My dear emerging artists, I’m here today to announce you that the entry level for the title of ‘newcomer of the year’ has been officially set. I’m not going to exaggerate by saying that I’ve found the winner yet, but surely the game has just gotten much tougher.
Discovered completely at random a few weeks ago, it took me very little to be fascinated by latesleeper. First of all because there’s actually still little to listen to since her entire catalog is not enough to compose even an album (her first tune ‘Mosquito‘ dates back to less than a year ago). Secondly, because you don’t need to spend hours trying to overanalyze her music. It’s immediately clear that you are in the presence of something out of the standard. A drum & bass act that is not satisfied with navigating well-known water, but that has her eyes fixed on the horizon, at the borders that have not yet been crossed and the barriers that have not yet been broken.
This new release, a combo of tracks (including a collab with gyrofield) released on DIVIDID, only reaffirms this approach. ‘Bushwa,’ for example, is sure to drive you crazy and whisk your brain. To say that it’s syncopated is an understatement, to say that it is mental is just barely enough. Its broken rhythms together with an immaculate sound worthy of an ASMR video create a feeling of emptiness so effective as to make you dizzy even if you are comfortably sitting on your favorite armchair. It’s a challenging listen that I’d be curious to experience live to fully test its destructive potential. ‘Wake Up Slap’ instead sounds heavily inspired by footwork and results in a more canonical rave weapon than ‘Bushwa’. This at least until you get to the second drop, where you have to be ready to go through a further dose of sonic slaughter. The contribution of gyrofield on the groove is evident but extremely functional in the success of the track as it slightly softens the muscular latesleeper’s approach.
If you’re a drum & bass purist, I’m not gonna lie, these tracks will be hard to digest. If instead, you’re keen to discover what this genre can offer when someone explores new ideas and approaches, this is the ideal food to feed your mind with. latesleeper is proving to have her own unique and original vision, let’s see where it will lead her in the next ten months. Stream ‘Bushwa’ and ‘Wake Up Slap’ on Spotify or on your favorite platform here.
