Yeah, it’s a picture of an underpass. What do want, a medal? Er, yes, anyway – look here. It’s a preview for the launch of the debut Underpass album, ‘Disorienteering’. There’s a review of the album coming soon, but a sneak preview would include the words ‘gleaming’, ‘crunchy’ and ‘lovely’. It really is bloody great. Watch the venue’s Lego wall get rearranged here:
Kruger presents Wonky Disco: Underpass album launch
This month Wonky Disco features Underpass: the Cardiff-based electronica wizard bringing his digital bleep funk to bump in yer trunk! Launching his debut album ‘Disorienteering’, the night will cover all the electronic bases from shimmering soundscapes to glitchy hip hop. Also featuring C++ on record-spinning duties, live visuals and a Fenchurch giveaway – its a New Year’s Earful of delicious, dissolvable dance music.
Doors 9pm
free
Quotes about ‘Disorienteering’:
“profoundly and spectacularly GREAT” Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales
“a joy to listen to… an excellent package in every sense.” Kruger Magazine
The debut album from Underpass, entitled Disorienteering, will seep into stores this January.
Neatly wrapping up recent productions, it is equal parts glitchy hip-hop, electronica and guitar scapes. In other words, it’s the gentler side of his output last heard on his Variable Architecture EP in 2006.
“Channel Zero” has already impressed with its slinky guitar lines and crunched ambience as the online video crept out and netted the track plays from the likes of Bethan Elfyn on BBC Radio One and Adam Walton on BBC Radio Wales. Look out for the next video, “Leigh Delamere”, part two of a visual triptych that accompanies the album. Like the music, it hints at a fixation with place, space, transportation and urban sprawl.
Elsewhere, “Sorry To Meet You” keeps the tone subdued with its stuttering edits and shadowy vocoder, while tracks like “Security” and “Wapping” plunge into heavier glitchy hip-hop territory. Away from the electronics, “This Connectivity” stretches and builds a wall of distorted and delayed guitars.
The album has given Underpass a chance to work with some of his favourite peers, crafting the track “Hold Your Dreams In” with long time friend Rhodri Viney, himself a chameleonic musician and vocalist. The artwork and packaging were designed by artist Hannah Biscombe, whose work you may have seen exhibited on the London Underground.
As a youth, Lee Marshall began his musical adventures in a break from the claustrophobia of a dull suburb – by forming a series of guitar-led punk bands. This was roughly the time when creating your own scene was, for him, the only viable option. He continued to apply that ethos while graduating to his latter day work as Underpass, using his own Urban Planning Records label to hold analogue and digital mindsets in tension.
Underpass continues to do remixes and productions for the dancefloor, showing his versatility as a producer. These have included a forthcoming remix of bleep pioneers Unique 3 for Mutate Records, and other tracks for the label that need to stay comfortably under wraps for now.
These days, he always uses the name Underpass. Indeed, those who know him for his bass-heavy club material might find the musicality of this album a surprise. In the words of the man himself, “This album has been a while in the making. It made sense to offer like-minded tracks together. While the music I make doesn’t always fit neatly into little genres, it’s all me.”
