Reclaim Your City 641 | Mari Sakurai

Over the past few years, German DJ Marie Montexier has built and cemented her reputation as one of the finest groove merchants around, gracing the stages of the most highly-regarded clubs and festivals out there including Berghain, Fabric, De School and more. Her eclectic selections tap into the broadest spectrum of rhythms and influences, from tribal-informed electronics to straight out surgical indus-minded payload onto breaksy delicacies, propulsive house NRG and jagged funk from outer-space. Highly infectious, here goes an all vinyl mix fusing wild dynamics with deadeye DJing accuracy, oozing unclouded raving joy and out-and-out confidence. A no-miss delivery from a DJ in full possession of her art. 

True to their deep, widescreen approach to both production and live-performing, Parisian outfit Atomic Moog clock in with a helluva sleek and lushly relief’d mix, recorded on the occasion of their latest live performance at Outre Bleu on March 29. Through their releases for the likes of Delsin, Appian, Lowless or Monument, the French duo has been carving a niche for itself at the fringes of the dubbed-out techno tradition and abstract-leaning experimentality. This two-hour jaunt into their reverb and delay-heavy imaginarium has us moving across narrow corridors and cathedral-large spaces by turn, exploring the concept of spatialization in dance music under a new, boundary-pushing light. Through focal-shifting jumps between acid-drenched beds of rippling analogue sine waves and sizzling machine circuitry, the constant angle shifts from macro to micro tell a tale of vibrant sound research, not quite picking a side between the dance floor’s sense of purpose and genre-unbound, creative unintentionality. 

Throughout the years, Detroit-born Berlin-based groove operator and Tresor / Globus resident Eric Cloutier has been honing and refining his palette as both a producer and a DJ. Not one to engage in dogmatic restraint, Cloutier keeps developing his vision through carefully curated selections and an equally impeccable mixing technique. Boasting the variety and precision of his releases for his own imprint Palinoia, the present mix was recorded live at The Chinese Laundry in Sydney last year. Playing the main room open-to-close, Cloutier put together this mix as an evolving story and, much like the crowd of that night which proved highly receptive to the narrative, we hope this one will resonate with you. A most exquisitely complex and deep-diving plunge into Cloutier’s shape-shifting headspace, alternating heavyweight punch and dubbed-out minimalism with swashes of textured membranes and faux-organic, modular-like intricacies, this mix is as elusively impossible to pigeonhole as it proves sophisticated in its design. 

Berlin-based French DJ and producer Perfo is our guest this week with a special two-hour round of cross-pollinated salvos and anti-normative grooves. Having made a name for himself through a string of releases for key imprints including MORD, 47 or Hayes Collective, Perfo serves up a masterly executed set spanning the breadth of his adventurous scope and clinical skillset. From faux-tribal polyrhythmic evocations to future-facing hi-tech stunts, through nods to heavy-lidded machine funk and the Detroit sound's trademark blend of rough-hewn firepower and ebullient sensuality. Serious number. 

Right on cue to support the release of his newest EP on SK_eleven, here comes Manchester via Berlin's own Setaoc Mass with a banger of a mix to break June in proper, pedal to the metal. Exponent of a sound both intrinsically rugged yet layered to mind-altering effect, the British producer has been dishing out unstoppable slices of hi-velocity techno laced with a signature stripped-back, psychedelic edge. This new RYC podcast doesn’t veer off from such a direction and we’re graced with a two-hour mind trip boasting both bass-driven warehouse impact and an elegantly-woven tapestry of abrasive grooves, leaning by turn towards atmospheric elation and on other occasions pushing in the direction of utter fibrous, steel-coated industrial pound. The result is a wilder than wild ride down a smouldering pit of acid-washed hard hitters. Brutal. 

Ghent-based DJ and Fuse resident Marie-Julie is our guest this week with the killer delivery. Merging future-facing, hi-tech abstraction with a sixth sense for those inescapable rhythms and a wonky, off-kilter sonic engineering, Marie-Julie entices us down the path of complete mind-alteration. Constantly shifting gears, her vinyl blends run the gamut from dystopian murk to ankle-snapping old skool breaks, through lysergic psychedelia and chromatic dubs a la Basic Channel, without ever losing in cohesion or attention to detail. Do not resist, but just let this mad whorl of sound grab you and fling you into an entirely uncharted, demented zone of its own. 

A well-known alum of acclaimed record labels such as Hayes, Klockworks, Fuse, Blueprint, Soma et al., Lisbon-based DJ and producer Temudo clocks in with a mix showcasing the breadth of his vista and smooth mixing skillset. Up with a choice selection of unbending warehouse percussion, laser-guided dubs and further esoteric mind-expanders, Temudo reels off a magnetic field of hi-velocity grooves, brutalist analogue bursts and cutting-edge sound design. Swinging the pendulum between straight out heavyweight, 909-fuelled barrage fire and heavily processed electronics on a mission, here’s a mix for those in search of both thrilling floor jack and superior groove know-how. Monster treat. 

French-born, Tbilisi-based Ina Kacz is a DJ and producer whose vision far exceeds the limitations of a genre, including one as multi-faceted as techno. Her shape-shifting sets span a wide spectrum of styles and sub-divisions, flourishing somewhere at the junction of acid-drenched cycloramas, chiselled ambient breaks, twilight dubs and chrome-coated industrialism. With her exquisitely fine touch and impeccable understanding of the groove, the French artist pulls out a two-hour jaunt into her pulsating headspace, packed to the rafters with streamlined style collision, inch-perfectly engineered plot twists and hair-raising momentums. 

A true driving force both within and beyond the South-American techno ecosystem, Zisko graces us with two hours of clinically laid down big-room punch and genre-unbound, off-kilter rhythms on steroid. Championing a sound both highly intense and surgically precise, the Argentinian DJ and producer has us surfing a rogue wave of frenzied analogue funk, sci-fi-informed industrial pound and proto-electroid impulsions. Not one for the faint-hearted, Zisko’s mix is galloping techno at its most eruptively driving and merciless, bound for heavy-duty, mid-set apexes and hi-impact mosh pits down the basement. Total smasher beware, this one’s cut from the heaviest alloy. 

Taking over the RYC waves this week, Tokyo’s finest Mari Sakurai punches in with a helluva 2-hour treat by way of introduction. Working her way in the gap betwixt post-industrial opacity and heavy-duty brutalism, Mari has been slowly but surely making a name for herself with uncompromising sets spanning everything from cool-handed big room pound to mazy abstraction and other bursts of mind-altering sonics from way deep. Known for cutting a path of destruction with every of her mixes, her RYC offering doesn’t depart from such intentions, and we’re invited to a smorgasbord of claustrophobic hi-tech onslaughts and a string of purely exhilarating, apex-seeking momentums. Hi-voltage shockwave due for impact imminently.