Bopside US レコード& CD

Review: Tadd Mullinix's Michigan-based label Bopside returns with its most ambitious project yet, a debut album from his and D'Marc Cantu's brilliant 2AMFM project. This eponymous album has been a long time coming with 2AM FM responsible for some crucial 12" cuts on labels like Creme, Spectral Sound, M>O>S Recordings and Nation dating back a decade! It feels like Bopside is the right platform for Mullinix and Cantu to fully express themselves as 2AM FM and this album is deep, but there is also a real warmth to their productions. Highlights include the melted mechanical acid of "Midnight Social", the lo-fi electro-pop of "Excuse Me Miss" and the soothing ecstasy pads of retro houser "What We Live For".

Review: The first single on the Bopside label comes from its' creator, Ann Arbor-based producer Tadd Mullinix, under the JTC mantle (the recently abbreviated take on James T Cotton, one of his many pseudonyms). "Escalator To Sorga" is a thing of great beauty, with a lolloping Detroit deep house groove - hissing cymbals, loose hits and so forth - overlaid with long, drawn out chords and tactile stabs. "Infinite Organism" sounds like a late '80s British house cut with old skool Motor City stabs and stargazing melodies, while "Veronja One" is the kind of deep, undulating electro jam that Drexciya used to do so well.

Review: album on his own Bopside imprint, eight tunes of hyper galactic deep house from the outer realms of space. Everything on here sounds like it's been made in 3D, from the organic sounds of "Caskadia", to the molecular shapes heard on "Nexus Ship Core", and the slow-burning dub waves of the artfully-punned "Dusselmorph". This is techno for people who don't like techno, or house for those that need something with a little extra 'umph'. Imagine Terrence Dixon in Chicago mode, and you're getting close...

Review: In recent times, Tadd Mullinix seems to have focused mostly on his long-running JTC project. Here, he dons his industrial/electro/new wave/EBM alias Charles Manier, a handle last used for a superb album on Nation back in 2013. American Manier explores similar territory to that set, with Mullinix focusing on sharp analogue rhythms, macabre textures, stylish synthesizer parts and unsettling, end-of-days vocals. It's an intoxicating brew that guarantees a string of highlights, from the ghostly, nightmarish beat science of "Deatomized" and bustling EBM throb-job "Sift Through Art Collecting People", to the brutal, Dexter-style Rotterdam electro of "Unsubscribe".

Review: Tadd Mullinix returns to his more experimental Charles Manier guise and follows up 2015's demonstrative sophomore American Manier with another politically galvanised trip into the darker, starker, fringe-frolicking pastures of electronica. Coated in his own artwork and burning with fusions such as a fuzzy kraut stew of "Lions Of Rojava", the swampy, insistent 99 percenter "Truest Coffer" the experience gradually builds in momentum and shape as we hit the final floor-focused throes where impenetrable weaves of molten machine funk entwine and tangle with uncompromised hypnotica. Another stern statement from the man like Cotton.

Review: The second release on Tadd Mullinix's Bopside label introduces Brandon Mitchell, a local Michigan-based artist who has previously worked alongside the producer under the rapper alias Kadence. Back in 2006, Mitchell featured on two tracks Mullinix recorded as Dabrye for the Two/Three album released by Ghostly International, whilst the Michigan man has also been experimenting with pop music under the Barefoot Sneaker Slaves name. As far as we can tell, Waiting For A Minute looks to be Mitchell's debut release under his given name, offering two undeniably soulful house tracks written and produced with Mullinix. Proper effervescent US vocal House business this, great stuff.

Review: It's not hard to admire the sheer bloody-mindedness that drives Tadd Mullinix's label venture, Bopside. In between the recent Charles Manier album and the upcoming JTC long-player - a contender for house album of the year - comes Skein. Produced under his birth name, it's a deeply experimental three-tracker. The title track is a succession of screeches, howls and white noise blasts, while "Hadopelagic Chime" sees the US producer map out a series of soundscapes against a low tempo backdrop. Closing track "Bridge Out" is a succession of abstract clatters, noisy interference and scattered dissected FX. God knows what demographic Mullinix is hoping to a appeal to - if any.