting the wider appreciation she deserves. Dekmantel’s latest podcast is the perfect way to get acquainted with her skills as a DJ, offering a big room mix of Nina Kraviz, Josh Wink and Robert Hood that’ll have you dreaming of summer festival season.
Joakim
Best of music you can dance to in 2016
Joakim’s annual “best of music you can dance to mixes” are some of the best ways to hear all the great stuff you missed in the past year, and his 2016 edition is no different. As always, the French producer and DJ sidesteps the hype tracks for two hours of under-the-radar house and techno from the melodic end of the spectrum, mixing up Mr Beatnick, Peggy Gou, I:Cube, Willie Burns and Pépé Bradock alongside music from himself and his Crowdspacer label.
SKY H1
Choice Mix, RBMA Radio
SKY H1 dropped her emotionally turbulent Motion EP on Visionist’s rebooted Codes label last year, cementing her status as a producer on-the-rise. For the first RBMA Choice Mix of 2017, the Belgian producer plucks from similarly sparse, pummelling and neon-lit sounds that run the gamut from Kamixlo and Amnesia Scanner to Sky Girl and definitely keeps us listening.
