Debruit

The Donky Pitch crew return for 2010 with another line-up blending hip-hop, dubstep and all things electronica which is both heavy on cutting-edge experimentation and also damn good fun to dance to!  They’ve lined up two live performances; headlining will be Paris-based Debruit and Brighton-based “Skwee” producer Boss Kite will play his debut live show.  On top of that you get arch-dancefloor destroyer and Donky resident DJ Slugabed. For bio’s read below.

Donky Pitch return to the Jazz Place in Ship Street on Thurs 18th Feb.

And if you love/like/are curious/don’t-know-what-the-hell-it-is-but-think-it-sounds-funny Donky Pitch will also be holding a screening of the film “We Call It Skwee”.  Its at The Globe pub on Tues 2nd Feb from 8pm with Donky Pitch DJs playing their favourite ‘Skwee’ tunes subsequently.

Slugabed’s squashed 8-bit hip hop and lo-fi mangled beat structures have earned him releases on Glasgow’s Stuff Records (Rustie) and Ramp Recordings (Zomby, Fying Lotus, Ras G). He also has a debut EP for Planet Mu (Starkey, Boxcutter, Milanese), Ultra Heat Treated, forthcoming this month, all at the youthful age of 20. If you’ve made it down to DP before or if if you’ve caught this man in a club somewhere else in the world, you’ll know why we made him resident, if you haven’t … Check out his recent mix for Rob Booth’s influential Radio Show Electronic Explorations

(Donky Pitch)
myspace.com/506166353
soundcloud.com/bosskite

Boss Kite, aka local Brighton chap Ross Flight, is a victim of Skweee. Like the rest of the Donky Pitch family Ross fell in love with this Scandinavian phenomena on first listen and in the 9 months since he has been knee deep in synths and computer programs forging his own melodic take on this ’synthetic funk.’  “I started making Skweee music because I really wanted to be part of something I thought was exciting, fresh and completely unlike most electronic music that was coming out of the UK at the time. The simplicity of the sounds really grabbed me and I found a strange sort of personality in the music that was different in every Skweee track I heard.” The results of his labour have gained him recognition from the rest of the burgeoning Skweee community around the world, and we’re really pleased he’s chosen to share it with us first.

TOKiMONSTA

Eventually found the Jazz Place after initially going down the wrong street (does anyone else still have trouble navigating the south lanes?) all the while getting heavily rained on.  It’d been a while since that last time I’d been down in the Jazz Place and it was good to be there again as I’ve some fond memories of that cosy basement.  Blue Daisy took the controls as first live act of the evening and was warming into his set when I arrived.  Playing what I suspect were mostly his own cuts, Blue Daisy played a set with a lot more groove than I had been expecting, mixing some very deep and atmospheric sounds with precision assaults of crushing beats.  It put me in mind of one of my favourite Warp artists, Clark.  Especially the crushing mile-wide repetitive beats of what I think I recognised as his own ‘Hunterz’.  On tonight’s evidence I got the distinct impression Blue Daisy will among the most interesting artists in electronic music over the next few years both live and producing beats.

TOKiMONSTA came straight after Blue Daisy’s seamless groove with 45 mins that veered between cosmic hip-hop and some good old-fashioned rave inspired anthemic moments.  Chief among the latter and getting a great reaction from the crowd were her own cuts using samples of of Lee “Scratch” Perry’s ‘I Chase the Devil’ and The Loonies ‘I Got Five on It’.  It all got very muddled up during TOKi’s set as her concoction of gnarling sub-bass and shimmering scatter-gun beats combined to addle my mind.  The only thing I clearly remember is not being able to leave the dancefloor.  And there I pretty much stayed until the end of the following set of Slugabed.

Big ups to Donky Pitch for putting on a night of such unique quality.  One of the organisers told me they are simply interested in playing music and putting on artists that they really want to hear, and hopefully this will be what a number of others will want to hear also.  The crowd was a good mix of those who wanted to have a bit of a party and those more content to head nod, but it was clear the vast majority were drawn there for the music.  With a music policy at the intersection between British dubstep, west coast hip-hop and Scandinavian skwee, a place where a great deal of innovative and exciting artists are creating some amazing music, Donky Pitch is well placed to showcase it in Brighton for our distinct pleasure.

Donky Pitch DJs have a residency every 3rd Saturday at The Globe. 9pm-1am

Find out more about Donky Pitch here

Listen to Donky Pitch guest mixes here

Review by Paul Clare

Blue Daisy

The first Donky Pitch night was only held back in June this year but is already proving to be a heavyweight addition to the underground music scene in Brighton, playing cutting edge experimental hip-hop and electronica, without the added pretentiousness but with a lot of fun(k). Next Thursday sees them put on two live performances by some rising stars of electronica from opposite sides of the Atlantic. TOKiMONSTA based in L.A. and part of the Brainfeeder label family which includes Flying Lotus and Gaslamp Killer is playing as part of her first UK tour. Expect some soulful hip-hop sounds set against some real dirty floor shaking bass. Blue Daisy from Camden is someone a lot of people are very excited about. A live set that should leave the crowds guts shaken and minds enriched. In his own words:

“Imagine yourself in a box, a normal four-by-four box, and you’re sitting in there, and you’ve got little holes to breathe….and different atmospheres are coming in- you’ve got the cold air coming in, the hot air coming in, and it overwhelms you. You pass out and wake up again in the same box, but that box becomes a new world. So now, where you’re sitting, it’s not a box anymore, the box becomes what you want it to be- it becomes your world. And that’s what I try to do with my music; you’re listening to my music but I don’t want you to just listen to it, I want it to grab you and sit you in the middle of the track.”

Resident DJs Slugabed and Ghost Mutt will also be playing some wonky, funky, bass-y goodness. Not many better reasons to start your weekend early, not that most of Brighton need much encouragement to do that.

Donky Pitch 1.2 is at The Jazz Place Thu 26/11/09

Words by Paul Clare