Reclaim Your City

This week’s mix comes courtesy of Japanese DJ Yusuke Harada, alias YSK, a particularly deft merchant of deep-diving techno grooves and layered, abstract-leaning sonic explorations. His rapid-fire mixing style, exacting and dexterous, takes us on a journey down mesmeric dub-scapes and intricate mazes packed with hi-NRG cliff-hangers and unsuspected crossroads. Running the voodoo down with remarkable consistency and unfailing precision, YSK is yet another instance of the Japanese scene’s ability in shaping some of the most skilled and discerning DJs around. Be ready for a massive two-hour deluge of brooding sines and claustrophobic atmospheres, wreaking the kind of mastered chaos from which you won’t come out unchanged.

On the rise towards wider recognition and duly so, Swedish DJ and
producer Joline Scheffler - whose path may cross that of RYC in other
ways soon *wink wink* - has been making waves with her highly dynamic,
exhilarating take on classic techno motifs, pushing grooves that bridge
the gap betwixt entrancing cavalcades and more intimate sonic
explorations. Dexterously swinging the pendulum from immersive
4x4-spoken poetics to verbed-out refraction, through more spacious,
cosmic-leaning developments and a proper pictorial sense, opening up
portals onto new dimensions and sensations with every bar, Joline excels
at crafting these unsuspected epiphanies and fulgurations that can be
enjoyed as intensely both on and off the dance floor. A master of
translating emotion through signals, who keeps affirming techno’s
never-ending power of transcendence and subjugation.

Dwelling the deeper end of the spectrum, Amsterdam’s own brooding vibist
Nawaz clocks in this week with a raw, uncompromising entry. Adepts of
menacing sub-bass onslaughts and cutting-edge minimalism will find in
Nawaz’s contribution the perfect companion to their next couple of
hours. Dynamic and nuanced, structured yet chaotic, his mixes explore
the darkest, infra-visible layers of audio synthesis, with a clear focus
on the tantric, hypnosis-inducing effect of loops and repeated motifs.
Enter a realm of complex sonic architecture and intricate envelope
interplays, each membrane throbbing with a life of its own that echoes
far and deep into the psyche long after the lights have gone off.

Belgian up-and-comer Wala punches in this week with two hours of
elegantly stripped-back techno grooves and velveteen atmospheres. Clad
in soft, fuzzy envelopes, his music summons the finest of immersive
Basic Channel-ian dubs and sensual Detroit house churners, dishing out
cinematic sequences rife with minimal, reverb-soaked drifters and slices
of deep-diving, hypnagogic abstraction. Emotional and articulate, his
sonics fuse the elegance of classic, progressive 90s rollers with the
future-proof vision of state-of-the-art electronic research - evolving
at the fringe of full-fledged floor-busting potentiality and skirting
the conceptual, off-kilter side of house and techno that keeps the scene
afresh with a renewed - and much needed - call for undomesticated
innovation and self-affirming gravitas. Surgical.

A serial crafter of deep-diving floor narratives whose magic innervates
Brussels' Metropolis Sunday parties, Belgian DJ Sonhan has cemented his
position as a surefire groove manipulator, consistently dishing out
mixes that span the gap between heavy-duty techno, jagged psychedelics
and chiseled dub freqs. His debut mix for RYC conjures up a similar
headspace, unrelentingly sinking us down a smouldering corridor of
soulful electronics and pumped-up peak time ascensions. An experience of
heightened depth and intensity, unfolding with a finely balanced mix of
seamless cinematic savoir-faire and dazzling fire at heart.