Umut’s Selection of the Week 010 • DJ Trace – Zone EP [DSCI4028]

Deutsche Version

After 13 years one of the innovators of Techstep is finally back. Responsible for helping build the careers of artists like Black Sun Empire, Task Horizon, Silent Witness, Mindscape & Chris.Su. We are talking about none less than DJ Trace, the label manager of DSCI4. His new record is a really interesting mixture of something new and his old No U-Turn sound.

The first track on the menu is Dibby which convinces me with it’ s deep kick. After the obligatory eight bars and a vocal sample, the track starts for everyone that has learned to mix with Rekordbox. Shimmering oldschool-atmos unfolds more and more and leads to a funky drop which makes you want to dance. The deep bass and trumpet are doing their bit and if you close your eyes you can literally taste the year 98.

For the second course, Mr Trace serves us a display of rumbling danger with Overdose. You will find a nice uplifting atmosphere, vocal samples and a crisp kick. In contrast to track one it gets really dirty and wild. The drop is nasty and thanks to the insanely rumbling bass, the minimalism doesn’t seem empty at the beginning. Trace knocks a lot of tricky fills and pads around our ears as the track progresses. In the second part he adds another layer to the already existing sounds and it just rolls on.

Cobra then takes us into more percussive realms and has a light reggae flavour, which is due to the funky bongo. In the intro you quickly notice that it’s arranged a bit faster because the percussions lead the way. As soon as it drops, Trace releases the funk. The Bongo sits tight on the bass drum and gives it a nice round sound. The beautifully drawn-out atmo pads should also be mentioned here.

Last but not least we have Aggy. At the beginning the intro exudes a really positive atmosphere. This is quickly driven away by the dark techstep sound which has helped Trace to become so well known in our scene. Effective drumwork with a tendency towards hardstep meets full synth hits and atmo-fills a la Bladerunner. The track really swings up in the course of the song and you almost can’t hold on anymore. You just have to nod your head. The whole thing is garnished with effect soaked vocals and the deal is done

So, you can say that Trace’s new EP definitely lives up to his reputation. Dark, dirty but also quite mature. Also in his latest interview with UKF, he mentioned that he has about 20 tracks in the pipeline. So I’m damn curious.

DJ Trace – Zone EP
Label: DSCI4
Release: 13.10.2018
Catalog-Nr.: DSCI4028
SoundCloud • buy • Label-SoundCloud

Header image by Vivian Hötter and Linus Knappe.

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