- The music of UK-via-Barcelona producer Oriol sits blissfully unaware somewhere between funk, jazz, house and, erm, chillwave, and it's just a little bit conflicting. Is it refreshing to be so independent of externally-imposed context, or is it just destined to be ignored by a world obsessed with classification and categorization? Regardless of the answer, it's intriguing to note that Oriol's home is Planet Mu, an English label once focusing on IDM and breakcore that now acts as an outlet for the weirder corners of the UK bass scene. So what's Oriol doing here then? The first single from Oriol's debut album Night and Day seems intent on aligning Oriol with UK bass music, which might seem a bit odd—until you hear the results, anyway.
The original track is a slow-burning cruise illuminated by barely-seen torchlights, and the usually-effervescent FaltyDL seizes on the seedy underbelly of the track, plunging it into sludgy morphine depths. Torchlights are snuffed out in favour of blacklights as Lustman drafts in pitched-down vocals that waft in like a nightmarish hallucination, and the bubbliness of the original is perverted into a demented loping shuffle. Another major album highlight "Memories" is also given the remix treatment; Shortstuff peels off the extraneous layers and fashions a barebones 2-stepper for a profoundly weird four minutes, nail-gun percussion and subaqueous bass wobbles keeping the track from staying on one axis for more than a few bars. But it's the Jake Slazenger remix, AKA label head Mike Paradinas, that steals the show, piling on synths layer by agonizing layer as the track's slow rise builds to an awe-inspiring confetti-strewn climax.
Tracklist A1 Coconut Coast
A2 Coconut Coast (FaltyDL Remix)
B1 Memories (Jake Slazenger Remix)
B2 Memories (Shortstuff Refix)