Its about that time of year where everybody gets bombarded with lists of “my top 10 from this year” on Facebook. So we thought – why not do this for ourselves?

Its an opportunity for us to reflect on some of the best music from a busy year for electronic music, which has given us new material from the likes of The Chemical Brothers, The Orb & Brian Eno.

Of course, there are far too many albums we could list here, but we really want to know what music really floated your boat… so let the discussion begin!

Well in that time they have been raised a child down in the deep dark corners of the Mezz and he has finally grown to be a ….BUG! That’s right they have stuffed all the best drum and bass, dubstep and grime into his suitcase and he has taken the boat across the river liffey to the bright lights of the Twisted Pepper!

Antidote presents BUGGED!! Will come to you for the first time tomorrow night (Thursday Nov.04) from the BASSment of the Twisted Pepper. Get ready to enjoy the best in low frequencies and highly addictive wobble as Garret Moore ( Breakbeat & Jungle ), AV Kid ( Filthy Dubstep & Grime ), Proffesor Chaos ( DnB – Halftime – JumpUp ) take to the decks to literally rock the foundations in the Pepper.

There are great drinks promotions all night and plenty to see throughout the club as all three floors are packed with music.

This is set to be the best thing to see on the first Thursday of every month so dont miss it!!!

And remember if you havn’t had enough you can always end your week with Antidote in the mezz on a Friday night!

Wrap your ears around this mix and get on over to the facebook pages for more info!

Professor Chaos – Bugged (Antidote) Mix by AntidotePresentsBugged

Mr Jones: Colin and Merro// Antitode presents Bugged// Westway Flyover// :
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=137208746331583
Bugged Launch Night :
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=136106613106131
Antidote :
http://www.facebook.com/Antidoteatthemezz?ref=ts

Other recent work includes an excellent remix of ‘Bird 1′ by Underworld, which you can listen to on the Beatport Blog.

Marshall Watson ‘States Of Matter’ – Released November 23rd 2010.
C/C/S2037 / (2010)
01. ‘Solid’
02. ‘Liquid’
03. ‘Gas’
04. ‘Plasma’
CarCrashSet

Marshall Watson Discography (DOWNLOAD FROM SENDSPACE)

Albums:
-Math and Other Word Problems
-The Time Was Later Than He Expected
-100 Smooth Trombones

Singles/Compilation
Meady–exp036, The Rhythm Method
Fall Without Change–Subvaritrax
Along for the Ride–Pop Songs for Edith Metzger
Magee, Crying to Heaven–Dirty Compilation 2009

Remixes
The Departure–At the Close of Every Day
Tape Noise–Telefonica

Other
I Love You Neckface–Unreleased
Fourth Floor Window–Unreleased
Sprattle–Unreleased

Drawing influences from a wide array of sources – everywhere from eighties new-wave and synthpop, the kind of music Cut Copy put out is hard to pidgeonhole into one single genre. If you’ve given their critically-acclaimed sophomore record In Ghost Colours a listen, then you’ll understand the sort of magic Cut Copy are working here – an intoxicating mix of New Order-esque pop, dancing-shoes friendly beats, fluttering synths and whimsical vocals make it difficult to skip past. Check out the charming video for lead single, ‘Hearts on Fire‘ here. (Australians: who else remembers this as the soundtrack to 2008? I know I sure have some great memories of drunkenly holding hands with strangers and shouting out the lyrics into the sky…)

Internationals may recognise the name Cut Copy after seeing them support the French electro powerhouse Daft Punk on the Nevereverland tour, as well as acts such as Bloc Party and Franz Ferdinand – a seriously impressive addition to their already stellar list of achievements. Cut Copy, incidentally, have also knocked back offers of a support slot a schizophrenic, colourful list of big-name artists, including Lady GaGa, Coldplay and Nine Inch Nails. Such a disparate mix of names would indicate that the joyous energy that Cut Copy are pumping out transcends barriers of genre and trends – accessible and highly appealing, with a longevity that seems lacking often in the genres Cut Copy are working within.

With a new album to be released in January 2011 on Australian-based label Modular Recordings, Cut Copy have released a single from their as-yet unnamed record, and it’s available to download on the website. For the small price of your email address and membership of their mailing list, you can preview ‘Where I’m Going’ – yet another reinvention in sound for them, recalling the vibey, carefree feel of the Beach Boys (no, really – stay with me, here!) while retaining the shimmering, dancey infectiousness of their previous efforts. Check it out on the Cut Copy website!

However my attention over the past two weeks kept getting pulled back to an artist I featured on my latest Black Box show. Thick Plastic, a song writer from New Jersey, epitomises that rare breed of musical human that buries itself within a world of production and creation regardless of any popular trends or cliché-ed aspirations for world domination. It is clear listening to the self-produced recordings from his makeshift home studio that more time was spent writing and creating something of substance and personal value rather than that one hit wonder, or pop disaster that too often infects our daily lives and degrades the face of popular music. While often this approach will lead to something far less than impressive, Thick Plastic kicks that trend to the kerb by delivering a whopping great sound and and inventive range of ideas in his music that harks back to the days of 60′s and 70′s Rock and Roll. Echoes of The Band or The Grateful Dead can be heard in the seemingly haphazard arrangements and crashing cymbals.

Have a listen to “Aspadistra” and check out the facebook page HERE!!!

Thick Plastic – Aspadistra by dirtyradio

If you’re familiar with the Scott Pilgrim graphic novels from Oni Press or the excellent film version Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, you know that creator Bryan Lee O’Malley’s work is influenced more by music than by other comic books. Like his hero Scott Pilgrim, O’Malley plays in an indie rock band — although in O’Malley’s case, he is the only member. Operating as Kupek, O’Malley’s put together an impressive catalogue of self-made music, but even the man himself admits that his most requested and most listened-to track is his indie-styled cover of Underworld’s classic, “Born Slippy .NUXX”.

Among the countless remixes of this venerable anthem, Kupek’s cover is arguably the best reinterpretation and demonstrates a sincere love for Underworld’s music in general. This version of “NUXX” includes some shout-outs to “Jumbo” at the end, and, incidentally, obsessive Underworld nerds will notice a “Two Months Off” reference in the graphic novels.

Kupek’s “NUXX” cover has been circulating online since 2004, but thanks to the incredible response to Edgar Wight’s Scott Pilgrim film (the response by those who’ve seen it, of course), interest in O’Malley’s other work is at an all-time high. You can learn more about Scott Pilgrim at http://scottpilgrim.com/ and more about Kupek at http://www.radiomaru.com/kupek/

Kupek – Born Slippy .NUXX (Underworld cover) by khouri

San Francisco DJ Jeb Edwards has given the Internet a gift far greater than we deserve. In defiance of Warner Bros.’ callous and feeble remastering and reissuing of some of the best post-punk and electronic music of all time — that of Joy Division and New Order — Edwards and his cohorts have prodigiously “remastered” all the bands’ original Factory Records singles — including “Blue Monday”, “Temptation”, “The Perfect Kiss” and “True Faith”, and all of their associated remixes and B-sides — and made them available for download at Recycle: Joy Division & New Order.

Says Edwards:

All tracks were taken from the best/earliest possible sources to avoid modern mastering techniques which crush the dynamics. Tracks sourced from vinyl have been carefully cleaned and EQ levels have been tweaked for consistency. The artwork was scanned at the highest possible resolution and the type was reset when possible using the original fonts.

All of these singles are out-of-print. Many of the tracks have never appeared on CD. This was a labor of love from a small, devoted circle of fans.

These singles changed my life. I hope they change yours, too. If you like what you hear support the band by purchasing their catalog.

Official efforts to remaster and reissue the music of Joy Division and New Order have been a mixed bag of decent success and dismal failure. A beautiful collection of most of Joy Division’s recordings was released in the four-disc Heart and Soul boxset in 1997, but it lacked more or less a whole disc’s worth of material. The long-rumored New Order boxset Recycle (from which Edwards’ project took its name) finally materialized in the form of Retro in 2002, and featured virtually nothing that was not already available on the band’s studio albums and previous compilations. A “bonus disc” of rarities was included at the last minute to help pacify disappointed fans. Most recently, Warner Music Group’s Rhino label reissued all of New Order’s 1980s albums, each with a bonus disc of remixes and other obscurities. These releases were disappointing to dreadful, depending on who you ask, with many tracks featuring pops, clicks and hisses as if remastered with a phonograph. And of course, as has become tradition for New Order compilations, the Rhino collection was rife with typographical errors and mislabeling.

Edwards’ versions are crisp, clean and most importantly, warm. Recycled’s stated goal is to update this important material while still preserving its essence, and that is precisely what he and his team have done. Additionally, Recycled also provides listeners with remastered artwork, scanned, in most cases, from the original Peter Saville sleeves.

Edwards provides download statistics for each release so as to demonstrate to the powers-that-be the tangible demand for this important material to be re-compiled and reissued properly. A worthwhile endeavor, to be sure, and one we should be grateful for.

But during all of this I came across something completely different, an artist called Neat from Lyon in France. I was intrigued by the description provided on his Soundcloud page, placing his music in “the blurred era of post-dubstep” … a “greyzone between dancefloor and deep music”. Listening to his compositions there was clearly a heavy dubstep influence in the rhythm and tempo, however some haunting vocal samples and syncopated synth lines suggested a more experimental side. He has recently been working with sub specialists Airflex Labs for his latest EP “A light I Know” in which has taken to exploring the deeper, sub-frequencies of musical production.

I caught up with him to find out what Neat was all about and what this “Blurred era of post-dubstep” really is…

Dave: Hi, so first of all can you tell all of our readers who or what is Neat?

Hugo: My name is Hugo, i’m from the south of France, currently based in Lyon. I got into making music 12 years ago with a classical drums/percussion training, playing rock/jazz/whatever in several bands. I started to move around electronic music 8 years ago when I first discovered early electronic-infused pop/rock artists. I think my biggest influence at the time was (and still is) Detroit techno. Artists like Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson, Carl Craig, Deepchord, Basic Channel…I got hooked by the sounds and textures which I found extremely innovative, not to mention the prominent rhythmic aspect.
So I bought some drum machines and stuff to jam with. I learned all the production side step by step, with an incredible lot of trials and errors. I think my actual sound is the result of years of learning, plus a whole lot of influences ranging from concrete music to photography, but also simple things like human moods and behaviors.

Dave: A lot of people would consider Dubstep to be the most cutting edge music in the worldwide underground scene at the moment, yet you place your music in the “blurred era of post-dubstep” … is Dubstep outdated in your opinion? and what is the “future garage sound” that you have talked about?

Hugo:Well i don’t think it’s outdated, in fact i think it doesn’t really mean something anymore. What is Dubstep : Wobble ? 140-ish bpm ? Syncopation ? At the time of the first Tempa releases we could easily define the Dubstep “sound” because it was something we never heard before and we needed to stick a name on this new breed of dance music. Now it’s a bit tough to be honest. Do you find artists like James Blake, Ramadanman or Sbtrkt that close to the first Mala and Loefah’s dubplates ? I don’t…
The interesting thing is that it has spawned a whole lot of subgenres now, it’s a bit confusing to be honest. That’s why i’m using “blurred era” : you don’t really know how to categorize what you’re listening to. Maybe it’s a positive thing, more music and less meanings!
As for Future Garage, it’s a subgenre that uses the codes of Garage but with fresh ideas. It’s far from the pitched r’n'b songs with a skippy beat on them. It has that shuffled groove, heavy sub bass, and maybe a more IDM side. I think it’s promising if we take it a bit further. Check Whistla, Submerse, Sentinels, Opti…

Dave: So when you sit down to make new tracks are these the artists that you aspire to emulate or out-do with your music? Who are your influences?

Hugo: I’m not really into copycats/competition to be honest, although I often pick good ideas here and there. When I start new tracks I tend to have an idea/concept before rather than dabbling with sounds and putting them randomly in my sequencer. I think it’s the hard part. Production is one thing, but if you have no ideas behind, it won’t help.
In terms of influences at the moment i really feel every bit that comes out of Hessle Audio, also Peverelist, 2562, Floating Points, Martyn… But I come from techno and it still influences my sound in a way, artists like Matthew Dear, Miro Pajic, Oni Ayhun, Marcel Dettmann and all the new Berlin school.

Dave: What is your opinion of the underground electronic music scene in France at the moment? Do you think it compares to the rest of Europe and the USA?

Hugo:We’re experiencing some issues here. We have loads of talented artists in France, and i’m not talking about the cheesy french touch renewal. The problem is that we’re confined in a way of interacting that just doesn’t work. For example in the UK, artists are always trying to push their visibility by meeting people, showcasing, chatting, planning projects. They have a social schema that allows this, in my opinion. I have a feeling that here we are a bit stuck, like everyone is doing his thing alone. It’s a cliché to say, for example, if you’re making techno you should go to Berlin but it makes sense in a way. As an artist you naturally want to gain some interest, and it’s tough when you’re living in a place where there’s no proper “scene”. I mean, you have internet, but that’s not all.
The problem here is that it’s actually difficult to push a local scene as there’s not that much interest. People are not so curious in the end, they tend to fall in the trends quite easily and there’s not much room for alternative and forward-thinking music. For example in Paris it’s hard to hook up people on what you’re doing unless you’re booking big names or releasing on big labels.
Anyway the situation isn’t that freezed, you still have a lot of musical activism.

Dave: So has working with Airflex Labs influenced your music? Is it a creative relationship?

Hugo:I don’t think it has influenced my music too much to be honest. But it was very helpful to meet some people who share your thoughts about a lot of things, including music and its future. It’s a creative and productive process because we always share our opinion about new tracks, ideas, etc. It maintains a busy climate, i think it’s a good thing.

Dave: Do you have any events or tours coming up in the near future? What’s next for Neat?

Hugo: I’m doing a few gigs here in Lyon and Paris [...] I have a few remixes in the pipeline for Isotroph and Nekochan, hopefully a collab EP with Submerse, plus some more tracks of mine…
Stay tuned, big things to expect from Airflex in the near future !

Dave: Great! Well thanks so much for talking to us here at Dirtyradio.org .

I am going to be featuring three tracks from Neat’s EP on my Black Box show this Sunday at 7pm GMT. You can also catch more info on the album and get your ears wrapped around some music at Neat’s Soundcloud and websites here:

www.soundcloud.com/neat
www.myspace.com/neatbeats
www.airflexlabs.com

ARX008D – NEAT – A Light I Know (Deep Mix) – CLIP by neat

Queen Kwong is a three-piece Los Angeles rock outfit lead by Carré Callaway, a musician and singer who was discovered at age 17 by Trent Reznor. Callaway and various versions of her band have been playing here in L.A. for several years now — even supporting Nine Inch Nails on two occasions — and developing a sound that’s as melodic as it is raw and aggressively “underproduced.” That sonic nakedness is curious given QK’s stated influences, which include Spiritualized, Radiohead and of course NIN, but those variously exhilarating and melancholy electronic moods come through in her fastidiously analog rock — especially live, as a number of YouTube videos demonstrate.

Despite appearing on Virgin Mobile’s NXNE bill with Iggy and the Stooges, The Raveonettes and Wavves and her underground single “Pet” being used in a high-profile campaign for Levi’s Europe, Queen Kwong remains unsigned. The band is recording their first full-length album now, but more recordings and demos can be heard at queenkwong.com and updates can be had via Twitter and Tumblr.

Photo by Laura Taylor.

Queen Kwong: Pet by khouri

Also involved in collaborating and supporting an Afro-Latin collective based in Madrid which actively seeks out to record artists from Africa+Latin America/Carribe called VOCA which is headed by the producer Rasgus who often heads out to Tanzania and Ethiopia on recording missions! – you can catch up with their myspace HERE and check out some of the amazing tunes and recordings.

Otherwise its time for the music to speak for itself so here are a Couple of tunes from 13th Tribe for your ears to feast on!

Babylon Shall Fall Dub feat Horsemouth. by The 13th Tribe

The 13th Tribe feat Niche Flow- Negro by The 13th Tribe