RA Podcast

As he'll happily tell you, Eddie Fowlkes has been DJing for 42 years. That's a long time for anyone, but especially for someone who never really stopped. From his early records on Juan Atkins' Metroplex record label through to newer releases on his own labels City Boy and Detroit Wax, he's been doing his thing and staying true to himself and his timeless combination of Detroit dance music genres. He doesn't always get his dues alongside his fellow Detroit techno pioneers in the Belleville Three, probably because his sound was always more hybrid, a blend of techno and house that he would come to call techno soul, including on his landmark 1993 album with Moritz von Oswald and Thomas Fehlmann, The Birth Of Technosoul. But Fowlkes is still a force of nature, and a master at mixing too, having four decades to hone his craft. You'll hear that skill on his RA Podcast, which comes in the wake of two more prominent releases, for Rekids and Classic Music Company/Defected, that might help (re)introduce him to a wider audience. Touching on soul, jazz and funk, this is functional but deep stuff played by a master selector, whose hands you can always hear in the mixing—a personal, human touch that defines techno soul. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/877

Mauricio Rebolledo is one of those veteran artists who has stood the test of time. He can play Burning Man, go back-to-back with DJ Tennis and mentor young producers with unwavering finesse, staying true to his signature sound of sparse, psychedelic chuggers. Where many of his peers have embraced a more commercial sound, the Mexican artist likes to keep it weird, opting for touches of Krautrock and hazy atmospherics in both his sets and on his albums. He tends to be associated with tribal drums and screwy trance, but in reality, the Hippie Dance cofounder and long-time Kompakt affiliate is a man of many influences—as heard on his RA Podcast. Whimsical interludes of French dance pop and retro synth-wave are interspersed with shoegazey electronics ("Dive" by Pale Blue) as well as plenty of his own productions, which blur the lines between minimal house and techno. This is a hypnotic, brooding journey that starts and ends with versions of Justus Köhncke's "Elan," which adds to the mix's loopy feel. (There's also a Prins Thomas remix thrown in for good measure.) No peaks or climaxes here, just long plateaus of zigzagging synths and winding chords. Turn on, tune in and drop out, as they say. @rebolledostyle Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/876

There's an old-school touch to ISAbella's sound. Breakbeats, rolling tech house, progressive house and trance pepper both her studio mixes and her debut EP, transporting listeners to a place of peak '90s indulgence. It's no wonder, then, that vintage rave sounds are a signature tenet of MARICAS, the club night and label that she helped start in 2018. Her love for the '90s is tangible on her RA Podcast, an emotional journey across breakbeat house, trancey techno and funky electro. First-rate throwbacks such as Canyon's "Move" and "Lightspan Soundwave" by The Shamen exude a carefree euphoria, while heavier cuts like Desert's "Moods (Club Mix)'' intensify the feeling of rapture. Even the contemporary releases, like Bashkka's excellent "C-quence Of Calamities," feel rooted in nostalgia. MARICAS mixes are usually energetic from the get-go, but ISAbella starts out nice and relaxed this time around. The mix's most striking element is how personal each track feels—a reflection of her intimate relationship with these records. Each one evokes a special poignancy and though these ephemeral selections were largely improvised, ISAbella believes they "show what's going on lately and what's going on forever." @bellasalmonella Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/875

"I am going to take you on a ride where I will challenge you to back down or go with me," Parrish Smith says in the interview below. "If you don't like to do this, and you see a glimpse of me, you will dislike me. But the second time it happens again, I will be there to change your mind again, just to be challenged." It's a confident, confrontational idea that goes with an unusually confrontational RA Podcast, a mix that represents a truly free spirit in the European dance scene. Smith, who also moonlights in the band Volition Immanent with fellow Dutch trailblazer Mark Knekelhuis, makes and plays hard, aggressive techno. But instead of gabber BPMs and overdriven kick drums, he directly incorporates ideas, sounds and influences from rock, punk and metal, a tricky combination that he nails like few others have been able to. (Just check his album Light, Cruel & Vain.) Case in point: this mix blends Regis, Tzusing and Playboi Carti with Sepultura, Juno Reactor and Celldweller. It's a journey to the end of aesthetics, where opposites don't attract so much as crash and melt into each other. It's a fierce hour-and-a-half but never quite overbearing or overwhelming, gracefully weaving in and out of chaos like the work of someone who knows the real impact and art of heavy music. @parrishsmith Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/874

Emma Blake is, musically, something of a nomad. She made her name—Solid Blake—that is, in Copenhagen, where she cofounded the influential Apeiron Crew alongside Mama Snake and Smokey. They were responsible in establishing the city's "fast techno" sound, which blended sleek techno and trance influences into something colourful and retro-futuristic. But Blake's side of things was always more rooted in electro, with a party-starting flair that you might be tempted to pin to her Glaswegian upbringing. (Her first release, <i>Mario</i>, came out on the label of the legendary Glasgow taps-aff basement nightclub La Cheetah.) And she's also spent time in Berlin, so she has those techno bona fides, too. Another EP, released on Modeselektor's Seilscheibenpfeiler, further fleshed out her electro-techno hybrid sound, also explored in her Historical Repeater project with Danish artist Ctrls. DJing has been her major focus, though—she has an excellent Rinse FM show—and you'll hear a refined approach on her excellent RA Podcast, which is like a club set in miniature, starting out midtempo and rushing towards a heady climax with tracks like Pariah's "Squishy Windows." It's loaded with creative grooves, toothsome textures and the kind of sleek melodies that helped define her stint in Copenhagen since the beginning. @solid_blake Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/873

Joe Delon loves music. You might think that would (or should) be self-evident in someone who DJs for a living, but the electronic music world would be a better place if everyone cared and thought as much as he did. In addition to being an increasingly in-demand DJ, he runs a stellar label, Welt Discos and moonlights as a music writer, with a beloved Substack newsletter that he usually updates twice a week. A blend of touring DJ travelogue and mix recommendations, it's a rich source of information and music from an artist with a warm, friendly voice—and perhaps more importantly, impeccable taste. It's that taste that has endeared him to many dance music fans around the world over the last few years, developing a dedicated fanbase who greet every new mix with bated breath (including, hopefully, this one). He's something of a record digger, but not in the clichéd way—he just loves to find records new and old full of melody, springy rhythms and a generally quirky, positive vibe. The music he selects often has an '80s tinge to it, even when it's not from the '80s, but it's hard to pin down what he plays, both because his sets are so unpredictable, and because it wouldn't be fair. His RA Podcast, as he explains below, is meant to sum up his last year of DJing, a carefully put together selection of favourites from 2022 (meaning records he played that year, not that came out last year). As always, it's a mix of familiar and far-flung records, mixed with Delon's breezy, unique style. Part of the reason why people have come to love his DJing so much is that it just kind of puts a smile on your face. Listen and you'll see. @joedelon Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/872

"I'm usually the first person to label Valentine's Day a commercial scam," says Kikelomo in the interview below, "however I recently realised that sharing music and connecting with people through sound is one of the ultimate expressions of love for me." When the Berlin-based DJ sent in her mix to RA, she subtitled it "All about love." It's nearly two hours of dance music that radiates warmth, positive energy and compassion, expressed through the wide, almost kaleidoscopic genre lens that Kikelomo has made her own. House, jungle, electro, hip-hop, you name it. The mix is even split into two distinct sides, like an old-school cassette mixtape. In addition to being a great and adventurous DJ, Kikelomo also started @orokoradio, a station based in Accra, that connects the Ghanaian capital—and other African cities—with the usual electronic music hotspots, and showcases homegrown talent and sounds through a platform of their own making. It's all part of her mission as a DJ to not only share music and love, but also to connect, uplift and create real community, as she also discusses below. It's not just a buzzword for Kikelomo, but a mission. @kikelomooo Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/871

People usually talk about Berlin, London, New York when discussing electronic music hotspots, and Paris doesn't always get its due. Case in point? It produced Jennifer Cardini, one of the most distinctive DJs to to ever come out of the city. (She's lived in Germany for a while, but the point stands.) Her sound lands somewhere between disco, house and EBM, rooted in a groovy, post-modern chug. You'll hear nu-disco, industrial, techno and electro too, usually built around big hooks. It's a sound that is not only instantly recognizable, but instantly likable. As a producer, Cardini also deserves her flowers. She's been putting out records since the mid-'90s, and with her first label Correspondant, she's built up a rock-solid catalogue from artists like Fort Romeau, Man Power, Cormac and more. More recently she started the Dischi Autunno imprint, a place for more crossover-friendly music that indulges Cardini's tastes for all things melodic (and maybe a little goth). Cardini's RA Podcast is a beautiful summary of all these ideas and influences. It's hard and banging, sure, but also lithe and athletic. There are plenty of tracks with the surge of EBM or the stab of industrial. Lots of reverb. Decadent melodies undergirded by tough drum patterns. And it's paced as expertly as you'd expect from someone who's been DJing for over 30 years. In the interview below, Cardini says she "loves how the young generation is digesting four decades of club / rave culture," and you can hear that history living and breathing in Cardini's DJing, too. @jennifercardini Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/870

We're not in the habit of quoting press materials all the time, but in Kajetan Łukomski's case, it feels appropriate. The first sentence of his bio is "Avtomat is a person with way too many interests." If you know any artists from Poland's wide-ranging, always-growing electronic music scene, chances are he's one of them. He's a DJ, producer, organizer and activist, once a member of the queer feminist collective Oramics, and is endlessly passionate about supporting, spreading and playing music from the Central European and Eastern European regions. With roots in metal, goth and electroclash, there's a certain spikiness to Łukomski's style, but also a polyglot knowledge and a hunger for new sounds. Lately he's been trying to mix club music with Polish folk traditions, which is the mission of Łukomski's RA Podcast, but it's also just the jumping off point. In these almost four hours of expert blending, genre-jumping and incredible pacing, Łukomski touches on almost every style of dance music you could think of, with aplomb and occasionally surprise (like that irresistible Bloc Party edit). If you can, it's worth digesting all in one sitting, so you can truly appreciate the ground he covers. @avtomatmusic Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/869

Before she was Femanyst, Akua Grant was called The Lady Blacktronika, also known as the First Lady Of Beatdown. Beatdown was a type of of ultra-deep house characterized by creamy chords, soulful melodies and, in Grant's case, honeyed vocals. She ran an integral label called Sound Black Recordings, home to some of her best tracks. But around 2017, she turned towards what was essentially the polar opposite: industrial-tinged super hard techno, full of distortion and anger. This is where we find Grant now, as Femanyst, with a mix that shows off heavy-duty techno that still has a heart. She started her own new label, called Dark Carousel, and has released on Paula Temple's Noise Manifesto. She manages to take some of the hardest techno around and imbue it with her signature melodic style. This is probably one of the toughest RA Podcasts yet, but it's also full of feeling, dynamism and tension. Get your best listening setup ready and sink in for two hours. @msladyblacktronika Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/868

Name a genre, and you can bet that Luis Garban has tried his hand at it once or twice. Once a staple of the mid-'00s IDM and breakcore scene—think Tigerbeat6—as Cardopusher, Garban found a temporary home in the dubstep scene afterwards, before shooting off in what felt like a million directions. He might be the only artist to release on both Hyperdub and Boysnoize Records. He makes music that can sound like the future or the past, sometimes both at once, and the Venezuelan-born, Spain-based producer's name is shorthand for musical adventurism and variety. Last year, things got even wilder with the debut of Safety Trance, a new alias that explores pan-Latin club music, with a focus on collaboration and shorter, structured songs. (Artists he's worked with include Arca, Iceboy Violet and Virgen Maria.) It's some of the best and most creative work of his career, riding a larger Latin techno wave producing some of the best music around these days. If that weren't enough, returning to Cardopusher, Garban has a career-best EP on the way for EVAR Records, pulling together the various strands of the project into a multi-genre, Gen-Z-friendly raveathon. Loaded with original tracks from both projects, RA Podcast could be billed as Cardopusher vs. Safety Trance, with highlights coming from Atari Teenage Riot, VTSS and Venetian Snares, which should give you an idea for the kind of controlled chaos you're in for with this one. @cardopusher Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/867

Roughly ten years ago—if we pretend the peak pandemic year-and-a-half doesn't count—Lars Dales and Maarten Smeets first came together as Detroit Swindle, before changing their name to Dam Swindle towards the end of 2020. The original name was meant as a tribute to one of their favorite musical legacies, but recognizing that it didn't come across how they meant it, the duo changed their name to pay homage to their other favourite place: Amsterdam. Dales and Smeets have become core parts of the Amsterdam house scene in their time, especially with their excellent Heist Recordings label, which they started back in 2013 (hey, now *that's* literally ten years ago). It's easy to understand why the duo have become so popular. In person and onstage, they're goofy, funny guys, the kind of people you might describe as the life of the party. And musically, they're massively appealing, marrying a European tech house strut to deeper and more soulful inspirations, a preoccupation reflected in Heist's impressive artist roster: Ge-Ology, Demuir, Byron The Aquarius, Matthew Herbert and more. Their RA Podcast comes at a time of reflection and change, looking back on the decade-plus history of both act and label and plotting their new album, which they say will expand their horizons even more. The mix is eclectic but smooth, pulling together tracks from the likes of Omar-S, Lil Silva, Ruf Dug and Genius Of Time (with one of last year's most underrated tracks). It's always a treat to hear consummate club DJs in a more relaxed mode, and this one's no exception. @damswindle Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/866

When it comes to the sound of modern-day techno—fast, melodic and polyglot, working in genres like trance and gabber—it's hard to find an artist more clearly representative than Anetha. The French DJ encompasses all these influences with style, landing on a lithe sound that's both heavy and nimble, earning her a first residency at Paris party Blocaus (and, currently, Awakenings and Fuse, among others) and appearances on labels like Work Them and Oaks. What really sets Anetha apart, though, is her commitment to developing and uplifting the artists around her. She launched her own label, Mama Told Ya, in 2019 with a unique and heartwarming concept: each release would highlight an artist, often young or new to the game, and feature one collaboration with Anetha herself. It's a move that turns the usual label-artist dynamic on its head, making each new record a fully-fledged collaboration, and lending her own gravitas to the artist she features. And a year later she started an agency—or what she calls a "creative engine"—to help those artists in a more holistic way. Her RA Podcast is a perfect way to start 2023: with energy and verve, and a perfect balance of light and dark. This is techno at its most creative, dark and discombobulated beats cut through with glowing vocal samples from some of the most recognizable songs of the past five years. If you wanted to explain to someone what techno sounds like in 2023, you'd do well to start here. @anethamusic Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/865

Skee Mask is one of dance music's greatest crossover stories of the past decade, with new albums greeted with the attention usually reserved for an Aphex Twin or a Caribou. ("Loved seeing this on r/indieheads," said one Reddit user, on the release of the 2021 LP Pool.) It's not hard to understand why: albums like Compro, he blends well-worn dance music tropes with incredible, detailed soundscapes and spine-tingling melodies. And on his 12-inches, he brings that sensibility to the dance floor, with an approach probably best described as articulate. Even on his most ambient of tracks, everything is in its right place. Along with founders the Zenker Brothers, his music outlines everything that makes Munich outfit Ilian Tape one of the best techno labels going. On the decks, it's kind of a different story. It might surprise you if you only know his albums, but Skee Mask is an incredible DJ, balancing his predilection for hip-hop and UK-informed sounds with laser-focused techno. He can adapt to all sorts of situations—there's an incredible recording of him DJing with four of the best grime and drum & bass MCs in the business—and on his RA Podcast he focuses on the techno side of things, with nearly two hours of pacey techno and creative mixing, with dips into acid, electro, garage and more. It's a party-starting mix from a genuine star, perfect for getting through the holiday doldrums or pre-gaming your NYE plans. Like Skee Mask's best records, it's something to enjoy in any number of settings. @skeemask-music Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/864

You might have first heard of Earth Trax under his original alias, The Phantom. Or maybe his given name, Bartosz Kruczyński, which he uses for gorgeous ambient music. Or Pejzaż, where he cuts up Polish records from his vast collection. Or as part of Ptaki, another sample-based project he did with fellow Warsaw resident Jaromir Kamiński. You get the idea—dude makes a lot of music. And a lot of it is very good. Earth Trax is the project that really made us swoon, with a soft-focus, sunset-hued meld of techno, breakbeat, progressive house and trance. On wonderful records like LP1, melancholy is the operative word, but Kruczyński isn't exactly a sadsack. It's more complex than that, nailing the tears-on-the-dance-floor vibe with the part that many people forget: it's still club music. That's why tracks like "Dream Pop," which kicks off this mix, are so successful—they're heavy but never weighed down by emotion, with a skip in their step and a robust low-end to go with the sighing vocals. Kruczyński's RA Podcast is something of an excavation of this sound, using his own tracks and those of like-minded producers to sketch out a style that's equal parts rousing and pensive, midtempo but still propulsive. Over two and a half hours he lets these tracks breathe and leisurely mixes them together, almost like an old-school progressive house double mix CD but in the more vibrant, varied clothes of today—before it starts to unravel into an extended, beatless outro that's worth sticking all the way until the end for. @earthtraxonline Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/863

Yazzus is one of the most exciting DJs out of the UK right now. But she doesn't play the usual UK stuff. Instead, her work—her productions and her DJing—is both a historiography and a dialogue of the Black Atlantic connection, taking in dance music genres from both sides of the pond. Her work, encompassing techno, electro and sometimes house, is an Afrofuturist project that combines past, present and future. Her recent EP, Black Metropolis, accomplishes this with a genuinely innovative take on '90s Black dance music that uses a vintage template to do something fresh. She calls her RA Podcast a "Black excellence" mix, traveling between eras and places, featuring artists like Skin On Skin, Paul Johnson, Drexciya and Huey Mnemonic. It's part of her mission to highlight (and remind people) about the Black origins of dance music, and also the vitality of today's Black dance music. This mix is a history lesson, a narrative and a rave all in one, something we're proud to host from an exciting young mind in the electronic music scene. @yazzus-1 Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/862

Being named a resident at Berghain is likely an unattainable dream for so many DJs, but for Sedef Adasi, it all happened naturally. The Turkish producer grew up in the mid-sized Bavarian city of Augsburg, where a lack of spaces she felt comfortable with—she's mentioned DJing in shoe stores—led her to start her own party, HAMAM Nights. From there she made her name with a vibrant, diverse sound that encompasses breaks, electro, techno and more, with soft-focus melodies and plenty of vocal hooks. She's one of the first residents at the legendary club to truly reflect the glorious cross-pollination of dance music styles in the '10s, when techno absorbed ideas from dubstep, garage and more. Adasi represents both floors of that club, and you could imagine this RA Podcast going down in either room, but of course, she exists outside that club's narrative too. What you'll hear here is a cutting-edge and dynamic blend of electro and Latin techno—with two tracks from 2022 MVP Nick León—mixed with grace and finesse. Her sound is immediately approachable, well-paced and full of catchy moments and breakdowns. Listen and find out. @sedefadasi Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/861

This month, UK duo Mount Kimbie put out a double-album that is essentially two solo records welded together. It's not terribly surprising: each member lives in different countries (the hip-hop inspired Dom Maker in LA, techno head Kai Campos in London) and they've talked about their differences and what each brings to the table in past interviews. MK 3.5: Die Cuts | City Planning splits the duo's kaleidoscopic sound into its constituent parts, with Maker's side focusing on woozy hip-hop and R&B and Campos's reflecting a love of straightforward '90s techno, as dance floor-friendly as anything the group have ever released. It's the latter that we're here to showcase with this week's RA Podcast, which is a recording of Campos's new live set. In a way it's a more fleshed-out, comprehensive companion to the his side of the album, but it stands on its own as a blistering techno performance. Combining the melodic sense and quirky arrangement tics of Mount Kimbie with a pulsating, stripped-back approach borrowed from Detroit techno—classic drum machine sounds used to the fullest—Campos reinvents himself as one of London's best techno artists. Like the new Mount Kimbie album, it's different, welcome and impressive. @mountkimbie Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/860

As part of our celebration of 21 years of club culture, we're featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties and clubs most important to their lives in dance music. The Loft is one of the most storied and sacred spaces in dance music history. Founded in Manhattan in 1970 by the late David Mancuso, The Loft was a party unlike any other: relaxed and gently psychedelic, with pristine audiophile sound played at a medium volume level kinder to the ears. You didn't need to blast the music to appreciate the sonic perfection of the music and the system it was played on. Over the decades, Mancuso invented his own influential style of DJing, letting the records breathe rather than mashing them together. Mancuso, who died in 2016, had many acolytes over the years, perhaps none more prominent than Colleen 'Cosmo' Murphy, who provides our final 2122 birthday RA Podcast: a tribute to The Loft. Murphy has an impressive resume without The Loft: she's a long-time radio DJ, founded the Classic Album Sundays series and started her own Lucky Cloud Loft Party in London, in collaboration with Mancuso. Her DJing style, slow, steady and respectful of the music, channels those years spent at The Loft, and her RA Podcast embodies the disco-influenced sounds that define the party, played with care, love and reverence.

As part of RA2122, our ongoing celebration of 21 years of club culture, we'll be featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties or clubs most important to their lives in dance music. DJ Voices will be playing our RA2122 party in New York this Saturday, November 29th. DJ Voices is a prime example of an artist that really can do it all. The New York-based artist, originally from Florida, has been an integral part of New York's electronic music as a DJ and as a booker at one of the city's best venues, Nowadays. Voices got her footing as a selector as a founding member of the DJ collective Working Women, but these days she performs solo through her Nowadays residency and her radio show on The Lot, Nothing In Moderation. Her sets are known for their psychedelic dynamism—her selection, with which she prioritizes "energy and drama over genre," often flits from rolling low-end music, uptempo tracks (that she then slows all the way down) and wonky leftfield beats. "It would be hard to overstate how much Nowadays is part of my story at this point, personally and professionally," Voices told RA in the following interview. Her approach to assembling this mix she recorded for us makes that abundantly clear. The mix she recorded for RA—which sprawls out over almost three hours—features tracks that she has either played in her five-year tenure at Nowadays or that she plans to play there in the future. She organized the set in a similar way to the way she goes about her Nowadays sets. She kicks off with fast and nimble bass music ("I like to start fast in hopes of people dancing half-time"), then transitions into a knotty web of dubstep and bright percussive tracks and closes with weightless jungle. The playlist she sourced from to create this mix featured music from every Nowadays resident. It's this same thoughtfulness and meticulous attention to detail that has made her a household name in her local scene.

For our RA2122 series, we've been focusing on dyed-in-the-wool DJs paying tribute to the places that were most important to them. But what if you're an electronic music superstar and you didn't necessarily get your musical education in a club? That's how we come to Marie Davidson, a Canadian artist who counts among the world's most engaging and electrifying live performers, mixing techno with electroclash and post-punk for a sound that feels familiar but totally new at the same time. In 2019, she announced she was retiring from live club music, and then formed a band with fellow Montreal scenesters. But on her RA Podcast, she returns to dance music with a cannonball-sized splash. To hear her tell it, Davidson only became interested in DJing recently—she's only been doing it for a few months. It's a new way for her to explore club music and also pay tribute to the artists she loves, without putting her whole self out there in the same way required of live performances. But you could never tell that Davidson is new to DJing. Her RA Podcast is a masterpiece of modern techno building and pacing, dipping into straight-up trance several times in a way that reminds us of Sasha's legendary Global Underground 013: Ibiza mix CD, with an hour of steady tension rewarded with one hell of a melodic payoff. She sounds like she's ready to play at some of the world's best clubs, proof positive you don't need to have the usual backstory to be an excellent DJ. @mariedavidson_official Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/857

As part of RA2122, our ongoing celebration of 21 years of club culture, we'll be featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties or clubs most important to their lives in dance music. Chris Clayton, AKA Karizma, takes DJing seriously. But he also knows that it's about having fun, or at least helping other people to have fun. This is the formula that makes him such a fantastic DJ, and one of the most technically skilled around (he uses CDJs like few others can). He practices two hours every day, and has been DJing since he was 13. For him, there was no specific party or club that made him the DJ he is today—it was the whole Baltimore scene he grew up in. He is the party. His approach is deeply informed with his history in Baltimore, a city with its own vibrant music scene that always taken a different tack than the rest of the major American undergrounds. House, techno, hip-hop, jazz (and of course Baltimore club), there have never been any boundaries for as long as Clayton has been DJing, which makes his DJ sets as musically adventurous as they are technical. This hour-long set is a neatly-packaged example of his genius, leaning on the jazzier side of his sound, featuring plenty of Atjazz records, his own wide-ranging material and killer edits of Rihanna and Kendrick Lamar.

As part of RA2122, our ongoing celebration of 21 years of club culture, we'll be featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties or clubs most important to their lives in dance music. The first time we featured DJ Nobu on the RA Podcast, over ten years ago, we called him "one of Japan's best DJs." In hindsight, i think we can all agree that the country qualifier is no longer necessary: he's one of the world's best DJs, bar none. An absolute master at curating and mixing techno, Nobu has helped to inspire a Japanese school of techno that is psychedelic, hypnotic and often very pretty, without losing the genre's oomph or edge. And he's more popular than ever around the world, playing some of the best parties and clubs in pretty much any country or city you could name. But DJ Nobu's roots and heart are close to home. Frustrated with techno in the Japanese capitol, he created his own party in his neighbouring hometown, Chiba, where nightlife was less pretentious and the vibe was a little looser. Future Terror quickly became known as one of Japan's premiere techno parties, and paved the way not only for Nobu himself, but many other Japanese DJs who Nobu and his later partner Haruka gave the chance to shine. The party also recently celebrated its landmark 20th anniversary with its first-ever party in London. This mix is a direct tribute and encapsulation of Future Terror, what Nobu calls a "condensed story" of the series focusing on the more outré elements at the fore—an "awareness of techno" with plenty of more leftfield tracks thrown in. What follows might be a little gentler than you'd expect from Nobu, but it's all top-tier techno mixed with an expert hand. @djnobu_bitta Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/855

As part of RA2122, our ongoing celebration of 21 years of club culture, we'll be featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties or clubs most important to their lives in dance music. It's safe to say that there would be no house music, and no dance music as we know it, without François Kevorkian. The French-born, New York-based DJ started remixing disco records in the late-'70s when he was in his early 20s and became a pioneer of the form alongside names like Larry Levan, Tom Moulton and Walter Gibbons. And though he would become a house icon, he became especially known for the trippy "dub" mixes on the B-sides of records, which often eschewed the structure and vocals of the songs he was remixing in favour of excursions into the unknown. It's that legacy that led him to Deep Space, his Monday-night residency at the once-legendary Meatpacking District club Cielo, which was one of the most beloved (and best-sounding) rooms in Manhattan. Deep Space started at 2003 and ran weekly for 15 years, eventually moving to Output in Brooklyn. The idea was to explore "dub" in all its forms, and to play all kinds of music while manipulating it in real time. The slogan was "Live On The Mixing Board." At Deep Space you would hear all kinds of music. Dub, reggae, dub techno, drum & bass—and later on, as you''ll hear in this mix, dubstep—sure, but also disco, R&B, funk, old-school house. All music was dub in Kevorkian''s hands, and over the years Deep Space became one of the most renowned and consistent parties in New York, a place of refuge and discovery every single Monday (and, eventually, Sunday). This four-hour recording allows you to almost experience what it was like to be in that room—you can even hear the crowd whooping and cheering—as Kevorkian journeys through ultra-deep techno, dubstep and a string of funky disco and post-disco tracks. It''s a sound all his own, and though it was recorded 13 years ago, still sounds full of possibility and potential. Like the future. @fknyc Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/854

As part of RA2122, our ongoing celebration of 21 years of club culture, we'll be featuring some of our favourite DJs from around the world, highlighting the parties or clubs most important to their lives in dance music. First up we have Tama Sumo and Lakuti, both residents at Berlin's Panorama Bar, the house-focused room upstairs at Berghain. Panorama Bar has played host to thousands—if not millions—of people's most formative dance floor experiences, with an unparalleled vibe, near-perfect sound and window blinds that have taken their own place in dance music mythology. The duo's mix highlights the style that Tama Sumo and Lakuti have brought to the club and represents its anything-goes energy, mixing tracks from iconoclasts like Hieroglyphic Being (including one of his best-ever tracks) in with old-school favorites from Reel By Real, Larry Heard and even Ministry, moving from house to industrial to disco without batting an eyelid. Tama Sumo and Lakuti's loose but impeccable flow ties together house music history with a deep love and knowledge of all genres and, perhaps most importantly, the desire and know-how to just make people dance. We couldn't be more thrilled to feature Tama Sumo and Lakuti for the first mix in our birthday series, and we hope that you enjoy it as much as we do. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/853

This week's RA Podcast marks something of a debut for Infinity Division, the new solo project from Canadian artist Ash Luk, best known as one half of EBM-techno duo Minimal Violence. (Minimal Violence had itself been a solo project since last year, when cofounder Lida P left the group.) Getting his start in Vancouver's punk scene as part of the band Lié, Luk's approach to dance music is informed not only by those origins but by Western Canada's long history with industrial music and techno (spot Skinny Puppy and Tunnel Canary in the tracklist). Minimal Violence first impressed us with their hardware-focused house and techno, a harder-edged version of the sound that was sweeping Vancouver at the time, before moving on to Ninja Tune sub-label Technicolour and then Tresor for a series of records that saw their sound become more expansive, sharper and more melodic, incorporating not just techno and punk influences but also trance, EBM and more. These are the genres that feed into Infinity Division, and Luk's RA Podcast hurtles through everything from old Prodigy, '90s German hard trance, Canadian breakcore and new tracks from his project. This is heavy dance music that's also heavy on melody, unafraid of huge crescendoes that hit that sweet spot between punishment and euphoria. Buckle up. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/852

For some dance music fans, Hamish & Toby may be their new favourite DJs thanks to a recent US tour and excellent sets at festivals like Glastonbury, Dimensions, Houghton and Freerotation. 2022 was, after all, a breakthrough year for the UK duo. But in their own, close-knit world of Discogs fanatics and vinyl purists, Hamish Cole and Toby Wareham are admired and established names. They met while studying in Leeds, bonding over a shared love of wiggly bombs at countless clubs and hazy afterparties. They ran events (Butter Side Up, Dog Eat Dog), DJ’d tirelessly and continued to dig for obscure gems. Within a few years, they were both working full-time music jobs in London, booking Dimensions Festival (Hamish) and The Pickle Factory (Toby). (Hamish is now a director at Dimensions.) All in all, they’ve dedicated the past 15 years of their lives to dance music. For all their behind-the-scenes work, Hamish & Toby’s true love is DJing together. They’re known for their long, expressive sets that go, in their own words, “all over the map.” Their RA Podcast, which was recorded live at Philadelphia party Subsurface in May, is a four-hour odyssey through golden-era house, tech house and UK garage. Proper party music, in other words. According to the duo, they were “fully locked in, as comfortable as we’ve ever felt DJing.” It really shows. @hamishcole @tobynicholas Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/851

Whether you're hearing a track or a DJ set, you can usually tell it's Nene H pretty quickly. In just a few years, Beste Aydin has developed a very specific approach within the realm of techno. She inhabits the genre yet colours just enough outside the lines without losing the plot—or the pull—entirely. The focus is on fun, on groove and on hooks, with sets that dip into trance, electro, ghetto house and even hints of hyperpop, tying in neon threads into techno's all-black garb. She's used techno as a jumping off point for orchestral and choral performances, as well as the poignant expression of grief (on her stellar debut album). She's become a regular at Berghain and groundbreaking festivals like CTM, traversing a highbrow-lowbrow line that posits that every kind of dance music deserves the highbrow treatment. Her RA Podcast is an irresistible hour of techno full of what she calls "Neneisms," turns into pop hooks amidst hulking techno beats and dips into funky, electro-informed beats. @nenetreat Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/850

Depending on who you ask, Yousuke Yukimatsu is the best DJ in the world. Or at least in Japan. The eccentric Osaka-born, Tokyo-based DJ has built up an arsenal of fans and disciples—most famously Tzusing—who revere his cross-genre approach and knack for out-of-this-world blends. Case in point: he recently released a mostly ambient mixtape that somehow felt more gripping and propulsive than many techno DJ sets. He also used that release, Midnight Is Comin, to highlight Japan's underrepresented experimental electronic music scene, another sign of his wide-ranging and unusual tastes. To go with his voracious hunger for all kinds of music, Yukimatsu can play alll different kinds of sets, from the meditative to the peak-time, all with the blending ingenuity and expert pacing we've come to expect. Just check his mind-blowing Boiler Room set from 2020. If that performance was nightclub madness and Midnight Is Comin was a slowly unfurling coil of downcast textures and moods, then Yukimatsu's RA Podcast is something in-between. Over two captivating hours, Yukimatsu brings in beats only to jettison them, returning several times to artists like Palmistry, Tzusing and Ryo Murakami. He anchors the mix with familiar tracks and voices before letting it drift out to sea again. It's also deeply personal, focusing on tracks from people he played with at his Zone Unknown parties in Osaka and Kobe, as well as his friends who participated in Midnight Is Comin. Some of these blends need to be heard to believed. But more important is the pacing: the mix moves at such a slow but intuitive speed that it's almost tantric, the work of someone who knows how to keep the party going at a simmer without giving into the temptation to go faster. (He even says that the mix was supposed to be longer.) With hooky tracks from Palmistry and Equiknoxx up against explosions of noise and heavy EQing, Yukimatsu's RA Podcast is like dipping your head above and below water, soaking in and appreciating the beauty of both realms at once. @yousukeyukimatsu Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/849

If you haven't heard of Nikki Nair at this point, we'd invite you to come out from under that rock you're living in. But jokes aside, the last 12 months have been the Atlanta producer's year. He's toured seemingly endlessly, has found his way into a number of local scenes and has put out records for labels like Dirtybird, Lobster Theremin and Scuffed Recordings. If that weren't enough, he's also been putting out an illuminating series of monthly singles on his Bandcamp that show off both his restless muse and his seeming ability to both perfect and put his own stamp on any sub-genre or style he tries. People usually use some form of the word "bass" to describe Nikki Nair, because of the way his music flits between dubstep, drum & bass, electro and more. One moment he's making staggering hip-hop instrumentals that would have fit right into the old LA beat scene, the next minute he's making pneumatic techno or uptempo stuff that would fit right in one Juke Bounce Werk. His voracious appetite for new sounds comes across on his RA Podcast, which is a sprawling two-hours-plus of genre hopping and careful mixing, hopping from mood to mood like a 2-D video game platformer. It starts off perhaps a little slower than you'd expect, but weaves through countless Nikki Nair tracks, older selections from Wolfgang Voigt and Drexciya and mind-melting club tracks from newer producers including DJ ADHD, Despina, Limewax and more. If you want to know what the hippest, most inventive dance music sounds like, bridging continents and oceans, this mix is it. @nikki-nair Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/848

As anyone who's been to a Nordic country in the summer will tell you, there's a certain magic in the temperate air that you only get from a place that is cold and dark for most of the rest of the year. That probably goes some way towards explaining how a country like Sweden produces some of the sunniest music around, whether we're talking about pop or underground dance. Since she debuted on Stockholm label Studio Barnhus in 2018, Bella Boo has been at the forefront of this sound, making clever, fun and joyous house music on records like Once Upon A Passion, where pop instincts embed into deep house grooves. Bella Boo's RA Podcast both highlights her distinct personality and also the sound of Stockholm in full summer bloom, featuring local producers like Kornél Kovács, Axel Boman, Genius Of Time and Samo DJ. It's full of catchy basslines, hooky vocal snippets, luxurious melodies and plenty of brilliant transitions. It's kind of like listening to one of her records: a restless and kaleidoscopic approach to house, where the rhythms shift and a new earworm is always around the corner. Bella Boo has all the makings of a star, and this mix feels like another step in her impressive rise. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/847

"You can't take a sound and exclude the people who created it and say, this is our sound," DJ Noir said in our 2020 feature about Juke Bounce Werk, the label she-cofounded. "No, it's either Chicago footwork or it's other." Back then, the Los Angeles-based imprint and crew was still primarily focused around footwork, but Noir and co—including artists like Kush Jones, DJ SWISHA, Surly and Sonic D—have branched out into all sorts of uptempo sounds, touching on house, UK garage, jungle and funk, but always with the fleet-footed approach that makes JBW what it is. "We used to sit down and say, we have to make 160, or we have to keep it footwork and juke," Jones said in that same feature, "but we are also like, if you are strong and developed in another sound, then you should also be free." Sitting atop this empire of boundary-breaking, innovative dance music is DJ Noir, who is one of LA's best uptempo DJs, or honestly, of any genre. Her sets can be speedy and intense, sure, but it's the way she lets off steam at just the right moments, or gracefully dips into halftime, maybe even a spot of dubstep, that really sets her apart. The LA scene is spoiled to be able to see her DJ quite frequently, but along with the artists she tirelessly promotes and develops with JBW, she deserves a wider, more global spotlight. We hope her RA Podcast might convince you of that, too, an hour of remarkable DJing and skillful blending that connects continents and scenes, from Alix Perez to INVT to Nikki Nair and Bastiengoat. Buckle up! Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/846

Nadia Struiwigh immediately turned heads with her debut album, Lenticular, on CPU Records. It wasn't her first record, but it was an auspicious release at an auspicious time for a label that was at the centre of a revival of early '90s IDM and electro styles. You could use those terms to describe Dutch producer Struiwigh's music, but you'd have to also mention ambient—just check out her last album, Pax Aurora, for Rotterdam powerhouse Nous'klaer Audio—and techno, which is the subject of her new RA Podcast. Those familiar with Struiwigh only through her records might be surprised by this mix, which is over two hours of alternately atmospheric and pummeling techno. It highlights the versatility and potential of the genre, as well as Struiwigh's own outlook on it. She was a techno DJ before she started making the softer, weirder stuff, and she can recognize the music's innate emotional qualities, even at its most functional. As she says below, her intention is to "glue the best of both worlds" to create a "rare energy" with her DJing and production. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/845

eviewing their 2021 EP on Livity Sound, RA's Henry Ivry said that the duo—along with collaborator DJ Polo—represented a "micro-history of jungle, garage, dubstep and, of course, their bread-and-butter, UK funky." Now, you might not be familiar with them, but these two London producers, LR Groove and Razzler Man, have been doing their thing in the UK capital for nearly two decades, both together and apart. They reunited in 2018, inspired by the changing and cyclical tastes of UK dance music fans and, perhaps most importantly, the international rise of South African dance music and its interplay with other genres around the world. The duo have now released two records for Livity Sound, which is among the biggest badges of honour you can get in this sector of electronic music. Effortlessly combining UK funky, dubstep and snatches of gqom and amapiano, the duo's music feels organically adventurous, but hardly trendy—in fact, the space and reverb of their beats still sounds a lot like the music they were associated back in the '00s, in the best way. Their RA Podcast is a journey into the musical borderlines they operate, made up mostly of their group tracks and solo, along with cuts from like-minded artists such as Scratcha DVA, KG and Karizma. It's a whole lot of UK and a little bit South Africa, the sound of Black British dance music in flux and perpetual evolution. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/844

If we were to pick one word to describe Ziggy Devriendt, AKA Nosedrip, it would probably humble. He runs a one-man empire out of the modest Belgian coastal town of Ostend, and his STROOM label is one of the most quietly brilliant outfits in Western Europe. A mixture of obscurer-than-obscure reissues and quirky new material makes for a label as unpredictable as it is essential, and Devriendt's unusual touch is all over it—he prefers to make up his own compilations and sequences instead of just repackaging old records, for example, which explains how important curation and putting songs together is to him. So it's not a surprise that , in addition to being a music nerd supreme, Devriendt is also a remarkably good DJ, whose ear for oddball cuts translates well into intuitively danceable music. Judging from his RA Podcast, he's had trance on the mind—the mix features flighty beats that range from CJ Bolland and Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia to new-school practitioners like J-Zbel, plus a major highlight from Peter Van Hoesen that you might remember from Marcel Fengler's Berghain 05 mix and plenty of new material from Stroom. (He's also putting out a compilation of Belgian trance, which might explain the direction of this mix.) It's a three hour-ride that varies from jaw-dropping mixing to abrupt, almost shocking transitions that might startle you out of your chair. @ziggy-devriendt Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/843

Imagine growing up near Berlin, getting into dance music, going to Berghain for the first time and getting your mind blown by techno. Then, ten years later, you become a resident DJ at the fabled club. Not many people—any people?—can claim this story, but for Fadi Mohem, what would be so many DJs' dreams became a reality. After getting his 2017 debut 12-inch Reckless in the hands of all the right people in Berlin, Mohem established a bold, bouncy techno sound with releases on Modeselektor's Seilscheibenpfeiler, Ben Klock's Klockworks and FJAAK's SPANDAU20, pretty much the cream of the crop of modern techno. Now, this year, he's becoming one of Berghain's newest residents, alongside other exciting names like Sedef Adasï and Naty Seres (and Lakuti upstairs at Panorama Bar). As heard on his recent collaborative with Ben Klock, Mohem has modern techno down to a science, thanks to a combination of reverence for the old-school and clever rhythmic touches, like the irresistible snare pattern on "Prefix." His RA Podcast sounds like what you might expect from a new generation of Berghain resident: aerodynamic, heavy and, honestly a little midtempo compared to a lot of other young techno DJs. It's the sound the club has made world-famous, with cuts from Reeko, Heiko Laux and Truncate, plus some special moments from aya, DJ Deeon and Petar Dundov. It takes a certain kind of DJ to get to this hallowed place, and Fadi Mohem deserves it. @fadimohem Read more: https://ra.co/podcast/842

Welsh artist Kelly Lee Owens has a special grasp on techno. She can make it sound wild and naturalistic, like wind blowing through a dense forest, or make it feel cold and sleek, like a gleaming slab of chrome. Either way, though, it's always full of emotion, thanks to the intricate textures and distinctive tones of her voice. You might even say she takes a singer-songwriter approach to techno, but that doesn't mean her music isn't suited for the dance floor. Her most recent album, <a href=/reviews/34853 target="_blank"><i>LP.8</i></a>, marks a step away from the dance floor, however, and into a place a little more dark, more unpredictable. It's also some of her most gorgeous work, centering around "Anadlu," an eight-minute cut that feels perfectly pitched between ambient and techno, with heavy, lumbering drums but an otherwise lightweight, almost wispy feel. Owens' RA Podcast occupies this zone almost perfectly. Beginning with 11th century music from Hildegard von Bingen, it ties all sorts of traditions together, from Pan Sonic to Throbbing Gristle to Marco Shuttle to Oneohtrix Point Never & Rosalía. It floats, it accelerates, it loops and doubles back in on itself, an hour of gripping electronics from one of techno's most distinctive voices. Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/841

Camila Milieme has been playing techno long enough to experience a few of its boom-and-bust cycles. Starting off in Brazil in the late '90s with the kind of rippling, tooly techno you'd expect from that era, Milieme lost interest once things started going minimal and took a break from techno to take up studying instead. By the time she checked back in, the genre had taken a turn closer to the stuff she used to play, so she packed up her bags and moved to Berlin, where she's become an indispensable part of the techno scene. As The Lady Machine, Milieme has released on Mote-Evolver and also runs her own label, Unterwegs, with UK producer Decka. As you'll hear on her RA Podcast, she prefers a classicist (yet, still, modern) style of techno that mixes toughness with texture and detail. With plenty of unreleased tracks from her cohort and tracks from British Murder Boys, Jeff Mills, Dave Clark and Christian Wunsch, this is a timeless techno mix for heads from any generation, from the '90s to the '20s. @theladymachine Read more: https://ra.co/podcast/840

"Working my ass off, to be honest," is how Eli Escobar starts our interview below. That basically sums up his vibe. The New Yorker might not have the same household name status of other DJs who have been soundtracking Manhattan clubs since the early '90s, but he certainly deserves it. Any New York resident worth their salt should have him near the top of the list of their favorite local DJs. He plays anywhere and everywhere in the city, and he can play pretty much anything he wants to, as his RA Podcast will attest. When it comes to his own music, Escobar puts out records equally informed by disco, hip-hop and house—in other words, a very New York sound. He hasn't been producing as long as he's been DJing, but his albums and EPs for labels like Classic, Night People and Razor N Tape are full of the soul, humor and talent of someone who knows dance music inside out. As Escobar says below, he doesn't really have any one type of sound. His DJing varies greatly from night to night, and he's always adding to his considerable collection, so no one set is quite the same as another. For his RA Podcast, put together painstakingly with many specially edited tracks and recorded in a hotel room in Colombia, he strikes a relatively reflective tone, but it's still eminently danceable. He moves gradually through two hours of house and disco that ranges from celebratory to muted, from minimalist to rich with live instrumentation. It's the sound of New York dance music as passed through generations, from one of its best and most beloved musical storytellers. @eliescobar Read more: https://ra.co/podcast/839

Last year, New Jersey group OSSX wowed us with a mix of completely original material that blended infectious edits of Janet Jackson and September with tracks like "Split Wig"—one of last year's indisputable breakbeat anthems—that showed how the then-duo could bring together generations of American dance music into one compelling, vibrant mix that celebrates all shades of East Coast club. Their RA Podcast might not be an all-originals mix, but it shares the same spirit. OSSX—now a trio, with Juke Bounce Werk member Elise joining original duo Equiss and Lektor Scopes—sprinkle the mix with more of their excellent unreleased originals, in-between canny and clever edits new and old, like DJ Sega's rework of Basement Jaxx's "Where Your Head At," which makes for an early highlight, along with DJ Swisha's Baltimore club edit of Robin S.'s "Luv 4 Luv" and the bouncy DJ Problem version of Mary J. Blige's classic "Family Affair." You can hear both the evolution and history of these genres through this mix, along with cuts that touch on UK garage, ballroom and jungle. Trust us when we say that this is over an hour of pure fun, showing the ingenuity and timelessness of American dance music through the decades. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/838

Spend enough time at (or listening to) The Lot Radio, and chances are all you'll find Gabrielle Kwarteng. Even though she lives in Berlin now, the American DJ wears New York on her sleeve, repping for the station that helped make her name (she won a Mixcloud award for "Best Eclectic Show" pretty early on). Sure, you could call her sound eclectic—she jumps from house to Afrobeat to Jersey club and beyond—but it seems like "intuitive" might be a better word. She has the taste of someone raised by musical parents on a diverse diet of albums, of someone who eats, breathes and sleeps records. Buoyed by her success in the US, Kwarteng moved to Berlin in 2019, not too long before the pandemic. Like so many other up-and-coming DJs, her momentum almost stalled as a result. But here we are in 2022 and Kwarteng is more successful than ever, with a string of upcoming festival dates highlighting her wide, transatlantic appeal. Her RA Podcast is equally welcoming, with a taste for house music that feels perfectly pitched between the classic and the new. You can hear an old soul, but she also has cutting-edge tracks from the likes of NIkki Nair, and a gutsy, fantastic edit of "Can You Feel It?" by Tom Carruthers. The mix also reflects her recently getting back in touch with her roots, featuring smatterings of East Coast club music and ballroom, all wrapped up with an exquisite finishing touch courtesy of a long Moodymann play-out. Read more: https://ra.co/podcast/837

We probably don't need to tell you who Deadbeat is. (He even did a previous RA Podcast for us, all the way back in 2007.) But if you need a refresher, he's one of the most important and revered artists in dub techno. The Canadian artist came up in the Montreal scene alongside other trailblazers like Akufen and other Canadians (think Cobblestone Jazz, Mathew Jonson, Wagon Repair, etc). His early records for ~scape are some of the most classic and influential minimal there ever was, but dub is always at the heart of his work, and runs in the veins of BLKRTZ, the prolific label he runs himself. Sa Pa, on the other hand, sits somewhere in the ambient zone. Originally from Adelaide, he's found a powerful creative sparring partner in Deadbeat. The two released their first album together, The Mountain, earlier this year. It's the 50th release on BLKRTZ and maybe one of the most monumental records in either artist's catalogue, a triple-LP that harks back to the hypnotic, plink-plonk days of yore with the strong cross-genre underpinning that marks Deadbeat's work these days, and plenty of lovely atmospheric wiggles. The duo's lengthy RA Podcast, taken from two different recordings at their Absurd Dub Lustre party in Berlin, mirrors the LP's sound, weaving through tracks new and old. It's full of warm, dubby vibrations and smooth transitions. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/836 @sapaofficial

Marco Weibel is the epitome of modesty. Over the past decade, the New York artist has quietly amassed a loyal following through expansive DJ sets that touch on everything from spiritual jazz to disco, but rather than credit himself, he lets the tunes speak for themselves. This humble attitude has won him the respect of veterans such as Lefto, as well as a growing fanbase from all corners of the musical spectrum. When he's not DJing, Weibel curates nights at various New York venues and co-runs Darker Than Wax, a label based out of Singapore (where he was born and raised). His selections showcase rhythm and texture over drops, but he always has an arsenal of radiant house cuts or UK garage to fire up a crowd. Cavernous crates aside, the cadence of his sets is perhaps their most distinguishing feature. On his weekly shows at Lot Radio, Hawaiian funk is followed by broken beat while at the club, 2-step spills into dembow techno and rich amapiano. While his mixes and performances usually start out on the melodic side, his RA Podcast switches things up. Unleashing a whirlwind of jungle before moving onto '90s-flavored house and other loopy styles, his session highlights local talents with plenty of delightful transitions throughout. Peter Brown's spacey soul flows into Aquarian's pulverising breaks, Ayesha's percussive techno precedes heart-tugging house and heavy dub morphs into Kerri Chandler's acid. Fluid and rolling, this is a true digger's delight. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/835 @marcoweibel

Emerald is a name that should be familiar to any Rinse FM devotee—she's been DJing on the UK dance music radio giant since 2014, and has just started a new flagship slot called The Dance Show on Friday nights. The Londoner is a consummate radio DJ, blending together genres and tempos with pitch-perfect mixing and an ear for hooks that makes each track stand out. (She calls herself "genre fluid.") She's said so much in the lengthy, excellent interview below, so we can keep this part brief. Her RA Podcast combines newer favorites from Lauren Flax, Queer On Acid and Neil Landstrumm with older, recently acquired records from DJ Deeon (1994) and FSOM (1992). If this is your introduction, then take a listen and make a note to check out The Dance Show next Friday. And if you already know Emerald, then you know this is gonna be a good one. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/834 @ emerald-rose

Nick León is part of a newer generation of Miami producers who infuse modern-day club music with sounds from around the region, everything from Miami bass to reggaeton. In León's case, his most recent—and most exciting—music has focused on beats inspired by reggaeton and its sub-genre perreo, but with a musical palette that speaks to a love of electronic music from Aphex Twin to Burial to music on labels like NAAFI and TraTraTrax. (This is a predilection he shares with DJ Python, whom León just launched a new party with.) It's on the latter label he released the Rompediscoteka EP, one of the canniest genre fusions he's done yet, meant to hark back to the feeling he had when he first discovered reggaeton. (It came with eye-opening remixes from Maral, Kelman Duran and Henzo, producers whose personal-but-global approach mirrors León's own.) He also head a head-turning EP on Future Times, which threw Miami-style electro into the mix, with an ambient touch. Like his productions, the young Miami DJ's sets can range from slow and low to high and tight, and his RA Podcast captures León in peak-time mode. It's a Latin-spin on everything from techno to tech house to cool-kid club music, with selections from Nico, Simisea, Siete Catorce, Ricardo Villalobos and MM adding up to a vibrant and rhythmically restless hour that soars across genres and scenes. Read more: https://ra.co/podcast/833 @NICKLEON

Toronto's Cindy Li, AKA Ciel, has a knack for balancing warmth and pressure. Her productions and mixes often feel coated in an iridescent gloss, evoking the trippy stylings of '90s UK tech house and the swung drums of classic New York house. In between that, though, there's lots of vigor via sleek electro, rippling trance, barrelling techno and big, bad breakbeats. Her style may lean towards the atmospheric but it's loaded with moxie, giving her the versatility to close out a main room or kick off the afters. Her fluid movements between bouncy basslines, spiraling synth patterns and weightless house grooves are just one facet of her impressive rise as a DJ and producer. When she's not behind the decks, presenting radio shows or working on the excellent Parallel Minds label she runs alongside other Toronto acts Yohei S and Daniel 58, Li throws herself into community work. Committed to diverse dance floors, affordable housing and overall equality in the music industry, she's a hard worker in the realest sense of the phrase. Li's RA mix is a treat. Rolling through scintillating drum work, wonky rhythms and dreamy pads, it feels like quintessential Ciel. In her interview below, she described how she enjoys "the challenge of trying to combine and make cohesive all the diverse styles of music I loved in a DJ set." Judging by this mix alone, it's safe to say that Li succeeded. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/832 @ciel_dj

Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/831 @madam_x

The decade-spanning career of Roy Davis Jr. is intrinsically intertwined with the history of house music. As one of the defining voices of Chicago's underground, he's worked both behind the decks and behind-the-scenes. From handling Strictly Rhythm's A&R sector in the '90s to joining seminal production crew Phuture to launching his own Undaground Therapy Muzik label, Davis Jr. isn't just a veteran but a compendium of dance music knowledge. Daft Punk cites him as an influence while the likes of Disclosure, Zed Bias and Waajeed have sought him out for collaborations. He may be best known for his 1998 single Gabriel with Peven Everett—now a garage anthem on both sides of the Atlantic—but his discography and DJ sets go well beyond club hits. Weaving in soul, gospel, disco, techno and acid into a deep house framework, he marries raw funk, plush melodies, hypnotic synths and stripped-down arrangements. All these elements are beautifully captured on his RA Podcast. Moving from a state of eyes-closed bliss to body-moving grooves, the near two-hour session is as grounding as it is free-floating. Spiritual, sensual and tightly mixed, it's a lesson in multifaceted house music.

There's a track on HAAi's upcoming debut album, Baby, We're Ascending, called "Louder Always Better." That kind of sums up her approach right there. (See also: "Biggest Mood Ever.") Since her first record, 2017's "Be Good" her approach to dance music has been to make as dense, overwhelming and uplifting as possible. Much has been made of her background in psychedelic rock, which definitely informs records like the muggy, intense Motorik Voodoo Bush Doof Musik, but it's not the whole story. A better point of reference might be DJ Harvey lost in the Australian desert, but comparisons are beside the point. At this point, HAAi is completely unique. The Australian producer has made quite a name for herself as a DJ in her adopted hometown of London, and while her album shoots off in all directions—from ecstatic rave-pop to sultry stunners—her RA Podcast captures the spark that makes her such a beloved force behind the decks. Weaving powerful techno from artists like Atrip and Piska Power with weirder, adventurous music courtesy of Cocktail Party Effect and Sha Sha Kimbo—plus a few tastes of HAAi's new album—it's an eclectic mix that's as windy and unpredictable as her records. Plus, it ends with classic track by The Cure. That's just good taste.

Louie Vega shouldn't need an introduction, but we'll do it anyways. The Bronx-born Puerto Rican artist embodies the soulful sound of New York house music, and he's been doing it since the '80s. His history features a litany of legendary names and clubs, from the Devil's Nest to his much-vaunted residency at The Sound Factory in Manhattan, and he's made music with the likes of Todd Terry, Mood II Swing and Barbara Tucker. But it's with Kenny "Dope" Gonzalez that Vega made his most cherished and influential work as the duo Masters Of Work, putting out huge singles and making house remixes for some of the most iconic names in '90s pop music. To listen Vega's discography, especially as part of Masters At Work, is to hear the evolution of house music and garage (yes, both US and UK). It's difficult to overstate the impact those '90s records had on New York and beyond, and they're still some of the most swinging, undeniable house records ever made. Just try playing a MAW Dub for a newbie and see their reaction. House music has been Vega's lifelong mission, and almost four decades in, he's still refining his craft, moving towards ever-jazzier, ever more soulful sounds. His RA Podcast shows off some of his favorite tracks from contemporaries like Mood II Swing, as well as his band Elements Of Life and a handful of new tracks from his forthcoming album, Expansions In The NYC, which aims to capture the sound of his club night of the same name. You'll hear lush live instrumentation, powerful vocals and, of course, those addictive, sometimes skippy house beats—the sound of a master at work. Read more: http://ra.co/podcast/828 @nuyoricansoulnyc