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Selections: CCL

In our new regular feature, Selections, we invite DJs, producers and label heads to dig into their digital crates and share recent additions to their Bandcamp collections. This week, Seattle-based DJ, visual artist and New Forms festival co-curator CCL selects nine gems spanning hypnotic club wigglers, 160 bpm switch-ups and hazy beat tapes

Record stores and clubs around the world are shut, and opportunities to find new music out in the wild have been ripped from under our feet as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. While hearing new music played out by your favourite DJs will have to be put on hold due to these unprecedented circumstances, it’s never been easier, or more important, to support the artists and labels putting out EPs, albums and compilations in the midst of all the madness.

With tour cancellations and festival postponements leaving many members of the international electronic music community out of pocket, Bandcamp has become an even more vital platform for supporting the music you love, with 80% of all sales from the online music store going directly to artists and labels. Last month, the platform announced it would be waiving its revenue share for all sales for one day, and on 20th March, took no cut from purchases made. In total, $4.3 million was spent on music over the course of 24 hours, all going straight to the creators. 

In our new regular series. Selections, we’re inviting DJs, producers and label heads to dig into their digital crates and share recent additions to their Bandcamp collections. In lieu of opportunities to discover new records on the dancefloor, Selections – along with radio shows and mixes – will give you the chance to nab new sounds from the crates of tastemakers, and support the artists behind them while you’re at it. Win-win, right? 

This week, Seattle-based DJ, producer, visual artist and New Forms festival co-curator CCL flags up nine newly added gems in their collection. Spanning slow and swirly club wigglers, 160 bpm switch-ups and hazy beat tapes, these selections demonstrate CCL’s endlessly nourishing DJ technique: one that emphasises the delicate interplay between weight and weightlessness, velocity and poise, and cathartic intensity and psychedelic lucidity. CCL’s sets can sound like an earth-sized bubble bursting, or a dreamy fog descending, and we’d recommend you dig into their mixes for UnsoundDiscwoman and The Lodge. As for their own productions, this collaboration with Flora FM, ‘Iridescent Lake’, has been described as an ‘aquatic jungle bopper’, and, really, what more could you even ask for? 

Dig into CCL's Selections below. 

Tomás Urquieta
'Síntesis de Fricción'[Insurgentes]

"I’ve been loving this tense anticipatory roller from Chilean artist Tomás Urquienta. By the time it unfolds, the skittering space leaves room for you to unleash your most potent bass weight. It was released on Colombia based label Insurgentes, and Alex T (may he Rest in Snyder's Peace) first told me about the previous ultra-fast Seph release – 'A CCL wiggler'."  

Millia Rage
'hopper7'

"This self-released track by Chicago based Militia Rage is such a froggy wiggler. I’d probably play this in an especially 'slow' (90-100bpm) part of my set; I love to play at this tempo and grooves like this fuel the kind of kinetic wormhole that makes you lose track of time and space."

Laughing Ears
'Resistance 反' [Chinabot]

"This was the first track I heard from Shanghai-based artist Laughing Ears, and I’ve been a fan ever since. I’d play this in an 80/160 session or as a segway to switching to that tempo. I love the way it unfolds, it’s delicate, driving and anticipatory at the same time. The label, Chinabot, is one I’d recommend checking: 'A collective and label created to change the dialogue surrounding Asian music'. You’ll find pretty much everything on it – one of my favorite Bandcamps to return to." 

X.WILSON
'B​-​12'

"If the dancefloor (or honestly your bedroom) is ready to receive some juice, this new self-released X-Wilson track would be sure to deliver. X. Wilson is a non-binary composer, producer, DJ, and storyteller based in Kansas City, their tracks are would make any dancefloor wiggle."

CNDSD
'Primal Urge' [SUBREAL]

"Subreal is run by two of my favorite producers, Siete Catorce and Amazondotcom, a home for 'sounds and rhythms that may have trouble defining/identifying themselves' - I couldn't relate to this sentiment more. This one is less of a 'dancefloor-oriented' release on the surface, but I’d love to hear track as a palate cleanser or as a way to switch up the tempo. I love how the complex rhythms and melodies interact with one another, it gives me this feeling you’re watching an alien being come to life."

3Phaz
'Three Phase'

"One of the most interesting albums I’ve heard this year"

DANA
'Roses In Bloom'

"After spending most of last year rinsing DANA’s track, 'Bird Atop World', a track featured on an Identity Spectrum compilation, and notably in Kiernan Laveaux’s life-changing TRUANTS mix, I was happy to see there was more fuel for my obsession. DANA’s tracks are always irresistible, but I’m finding her music especially healing and hypnotic lately. She says, 'In this track, a single voice becomes many with rapture inducing nostalgia, hypnosis and the powerful feeling of oneness'. One to shut your eyes to and remember the last time you felt this way."

Eddou XL
'No Mistakes in Jazz'

"Believe it or not, with all this time inside alone time, I too have been drawn back to more hazy, warm, laid-back grooves lately - Jazz, R&B, hip-hop etc. This beat tape has been sloshing through my cranium while I stare out the window—Jazz records looped through boom-bap beats, just enough to keep my head nodding."

Minor Science
'For Want Of Gelt' [Whities]

"This track is utterly mind-blowing, as is most of Minor Science’s new album. I had been finding a way to sneak this particular track into most of my sets before the lockdown and I’m still dreaming about being able to play it again in front of people. For now, my neighbors will suffice (sorry!). It sounds like being whirled around in a broken, time transporting tumble drier–you’re spat out at the end, hair askew, covered in sparkly jelly beans. The drum solo breakdown, all the intricate details, it’s just too fun in a manically satisfying way."

Want more? Check out Martyn's Selections here