Is being called “spastically great” by The Fader an honor for a young and upcoming producer? I definitely think so!
Growing up in Berlin’s Dancehall and Soca scene, then turning heads with his podcast series for seen., now being one of Munich’s Bass-Ambassadors with his own party at Crux club and hosting the monthly Man Recordings Man FM show, Tim Turbo is a busy young man having his hands in a lot of cooking pots at the moment.
His Debut EP “Hush (Iggy Iggy) / Linyora” is breathing the spirit of the newest wave of eclectic club productions, which I would describe as neon-colored tribal patterns translated into music, a hint of ethno in a clear and sometimes quite minimalistic beat construction. On being asked if he feels Tropical he explains: “At the point where I did the tunes for the EP I was definitely very much inspired by all kinds of Tropical and Caribbean music, as you can hear. But right now I listen a lot to the all this deep Post-Dubstep stuff, old Detroit Techno and Acid. Tropical vibes will still be a big inspiration, but if everybody would just be inspired by that we all end up again at the point where the Global House thing started and all stuff would sound pretty much the same. Like already everybody is using pretty much the same beat pattern again. I just have to change constantly. But I grew up on Reggae and Dancehall, so there will always be a tropical island somewhere in me.”
Teaming up with Spoek Mathambo for the first EP seems to have been a pretty lucky move, as the “post-Apartheid Post-Hip Hop Posterboy” is literally making the masses and the media scream these days. That the combination with his wife Gnucci Banana is absolutely dancefloor-banging already has been proved and tested with the Schlachthofbronx track “Ayoba”. But the new Tim Turbo productions take the interesting interplay between the couple a step further.
“Linyora” tells the story of a Soweto Area Don who is falling for the most beautiful girl in the hood – delivered by Spoek and Gnucci in a perfectly interwoven dialogue, riding on the heavy kickdrums and percussion of the techy dark Kudurobeat in a melange of English, Swedish and South African slang.
“Hush (Iggy Iggy)” is a synth-driven Bmore production talking about all the haters out there that won’t stop talking behind your back in a jealous manner (that’s what an Iggy means in South African slang). The just dropped video features empty Munich car parks, Iggys with denimheads and the protagonists Tim, Spoek and Gnucci (a little bit like The Famous Five -2) clad in shirts designed by Gabe of the seen.-crew, who also did a great job for the cover artwork:
Finally the EP scores with it’s versatile selection of remixes – being an avid remixer himself, Mr Turbo knows who to ask to please the Transnational Global Tropical Ghetto Bass Club Crowd with it’s changing moods and preferences. Douster jumps in to take “Hush” back to the days of “Streets Sweeper”, “Bookshelf” and “Bellyas” inna a late-90s Dancehall vibe. So Shifty are giving the tune a light and airy clubfeel, while Beware and Motorpitch are up for a Minimal and Deephouse influenced bassline. Finally Cocotaxi adds some swedish swagger for the final touch.
Both reworkings of “Linyora”, by Hat+Hoodie and Tipanic, are totally made for the dancefloor, I would go as far as recommending them for fist pumping.
On the one hand the original versions are quite strongly relying on the layering of voices, not so much on a specious bassline, while the remixes have in common that every single one has a quite differing definition of an appropriate clubsound – not a big surprise for someone who says that he “intended to make real tunes with vocalists that you could listen to at home or in the car, too, not club only dance music” and “The LOL Boys recently tweeted: „if we can hear ur weirdo bassline on laptop speakers we don’t like it“ But it is definitely stressed too much by the commentatorship that this „movement“ of Tropical is all about bass. Any other club music wouldn’t be fun without bass either, right? Also I think bass should be a condition, but the melody of a tune is really what people touches emotional.”
Tim Turbo Ft Spoek Mathambo & Gnucci Banana – Hush (Iggy, Iggy)/Linyora EP by Tim Turbo
All you can say is well done, young gun! And as I already expected that there must be more things in the making from someone who is as squirelly as Tim Turbo, I checked back with him for his next steps and future plans: “I will launch a new project later this year, which will be more inspired by all the sounds I’m listening to right now and this project is also meant to end up as a computer/controller driven live show on stage. We’ll see. Also I got lots of Tim Turbo remixes coming up in the next time and I got some tunes for another EP. I will hopefully start a new party series in munich together with the good folks of Man Recordings, plus continue to host their Man FM podcast radio, as well as continue my own party series BTYCL in munich. And maybe there will be a Remix EP of „Hush (Iggy, Iggy)/Linyora“, too, featuring another very well known munich based crew.” Sounds like a deal.
“Hush (Iggy Iggy) / Linyora” EP will be released on Big-N-Hairy October 1st, but can already be pre-ordered via Juno
New post: @timturboberlin – Hush/Linyora EP http://www.tropicalbass.com/2010/09/tim-…
Thank you for the great article!!! RT @TropicalBass new post: @timturboberlin – Hush/Linyora EP http://www.tropicalbass.com/2010/09/tim-…
Great article!
Fuck Yea Mr. Turbo!! “The only real man around here” Haha California Lazerdaze Tour was di HARDEST!!!
This is the great blog, I’m reading them for a while, thanks for the new posts!