Inn
You already know Jason Hendardy & Mike Stillman from the Bay Area’s premiere dream weavers Permanent Collection who have sadly retired their beloved dream machine to make for new notes of blisteringly beautiful distortion designed with destinies of extreme purpose. Presenting the grand unveiling of their instant classic Vacancy EP recorded, mixed & co-produced by the maven of noise Monte Vallier & masted by Carl Saff. Hendardy & Stillman turn all the dials way up while at the same time not compromising on the quality of their terse melodic arrangements.
Right from the get-go of the slammed open dog racing gates, Inn kick the action into the high gear of “Here Today” that trades the permanent notions for embracing the anarchy of the temporal. The thrilling overclocked motor-like revs of “Let Up” is a track that does not let up for anything, completely pulverising you into the sweetest smiles of submission. The entire three song cycle draws to a premature close (that only keeps you wanting to hear more of that insane guitar roar that Jason & Mike unleash with everything they have) with “Waste Your Time” that finds Inn repeating that they “don’t wanna waste your time” while doing anything but waste anyone’s time as a kind of tongue in cheek gesture to the super succinct nature of the Vacancy EP. And just as those glorious nine minutes and twelve seconds draw to a close, Inn provides the continental breakfast that keeps you craving an epic brunch from the duo. Jason provided the following introductory words on the formation of Inn:
We don’t have too much of a mission statement other than two guys who never moved out of the bay area making music about growing up and living in the bay area, listening to too much Husker Du, Jawbreaker, Teenage Fanclub, Hickey, and Icky Boyfriends. Inn just seemed like a fitting name because we kind of hole up in a room with no windows to make music.
D/R/U/G/S
Manchester prince of the nu-sophisti beat Callum Wright, oka D/R/U/G/S just dropped the big-mental dance floor destroyer “New Born Love” featuring rich vocals courtesy of Akiine. Released via Wright’s own Code Silence label, the DJ/producer/artist/and so forth continues to create designer sound narcotics that have grown in greater pop distinctions like the subterranean basement rave sounds emanating to the concrete FM radio surface levels of main street. With an upcoming busy schedule playing Start The Bus in Bristol August 28, The Waiting Room in London September 1, and DJing Shoreditch’s 1234 Festival September 3; D/R/U/G/S sets out to channel our own chemical compositions that comprise feeling, moods, motivations, & more through pastiches of house beat revelations.
“New Born Love” moves with an assured sense of found affections where Akiine’s candid vocals provide a warm sense of perpetual endearment in recitations of “I always want to sing for you.” The joy & bliss brought by a realized love or new special addition to one’s family is celebrated with an intimate piano key hooks adorned by exorbitant rhythms that shine bright like clusters of bright beaming diamonds & crystals. Callum & Akiine comprise a synergistic team where the the understated aspects of Wrights keys are elaborated upon by Akiine’s earnest delivery that brings infinite sense of care & comfort. After the following stateside premiere of “New Born Love” read our interview with Manchester’s own Callum Wright.
Tell us about the processes and pragmatism at work on the new EP.
It’s a continuation of where I’ve been heading the past couple of releases, moving the sounds of the live show, club releases and
full band tracks closer together into one whole project. Taking parts of all these different styles, based around dance music/electronica and trying to form something new.
Interested in hearing about how the live show has evolved as well.
We’re just about to launch our first full live show in a couple of months, super excited about it. I’ve done live electronic shows before but there’s a limit to what can be achieved there, especially with only one person, you’re kind of limited to playing around with samples and loops etc, which while fun isn’t particularly engaging as a performance. Now with a vocalist on board, it’s given us so many options. The best live shows I’ve ever seen have all been from the legendary older names in dance music, Underworld, Chemical Brothers, Orbital, I’d love to build towards something like what they put across.
Give us the story about the birth of “New Born Love” and working with vocalist Akiine. How did her contributions breathe new sorts of life into the song?
She released a few EPs on Bad Life Records same as ourselves and her vocal stood out immediately as something that fits in perfectly with our sound. Lyrically it’s so rare to find club or club-influenced tracks that have any intelligence to them, they are usually horrendous, I was delighted with what she put together.
What prompted the formation of Code Silence Records?
It’s something I’ve wanted to do for the past four years, ever since I started D/R/U/G/S. The majority of labels in dance music are run by artists and the scene is far healthier because of it. I’d love to see that concept spread across music, it’s hard because without knowing how to set things up or the kind of help you need its impossible to get something off the ground, we’ve had help from some great people who genuinely care about getting good music out there and supporting artists, those people are thin on the ground.
Other artists and releases we should also be hip to?
Mhairi, Akiine, Kotelett & Zadak, Sirens of Lesbos, HQFU, Winter Son, The White Shadow. All newish, all electronic of some form. All amazing. Also, here’s a shameless plug, look out for Darkline, a new club collaboration gonna be putting out their first singles on Code Silence.
Future predictions and hopes from D/R/U/G/S?
I can’t wait to get this live show up and running, the songs are so much fun to play, Candi (our singer) is great to work with and there’s just so much to play around with soundwise, there’s a lot of possibilities. And just to survive the next few years before the UK Conservative party ban music.
OIM Records
By now the East Bay’s prestigious imprint OIM Records (Oakland Indie Mayhem) is one of the best kept open secrets the world has been waking up too over the past few years. Founded by famed producer Jeff Saltzman, today the imprint debuts their second edition of their compilation series with OIM: Vol. II that features what is a veritable whose-who of artists who have graced the pages of Impose in recent years featuring favorites like Bells Atlas, Hot Flash Heat Wave, The Tambo Rays, Be Calm Honcho, O, Everyone is Dirty, Sugar Candy Mountain, TV Heads, & so many more. OIM is one of those labels that could only have been born about in Oakland where the most jaded of Bay Area scene critics can find a wealth of new heroes in artists that continue to rapidly shape how see hear, see & think about the world around us, ourselves, others, and so on.
Listen as OIM Records flex right out the gates with everyone’s favorites Hot Flash Heat Wave who bring about all the big festival fun with “Bye Bye Baby” that rocks on the heels of the catchiest riffs around. The Tambo Rays then prove that their super snazzy sound has only increased it’s own pop profile in recent years with “Get It Right Now”, right before Bells Atlas spins the entire world globe on your nose with the comforting psych-pop lullaby song of “All Is Well” that resonates to the most guarded places of the spirit. Next on the comp is O who exhibits a trippy display of empathy of “Be There For You” where further expressions & illustrations of commitment are heard between the harmonizing vocals, chords & keys; as our buddies TV Heads reprise their single “Chin Up” (premiered earlier this year in this very column) with continued motifs of endless & limitless cheer & earnest affections. “Kid Go Hard” from Be Calm Honcho illustrates anecdotes of misspent youths & pages turned, while Everyone Is Dirty who continue their takeover of the Bay Area scene circuits with some of the most original pop being made right now with “Silver and White” that operates on such a level of esteem & sophistication that is begging to be placed in an arty film featured presented at Cannes. Spooky Mansion took us on a weird trip through an inverted haunted house on “Mrs. John”, right before Virgin Teeth brought about a psuedo-history lesson with “Isaac Newton” that divulges it’s own sort of gravity & freaky-physics that makes for an overall cosmic pop roller-coaster ride. And then right when no one was looking or listening—Other Band On Earth breaks up the party by broadcasting their own frenetic ruckus of “Pleasure” that abides by an erratic pattern of self-ordained & governed sequence of arrangement & rhythm that could bring Mike Patton to his knees. The OIM ride returns full circle with the wondrous Sugar Candy Mountain that continue to dose the world’s ears with further lysergic gifts as heard on the psych-pop majesty of “A Day At Every Door”. The OIM trip is all yours to discover—right here, right now.
