RICK SHIVER
Libertine Supersport / Ta Gueule / Brussels
I can’t get it shorter, sorry!
* Art Department “I C U” & DJ T. – “Burning” (Art Department Remix) & “Touch You Gently”
* Blood Orange – “Dinner”/”Bad Girls” & “Sutphin Boulevard”
* Axel Boman – Europa EP
* Benoit & Sergio – Where The Freaks Have No Name EP & “Boy Trouble” & “Everybody”
* Daniel Bortz – “Boyz 2 Men” & “Can’t Sleep At Night”/”Other Life”
* Daphni – “Ye Ye” & “Cos Ber Zam”/”Yes I Know”
* Julio Bashmore – Everyone Needs A Theme Tune EP & “Father Father”
* Junior Boys – “You’ll Improve Me” (Original/Caribou Rmx)
* Lee Curtiss – “I Can Hear Your Arthur” & “Candy” feat. Matt Tolfrey
* Levon Vincent – “Man Or Mistress”
* Maceo Plex – “Your Style” & “Falling” & “Can’t Leave You”
* Mario & Vidis feat. Ernesto – “Changed” (Original/12″ Dub)
* Omar S – “Here’s Your Trance, Now Dance!!” & Who Wrote The Rules Of Love EP
* Pillow Talk “Soft” (Life And Death Remix)/”The Comeback”
* Solomun “See You Everyday Alone” / Noir & Haze “Around” (Solomun Remix)
* Todd Terje “Ragysh”/”Snooze 4 Love”
* Storm Queen “It Goes On” (Vox)
* Tale Of Us – DJ T. feat. James Teej “Sense” (Tale Of Us Remix) / WhoMadeWho – “Every Minute Alone” (Tale Of Us Remix)
* Virgo Four “It’s A Crime (Caribou Remix)
* Zomby “A Devil Lay Here”/”Natalia’s Song”/”Riding With Death”
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WALRUS
Bepotel Exists / Bright Entity / 54 Kolaktiv / Brussels
IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER :
* Factory Dance / Factory Records 12″ mixes & rarities 1980 – 1987 ( Strut Records )
Bill Brewster of Strut Records compiles the magical moments between Britain’s post-punk and early Haçienda dancefloor bombs. Interesting discoveries and timeless (uk) dance music. Without a doubt the best compilation of 2011.
* Brecht Evens / De Liefhebbers ( Oogachtend )
After “Ergens waar je niet wil zijn” Brecht continues with his new comic book “De Liefhebbers”. The story is about professionalism of a failed artist combined with his sober dialogue style and his visual splendour. His work is very inspiring for me as a musician, it’s rhythmical, colorful & humoristic.
* Animal Collective / Cirque Royal Brussels 18.05.11
I didn’t have to think long to chose the best concert I saw this year ! They keep on inventing themselves, Always taking new musical ways and combining new and old songs in a one and a half hour big musical trip. speechless …
* Levon Vincent / Man Or Mistress ( Novel Sound )
First time I heard this song : “Huh? levon is doing very trancy shit right now, don’t really know if I like it?”
Second time : “This will burn floors, let’s buy it!”
Third time : “This is the best house record of 2011!”
Home of Beautiful Swimmers, Max D & Protect-U. Great label with no boundaries, honest contemporary dance music. They don’t copy, but they add things to classic US house and disco. check there site for some cool edits and there “discovery channel”.
I forgot a lot of other stuff, sorry for that.
A peacefully 2012 to all holgerzzz out there !
xxx willy
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AGUILA
Los Ninos / Fingerspitzengefühl / Brussels
Vakula – Dub as Always (Shevchenko)
2011 will be marked by the deep-house Ukrainian dj/producer Vakula. Delivering more than 10 ep’s! Thank you.
Try To Find Me – Needs Ending (Golf Channel Recordings)
Justin Van Der Volgen aka Try To Find Me took me in a trance from the first second I heard the record.
A spaced out Balearic loop taking you far, far out there!
Grauzone – Raum (Atas Extended Mix) (Live at Robert Johnson)
7:42min. of new wave madness. The perfect 6am track.
Willie Burns – Windows Down
When house / electronica meet ‘emotions’, my hart melts!
Rocha – Night Music (International Feel)
If The Orb was formed in 2011, they would be Rocha!
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EMMANUEL
Mapp / Brussels
In no particular order…
# DANIEL MALOSO “Hijos de José” 12″ (Comeme)
This is what you get when South America meets EBM: a dark sound, happy and funny enough for the dancefloor. Sometimes funky people are dressed in black!
Hats off to the COMEME label for coming up with this nouvelle vague of Argentinian, Mexican and Chilean artists who make music you’ld not really expect given where they come from. Amazing maxi’s from DIEGORS, REBOLLEDO, Chilean pop and the new PHILIPP GORBACHEV.
# ROBERT JOHNSON: the club and the label.
For his exactigness, his open-mindedness, his quality bookings and his impeccable productions.
I can’t help but think about PULP in Paris in the early years 2000. A small club that reconciled rock & electro. And this is what’s happening in Frankfurt now, with a new blend of sounds for a new decennium. Two clubs, two amazing labels: Kill The DJ and Live at Robert Johnson
Essential listening:
GRAUZONE “Raum (Ata’s extended mix)” 12″
LIVE AT ROBERT JOHNSON VOL. 8 mixed by DIXON
# Thanks: Ivan Smagghe for the persistence of high quality sets throughout 2011
# DEERHUNTER live
La classe!
# MANO LE TOUGH
The artist to follow. Two amazing 12 inches out this year. Deep, melodious, sometimes pop. If slowing down the music gives you this feeling, we say YES!
# CONNAN MOCKASIN “Forever Dolphin Love”
It’s friggin’ hard to find one track… But this is my track of the year for what it brings up and what it projects. Poetry, elegance, softness and nature make a comeback thanks to this small blond New-Zealander, and for the better! Let’s all sing the dolphin chant!
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GRATTS
22 Tracks / CollectIEF De Ruyter / Brussels
Hi. I’m based in Brussels and discovered a lot of things in 2011. Here are some of those things. Consider this a very incomplete list of very, very few aspects of life.
1. A good soundsystem in a small, dark basement = the perfect party.
This, of course, was already discovered many moons ago, but after visits to East-London, Berlin, New York, Amsterdam and even Deventer (yup, that’s a real city in Holland) this year, again and again it’s been confirmed that this should be the party manifesto. The worst are mass events such as I Love Techno, a Plopsaland sort of take on a night out dancing.
2. House music is back, although of course it had never left in the first place. (Just like vinyl, by the way, which seems to be “back” every year, when media decide to write an article on the resurrection of it.) House? 2011 gave us future classics from the likes of Storm Queen, Solomun, the We Play House camp, Kenny Larkin, Steffi, the Rush Hour network (not in the least that epic Caribou rework of a Virgo 4 classic) and obviously many, many more. Deep, raw music to make you dance, rooted in the origins of the music as well as keeping things interesting and forward looking. The Caribou rework of Virgo being a perfect example of this synthesis between old and new.
3. 22tracks.com landed in Brusssels. The result are 22 really cool and indie music playlists you can stream freely, with a lot of great local people involved. But that’s not all: 22 also gave us the first 22tracks night in town, and the party at Recyclart was legendary. Stardust must have been right when they realized The Music Sounds Better With You, 22tracks. Love might bring us back together.
4. Expanding the intro for 4 bars and adding a muffled kick drum does not equal “hay guys check this out, I made this great disco edit and in the process, thanks to my idle hands, this piece of art will finally stand the test of time and eternity. You can thank me later, but first buy the overpriced mp3 on Beatport”. Instead, you probably bought a perfectly fine slice of music, a one-way ticket to mediocracy. In 2012, hopefully italo and new beat won’t get fucked in the ass the same way disco has been the last few years.
5. Drinking smoothies, fruit juices, soup and munching extra vitamins will cost you just as much as smoking a pack of fags every two days. I must have won hundreds of euros so far by quitting the smoking habit, and instead of doing what I guess would be the most reasonable thing (saving up and booking a holiday to Tenerife / buying three dogs, addicted to the most expensive sort of dog food / getting tattoos all over my body and start writing all my Facebook statuses in H I P S T E R F O N T), I decided to invest in healthy snacks. In 2011 I discovered I’ll never need a cigarette again, and many other people seemed to share this thought.
PS: Kavinsky (a guise of a certain daft dude called Guy-Manuel De Homem-Christo) blew everyone away with a tune by the name of Nightcall, which was included in the amazing movie soundtrack of the equally amazing movie Drive. (By the way, Ryan Gosling was everywhere this last year.). More movie soundtracks should end up on the dancefloor. Also, Donald Muylle and Ignace Crombez deserve more coverage in any (new) media in 2012.
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88888
Antwerp / Brussels
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