Five Tracks: Etch

To celebrate their 50th release, Keysound Recordings put together Certified Connections, a 14-track compilation featuring some of the freshest faces i

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To celebrate their 50th release, Keysound Recordings put together Certified Connections, a 14-track compilation featuring some of the freshest faces in the evolving bass music scene, including artists like Murlo, Logos, Wen, Facta, and the one like Etch. Truth be told, I'm not that familiar with Etch; he dropped an EP on Keysound in 2013, and has been featured on their Keysound Allstars 2 release, but this Brighton-based producer is very foreign to me. Lucky me, I love discovering producers via their influences, and turth be told, Etch's selection for Five Tracks, which as you'll see are made up of bits that changed the way he saw music, are very in line with my own personal influences. Now I want to become Etch's biggest fan. Here is Etch's thoughts on his edition of Five Tracks:

"So picking five tracks is probably the hardest thing in the world for me and I know I'll look back on this and think "nah shoulda picked different ones," but instead of pondering over it, I'm just going to pick a few tracks that changed the way I saw music without thinking about it too much."

Splash - "Heaven"

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This is one of those early jungle tracks that really has that "magic thing," something I can't quite put my finger on; it's not dark, it's not light, it's just alien... it's a kind of vibe that I have noticed can only be heard in UK hardcore, jungle, garage, and dubstep, something that I guess is a combination of almost complete lack of musicianship combined with a desire to construct something new and fresh. This without a doubt changed my approach to music, it's a lot more stripped back than a lot of jungle at the time and this record is mainly known for it's A-side, "Babylon."

Flying Lotus - "Flattery (Sympathy For The Biters)"

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This is a bit of an obscure track to pick from FlyLo, mainly because in my opinion it's not his best. But when I heard this in 2008 on the Mary Anne Hobbs Evangeline compilation I at first hated it; my main reason for getting that comp was for dubstep, which I was still on a journey of discovery with, but every time this track came on I was like "nah what's this shit, it sounds out of time," but it grew on me more and more until it was pretty much the only track I listened to on the album, then Los Angeles dropped and it just changed my world, I think FlyLo has earned his place as the godfather of modern electronic music.

Digital Mystikz - "Ancient Memories (Skream Remix)"

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Anyone who's seen me DJ knows... nine times out of 10 I play this. This was the first dubstep track I ever heard, way back in 2006—until that point I was overly obsessed with complexity and aggression, I was listening to stuff like Venetian Snares, Squarepusher, Bong Ra, and Tech Itch, but this just opened up a whole new world to me and it's stuck with me ever since, no matter what dubstep became or is further going to become, it's still one of the UK's ultimate genres.

Boards Of Canada - "Dawn Chorus"

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BoC are just absolutely untouchable, without a doubt my biggest inspiration, they are so sonically unique and outside of the norm. Geogaddi is possibly my favorite album of all time and this is it's highlight. It just reminds me of growing up in Brighton, walking back home through fields from raves and after going to clubs as the sun's rising, they create a very specific warm, nostalgic and obscure sound, it's like modern psychedelic music, I don't know how they manage it... A combination of vintage hardware and modern audio manipulative techniques, I dunno, but either way it's unreal. I dream to make music like this.

HP Lovecraft - "Mobius Trip"

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HP Lovecraft are an extremely underrated (in my opinion) psychedelic rock band from the '60s, they're music affects me in the same way BoC's does. I'm a huge huge fan of psychedelic music both past and present, and despite all of my previous picks being electronic music, I'm very rooted in band-based music and grew up on stuff like The Doors, Joy Division, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Tom Waits and so on. But I think this track has something very unique, I love all the little reversed effects and primitive delays that echo around the track. I find it strange not many people draw the comparisons between this kind of music and modern electronic music, the only guy I've really seen draw those dots is The Gaslamp Killer (who is also my favorite DJ in the world, I think).

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