If you can peel your eyes off the page, having opened them to that splash of colour up there, it may interest you to know that there's a new Nightmares On Wax album coming out soon. The artist otherwise known as George Evelyn (pictured) will release 'Feelin' Good' via Warp on September 16th.A taster of the LP is available now - download the track 'Now Is The Time' from the official NOW website.
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Review: It would be fair to say that Studio K7 has pulled off something of a coup in getting Kenny Dixon Jr. To agree to compile and mix the latest installment in the long-running DJ Kicks series. It is, somewhat remarkably, the legendary Detroiter's first commercially available mix set. This triple-vinyl edition features a whopping 19 cuts - all in unmixed form - from the 30 track mix. Musically, it's a blazed, jazzy, soulful and groovy as you'd expect, and contains a mixture of downtempo beats, nu-jazz and hazy house cuts from the likes of Flying Lotus, Dopehead, Peter Digital Orchestra, Nightmares On Wax, Soulful Session and Lady Alma.
Review: Previous remixes in the Nightmares on Wax 25th anniversary series - from the likes of Special Request and JD Twitch - have been fairly reverential, sticking to the sweaty spirit and sub-bothering bleep techno feel of the original material. Here, Ricardo Villalobos and Max Loderbauer take the opposite approach, turning in radical revisions that recast 'Aftermath' as a minimal techno after-party anthem.
There's very little of the original present, though what is used - most notably the vocal, cut-up and reversed, plus a few notes here and there - is brilliantly woven into the fabric of their wonky, 18-minute Dub. Adventurous DJs should check the thrillingly odd Electric Jazz Version, which re-animates the track as a quirky tech-jazz wig-out of epic proportions. Review: Nightmares on Wax is back with a fresh new single, 'Citizen Kane' featuring Mozez ) aka London based singer Osmond Wright) and Canadian rapper Allan Kingdom: who is a member of Thestand4rd along with Spooky Black, Bobby Raps and Psymun. Ahead of his upcoming album Shape The Future, George Evelyn serves up 'Citizen Kane' and it's one fine example of the veteran producer's new musical perspectives, as presented on the new album: where he presents a mixture of soul, hip-hop, dub and timeless club music. Review: Famously, George Evelyn's Nightmares on Wax project is the only surviving link to Warp's early days as a bastion of Yorkshire house and techno. Of course, the Leeds native left that style behind years ago - though, interestingly, two tracks on this belated seventh album ('Eye (Can See)' and 'Tapestry') touch on soul-sampling house - instead turning his attention to slinky downtempo grooves.
For the most part, Feelin' Good sticks to the plan, offering up slow, laidback, summery fusions of soul, dub, funk, instrumental hip-hop and string-drenched Balearic moods. It's something of a return to form after a string of so-so sets, recalling Evelyn's two greatest moments, 1990s' downtempo classics Smokers Delight and Carboot Soul. Review: Amazingly, it's 25 years since George 'E.A.S.E' Evelyn and then production partner Kevin 'Boy Wonder' Harper sat down and recorded 'Dextrous', their monstrous, bleep-era classic on Warp.
A quarter of a century later, Evelyn is still going strong, though the grooves have mellowed a lot in that time. Here, Warp celebrate the producer's epic career with a much-deserved retrospective. All the familiar favourites are present, from the rush-inducing thrill of early dancefloor smashers 'I'm For Real' and 'Aftermath', to the sinewy downtempo goodness of the decidedly Balearic 'Les Nuits', the blazed hip-hop dub of '195 Llbs' and stoner soul of '70s 80s'. This version also includes a number of exclusive remixes, with names like JD Twitch, Special Request, LFO, Morgan Geist and Loco Dice putting their own spin on this classic material. Review: Amazingly, it's 25 years since George 'E.A.S.E' Evelyn and then production partner Kevin 'Boy Wonder' Harper sat down and recorded 'Dextrous', their monstrous, bleep-era classic on Warp. A quarter of a century later, Evelyn is still going strong, though the grooves have mellowed a lot in that time.
Here, Warp celebrate the producer's epic career with a much-deserved retrospective. All the familiar favourites are present, from the rush-inducing thrill of early dancefloor smashers 'I'm For Real' and 'Aftermath', to the sinewy downtempo goodness of the decidedly Balearic 'Les Nuits', the blazed hip-hop dub of '195 Llbs' and stoner soul of '70s 80s'. Review: It all started way back in 1989 for Nightmares On Wax, in parallel with the first house music boom in Europe - typically dubbed the 'summer of love'.
Yes, George Evelyn and Robin Taylor-Firth have been around the scene for almost three decades now, and they are literally the longest serving members of the equally mythical Warp imprint, out of London. 'Citizen Kane' is the duo's latest single, a magnetic swarm of broken beats and neo-jazz strumming, kicking off with the 'Rap' version, the sort of gear that would appeal to the Dego purists out there. Chicago house legend Ron Trent is called up for the remix duties, and his 'Night Dubbin' remix is as deep and sensual as you'd imagine from an artist of his experience and calibre, and the tune is backed by an even sexier vocal version. If all that wasn't enough, the EP also contains an original mix, which will be showcased on the legends' upcoming album.
Review: Leeds legend Nightmares On Wax has long been affiliated with UK electronica giants Warp since the very beginning. 'Shape The Future' will mark his eighth LP for the label and that's not forgetting a couple of dozen EPs he's done for them over the years too. Put simply, George Evelyn is one of the most respected producers in UK electronica and we're sure excited whenever he puts out new music. Mixing hip-hop, dub, soul and gospel sounds, the album features guest artists such as Kuahitl Vasquez, Jordan Rakei and Sadie Walker. Evelyn has explained that the album was a journey 'both inwardly and outwardly all over the world, and both physically and emotionally'. Highlights include the dope yet soulful beats of 'Tell My Vision' featuring the fine vocal talents of the aforementioned Ashong, the wicked dub / Afrobeat crossover of 'Tomorrow' featuring LSK and of course the super soulful lead single 'Citizen Kane' featuring Mozez. Review: Nightmares on Wax main man George Evelyn cut his teeth at soul and funk all-dayers in the 1980s - he was a teenage breakdancer - before falling in love with house and techno.
Both of these aspects of his heritage are reflected on Ground Floor, which he's trailed as an attempt to go back to his roots. The EP opens with the stretched-out, soulful deep house of 'World Inside', which not only boasts a wonderful vocal from Andrew Ashong, but also snappy, dub-influenced rhythm patterns reminiscent of some of his early bleep productions. That aspect of his career is also referenced on 'Reclaim The Balcony', a breakbeat-driven house bumper that boasts some seriously heavy sub, and electro-tinged wobbler 'Dirty Triumphant', which was co-produced by Acid Mondays. Review: An album that's as ubiquitous in people's record shelves as Anthony Kiedis' Scar Tissue biography is for people bookshelves, Smoker's Delight has been the definitive Nightmares On Wax record since its original release 25 years ago. Regarded as one of the finest trip-hop albums of all time, this 20-track anniversary edition sees the inclusion of new and largely unheard material in the jazzy beatdown vibes of 'Aquaself', and dubbed out piano loops of 'Ascend'.
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Extra bonus material includes a funk version of lounge time hit 'Dreaddoverboard', and a live recording of Nightmares On Wax's all time classic 'Night's Introlude'. Take another hit.
NoW's debut album, A Word of Science, was - along with early tracks by, Tuff Little Unit, and Tricky Disco - a crucial bridge between the competing influences of New York house and electro, Detroit techno and soul, London rave and acid, and the burgeoning eclecticism of the years to come. Formed in the late '80s in West Yorkshire as an extension of Evelyn and company's b-boy crew the Soul City Rockers, NoW's first singles, 'Dextrous' and 'Aftermath,' were both highly regarded, and the latter shot into the U.K. Pop singles Top 40. The subsequent album laid a good deal of the groundwork for the downtempo experimental hip-hop/electro-funk worked over by Mike Paradinas, and others, and earned the group a secure spot among techno's select crew of next-step innovators. The group nonetheless disbanded following Science's release, with early contributor Kevin Harper leaving to pursue a DJ career and Evelyn turning out a smattering of house tracks on 's Nucleus subsidiary before settling into bedroom woodshed mode, often joined by Taylor-Firth. Following a four-year hiatus, Evelyn resurfaced with a track on the Headz compilation and, soon after, Smoker's Delight, basically an instrumental hip-hop album with a distinctively British eclecticism.
Still involved with the same sorts of genre-spanning sampler-and-sequencer experiments, Smoker's Delight was also less obvious, suited more to repeat listenings than previous material. The same was also true for 1999's Carboot Soul, Evelyn's first album as part of a deal with American indie label for domestic distribution. In 2000, NoW produced the first new track by in several years, included on an EP - Sound of N.O.W - featuring the rap pioneers. Following on its heels was a volume in the mix series DJ-Kicks.
Two years later, Evelyn delivered his fourth LP, Mind Elevation. A bigger gap preceded the release of his next proper LP for, but In a Space Outta Sound finally appeared in 2006, while 2008's Thought So. And the unmixed selector compilation Coming Home followed closely behind. Evelyn continued to work as a downtempo DJ, collaborated with arranger Sebastian Studnitzky, and released Feelin' Good, another eclectic set of productions, in 2013.
The following year brought a retrospective set, N.O.W. Is the Time, to celebrate 25 years of activity., Optimo's JD Twitch, and, among others, granted remixes. Evelyn issued the Ground Floor EP, featuring Andrew Ashong, and, in 2016. The next year, he released the first in a batch of singles that preceded the early-2018 set Shape the Future. Sean Cooper, Rovi Read More.
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