- Much like Bruce and Batu, Samuel is an artist in Bristol's younger generation who studied in Bath. He debuted on BRSTL last year, with a dreamy two-tracker that owed more to the easygoing side of Bristol's house and techno tradition: think Outboxx and the Falling Up crew rather than Livity Sound. But on his second release, for Mosca's Not So Much imprint, things take a turn for the strange.
"Static On The Dancefloor" is built around a triplet drum tattoo and a bassline that crackles and hums like a dodgy ground cable. Samuel throws in the odd detail—an emaciated hi-hat here, a pool of reverb there—and a couple of times the track builds to a crescendo, with layers of interference piling into the midrange before being swiftly whipped away. But we always return to that simplest of kick patterns, and Samuel handles this minimalism with style. "Pump Room," meanwhile, recalls Samuel's forebears: there are shades of A Made Up Sound in its soured chords, perhaps, and of Pearson Sound in its booming drums. There's quite a lot of detail to it—rolling snares, clouds of noise—but they all pump and wheeze to the same rhythm. It's ugly but compelling, and a promising new direction for Samuel.
TracklistA1 Static On The Dancefloor
B1 Pump Room