If this were 1985 and not 2010, Justin Long and Mazi (aka Audio Soul Project) would be the subject of a strange, cult-like following in Europe as these two shadowy guys from Chicago that craft the most incredible beats, pulling the strangest sounds out of the atmosphere and fusing them into bytes and acetate.
Dustbin Boogie Woogie on Mazi's Fresh Meat Records puts their freakish audio creations on full display as a kind of modern day homage to the jacktrack.
If you think you need soaring diva vocals to make something that speaks to your soul, you're sorely mistaken: there's nothing but a couple of sparse samples here and they're beaten down into the rhythm as another piece of percussion in their arsenal. No better example of this than in the snaking groove of this 3 track EP, "One Eye Open":
Wasted Chicago Youth - One Eye Open (Clip) by Fresh Meat Records
Anytime you put a horn riff or warm organ in a track, you're going to have someone going on about it being "jazzy". This ain't jazzy. This is bounce-off-the-walls Chicago House Music by two guys who have spent more time in sweaty lofts and warehouses and crawling to corner cubbyholes than any Teamster.
In a review of Justin Long's Strange EP last month, I wrote that no one is making music like this right now. These are Exhibits B, C and D. You're not going to hear any of the pre-packaged sounds that make 90% of the tracks you hear today sound like pre-fab Lego sets, with vaguely differing shapes built using identical pieces.
Wasted Chicago Youth - Dustbin Boogie Woogie (Clip) by Fresh Meat Records
There's a very small handful of people that take music in this scene this seriously (I've written about some that don't) and they really should be championed for the sweat they're putting into it. I mean, I hear from people all the time who read something like the above, and take the blasé attitude that "Fuck, dude, a sample's a sample, why take it so seriously?" And you wonder why so few give this music any credibility?
You can find music that's original but undanceable, and danceable but unoriginal, but rarely do you hear something that's both crafted with love and originality and can beat the living shit out of a room. This is one of the latter.
Wasted Chicago Youth - Van Gogh's Ear (Clip) by Fresh Meat Records
Dustbin Boogie Woogie is out now on Beatport, iTunes and your favorite download shop coming soon.
