Dekmantel Mix Series Archive 1-500

Lawrence le Doux is impossible to pin down. The Belgian has been beating his own path since the nineties under a range of different guises. His latest album Host—following a soundtrack on Hivern Discs and years of everything from rap to hardcore to ambient—came on his home label Vlek and was an embodiment of the last 30 years of electronic music in his homeland. From digital dub to house to industrial, it covers plenty of ground in authentic style and made for a fascinating listen. Over more than eighty minutes here, he serves up an equally kaleidoscopic mix filled with beautiful moments. It’s a late night affair that takes in ambient house, trippy 5am techno, dubbed out grooves, beguiling broken beats, trance, afro and plenty in between. Transitions feel natural and coherent even if, on paper, they shouldn’t. It’s a mix that comprehensively proves Lawrence le Doux’s understanding and knowledge of electronic music runs deep.

Lots of artist like to think they have their own singular sound, but not many are as hard to categorise as Lutto Lento. The Polish artist cooks up intoxicating brews of churning drums, weird samples, lithe synths, jumbled percussion and plenty more. Is is dancehall? Is it techno? Is it ambient? Who knows, but it’s beautiful in its abstraction and makes for some of the most compelling sound collages you are likely to hear. As a DJ he has an approach to sound that is just as eclectic and magpie. This mix one starts off with warped, twisted synths that sound stripped from the UK hardcore continuum, before growing into big, tumbling drums. A flurry of dancehall, broken rhythms, raved up Indian bass all follow and leave you in awe of the man’s ability to thread to tether so much different stuff with such a strong sense of cohesion. Truly, he is one of a kind.

Olivia has been intrinsically linked wit the Polish electronic music scene for almost 15 years. Maybe most famously, she is a resident DJ at Unsound, but next to that she also runs her own Radar night at celebrated Krakow club Szpitalna 1—where she is also chief booker—and DJs as one half of Chrono Bross. Both technically excellent and well versed in the history of house and techno, she mixes liquid acid with cosmic melodies, Detroit futurism with Dutch rawness and is someone fascinated by the paranormal, the infinity of space and the potential of robotics. All this informed her full bodied and psychedelic debut release on K-Hole Trax, and the mix she has put together for us. There is a dystopian air to start with, where fizzing synths and malfunctioning machines make for uncomfortable listening before jerking rhythms tinged with elements of electro and EBM being to make you move. Unsettling and abstract throughout, it’s a dark mix for strobe lit dance floors that is industrial and dehumanised, but one that is never less than compelling.

Pariah has recently returned with Here From Where We Are, his first solo material in a while. The debut album on Houndstooth finds the producer develop beatless, synth heavy soundtracks into long, thoughtful pieces that are utterly absorbing. It’s a new musical identity for someone closely associated with visceral techno thanks to his work as one half of live duo Karenn with Blawan, but as a DJ he still pumps the dance floor. This mix is testament to that: it’s ninety minutes of diverse electronic music that dips into afro drumming, sleek minimalism and off kilter UK bass as well as some cheeky garage. As it wraps up, drums make way for subtle and supple synth rhythms that leave you utterly horizontal, a mile away from the sweaty state that proceeds it. Like Pariah himself, it’s tied to no one sound or scene and is wholly refreshing as a result.

Skymark is someone who flies rather under the radar despite being a DJ who can light up your spirit with his carefully constructed sets of deeply resonant music. Like his selections in the booth, his productions combine soul, funk, Brazilian, gospel and jazz into spine tingling moods and grooves that emanate strong life forces and fill you with positivity. They come in the form of perfectly sun kissed albums like Primeiras Impressões and boogie fuelled Waves From The Nucleus on labels like Neroli, nsyde and Rush Hour as well as his own his own Modern Sun Records. The Swiss born, Rio based artist is a real student of sound and so time in his company is always a genuine lesson, and so it proves with the all vinyl mix he has done for us. It’s a joyous mix of shimmering, shining disco, soul, boogie and gospel gold that takes you ever higher. Making tough transitions feel smooth and seductive, he provides an utterly perfect summer soundtrack that you will be reaching for whenever the sun comes out.

Don’t DJ breaks rules. He takes risks. He goes with his heart and not his head. The music he makes is littered with odd sound sources, from oversized flutes to the sound of crushed plastic cups to frog noises, and his rhythms are always complex and challenging. He releases it on Fullfridge Music, Berceuse Heroique, and also runs his own Disk and is a master of fusing different sound worlds into compelling new forms. And that’s the case on the podcast he’s done for us. “I got drunk and recorded an all over the place old time favourites mix. it’s cursed,” he says. That means it’s a raw, instinctive selection with the mistakes left in and plenty of tough riding transitions that make it all the more thrilling. It’s exactly the kind of approach you would expect from the man: who else could squeeze in the likes of MC Hammer, Neneh Cherry, Frak and DJ Sotofett and still make it work? This is truly the work of a standalone DJ.

Jonas Rönnberg is full of ideas. Since 2013 he’s turned out 15 albums and a handful of EPs that find the Swede forever cooking up moody techno landscapes. His atmospheres are heavy, and there is always a bleakness to his work; a darkness to his drones that is cannot fail to suck you in. Labels like Northern Electronics and Semantica have proved perfect homes for his longform sounds, and serious as his music can be, the man himself is also very playful: his latest release is a romance inspired album that rushes with the excitement of falling in love and soars with acoustic guitars and lush pianos. Over the course of an hour here he shows off many contrasting sounds and offers a real snapshot of his hyper-active mind. One moment you’re up against of wall of glitch, then pop vocals and heavenly pianos, then suspensory ambient that is as beautiful as the beats that follow are brutal. It’s an ambitiously freeform session that never lets you settle in one place and, despite—or maybe because of—the strangeness of it all, cannot fail to hook you in.

Each of Steffi’s three studio albums on Ostgut Ton have brought with them new musical explorations. The Dutch born Panoramabar Bar resident’s debut was a warm and classic house affair with steamy vocals. Her second in 2014 was a more techno and electro styled work that took cues from the sleek futurism of Underground Resistance. But her latest, World of The Waking State from late last year, was her most fully realised and individual yet. A deep affair with flourishes of IDM, it’s utterly emotional and intricate, with pulsing drums coloured by deft synths that flash about with a life of their own. It was a perfect continuation of the mix she served up for fabric, but this new one for us follows a different path. Slowly awakening from spaced out ambient, it explores kinked electro, more rugged EBM style grooves and tough, drum lead tracks that are all tied together by a sci-fi sense of atmosphere. Like everything Steffi does, it manages to pack a real punch at the same time as touching on a range of moods from melancholic to optimistic. Now over two decades into her career, Steffi remains as unpredictable and compelling as ever.

Samuel Kerridge is one of the most striking techno producers around. Offering up a wall of noise and rhythm, texture and experiential electronics, he stands alone and really doesn’t care what anybody thinks. This attitude allows him to push borders and explore new ground on labels like Downwards, Contort and Blueprint. There Berlin based Brit is as exceptional in the DJ booth ask he is the studio and live arena, and his output remains as vivid and vital as ever six years after his spellbinding debut. This mix is arresting from the off. It’s a blizzard of overdriven drums and frazzled synth lines that are impossibly restless and raw. Even the moments of relative emptiness and calm are pregnant with tension and menace before things race off once more and leave you gassing for breath. It’s an impressively exhilarating ride that balances light with dark and calm with chaos in just the right proportions so as to never let up and never let you go.

Magic Teapot Records is an exclusive online record store in Barcelona, but also a recently launched record label (run by Daniel Baughman— A&R at Hivern Discs, booker at audiophile venue Nica —, Marco Gegenheimer - who releases on Studio Barnhus as MLiR - and Jens Ingelstedt). The DJ duo though is made up of Baughman and Gegenheimer, and when they come together they unleash hidden vinyl gems that get you dancing and romancing. Their sound is one that has a lot to say and draws on steamy tropical delights and intoxicating world music that could be thirty years old or brand new. Their mix for us is a 90 minute live recording of them doing what they do best at Nica, namely taking us around the globe on a real adventure that has a sense of musical wanderlust running right through it. There are intimate moments of acoustic heaven bleeding into soft, drunken synths and glorious passages of churning reggae and twinkling disco along the way. It’s music with meaning threaded together by a air of expert curators.

DVS1 came up as a raver in the Midwest, throwing techno parties for over 20 years and getting up to mischief, often next to huge stacks of speakers that still influence him to this day. He is now well-established as a vital DJ and resident at Berghain and Panorama Bar. This mix is something special and a side of DVS1 normally not heard or recorded! A true digger and passionate record collector running the eclectic Mistress Recordings and the more pure techno label HUSH. Here he crosses into house territory for a special dekmantel mix. Of the podcast we have here, he says, “This mix is two hours of a four hour rare “house” set recorded LIVE in Sept 2017 at an undisclosed location. I make it a point not to release many mixes and while most people know and follow me for my techno sets, this mix is for those who dig a little deeper and appreciate it all… Enjoy!" There is still a real sense of pace to the mix as it glides effortlessly though flurries of percussion into vocal numbers, cosmic curveballs and piano laced anthems. It’s a fascinating insight into a whole other side of one of techno’s foremost talents.

Khidja is a Romanian duo focussed on fusion. They met at high school in Germany and since then have soaked up sounds from all over the world, as well as from their Romanian homeland. From jazz to gypsy music, traditional instrumentation to techno, they skip between genres and generations with ease. Mixing up synths and cult instruments like the setar or ney, their organic soundscapes have come on labels like Hiven Discs and [Emotional] Especial and always add up to intoxicating and esoteric trips. Across the course of 90 minutes for us, they lay all that bare. It’s a punk minded session that journeys through sci-fi noise, freaky disco and no wave sounds with real intensity, building to dense peaks before dissipating and sinking down into a slithering groove. Bold and adventurous, Khidja explore the roots and peripheries of electronic music in brilliantly beguiling fashion.

Every mix in our series is special for different reasons, but there’s no denying that a new one from DâM-FunK will always turn heads. The multi-talented American DJ, musician and vocalist is a one man funk machine who has spent his life distilling boogie, g-funk, electro and synth pop into his own modern take on the genre. The Stones Throw afficionado and Glydezone head honcho has an encyclopaedic knowledge of music, is a prolific producer and collaborator with the likes of Snoop Dogg, and for ten years has hosted his own LA party Funkmosphere. Also, make sure to keep your eyes and ears pealed for his upcoming release ‘Architecture II’, dropping in August. This selection is very much like a night at one of those events: at nearly three and a half hours long, it touches on every facet of DâM-FunK’s sound from the opening and closing eighties synth-pop of Prefab Sprout to Jayda G’s recent tribal house cut ‘Sestra’s Cry’. Next to those, an impossibly diverse list of house and funk names includes Omar-S and Sylvia Striplin, 808 State and Barry White, Bas Noir and YES. As is always the way with DâM-FunK, each track is given the respect it deserves. The mixing is unfussy, often allowing tracks to end before slamming in the next one. Sometimes he moves the mix forwards, at others he takes a brave sidestep that would seem impossible on paper but that makes perfect sense in the context of this mix. All that means its likely you’ll keep on coming back to this timeless selection for many years to come. Mixed live in Ladera Heights (Los Angeles, California), via all original wax pressings owned by DāM-FunK.

Batu’s on a roll. He always is. In a few short years, the Bristol producer has made his own Timedance label widely acclaimed as one of the best out there, while his own productions constantly nudge swinging, bass heavy and broken beat techno in subtle new directions. They have come on the likes of Fringe White and Hessle Audio, while earlier this month he signed to XL Recordings for his latest EP. Always experimenting, challenging himself and and challenging us, he is an innovative artist driven by creating something new. In the DJ booth he’s just as interesting, and here serves up 100 minutes of music that show off his many different styles. His characterful broken beats eventually turn to techno, UK funky drum patterns and then get turned inside out as you’re left to float in a sea of ambient synths and subliminal rhythms. It’s a mix run through with the spirit of UK music from across the ages and wilfully flips mood and tempo so that you can start and end the mix at any point and it will always make sense.

After a couple of well received releases for 1080p and Pinkman, Betonkust and Palmbomen II will properly consummate their relationship with Center Parcs, a debut album on our label this summer. It brings together two Dutch artists with an achingly nostalgic, perfectly washed out and saturated sound that calls on house, pop, ambient, electro and IDM and fills you with familiar emotions from a time and place you might never have actually experienced. On this new, rough edged and hardware heavy mix the duo offer timeless sounds coated in tape hiss and rich in fuzzy, lo-fi melody. There are dreamy ambient passages that are like looking at sunlight through a frosted window, crunchy drum tracks that bristle and prickly with sharp hits and glassy keys and 80s synth tracks that are beautifully naive and innocent. The whole thing plays out with faded kaleidoscopic colours that leave you in a dreamy reverie, and it’s utterly magic.

SHXCXCHCXSH’s techno is as mysterious and abstract as their artist alias. The Swedish duo has remained anonymous since their debut in 2012, largely because they believe that existing in isolation makes it easier to be creative. And they sure have been that, with a spotless run of EPs and LPs on Avian and Rösten that balance light with dark, noise with groove. Though the pair produce famously heavy, dense and gritty soundtracks, they never forget a powerful underlying groove that makes them an equal part artful noise band and compelling techno duo. Their mix for us is made entirely of their own new compositions and is aimed directly at the club after a few years making non dance floor material. It bares that out across an idiosyncratic hour of broken rhythms, fizzing synths and distorted textures "but we didn’t want to repeat tired old patterns and processes and tried something new. This experiment gave us a new way of working with rhythms and we never had as much fun in the studio. Much of the material that came out of the experiment is in this mix and much more will come out as one album called OUFOUFOF on our own Rösten in October, and one EP on Mord in November." As such the mix has all the dynamism of a impromptu live set as it shifts from the sound of malfunctioning machines to apocalyptic techno and back to anxious ambient. Unpredictable and challenging, it’s the sort of mix that leaves you thinking WTF and immediately heading back to the start for a second run, just to try and work out what you just heard.

Alessandro Adriani has been championing unusual and unknown synth wave and industrial sounds for a decade now. The Berlin based Italian has done so on his Mannequin Records label as well as on Pinkman and Jealous God and at his bi-monthly party at Säule/Berghain. An inquisitive mind and avid collector whose taste ranges from jazz to Italo to disco, he is a real treasure trove of musical knowledge, as are his DJ sets. There’s a real sense of discovery to the mix he has laid down for us. It’s filled with chilly synths and industrial textures that are sometimes manic and wild, at others stripped back and haunting. There’s also twisted techno and macho disco, all stitched together with a sense of style that manages to sounds as much from the 80s as it does some unknown future. Adriani’s world is a timeless world, then, but one you’ll be compelled to return to over and over again.

Shanti Celeste always gets the party pumping. Not by reaching for obvious tunes or resorting to the lowest common denominator, but with great selections and slick mixing. Her reach extends deep into house, electro and techno, and can take you way back to the early days or propel you into the future with a seamless ease. Her own productions pull the same trick, and have given rise to pumping vocal house, slippery electro or darker techno jams on key labels like Dekmantel, Idle Hands, Brstl and her own Peach Discs. The London based Chilean born artist also finds time to do an NTS show, and serve up red hot podcasts like this one. It is made up of predominantly new and forthcoming music from friends and peers such as Strategy, Peverelist, E-unity, Bass Cleff, SW:SVN, Talaboman remixed by L.B Dub Corp, plus FFT1 and LNS. And it sure does pack a lot in without ever sounding hurried. There are skeletal sci-fi rhythm tracks bleeding into corrugated electro funk, tribal broken beats and deep techno with a fantastic sidestep into the peerless neo-soul of Jill Scott. It’s a brave mix of styles and tempos that leaves you wondering how Celeste has made them all work together quite so well.

Kamaal Williams has almost single handedly made jazz cool again. The exceptional keys player first did so as part of the now sadly disbanded Yussef Kamaal. Their debut album Black Focus was widely heralded as a modern great, and will soon be followed up by The Return, which finds Williams link with bassist Pete Martin, drummer MckNasty and sound engineer Richard Samuels. It is said to be a natural successor that deals in the sounds of the London streets as well as plenty of visionary jazz. Williams himself also makes soul infused broken beats and house as Henry Wu on labels like MCDE and Eglo and plays mesmeric live shows, so is one of the most vital characters in the modern music landscape. Before he plays for us a Lente Kabinet he has served up a special one hour mix that offers up plenty of his inspirations and influences. From high speed jazz funk to languid, worldly jazz via transcendental guitars and summery soul, it bares all the beautiful hallmarks of Williams’s own music and makes perfect sense in warm weather.

Stanislav Tolkachev has been turning out experimental techno for more than a decade but might never have been as prolific as he is now. Hot on the heels of an EP on Raw Waxes that brimmed with dark IDM invention, this month sees him serve up his fourth full length, It Will Be Too Late Then. It finds the Ukrainian serving up controlled machine made chaos, cavernous grooves and his trademark arpeggios across nine forward thinking tracks. All this and more is showcased on his podcast for us. Tolkachev’s compulsive rhythms are the foundation for what is an end of days soundtrack that takes you from the heat of a percussive battle to a charred and desolate landscape. It’s cinematic music rich in texture, blistering drums and sharp melodies that is beautiful in its brutality.

Paramida is a breath of fresh air on the Berlin scene. Her sound and style goes against the dark, mono-chromatic, machine made music of most of the city and instead heads in a more colourful and Balearic direction. She pushes a bright and emotional sound, and runs the Love on the Rocks label with a similar aim. She calls herself ‘Berlin’s most hated’ but surely isn’t, instead she’s picking up ever more fans because of her “discofied tropical leanings” and passion for unusual house music. And you can expect plenty of that in her podcast. It soundtracks a slow awakening with retro synths drawing you into, and jumbled grooves ranging from dreamy to sunset in style. The overall vibe is one a late eighties house party in Ibiza with plenty of curveballs and moments of subtle euphoria all included. It’s refreshing alternative to the Berlin sound the world knows and loves, and is a timely and welcome edition to our own series.

Since the end of Sandwell District, Silent Servant has continued to be an influential presence in the techno world. The American’s Jealous God label defies convention and expectation with each release and his own avant guard productions remain utterly unique. Each one speaks to his roots—Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine, The Cure—by fusing post punk and industrial with techno in chilling ways. His conceptual and sincere aesthetic carries over into his live sets, but also his DJ mixes. This latest one is special indeed: it is a mix of influences, in chronological order and “with only a few hiccups in dates” from 1972 to 2000 and all recorded on vinyl in one take. The resulting hour takes in plenty of those goth and alternative rock sounds, new wave, noise and experimental touchstones he grew up on in Los Angeles, but also seamlessly connects them to the techno that later influenced him so the likes of Kraftwerk, Neon, The Final Cut, Toddy Terry and Jeff Mills all make the cut. From stark and jerky rhythms early on to supple, strobe lit grooves in the second half, this is a personal mix that really tells the story of Silent Servant’s musical evolution.

SØS Gunver Ryberg makes big, powerful music. Hailing from Denmark the former stunt woman turned BAFTA nominated producer and composer lays down driving rhythms and textures for exhiliarating live shows at Berghain, Atonal, and on Boiler Room, or labels like Contort. Often stitching in field recordings to add texture and timbre to her work it adds up to a brilliantly dark and insular experience somewhere between noise and techno. Says the woman herself of her podcast for us, “this is a mix between unreleased tracks, jams and some already released tunes. All music is by SØS Gunver Ryberg except the remix for Else Marie Pade.” The resulting 45 minutes start off as an all out assault: a flurry of synths and frazzled lines, overdriven drums and apocalyptic overtones. But the heaviness subsides and the energy dissipates into muggy and dystopian ambient. Drums do then return and bring with them a real eeriness that makes this an utterly compelling session.

One of many debuts at Dekmantel Festival later in the year will come from Detroit in Effect aka D.I.E, the now solo project of Tameko J. Williams, also known as DJ Maaco. The Motor City artist has roots that run deep into techno and electro and have helped make him one of Detroit’s most under the radar but influential acts. Records like ‘RU Married’ are classic to this day, while other releases on M.A.P. Records helped established D.I.E’s sound as the artists themselves tended to stay out of the spotlight. But this mix will surely put Williams very much back in the headlines: it’s an hour of pure techno and electro heat from the heart of the 313 area code. Quick, slick mixes keep things moving at a real pace as slippery drums and squelchy bass race out of the speakers. Touching on everything from classic Drexciya to timeless vocal cuts, deeper grooves to all out physical assaults, it’s as much a mixing masterclass as it is a real history lesson.

Mafalda has quietly become a truly influential part of the London music scene. Born in Portugal but based in the English capital since 2014, she moved there after a powerful club experience involving Sadar Bahar and has since gone on to create many of her own. Not only does she play at Europe’s most cultured clubs and festivals, but she also co-runs the peerless reissue label Melodies International with Floating Points, DJ Love On The Run and Elliot Bernard, is resident at the much loved You’re A Melody night and worked at Cosmos Records. A serious digger and eye opening selector, she plays moving music with a positive message. In just over an hour here, Mafalda pours out her heart through a series of moving jazz tracks that are imbued with various elements of soul and Afroism. Sweeping vocal tracks range from raw and funk fuelled to blue eyed and sombre. As well as showcasing her ability to dig out high quality music that will have ID requests immediately flooding in, this perfectly sequenced mix is also the sort to get the right club in raptures despite the decidedly non-dance floor nature of the selections. As a DJ, curator and digger, then, Mafalda is one of the best out there right now.

The Maghreban is the most recent alias of an artist who has projects dating as far back as 1995. They deal in everything from drum & bass to jazz, hip hop to techno, and this most recent moniker doesn’t find the producer narrowing down his scope in any way. Proof comes with his debut album 01DEAS on R&S next month. It is a wildly diverse record that takes in 13 different genres studies from afro rock to freak house, jazz beats to dub rollers. Each one is perfectly produced and sounds utterly authentic. It should be no surprise, then, that the hour selection he has put together for us is just as wilfully schizophrenic. It’s a masterful mega mix of sounds and scenes and styles that really shouldn’t go together, but they do. Curious synth jams segue into serene electro, swinging dub house brushes up with horror soundtracks and high summer afro grooves dance next to cosmic disco in effortlessly coherent ways from start to finish.

Hot on the heels of his latest EP on Ninja Tune comes a new podcast from Nathan Fake. An outsider artist since day one, Fake uses cheap and easy-to-acquire technology to make his always idiosyncratic sounds. They have always been leftfield and thoughtful dreamscapes that fuse techno, experimental and ambient together, but have recently tended towards a darker, more intense place. That is played out across the 65 minute selection he has put together for us here. It features unreleased music from Fake and friends, as well as tracks from Karen Gwyer, long time Border Community label mate James Holden, plus Peverelist, Autechre and more. After a synth heavy and beatless start, lo-fi and fuzzy styles of electro, acid and techno all add up to the sort of primal yet intriguing trip you would expect from such a revered underground figure.

Twin Peaks is an improvised partnership made up of DJ Yazi from avant guard hip hop collective Black Smoker Records, and Future Terror resident Haruka. Both hail from Japan and their collaboration first started with a back to back DJ set. It soon—necessarily—evolved into a larger set up consisting of four decks and two mixers that allows the pair to fully realise their vision, which is to serve up a scintillating and diverse mix of sounds and scenes in seamless ways. Hardware is also occasionally added into the mix, but whatever tools they use, the results are always adventurous and expressive. This two hour session is a perfect example of the sort of magic that happens when this pair come together. Opening with otherworldly ambient bliss, psychedelia takes over before soot black broken beats begin to make a more physical impact. Things get ever-weirder from there, whether that’s with passages of spooky dub or paranoid techno. Throughout the session, though, you feel wholly consumed by, and lost in, a convincing parallel world that is as cinematic as it is cerebral.

Max Graef is at the centre of his own little musical world that includes being co-foudner of Money $ex Records and part of the Oye Records and Box Aus Holz crews. It’s a world of loose house grooves, jazzy influences and disco flourishes with lo-fi aesthetics that has spawned two essentials albums—on Tartelet and Nine Tune respectively—as well as countless singles. More recently he has delved into techno, though, proving that he is an inquisitive artist who has plenty of tricks up his sleeve. He is a wizard on a range of outboard gear as well as having some very real playing chops when it comes to keys, guitars and percussion. As a DJ his organic style always comes through, which means his mix for us is an impromptu thing that calls on lots of different grooves. Sometimes hurried and minimal, at others spacious and deep, it’s a showcases of all the many influences that Graef distills into his own productions and is a nuanced listen that stands up to home listening. Included along the way are a couple of forthcoming solo tunes, as well as one with long time musical sparring partner Glenn Astro, so have fun picking them out.

It’s people like Mano Le Tough who make DJing into an art form, as you can tell from the mix he has done for us ahead of our festival in São Paolo this weekend. The connection he makes with dance floors are always as deep as can be; with a real sense of melody, emotion and song like structure, he crafts sets that make a lasting impact on those who hear them. This has resulted in him being one of the busiest DJs on the circuit, on a par with deep house heroes Ame and Dixon, who he plays with regularly. As a producer, his smooth and mellifluous sounds land on labels like Permanent Vacation and more recently Pampa, which is a perfect fit for his curious sense of melody. This week’s mix is an hour of deep house that rumbles through a humid jungle, zones you out with hypnotic vocal tracks and encourages you to day dream amongst distant pads. Even when things turn more towards a techno groove later on, you still remain deeply entrenched in the groove, marching on through to a trippy climax that gently stirs you out of your hypnosis with a real celestial charm.

Courtesy is one of techno’s newest breakthrough stars. The Greenland born, Danish raised DJ, Ectotherm label boss and journalist first turned heads with some key online mixes in 2016 which showed she will reach for whatever works be that rave, electro or breaks. Since then she’s further established herself with her own regular NTS show and sets at key places like De School and Berghain, and in three weeks time she will play our festival in Sao Paolo. To get in you on the mood for that she’s first turned out a new mix which, as usual from Courtesy, is characterised by fascinating contrasts. It’s high in energy from the off, and races through a number of styles of house and techno that ranges from twisted to dubbed out to ghetto. Getting ever-quicker as it goes, there’s a subtle sense that you’re building towards something throughout the set. It makes it an absorbing, high octane ride that never settles in once place but at the same time feels like one complete story.

As long as Melbourne has had a house music scene, Francis Inferno Orchestra has been at the heart of it. Though now lives in Europe, the Australian’s sound is melody rich and tinged with disco dazzle when in the studio, while as a DJ he has an anything goes approach that turns up plenty of surprises. As well as co-running Superconcious Records, he releases on Let’s Play House and Drumpoet Community and has previously guessed on our Dekmantel Radio Show. For his mix, he goes sublimely slow and serene to start with. Beautiful ambient pads, twinkling keys and swooning strings encourage you to day dream before gently persuasive drums pick things up. From there, it’s an unpredictable ride full of twists and turns that one minute serves up acid, the next tribal drums, then hands in the air house. Before the end there is a return of ambient and even slow motion funk gets dropped. With spring just round the corner, this is a perfect mix to take us there.

UK artist Gatto Fritto is someone who operates in the shadows, in his own little world. The man born Ben Williams played our Selectors festival in Croatia last year and holds down residencies at Berlin institutions Sameheads and Renate, which prove why he is such a revered DJ. His work as a producer, too, has resulted in some exceptionally cosmic disco on standard bearers like International Feel and Dissident, as well as his own Fritto Morto. It’s twinkling, spine tingling stuff awash with melodies, FX and astral synths that transport you into the cosmos. A sense of frosty melody and plenty of pixelated synths characterise the nearly two hour selection he has put together for us here. It starts in abrasive and arresting fashion with serrated lines and stark drums before unravelling into sci-fi grooves then Italo, proto-disco and slippery electro. After exploring these diverse yet interconnected sound worlds for the first half, the second half races through an icy and intergalactic brand of techno that leaves you utterly breathless.

It is not the first time that we turn to a Cómeme artist for our next mix. The singular Latin American label was the first to release music by Ana Helder in 2011, and has continued to do so since. The Argentinian artist has a rough riding house sound built on kinked grooves and wonky synths. It’s uplifting and has taken her to DJ sets all round the world. Back home in Rosario she also promotes her own parties and has earned a reputation as someone with a subversive, unpredictable style. The hour she puts together here is a happy selection of upright tracks that pay no regard for genre or period: there is alternative 80s indie from Bob Chance, dubbed out drum tracks from Mr G and stripped back minimalism from Losoul and A Guy Called Gerald and its all mix up with African percussion and one of Anna’s own slippery and trippy cuts, ‘Sexe’. If Ana wasn’t on your radar before, this mix will certain ensure she stays firmly in your sights in 2018.

// 47 UMa b > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Terence Fixmer

// OGLE-2012-BLG-0026L c > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Patrick Russell Patrick Russell is one of the more under-the-radar DJs who hail from Detroit. The reason for that is his uncompromising style. He plays what he wants, not what he thinks you want to hear. Finally the world is catching up and the man brought up on the Midwest rave scene is making wider waves. He is a core member of the No Way Back party that reinterpret the city’s rave past for a new audience, and will be one of the many DJs playing Dekmantel Festival in August, so we invited him into our series to show off his skills. His sixty minute mix is a heady world of creepy and paranoid techno. From the sort of warped, 4am soundtracks that makes best sense in a pitch black club to brain frying and peak time stuff that bashes you round the head, it’s always on the move and always keeping you guessing.

// Kepler-61 b > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Job Sifre Another of the many standout DJs to emerge from the ever-fertile Amsterdam scene, Job Sifre is now rightfully starting to get props from outside the city. Helping him on the way is his monthly Red Light Radio show, which shows off his cosmic and electronic take on synth heavy house. He has backed that up with compelling sets at places like De School and Salon Zur Wilde Renate, as well as with a fresh new wave and house EP that was the first release on Interstellar Funk’s new label, Artificial Dance. Job will play with us at Dekmantel Festival in August, so first offers up a snapshot of his current sound. Over the course of nearly two hours, he takes his time to go from laidback and horizontal to more upright and drum lead. The sounds are often laden with icy synths, the drums are heavyweight and the atmospheres are spooky and sci-fi. His is a truly electronic world devoid of human life and it touches on new wave, macho disco, cosmic house and prickly dub in frosty and freaky ways.

// KIC 8012732 b > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Skatebård As is often the way with artists who hail from the chilly climes of northern Europe, Skatebard deals in a cosmic brand of disco. Usually coloured with elements of Detroit house and neo-Italo, his sound has given rise to hugely sought after mini-albums—such as 2002’s recently re-released Skateboarding Was A Crime (In 1989)—as well as plenty of functional yet emotive 12”s. Next to his own Digitalo Enterprises label, he has worked on the likes of Sex Tags Mania and Full Pupp, has produced with DJ Sotofett and is no stranger to a sense of fun when it comes to DJing. Midway through December last year he played, as he does regularly, at Fettschmelze in Karlsruhe. More than three hours of the set was recorded and is presented here as a fine overview of Skatebard’s broad skills as a selector. From carefree, key-laced disco to cosmic curveballs via sleek and futuristic house, it is a freewheeling mix that manages to glide effortlessly between sounds and scenes.

// Kepler-737 b > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Ece Özel We head to Istanbul for our next mix, and it comes from Ece Özel. A key figure on her native scene thanks to her Ozel Zevkler party and residency at MiniMüzikhol, she is celebrated for her weird and wonderful take on electronic music. It’s won her the attention of Boiler Room, and encompasses experimental, lo-fi, ambient, acid and plenty of oddities in between, but all ties together thanks to the underlying sense of mood. Ece will be representing at Dekmantel Festival in August, so you can really get to grips with her sound. Before that comes her podcast for our series, and it’s one that builds suspense slowly but surely with sparse, stripped back rhythms that always twist and turn. There’s wonky techno next to kaleidoscopic electronic house, crisp new wave joined to unhinged drum tracks and even hands in the air disco. Always tied together by an occult and unsettling sense of being on the edge, it’s a a set with Özel’s notably unhinged aesthetic stamped all over it.

// Gliese 3293 c > DF-18 // Incoming transmission: Broken English Club roken English Club is a project by Oliver Ho that explores the “dark friction” between man and machine. It has spawned two albums, most recently June’s The English Beach on L.I.E.S., which soundtracked the desolate scenes of his surroundings with eerie experimental techno. Heavy on apocalyptic synths and doom laden drums, and occasionally run through with melodic optimism, it’s a brilliant testament to Ho’s evocative studio skills after ten years of making more straight up techno as Raudive. Elements of EBM and industrial come into focus on the album, as they do in the mix he has put together for us. In just over an hour, plenty of angular grooves, slapping drums and cold, chilly metallic surfaces unfold in dystopian fashion. Starting off sparse and menacing with French vocals and synths which survey the landscape, eventually the machines take over and grow ever more wild so that you end up in a dehumanised world of reverb, manic pixelated melodies and whirring lines that have a life of their own.

Techno is Gunnar Haslam’s starting point, but the New Yorker often strays way off grid once he gets started. Mostly that happens when in album mode, where he weaves weird melodies into beatless tracks that are laden with drones. When turning out 12”s for the likes of L.I.E.S., Delsin and Argot, he favours a chilly, slithering sound, and as Romans with Tin Man he cooks up elegantly mournful techno that sends you deep into your own mind. The former psychiatrist also plays live with Mike Servito and Justin Cudmore as Hot Mix, so someone who is always evolving and exploring new territory. It’s the same story on his mix for us, which wastes no time in dropping you straight into a bendy, supple techno groove that soon begins to change shape and sound. Along the course of 70 minutes, it becomes skeletal and stripped back, percussive and spaced out then hurried and funky. A pulsing drum line underpins everything while the real drama unfolds in a burrowing top line or mind melting acid squiggle up top. In condensing many different forms of techno into this one mix, Haslam masterfully showcases the breadth of his fascinating sound.

Montreal's Phoebé Guillemot plays records as DJ FATi and is an album specialist as RAMZi. Just this month her fifth full length, Pèze-Piton, dropped and was another beautifully unusual mix of tropical house, dub, future jazz and experimental grooves that are impossibly loose and inescapably infectious. Releasing on cult labels like Mood Hut, 1080p and Rvng Into., her leftfield sounds feel at once completely alien yet also wholly organic and earthy. They are jumbled collages of trippy vocal sounds, squelchy synths and tumbling drums that real new details with each listen. Playing live but also DJing under the DJ Fati alias, when in selector mode her sound is just as fresh. This mix is a worldly hour of laid-back beats, jungle house and new age grooves that ooze exotic flavours and tropical vibes. It goes through blissed out and baeachy passages of instrumentals, jumbled drums and shimmering synths that paint a perfect picture of a some imaginary paradise where all there is to do is soak up the sun and dance.

Happy New Year one and all! We hope you’ll agree there could be no better way to start it off than with a second mix from the one and only Ben UFO. Think of this as side-b to last week’s side-a as, says Ben, “I went about this in the same way I would go about making a tape: two distinct but related ideas that I think work better on their own than if I'd tried to jam them together somehow.” It is another standout selection that showcases the Hessle Audio co-founder’s dual skills as both a tireless digger but also a technically skilled and accomplished DJ. Where side-a was an often heady affair with plenty of open space for you to get lost in, side-b plots a more high pressure and intense trajectory. It’s the peak of the trip that really gets you on your toes as it hurries through slamming grooves and a whole history of electronic music. The kick drums come on thick and fast throughout. Some feel blissed-out and dreamy, others feel dark and menacing. There are nods to the funky dread of hardcore, slither of electro and swing of UK garage along the way, and every new drop helps colour the mix and ensure it is anything but a linear and predictable affair. Once again mixing crate-digging smarts with a rare dance floor dynamism, these two Dekmantel mixes are the sound of Ben UFO at his best.

Christmas is here! We hope you have a lovely one and, to help make it a musically memorable time, we’re playing Santa and will be delivering a couple of extra special mixes today and next week. Ben UFO is someone very close to everything we do here at Dekmantel. His taste is broad and well informed, and his rare skill in the DJ booth is matched only by his endless quest for exciting new sounds to play. In that regard he embodies our outlook perfectly: he is someone who unearths a previously unknown gem as often as he breaks a red hot new record. His sets have been a key feature of Dekmantel parties around the world and, for us, he is one of the very best DJs out there. In basic terms, this is a deep mid-tempo house and techno mix. But the reality is that it unfolds with such an intriguing narrative that it feels like so much more. The mixing is so smooth you barely notice where one track ends and another starts. Instead, without realising, you find the atmosphere constantly changes, taking you from sci-fi machine grooves to muggy bumping techno, from celestial and hallucanogenic synth lines to creepy meandering riffs that encourage you to follow them into the unknown. It’s a mix that places you at the heart of a smoky dance floor, but is one that offers as much of a cerebral thrill as a visceral one. What’s more, it somehow feels like only half of the story.

Anthony Linell was formerly known as Abdulla Rashim, the centre piece of a Stockholm techno collective who have been at the sharp end of the scene for the last few years. Mixing up club grooves with exploratory experimental music, the intriguing and mysterious artist runs the Northern Electronics label and, at the same time, put out much of his own music on his Abdulla Rashim Records. A master of atmosphere and hypnotic grooves that cannot fail to suck you in, this year alone has seen him put out two albums and an EP under his real name. The sounds are just as absorbing as always, and mix up dark ambiance with dungeon synth and desolate sonic landscapes. All this carries over into his DJ work, and the mix he has served up for us here is a beautifully bleak and lonely one. Underpinned by slick rubbery drums and detailed with everything from funeral to sci-fi to subliminal synths, it’s an intriguing musical rabbit hole that gets weirder and more unreal the further down it you go.

Not for the first time, our mix series now turns to a DJs who has earned himself a Europe-wide reputation thanks to his essential skills as a resident. He is Phillip Jondo and his musical playground is Salon des Amateurs in Dusseldorf, a place where he serves up mixes of minimal wave and mutant disco, leftfield house and industrial that also takes him on the road to plenty of key gigs. Next to this he holds down a monthly show, We R All Egyptians, on London’s NTS and it is another brooding affair filled with ceremonial rhythms. Next to this, he also works as Garland with Simon Weins. Their debut release Preludes lands on Lullabies for Insomniacs on January 1st and is a loosely rhythmic offering that echoes with wonder and channels plenty of otherworldly magic. For us, though, he has put together an ‘uptempo and clubby’ selection that is beautiful weird and beguiling and is nothing like a regular mix of four to the floor styles. Instead it is a fizzing and restless brew of mystic drums and forest synths, of impish spirits and cinematic post-human landscapes that make for an intriguing listen. Ending up with a flurry of future electro, it’s a mix that shows Jondo’s musical world is truly unique and offers you a sneak preview of what to expect when he plays Dekmantel Selectors for the first time in 2018.

Swede Peder Mannerfelt makes music that is hard to categorise. And whether producing for Fever Ray and Blonde Redhead or serving up albums and EPs on Archives Intérieures and Hinge Finger, he is fiercely inventive. From experimental tribal concept music like his The Swedish Congo Record to the disassembled and goth-tinged techno rhythms of his latest, Controlling Body, he always pushes boundaries in bold new ways. He is an artist who likes to forget what he knows and go with his instincts, and it has resulted in a body or work that is truly beguiling. His mix for our series is just as esoteric. It is a two hour collage that starts of as a voodooistic brew of shamanistic rituals, abstract noise and kinked techno that takes you to a dark foreign world. From there there are some more traditional passages of drum rhythms and wild machine-made sounds as well as diversions into plenty more uncategorizable sonic spheres thanks to tracks from the likes of Pinch, Errorsmith, Vatican Shadow, Machine Woman, Umfang and tens more. It’s music as warfare, as cinema, as experimentation, and it sounds like nothing else out there.

Alexander Nut is an expert curator. He first proved that as the only experimental hip hop DJ on London’s Rinse FM with a show that was a cornerstone of the station’s early years. Alongside that, he has made his own Eglo Records into a future facing outlet that puts out soul, jazz, house, techno and everything in between, and core artists like Fatima, Floating Points and Funkineven have emerged and remained loyal to it as a result. His own DJing now takes him across the world on an ever busier schedule, and on his travels he never stops digging. This podcast is proof of that as it freewheels through myriad different musical spheres. From breezy afro to photo house via spangled bass tracks and summery groovers, it is full of twists and turns and mixes and blends that few other DJs would even attempt. A lot is crammed into a busy hour, and along the way you will go up, down and round and round. It’s the sort of selection that is infused with the same sense of subtle spirituality that colours all that Nut does, and for that reason leaves a truly lasting impression.

Despite having a discography that dates back to the last millennium, Pittsburgh’s Shawn Rudiman has never quite enjoyed the spotlight he deserves. His often analog electro and techno manages to be tough but not austere, and it has come under his own name as well as in the duo THD (Total Harmonic Distortion) on a range of boutique labels. He’s a prolific artist who this month looks back on his career with a two disc retrospective, Timespan on Pittsburgh Tracks, that offers largely brand new tracks which “go from base-level warehouse to more cerebral sophistication”. That versatility shows when he lays down one of his mesmeric live shows, as he has done for us in this exclusive new set. It’s just 45 minutes long but packs a lot in, from soul infused Detroit techno to elastic house. Passages of serenity are often followed by a heavily percussive wake-up call or serrated acid line, but never do things feel forced. From dark to light, visceral to beautiful, it has many different moods and is a great reminder of the talents of one of techno’s lesser known stars.

Norwegian Charlotte Bendiks came up on the famous Tromsø techno sound of her homeland. It means her music is mystical, frosty and metallic, which made it perfectly at home on the Cómeme label where she released her first EP. She has also had outings on Love OD Communications and throws her own parties back home, all while serving up off kilter DJ sets informed by growing up in an isolated and lonely arctic town. That lends them a sense of escapism, fantasy and story telling that when married to her so called “body music” style, make them utterly compelling. Over the course of ninety minutes, she segues through hallucinogenic synth tracks, loosely jumbled percussion and acid flecked slow motion house that will jerk you into action. It’s a playful and intoxicating mix that will warm you through on a chilly evening and conjures party vibes in brilliantly off kilter and unusual ways. On this evidence, it looks like 2018 could well be her year.