Production Influences: Lurka

Back when Skream was doing his “Stella Sessions” on Rinse FM, he was making such a variety of quality music in Dubstep. Every week you could tune in and hear several new Skream dubs of completely different flavours. I can’t think of anyone making such a broad range of styles as convincingly as he was back then, certainly not the sheer volume of them! This taught me how much you can really mine out of a certain template, more than you probably think! “Shake-it’ is towards the end of this era but for me it exemplifies the range of influences that went into his music.

I am a huge Dillinja fanboy of all of his music, the early jungle, the late 90s techy stuff and the noughties jump up bangers so when I worked for an online record shop I was chuffed to find they had an archive of vinyl rips including (almost) Dillinjas entire back catalogue! He has released so many killers! He creates so much tension through very clever use of dynamics and phrasing, particularly in his basslines (which are the rudest ever btw!) It’s also inspirational to hear of the lengths he went to present his music in the way he felt it should, be it through his meticulous production and recording of his own sound palette, custom building his own sound system and touring it around the country, to getting his own Neumann lathe to cut dubplates and do his own master lacquers! What a G!

It’s hard to think of an artist who walks the line between mainstream pop and the underground as successfully as Sophie has without seemingly compromising anything at all! It’s been an incredible ride to witness the heights that she has taken her music to. It’s some of the most idiosyncratic, dynamic, powerful and frankly weird in contemporary electronic music, and it’s all realised with exacting production. Her music gives me the confidence to trust my own intuition and tastes a bit more and to not stifle your own output worrying how something may be perceived. It’s also a constant reminder that your production chops can always use improving!!!

I was introduced to Curtis Roads’ music by my good friend, Craig “Asusu” a few years ago when he was completing his Masters degree. A lot of the Electroacoustic music that I was familiar with at the time was very old and tended towards “Concrete” styles and techniques of tape splicing and manipulation, so hearing Road’s music was a real revelation to me. His use of contemporary software (a lot of which he has built himself) was much more relatable and applicable to what I am trying to achieve making music on a laptop! His album “Point Line Cloud” left a particular impression, the level of detail and dedication he has to his art is incredible (some of his pieces take years even decades to be completed!) and his use of gestures, spatialisation, depth and contrast is endlessly inspiring. Not only does he make some of the most interesting music around, he is a long time University lecturer and very talented Author, writing several unparalleled texts on computer music making that I can’t recommend enough particularly “Composing Electronic Music”. It’s hard to read even one page of it and not be inspired to push yourself when you’re next making music! Legend.

I first encountered Flying Lotus’ music with his debut album “1983” which was super fresh and awesome but it wasn’t until I heard “RobertaFlack” when he guested on Kode 9’s rinse show that his music made more of an impact on me. So much depth and richness and originality to his sound at that time, combining an openness for experimentation in sonics and a super keen ear for melody. I also love how intuitive and mature his arrangements were and for the next few years I followed everything he did very closely. His albums were great, but it was the two EPs I really dug. The “Reset EP” featuring the modern soul of “Tea Leaf Dancers” and the “Pattern+Grid World EP” which is equal parts fun and deranged, maybe being a bit freer and light hearted when compared to his later gear. I am still enamoured by the drums and spontaneous feel of “Jurassic Notion”

These guys have been creating killer albums for the past decade plus, further refining and honing their sound with each one. It’s amazing what they are able to achieve with such humble instrumentation and stripped back elements, a deceptively simple and powerful sound taking in elements of post rock and indie, the sweetest vocal melodies ,dreamy guitar harmonies and a hint of gothyness, I can’t get enough! They clearly demonstrate that by mastering your instrument, perfecting your techniques and constantly refining, you can create something much greater than the sum of its parts!

After seeing Oneohtrix perform in Bristol when touring his “Replica” album I was blown away, I had never really heard anything like it, this Electronic/Modern Classical hybrid that sounded more popular than academic. It wasn’t until the release of “R Plus Seven” and in particular the track “Still Life” that he really nailed and perfected his sound as he moved on from the hazier sonics and loopier arrangements of much of his previous stuff to a refined palette of sounds with distinct moments and dynamism in his pieces. His arrangements are such a trip! He uses all manner of sound sources from super kitsch midi piano and vocals to crazy high art sound design, He effectively makes use of the entire frequency range in “still life” and his use of contrast demonstrated to me what a powerful tool that is.

“Blood Bitch” has been a huge album for me, the range of genres and sounds that she utilises and completely makes them her own is very inspiring. The variety in technique, delivery, instrumentation and spatialisation on this album is exemplary, one minute you are in a piece of ambient-concrete, the next you are dropped into a killer art-pop track like “Conceptual Romance” then to a candid recording of a conversation with field recordings segueing into a dreamy post rock track! But the main thing that I took from “Blood Bitch” is how expertly the album is programmed, to take such seemingly disparate tracks and order them to have a natural and flowing quality to them is incredible to me + it never overstays its welcome, before you know it it’s over and you’re starting it over again!

I’m really drawn to Portable’s releases through the 00’s, on labels like Background, Perlon and his own Süd Electronic. He has this uncanny ability to make music sound free-flowing and improvised and at the same time meticulously programmed!? His use of sound design and evolving textures set against these really addictive rhythms coupled with the fact that they are just so odd keeps me coming back and reminds me to embrace the inner oddball a bit more!

Alva Noto pretty much ticks every box for a musical and artistic role model, a long, varied and successful career, boundary pushing and wholly unique sound that constantly keeps improving, hugely successful collaborations with other super talented people (Ryuichi Sakamoto!!!, Ryoji Ikeada, Mika Vainio….) running an influential label (Raster-Noton, and now Noton) giving others the platform and opportunity to push challenging music and find an audience for it, plus the depth of emotion and ability to write a piece of music as moving as this!