Search:beppu

Following his appearance on Artist Series 2, Beppu returns to Alt Dub with Forms, a new release exploring the deeper, more experimental side of his dub aesthetic.

Recorded and shaped through analogue equipment, tape, mixing desk and effects, Forms is an exercise in space, texture and repetition. Deep bass weight, drifting echoes and finely layered electronic tones move through each piece, creating a sonic world that feels both stripped back and richly detailed.

Forms sits comfortably on the exploratory edge of the Alt Dub catalogue, drawing on the fundamental principles of dub while pushing them into more atmospheric and experimental territory. It is music built for deep listening—minimal in its ingredients, expansive in its effect.

The release is completed by two remixes of Traces from Stephen Hitchell, appearing under his CV313 and Intrusion monikers.

His respective Morning Dub and Evening Dub interpretations take the track in contrasting directions, extending its hypnotic qualities through deeper, more spacious treatments.

With its combination of analogue warmth, deep-space atmospherics and restrained dub experimentation, Forms is a carefully crafted addition to the Alt Dub catalogue.

Manchester dub techno explorer Andrew Hargreaves has just dropped his new album, Objects, on Lempuyang, and now some choice cuts from it get some tasty rework action. Deadbeat's Nephilim version of 'Notions' kicks things off with underlapping kicks that cuddle and comfort. 'Ruptures' (Federsen remix) taps into the stripped-back and sparse Basic Channel template, while 'Perspectives' (Merv remix) brings more light to the EP with subtle beams piercing the surface and energising as they do so. 'Assertions' gets an Ohm & Octal Industries remix that is more heady with widescreen synth layers constantly in flux.

Lempuyang is a dub techno powerhouse with an already vast and brilliant back catalogue, despite only being formed in 2021 by Alastair Kelly. Now he marks a half-decade of work with new compilation Pura Lempuyang Lima that embodies what this imprint is all about across four sides of wax. Yassin Omidi keeps it super deep and smoky with conscious dub mutterings, while Beppu brings more static and ambient sound designs to an equally immersive rhythm. Elsewhere, Octal Industries brings a little more drive and energy, Ohm & Anton Kubikov keep things utterly blissed out and dreamy and Peak:Shift brings gentle broken beats and aching melancholy. Lovely stuff as ever.

Second outing from our man Fran Hartnet’s SCART Label!

The Jon Hussey remix is on fire!!!!

Federsen’s Alt/Dub imprint returns with its second instalment of its Artist Series featuring Forward Memory, Thomas + James, Gradient and Beppu.

Federsen, known for his deep Dub Techno sound, launched his label Alt Dub in 2024. The imprint focuses on warm and spacious dub aesthetics, carrying the torch for Dub Techno’s origins. Since its debut release in early 2024, Alt Dub has expanded with collaborations and artist series featuring names like cv313 and Fletcher, establishing itself as a forward- thinking force in modern Dub Techno.

Forward Memory’s ‘Scholz’s Star’ leads the release, laying down organic percussion and twitchy, oscillating synth grooves alongside, subtly evolving textural components and evolving bottom end swells.

Glaswegian duo Thomas + James follow next with ‘Chosen Colour’, a deep immersive journey fuelled by billowing ethereal pads, bumpy bass stabs and a raw, reduced rhythm section.

Respected Dub Techno artist Gradient follows next on the flip side with ‘Vibes Realm’, delivering his signature floaty style via shimmering dub stabs, crisp drums and a swaying bottom end drive.

Beppu’s ‘Conversions’ then concludes the EP, shifting gears once again as spiralling dub echoes, hissy atmospherics and wide bass intertwines with delayed, broken rhythms.

Manchester’s multifarious sound organiser Andrew Hargreaves (Tape Loop Orchestra, The Boats, Beppu) channels key touchstones of Glenn Branca’s microtonal minimalism, the paranormal, and DIY amateur broadcasting with some of his most enigmatic, intuitive recordings to date.

‘Drones In The Air’ finds Hargreaves deep in a new phase of vibrational investigation where the sentimentality of prior eras gives way to more abstract conceptual processes. Utilising a bunch of oscillators and the Lyra-8, an “organismic analog synthesiser”, plus pedals, Hargreaves works within just intonation tuning systems - or more precisely “intuitive intonation” - to just-about harness a microtonal flux of clashing, beating frequencies, but the project is more about ceding a certain amount of freedom to the machines and allowing aural alchemy to occur, prompting a spectrum of harmonic colours and rich timbral overtones distinguished from previous tape loop-based works.

Comparative to “Glenn Branca’s micro-tonal workouts if he had worked with oscillators instead of guitars”, the result also variously evoke mysteries of The Conet Project, the oceanic feel of Éliane Radigue compositions, and early ambient works by Terre Thaemlitz in their sound sensitivity and scope. In ‘The Sun is Afraid’ he mesmerises with glistening microtones that develop a coarser traction, interrupted by shortwave radio comms and resolving into phantasmic noise gauze that speaks to his long-standing fascinations with entropic decay and the sounds between sounds. ‘Your Hands Are Shaking’ follows with a stealthier approach to coaxing a hallucinatory drone mass inflated by ether voices and thickening up into a sinister gloam redolent of NWW’s ’Soliloquy for Lilith’.