Reclaim Your City 675 | Ben Kaczor

Championing a sound intrinsically deep and leaning towards lo-fi dub techno, St. Odes co-founder and Dial Records alum Ben Kaczor stops by to deliver his first ever RYC podcast. Laying down a mix rife with the slo-churning, micro house-esque jams and eerily contemplative boogie that’s come to define his style, Kaczor treats us to a two-hour jaunt into a fractured headspace, organic and synthetic at once, inhabited by odd creatures and ghostly silhouettes. Evocative and lush, his mix conjures up the most haunting reverb-drenched melodies and esoteric grooves to shape a uniquely engaging, cinematic voyage. Give in to this slo-evolving buildup of dusty ambiences and falsely serene harmonies, as they teem with the kind of held-in magnetic power and subjugating potential to get any crowd wading in a weird, awry sense of XTC. 

A sonic explorer connecting the dots between spaced-out abstraction and trippy techno sorties, Shoal has been cruising the scene’s hyperspace for the past ten years with his eyes set on a new horizon of musical possibilities, eager to clear the ground for further audacious expeditions in the uncharted nooks and crannies of atmospheric electronics. Combining spacious and layered envelopes with finely textured, FX-soaked membranes of sound and forward-rushing dynamics, Shoal beckons us on the path of fearless time and space traveling through sound. Immersive and uncompromising, his present mix takes us on a bumpy ride across alien-engineered megastructures and subterranean drifts, in search for the unheard ore concealed at the heart of techno’s paling mainstream veinstone. 

For the past decade, Rhyw has been trading monster floor twisters, inherently bold and inch-perfectly engineered to whip up crowds into a frenzy with its UK bass-y chassis and post-industrial bodywork. Blending in rugged percussion with hard steel machine funk and hip-swaying grooves, the Fever AM co-founder keeps on carving out a lane truly his own in today’s oft tepid techno landscape. Aiming to trigger off yet unfelt sensations amongst ravers, Rhyw puts together mixes that defy gravity and genre-bound limitations, sculpting momentums and harnessing the crowd’s NRG like no one else. Sweeping his wide spectrum of influences, from two-step rhythms and Garage culture to classic steely techno punch, through Latin-inflected swing and electroid propulsion, Rhyw’s RYC mix ushers us down a volcanic vent flush with the wildest floor pyrotechnics and straight slapping bursts of untamed audio synthesis. Fiery. 

Hailing from Sapporo, Japan, Occa is no typical big room DJ but a master acrobat in sound, expertly pushing the envelope of electronics as a transcending means of expression. Shifting gears constantly between conceptual abstraction and functional architecture, seeking effect in every move and sniffing out substance in any sine, Occa dwells his own sonic continuum, hermetic to stiff norms and creatively hampering conventions. Laser-like and seamless, be ready for a descent into a cyclonic tempest of FX-splattered loops and verbed-out tactile, nimbly moving the cursor between ominous dubs, hi-tech floor destroyers and experimental-leaning detours. A masterclass in sound design, boasting both impeccable curation and mind-bending construction thru and thru, it’s Occa taking over with one of this year’s most hair-raising highlights. HARD. 

Diving deeper into reverb-soaked environments and subterranean sonic strata, Berlin-based producer and ungesund co-founder Elias. graces us with a mix bound to have all listeners zone out in a flash. A bold explorer of hyper-textured fractals and submerged post-industrial atmospheres, Elias. embarks us on a trip down the infra-visible and infra-audible, into the heart of our world’s pulsating matter and across FX-coated membranes of sound. Getting ever closer to the organic throb of it all, we’re ushered through an in-limbo kind of headspace, sitting at the junction of proper floor entrancement and abstract-leaning escapology. Prepare for a sense-awakening plunge into a sonic realm seemingly bleached-out and tenebrous at first, yet incredibly vivid upon closer inspection. Mesmerising and deep as it gets. 

Championing a sound both entrancingly serene and deep-diving, Blazej Malinowski joins us for a two-hour journey across dubbed-out psychedelic folds and straightforward cinematic crescendos he holds the secret to. Through a string of hypnotic releases for the likes of Semantica, The Gods Planet, Kvalia and his own imprint, Inner Tension, the Polish DJ and producer has been minting a sound signature both impeccably fuel-efficient and immersive to the full. Seeking the meditative thrill of sensory entanglement through contrasting dynamic forces and melodic chiaroscuros, Malinowski treats us to a rivetingly evocative outpour of shape-shifting techno epics and sunken, reverb-drenched atmospherics spiraling in and out of focus. Expect a deluge of mazy, claustrophobic 4x4 corridors and further unhindered panoramas of layered, swelling synthesis. Wild. 

Herald of a sound both punishingly jagged and haunted by the long heritage of Dutch industrial music, U.F.F. boss and Axis alum Kole Leijen aka DJ Surgeles steps in with a two hour mix reflecting his hard-boiled headspace, sprawling steely uptempo landscapes and further rapid-fire bursts of enslaving machine funk. Running the hoodoo down with masterly precision and undeniable flair, Kole amps up the pressure through a chiselled montage of titanium-coated big room wares, kaleidoscopic hi-tech motifs and abstract-leaning analogue techno stunts. Prime yourself for a wild ride across metamorphic, future-proof atmospheres and whirring fractals of sound. 

This week we’re blessed to welcome a true legend of the techno game with Rolando taking over RYC waves for a two-hour jaunt into otherworldly floor narratives and lushly-forested sonic landscapes. Now operating out of Edinburgh, the former Underground Resistance member - forever associated with the timeless classic ‘Knights of the Jaguar’ - has laid the foundation to a ceaselessly compelling body of work, including key releases on Ostgut Ton, Delsin and his own imprint, R3. Championing a sound most entrancingly dynamic, largely informed by groove, jazz and Latin percussions, Rolando graces us with a mix that combines the finest of his signature mystic-imbued vision and sixth sense for crafting some of the most memorable club experiences to be had. Tapping in his love for polyamorous Detroit techno and house combinations, mostly leaning into the more soulful side of his hometown’s heritage rather than the industrial edge, Rolando embarks us on a ride across shape-shifting technoid boogie reliefs and further uncharted routes. Brace yourselves for some of the lushest, most immersive and distinctive techno heroics around. 

Bringing this month of Clone-ruled brilliance to a closure, legendary German act The Exaltics treat us to a face-melting avalanche of abrasive kick-n-snare-heavy assault and future-proof sound engineering. Championing that no-surrender electro pulse and the same acid-soaked dystopian atmospheres that innervate their whole discography, the two-hour set here presented showcases the uncompromising nature of The Exaltics sound: both rugged to the core and infinitely complex in its musical phrasing. The result is a highly corrosive and equally dynamic mosaic of paced-up fragments, polychromatic ambiences and that signature in-your-face punch wrapped in a post-apocalyptic cinematic envelope. Steel yourself for liftoff. 

Third artist to grace us in this Clone-curated month of October, The Hague’s one-and-only analogue wizard Legowelt surfaces with a mix sprawling from esoteric proto-techno to hallucinogenic electro, via trance-infused dreamscapes, eerie pop and mystique-imbued downtempo. As the true master of the synths he is, Legowelt has us traveling far and deep into a layered multiverse of dazzling hardware stutter and iridescent machine funk out a frizzling, VHS-supported headspace. Effusively vivid and durably haunting 8-bit-informed tapestries succeed through this glitchy maze of fractured tempi and vectorial stunts, cascading seamlessly as Legowelt pulls off yet another magnetic expression of retro-laced granularity and enhanced organic synthesis. Mythical.