FMB MIXTAPE 216 | BIESMANS

Posted on July 6, 2023 by Feel My Bicep

FMB MIXTAPE 216 | BIESMANS

FMB MIXTAPE 216 | BIESMANS (iTUNES)

FMB MIXTAPE 216 | BIESMANS (320 DOWNLOAD)

This week’s mixtape guest is Berlin-based producer Biesmans who released his debut album ‘Trains, Planes and Automobiles’ in 2021 and now helms the mixtape series Watergate 28. We caught up with him to see what he’s been up to recently and for more info about the mix.

2023 has been an amazing year so far. I’ve been fortunate enough to tour 15 countries across three continents, and I’ve had some unforgettable debuts. Last month for example, I had my first shows at Fabric in London and Thuishaven in Amsterdam, both in the same weekend! Apart from touring, I’ve been dedicating a lot of time to the studio, exploring and sculpting a fresh sound. After years of releasing a lot of material, I felt it was important to take a small break and give myself the space to experiment.

I recorded the mix last Saturday afternoon on the main floor of Watergate club here in Berlin. In a past life I was a sound tech in the club so I really know my way around over there. Watergate also manages my bookings and I’m a resident, so I maintain a close connection to the venue. Just to clarify, the mix was not recorded during a club night or for a live audience. I set up a few CDJs and a mixer and immersed myself in the excellent sound system of the booth!

Absolutely! The main idea behind the mix was to give listeners a taste of what a Biesmans club set sounds like nowadays. However, the challenge was to condense a 3-4 hour set into approximately one hour. As someone who appreciates a wide spectrum of music, it was not easy to create a mix that showcases this range while maintaining a cohesive flow. I aimed to provide a proper intro and outro, opening with some house vibes, gradually transitioning into more intense rave-trance-techno influenced sounds for the peak time, and ultimately winding down with some trippy afterhour music. Of course, I couldn’t resist including a few of my own new tracks! There’s a collaboration with Johannes Albert set for release next month and two solo tracks that I’ve been testing on the road in recent months.

What are you up to next?

I’m super excited to finally start touring with my new LIVE set. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be bringing this set to Tomorrowland in Belgium (my friend Nico Morano is hosting his own stage there!), Rock Herk (also in Belgium), Watergate in Berlin, and many other exciting venues. Additionally, I’ll continue touring as a DJ across Europe extensively, and after the summer, I have another tour lined up in India. Besides my touring and music production, I’m launching a small label to release my own work and collaborations. There’s a lot on my plate right now, but I’m highly motivated and thrilled to work on these projects!

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FMB MIXTAPE 215 | PHIL LUCAS

Posted on June 29, 2023 by Feel My Bicep

FMB MIXTAPE 215 | PHIL LUCAS

FMB MIXTAPE 215 | PHIL LUCAS (iTUNES)

FMB MIXTAPE 215 | PHIL LUCAS (320 DOWNLOAD)

This week’s mixtape guest is Phil Lucas. Phil is one half of Twitch Belfast, one of Belfast’s longest-running and best independent electronic music nights. As usual, we asked him more about the mix & what he’s been up to…

AVA festival at the start of June was a great experience, it’s great to have been involved every year for the 9 years it’s been running. Gig-wise we’ve had Johnny Aux from Paranoid London, Sunil Sharpe, Ben Sims, Hodge, Altern8 and Radioactiveman play this year. We’re just enjoying ourselves at this stage and having fun putting on acts that we love. 

Local support DJs this year have been incredible, we’re still working through a backlog of amazing local DJs who broke through around COVID times like Reger, DJ Time of the Month, KEM, Hannah, Lorcan, More Gain, MXN, SPDPK and more.

Aside from that I just started a new job with a really small dog charity, it’s a really high-impact setup which is lovely. Twitch has always been a side-hustle for us alongside full time jobs for the 17 years it’s been running.

The mix was recorded at home in Bangor. I have all the tracks on record but ripped a few of them because of the short intros to loop them, I’ve become really reliant on loops when DJing from normally using CDJs in clubs. I used 2 x Pioneer XDJ700s and 2 x Technics 1210s and an Allen & Heath mixer.

I’m not a huge vinyl collector, I’ve a reasonable size of collection but I do collect James Stinson and Gerald Donald records, it’s just music that fascinates me, some of it still sounds like the future 25 years on and there are really strong concepts to each pseudonym and album, I love that. 

There aren’t a lot of artists making proper concept albums now, more collections of tracks and no theme behind it, it’s why I love Space Dimension Controller as well, it’s all very strong conceptually and not many people do it that well. Marion in Sound Advice, the record shop in Belfast has been hugely important in plugging the gaps in my Stinson and Donald collection, her shop is so important and good for Belfast and bad for my bank balance. Marion has been great for sourcing and holding all the Drexciya and side project represses which luckily have been regular in the last few years. I got stung badly on a few where I paid like £75-100 in the past and then they got repressed but I’m just glad to have them so no regrets! But yeah, the mix is hopefully to help others fall in love with this very special music from Detroit. 

And up next?

We have some big summer shows lined up with DJ Python, Pangaea and also a really special show with Iain McCready headlining who used to run and DJ with David Holmes in the Art College in Belfast.

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FMB MIXTAPE 214 | MICHELLE MANETTI

Posted on June 22, 2023 by Feel My Bicep

FMB MIXTAPE 214 | MICHELLE MANETTI

FMB MIXTAPE 214 | MICHELLE MANETTI (iTUNES)

FMB MIXTAPE 214 | MICHELLE MANETTI (320 DOWNLOAD)

This week’s mixtape guest is none other than Michelle Manetti! Having been on the scene for over 20 years, Michelle started as an underage clubber in the late 90s and now champions underrepresented artists in the music scene through her work with female-focused queer girl party Fèmme Fraîche and East London’s underground queer scene. You know the drill, we asked more about Michelle and the mix….

It’s been a pretty busy summer so far, this month I’ve had gigs in Ibiza, Madrid, Bristol, London and a little short break in Somerset and just gearing myself for a hectic festival season.

I recorded the mix at home, in the comfort of my living room, on some 1210’s and a DJM900nxs, rooted through a Pioneer DDJ1000 and recorded into Rekordbox.

So I wanted to do something really special for this mix, I decided to go back to my humble beginnings and record a vinyl mix. When I started DJ-ing over 20 years ago I was a vinyl only DJ (CDJ’s barely existed then) and used to record vinyl mixes all the time. I stopped playing vinyl about 10/12years ago and haven’t recorded one since then, so I thought i’d set myself the task and challenge to deliver one for this, as much for my own pleasure and benefit as anything else. Lately I’ve been digging around and buying much more old music than I have new current stuff, my sound is very 90’s influenced and right now, I’m really into the piano vibes of Italo and Euro house, as well as a lot of Ravey, leftfield and garage – especially speed garage (playing homage to my Croydon roots!), so wanted to bring these sounds into the mix to really showcase my sound, which is so eclectic, but always underpinned by house.

I’ve been buying a lot more vinyl again this last year, influence by the sounds I’m enjoying as well as by Vinyl loving DJ pals such as Eris Drew, Octo Octa, Marie Malarie and Angel D’Lite – I enjoy digging and finding those hidden gems, also shout out to a few instagram pages Belters4u, Discovery Vinyl, Todays Wax, Underground Sound who post little vinyl gems daily (some of the tunes in this mix actually came from recommendations from these pages) these are like the modern day music bloggers, which comes full circle as I actually first discovered Bicep from their music blog, when I was running a similar one back in the day. All of the tracks in the mix, apart from two are only available on vinyl, one of them however is some random track that’s only available on CD single, that had to be imported from Australia and record into the mix through rekordbox. I also snuck in my forthcoming track / collab with Demi Riquisimo, which is a vinyl only release coming out in July on Semi Delicious.

I’m gonna give a full disclaimer on the mix though, as enjoyable as it’s been to reconnect with vinyl, I’d forgotten how painstaking vinyl mixes are. I’m such a perfectionist and it took me more than a few attempts, a few swear words and some nifty editing to get this mix sounding right and I still wish the mixes were a bit tighter, but that’s the painful joy of vinyl for you. I was originally going to record the mix on these jenky old Numark belt drive decks that I’ve had since I first started to learn how to DJ, they’re cranky and wonky and I always told myself, if you can mix well on these old things you can mix anything.. they served me well, but at the weekend I was talking about my mix to my family and my brother-in-law, who used to be a DJ back in the 90’s offered to lend me his 1210’s he had sat gathering dust in the garage. There I am, about to record my mix (a night before the submission date, because as you well know, us DJ’s are always last-min) and I noticed the decks are coming out in mono, a little check and noticed the contacts were broken on one phono on each deck, I literally had to get nifty with some blue-tack and electrical tape to fix up the cables!! So when I tell you, this mix has taken blood sweat and tears, I’m not lying – but it’s probably the most heartfelt mix I’ve done in ages so thank you for the honour and I hope you enjoy!

Up Next?

Well I’m actually travelling off to Mexico in the morning, to play Mexico pride this weekend, but also have a super fun summer coming up. I’m playing 4 parties for London pride next weekend, including a big collab party called Studland Soho, which is a collab of my clubnight Femmme Fraiche, with Feel It, Little Gay Brother and Meat. I’m also doing some stage takeovers with my clubnight at Wilderness and Body Movements festivals and then just bouncing around for summer. it’s looking hot hot!

 

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FMB MIXTAPE 213 | GEORGE FEELY

Posted on June 8, 2023 by Feel My Bicep

FMB MIXTAPE 213 | GEORGE FEELY

FMB MIXTAPE 213 | GEORGE FEELY (iTUNES)

FMB MIXTAPE 213 | GEORGE FEELY (320 DOWNLOAD)

This week we have Ireland’s party starter on the mixtape. You’ve probably seen him on every festival line-up in the country, but we’ve managed to steal some time from his busy touring schedule. We asked George more about the mix & what he’s been up to outside of gigs…

I’ve been keeping my head down lately and working on as much music as possible. I’m really lucky to have my next couple of releases locked in on Armada Music and Boston Bun’s Circa ’99. Other than that, I’ve been playing gigs and getting myself ready for festival season!

I recorded the mix in my new home studio on a set of CDJ’s and Technic 1210’s. We’ve only just moved in, so it was really nice to christen the place with this mix.

To be honest, there wasn’t really much of a concept or idea behind the mix. I just wanted to put together something that really reflected what it’s like coming to one of my DJ sets. Packed with 90’s driven house bangers and splashes of funk and soul, I think this mix definitely highlights what I try to bring to each show I play.

And what’s up next?

Thankfully I have a very busy summer. I’ll be playing at a ton of festivals such as Otherside, Indiependence, Electric Picnic, as well as a few others that I can’t mention just yet. I’m also really excited to be heading back over to Canada to play a string of shows for Jika Jika and Groove In The Wild.

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FMB MIXTAPE 212 | JAY CARDER

Posted on May 25, 2023 by Feel My Bicep

FMB MIXTAPE 212 | JAY CARDER

FMB MIXTAPE 212 | JAY CARDER (iTUNES)

FMB MIXTAPE 212 | JAY CARDER (320 DOWNLOAD)

This week we have Jay Carder on the mixtape. Jay has been DJing across various radio stations for over 10 years, including Soho Radio, NTS & Rinse FM, and released her debut EP ‘Entropy’ at the end of 2022. We asked more about this mix & what she had been up to recently:

Firstly thanks so much for having me on the FMB mix series! 2023 so far has been a whirlwind…In January off the back of my debut EP, Mary Anne Hobbs asked me for a 6Music guest mix; she then playlisted the track ‘Eva’s Stoned’ for three whole weeks on the station – it was kinda mind blowing hearing it played daily. I also did a tour of India over Jan/Feb (15 gigs in 5 weeks say whaaat haha) before flying straight back to join Interplanetary Criminal for a few dates on his UK tour. 

Since then I’ve been playing most weekends around the country (plus a few cheeky sets in Barcelona), broadcasting on Rinse FM every Monday, and trying to squeeze in studio time as much as possible around other commitments (just about hanging in there with my ‘non-music-related-but-funding-the-dream’ day job too haha).

Ah yes, imagine the scene. I had an unusually free Saturday – I’d been playing in Peckham until 6am Friday night and crawled into bed for a few hours, then woke up around lunchtime to the sun streaming through the window. It felt like the first proper day of summer (aka festival season) and I just felt so energised and ready to dive into a day of digging. My normally chaotic house was empty with everyone away for the weekend and I had the whole place to myself to immerse myself in music, play it as loud as I dared (sorry neighbours) and dig to my heart’s content.

I’d been putting tracks aside for this mix for a little while, but that Saturday was a full 12-hour stint of finding, vibing and mixing tunes. The result is actually my favourite mix I’ve ever recorded – it’s full of twists and turns, highs and lows. I recorded it late into Saturday night, around 2am, on my humble yet beloved home setup of two XDJs and a DJM800.

I’m really genuinely excited to share this with the world! I know it’s been said a million times but a good mix is genuinely a piece of art itself – a collection of ‘moments’ strung together in a mesmerisingly coherent way. Of the tracks I chose, some I’ve never played before but am totally drawn to, and some have been causing some real damage in my recent club sets. Most of them are fairly new/some unreleased, but there’s a peppering of nostalgia in there too. With Bicep’s repertoire of huge melodies and chopped vocals in mind, I included plenty of euphoric moments and intertwined them with heavy breaks, bass and weirdly wonderful tension. I feel like the mix has a life of its own; it’s hard to explain really – you’ll just have to listen ;)

Up next?

I’m playing my first Boiler Room this bank holiday Sunday which is set to be a belter! Then festival season is well and truly underway. I’ll be at Gottwood and Glastonbury in June (big up Sports Banger for having me at their notorious Mega Rave), before heading for the first time to Canada to play at Bass Coast Festival in July. Secret Garden Party, Westival and Boomtown follow. By some work of magic I hope to find studio time for more releases, and of course I’ll be live on Rinse FM every Monday at 6pm throughout. I can’t guarantee I’ll make much sense, but I’ll be there ;)

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