before birthing his blasted acid house identity bobby draino drummed for various synth-punked groups around vancouver, and some of that scorched earth live energy bleeds through the five primordial bangers comprising his vinyl debut, *brain drain*. tracked live through one channel of a space echo straight to his computer, draino’s mo is overdriven drum machines saturated with gritty fried acid, bass damage, and blown-tone sequencer patterns, fused into a radical and weird debased mutant house. the eps five tracks are the cumulation of two years of demo workshopping, tr-606 and 303 autodidacticism, warehouse party spelunks, etc, all savvy tactics for developing a shredding, progressively singular style, which bd has in spades. one of the most awesomely wrecked and raw silk slabs to date. a west coast wiz worth watching. mastered by eric hanson. edition of 430.

repress

liverpool-based producer bantam lions has long been part of the scenery records family, helping label boss asok launch the imprint with 2012s one to one ep. here he returns with his third 12 inch for the label. lead cut *recollections* is particularly good, delivering a deep and attractive fusion of fuzzy analogue warm, dreamy melodies and intoxicating chords. he ups the tempo further on *many years later*. which layers dubbed-out chords and swirling textures over an energy-packed techno groove. the accompanying remixes are pretty tasty, too, with the cyclist particularly impressing with his detroit techno-goes-lo-fi interpretation of *recollections*. that said, the dreamy, new age-influenced downtempo take from mood hut regular cloudface is pretty darn good, too.

incl mirror system, system 7