NEW SOUNDS: FEBRUARY 2012

IN...MUSIC FEATURES

Shanghai's music makers have hit the ground running this year, and things are looking good for the months ahead, with both MIDI and Modern Sky's Strawberry festivals scheduled to take place in April (21st/22nd, 28th-30th), and a plethora of artists promising EPs, albums and gigs throughout the year.

Here's a quick round up of February's new music:

Last weekend local electronica whizkid Downstate dropped his debut LP on PAUSE:MUSIC at the Shelter, pitching it up somewhat with plenty of DnB! 'Farewell Static' is the result of a couple of years of seeing very little daylight by all accounts, encompassing glitchy beats, 8-bit sounds and everything in between.

Direct from the grimy depths of Shanghai's underworld, new 'indie-dance' outfit Power Word Kill have put out some instrumental demos - full vocal versions to follow we're told:

The most hardworking MC around, Didjelirium, has been characteristically busy, collaborating with all and sundry, among other things. In his own words:

"As you may know, I'm a story teller. One inner development of that concept is that I like to share stories, I like to hear various adventures. I've been lucky enough to get to 'meet' people online producing some great music and looking for vocalists, but keen on getting something a bit different, which is basically all I can do. Thus, they let me free to create stories around their beats and I let them free to arrange and edit it as they want, so the final tracks are really original works, really different from one producer to the other, yet united under the banner of story-telling".

Atlanta-born, New York-bred, Shanghai-based producer Hamacide finally got around to hooking up with local MC Cha Cha, just before she jetted off to Madrid last year to take part in the Red Bull Music Academy, to lay down some vocals for their 'You Me EP', released a few days ago:

"ChaCha is one of the first people I saw perform when I moved to Shanghai in 2010. Since then, I have heard her on numerous recordings ranging in many different styles, and I knew I had to work with her on something".

And we've also had a few well-established electronic producers put out new tracks this month:

Achun's 'Two Suns in the Sky', taken from his album 'On the Other Side', forthcoming on PAUSE:MUSIC (24th March).

Newcomer Huashan Unit's (aka Tzu Li) debut EP 'Synthes' on his own imprint, Huashan Records:

"Huashan Records will focus on the new Chinese electronic music scene, releasing talents in techno, house, post-dubstep and experimental music". Cool!