Daniel Avery And The Early Bird

No forty minute Sunday mix from me today- I've been away this week and haven't had much time. Instead, enjoy this sublime two hours from Daniel Avery and The Early Bird Show at NTS from last week. Daniel plays an early morning selection of songs and tracks, joining the dots between ambient, indie, trip hop and techno, with PJ Harvey, some of his own music, Sinead O'Connor, Two Lone Swordsmen, Holden Federico, George Clanton, James K, Deftones, Death In Vegas, Everything But The Girl, Skee Mask, Smashing Pumpkins, Interpol, Solvent, and Nulifer Yanya all making appearances. The full tracklist is here and you can listen here. Two hours well spent. 

I've posted two different Daniel Avery mixes previously. Both are still available to download. In November 2022 I put together a forty minute mix of remixes Daniel has done of other artists- it's quite intense and thumpy. 

Forty Minutes Of Daniel Avery Remixes 

• Enfant Sauvage: 58500 (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Saint Etienne: Fonteyn (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Leaving Laurel: Winter In The Woods (Daniel Avery Remix)
• David Holmes: Hope Is The Last Thing To Die (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Mandy, Indiana: Alien 3 (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Joshua James: Amber Rush (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Confidence Man: Feels Like A Different Thing (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Daniel Avery: Lone Swordsman (Chris Carter Remix)

Previous to that, in February 2022 when I started this Sunday mix series, the second forty minute mix I posted was a Daniel Avery one, thirty minutes of echo, reverb, FX and emotive ambient/ techno.

Half An Hour Of Daniel Avery

• Together In Static
• Illusion Of Time (Teodor Wolgers rework)
• Petrol Blue
• Lone Swordsman (Chris Carter Remix)
• Into The Voice Of Stillness
• A Story In E5
• Midnight Sun
• Lone Swordsman

On And On

This is newly out, On And On (Again), a collaboration between Daniel Avery and Confidence Man, five minutes of bouncy techno/ rave pop which sounds tailor made for summer, a track that will light up everything from barbecues to festivals. 

Last year Daniel remixed Confidence Man's Feels Like A Different Thing, a chunky breakbeat driven track with sirens and distorted synth sounds and one fragment of vocal looped up, 'You know I love it'- an altogether heavier, slightly darker affair. 

Feels Like A Different Thing (Daniel Avery Remix)

In a similar area Underworld have a new single out too, a full on thumper from Karl and Rick, Karl intoning, 'And the colour red', as the drums kick up a storm, the bass pumps away and the synth squiggles flicker in and out. 

Forty Minutes Of Daniel Avery Remixes

Daniel Avery's new album Ultra Truth came out on Friday, a record already sounding like a contender for album of the year. Across fifteen tracks Daniel's cavernous, euphoric/ anxiety inducing ambient/ industrial/ techno has been fine tuned into an emotive and immersive album. Back in January when I started this Sunday mix series the second week was an Avery half hour mix. In way of a follow up and to celebrate the release of Ultra Truth I thought I'd do a second Avery half hour but this time remixes, Daniel's of other people and one of Daniel, all dating from the last couple of years. The sounds that are trademark Avery- the reverb, the drums, the wall of fog and distortion, the thump of the kick drum, the wobbly synths- are present in many of these which range from fairly languid to full on 'panel beaters from Prague' techno (quote courtesy of Andrew Weatherall, who is never very far away). 

Forty Minutes Of Daniel Avery Remixes

• Enfant Sauvage: 58500 (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Saint Etienne: Fonteyn (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Leaving Laurel: Winter In The Woods (Daniel Avery Remix)
• David Holmes: Hope Is The Last Thing To Die (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Mandy, Indiana: Alien 3 (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Joshua James: Amber Rush (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Confidence Man: Feels Like A Different Thing (Daniel Avery Remix)
• Daniel Avery: Lone Swordsman (Chris Carter Remix)

Monday's Long Song

The Orielles, teenage punk funk sensations from Halifax, have been living and recording in Manchester since 2020 and have undergone a major transformation for their third album Tableau. Their musical experimentation was made clear when they remixed Unknown Genre recently, turning in a remix that sounded like something that could have come out on Warp in the early 90s,  a wondrous slice of ambient techno/ IDM. 

This song, Beam/s, came out as a single/ taster at the end of August, a slow burning eight minutes that starts off like Sonic Youth and then heads into Broadcast territory and then further off again, accessible and experimental space rock. The band were involved in directing and producing the video too. They seem to have placed themselves in a class of one right now. 

On second single The Room, out last month, they tapped into a 90s downtempo/ lounge/ pop vibe, not too far from Saint Etienne but with a 21st century future jazz feel. The album came out last week. I haven't heard it yet will do soon.

Back in 2020 when their second album Disco Volador came out there was a fantastic remix of Bobbi's Second World by Confidence Man and then previously in 2017 they were remixed by Weatherall (twice) and Radioactive Man. The Confidence Man remix is all summer dance music vibes, dubby keyboard stabs echoing round and a hissy drum machine with vocals wafting around over the top and uplifting house piano. 

Bobbi's Second World (Confidence Man Remix)

It's About Time The Sun Comes Up

It's a month since I last posted anything by Andrew Weatherall and that's too long a gap. Time for a remix, seven minutes of bliss and wide eyed abandon, the aural equivalent of sunrise after a night out that you don't want to end. Brisbane's Confidence Man, a male- female duo who make day glo, straight up, electro/ indie dance for nightclubs and festivals, released Out Of The Window in 2018, a poppy tribute to a night out that never ends and lyrics celebrating the joys of hedonism- 'It's about time the sun comes up/ We don't wanna believe it/ Seven hours later I'm still up/ I can't really see us sleeping'. 

Weatherall presses play on the steam powered drum machine, isolates and repeats extracts of the vocal, pulls in a gorgeous Hawaiian guitar lick, adds a pulsing synth topline and sends everything into 'euphoric chugger' mode, circling round a couple of key vocal phrases, one being the  'Slow down, carry me home/ Lights out, arms open wide/ Exhale, step inside' part. When the beautiful, rising ecstatic/ melancholic chord sequence hits at five minutes thirty it's almost too much to take but then the multi- tracked vocals take over to carry us home, 'try to free my mind/ I only want a good time...'

Out Of The Window (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Bobbi

Second summer of love vibes from opposite sides of the world- Halifax, West Yorkshire and Brisbane, Australia- and the combined talents of The Orielles and Confidence Man, out last month on Heavenly. The Orielles' single Bobbi's Second World came out in 2018, now followed by this remix by Confidence Man. Piano and synth bass building nicely with the Halifax teenager's yelps and whoops mixed in and out. A highly infectious six minutes encapsulating the fun of dancing outdoors to loud music.

Out Of The Window

While this ridiculously good summer continues to send rays of sunshine all over the place Andrew Weatherall sneaks out a second remix of Aussie duo Confidence Man. It's got a kind of electro-Kraftwerk-gospel vibe, with a lovely twangy guitar part. It's perfect for a Friday in July.

If you weren't tripping when you entered the foyer at the Park House Hotel at Heathrow 1968, you were by the time you got to the check-in desk.

Bubblegum

And as chance would have it here's a new Weatherall remix, fresh on the internet today and a free download too. Bubblegum by Brisbane duo Confidence Man taken on a trip.