If you wondered where your musical inspiration would come from in the waning hours of 2013, or the early hours of 2014, we’ve got some ideas. In lieu of top-this-and-that lists, we have a motherload of musical listening and discussions for a series we’re calling Music into 2014.
Eclectic and electronic, Mexico’s label Static Discos has become a nexus for artists from around the globe. Now, you can tap into that network as a listener, free. The new Dimension Series – a massive collection of free mixtapes from some extraordinary international artists – joins a year-end mix from the label itself.
Over the course of 60 releases and eleven years, Static Discos has already brought artists native to Mexico and Argentina to electronic music’s global community. The Tijuana-based label from Ejival, Fax, and Murcof continues to pour out fine music from those two countries.
With Dimension Series, curator Oscar González works with the label to expand the perception of what electronic music can be. Organized into a series of A-Sides, B-Sides, and a video, the works navigate a rich array of sounds from selectors with a full spectrum of backgrounds and tastes. The A-Sides include the likes of Israel’s Juju & Jordash, New York’s music producer slash visualist slash Mutual Dreaming party diva Aurora Halal, Fabric label manager Leo Belchetz of London, and Static Discos co-founder himself Ejival, among other key names. The B-Sides take the listener to Mexico City (e.g., Rob Anaya, Chuck Pereda), Berlin (e.g., Marsen Jules), and New York (Marcos Cabral). And there’s a lovely visual presentation, too, thanks to poster-style imagery by Ruben A. Tamayo, aka Static Discos co-founder FAX (who turns out to be a stunning designer as well as producer).
I was honored to be asked to produce a music video especially for the series, included here, which includes my own collaborative music experiment with Berlin’s Nerk on V-Records. Somehow, a trippy self-meditation on warped perception seemed to fit the mind-bending experience of discovering music.
“HUGO” | DIMENSION / Series video feat. NERK/KIRN from Peter Kirn on Vimeo.
Oscar talks a bit about his ideas behind the series in a statement accompanying the releases, excerpted here:
‘Dimension’ is a series of mixes that attempt to clarify and expand the vision of electronic music, with contributions from different people – DJ’s, journalist music, producers, founders and co-founders of labels – from all around the world, a total of 7 Dimensions and 7 B sides.
Dimension Series reflects a radiography of the panorama of electronic music around the world.
When people listen the Dimensions, they’ll find themselves having different sensations, a different experience with each mixtape that lets them know that electronic music goes beyond what they have ever imagined. (dub techno, techno, house, industrial, drone, disco, dark ambient, ambient, experimental, and many more)
And so the mixes in this series can be heard anywhere else in the world, radio stations, magazines online and live sessions.
… Someone maybe could have different experiences with each mix, perhaps the numbers will not mean anything to some, but for others who listen to the mix, could symbolize the death of the subject itself and the birth of the spirit, perhaps take us to another time and other place inside our minds.
There’s also a great interview for London-based independent broadcaster NTS Live, in which Oscar and Ejival talk about the series and also the scene in Mexico and Argentina, and how it connects to this international landscape:
INTERVIEW: DIMENSION / SERIES BROADCAST, DECEMBER 13TH – DECEMBER 24TH
Find all of the free downloads for Dimension Series at the minisite:
Sides A
DIMENSION 1 | L.A. | Vampire Slayer | Label Manager at Indian Gold Records, Music Producer and Recording artist at Static Discos
DIMENSION 2 | London | Leo Belchetz | Label manager of fabric Records / Houndstooth
DIMENSION 3 | NY | Aurora Halal | Creator of Mutual Dreaming party series, Video Artist and Music Producer
DIMENSION 4 | Israel | Juju & Jordash | Recording artists at Dekmantel
DIMENSION 5 | UK | Fudge Fingas | Part of collective Firecracker Recordings
DIMENSION 6 | Mexico City | Eji Val | Founder of Static Discos
DIMENSION 7 | NY | Ben Vida | Composer and Artists at PAN RecordsSides B
DIMENSION B1 | NY | Marcos Cabral | Recording artist at L.I.E.S. and co-founder of On The Prowl
DIMENSION B2 | Mexico City | Chuck Pereda | Electronic music amataeur (per the Michael Chabon definition), Cat supporter and Alpha nerd
DIMENSION B3 | Berlin | Cubenx | Recording artist at In Finé and Static Discos
DIMENSION B4 | Mexico City | Rob Anaya | Electronic music amateur, Space
DIMENSION B5 | Mexico City | Hombreojo + Sinecio
DIMENSION B6 | Berlin | Marsen Jules | Founder of oktaf – music & art
DIMENSION B7 | Mexico City | White Visitation | DJ and Producer of self-released tapes, distributed by RVNG Intl. and with releases for Opal Tapes and SUS Records.
http://staticdiscos.com/dimension/
For more Static Discos, there’s a wonderful Christmas-timed mixtape of their releases, bringing us to the close of 2013:
Xmas Mixtape 2013 by Static Discos on Mixcloud
(There’s a direct download on the Static Discos site, too.)
— and the label has recently launched a Cloud Player for more listening.
Visit the label for more.