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Microhouse: 21st Century Funk and Minimalism

///download///

It's hard to conceptualize a movement from within. Music brings us into the moment and once we're here, we enter into a unique artist-audience relationship. We begin to personalize the experience until we can no longer see the art from the outside.

I forget exactly how or when I discovered Microhouse music. I do know that it found me through an arbitrary flow of life experiences:

-I took a liking to German class in high school//developed a taste for the German cultural footprint.

-I attended Movement Fest (or tech-fest to the locals) in my hometown of Detroit. Saw Matthew Dear aka Audion and had a transcendent listening experience with my bandmates.

-I traced Dear back to Ghostly International, an electronic label based in Ann Arbor, Michigan -- the same town in which my brother ran a radio station called WCBN. There I browsed through records and ripped countless gigabytes of music for sport.

-I visited what may have been Metro Detroit's last and best independent record shop that existed called Neptune Records. I asked the owner what was playing. "This German producer, Isolee" he said and led me to the vast Microhouse corner of the store.

This is techno music with soul. House music infused with minimalism. The beats arestill muscular (as in house) but clever too. Dancy but funkier still. Trancy----well, maybe more psychedelic...

It's only been 5 years since this movement peaked. An extended visit to Germany coincided, but the experience has receded from the moment and into the past. I hear it now as a movement, a happening, an "I was there" moment for which I'm very grateful.


///Tracklist///

1. Estrella - DJ Koze
2. Enrico - Isolee
3. Abglanz - Pantha Du Prince
4. A Paw In My Face - The Field
5. Titty Fuck - Audion
6. Lindt - Thomas Fehlmann
7. Chromophobia - Gui Boratto
8. My Grandmotha - DJ Koze
9. Edelgrün - The Orb
10. Dinamo - Nathan Fake
11. Beau Mot Plage - Isolee
12. New Life - Matias Aguayo
13. Jet - Ellen Allien and Apparat
14. Come To Where I Go - Dirk Leyers
15. Action - Fields

///Notes on this compilation///

The content comes predominantly from German imprints: Kompakt (Cologne), Traum (Cologne), Playhouse (Frankfurt)----but there is an exception w/ the Audion selection released stateside on Ann Arbor's Spectral Sound, a subsidiary of Ghostly International.

This download is made available for the love of music. Please contact info@riouxnyc.com with any concerns.

Enjoy!

Summer Now

It has been a while since positing to this blog. My attention has shifted to the new website where you can hear//download music on a pay-what-you-want model. Everything posted there at mo was created very recently this summer in my apartment, besides On Returning, which was made last summer. All summer music indeed. Major thanks to Caroline Shin and her homemade granular synthesizer for being a part of Calls.

A few days that won't be forgotten from this summer.

6.10.10::: "sometimes we need to find the point of good enough"
6.17.10::: "everything you need is right here"
7.1_.10::: seeing and hearing Caribou glow
7.26.10::: Wayne Coyne charms the world via Central Park
7.30.10::: Rioux show right out my window on the roof. Magical night. Neighbors didn't even complain. until 1am.
7.31.10::: Sound installation featured in Alex Kleimann's "Digital Flux" exhibition.
8.1.10::::: 20 years old


THEBIGNEWS:

I'm putting out a record. With the help of Josh it will be released with visual synchronizations on DVD in addition to Vinyl LP. We've raised some money from our rooftop show to cover pressing costs but we are starting a kickstarter to make this thing real. So far this thing feels special. We're shooting for an October/November release. Sarah Faitell is designing the cover ^-^ before jetsetting to Accra (then Paris?)

stay posted to follow the kickstarter and stay tuned for:::

- a free digital EP of songs that I love but can't make the record.
- music making with Thurmon Green.
- a compilation I've arranged of early 00's Microhaus music from Germans or German labels.

Bushwick Project for the Arts

So the show for 6.21's MakeMusicNewYork event was great. Got to meet some talented musicians (Chimneys), and curators of a great new space. It's called Bushwick Project for the Arts. It is new. It is great. It will grow into something magnificent!

Don Pedro

The 6.17 show at Don Pedro was... A SUCCESS! Aaron and the Burrs, Beast Make Bomb, and Female Demand were all amazing people and music makers. Next show: TOMORROW Monday, (6.21) at Bushwick Project for the Arts (304 Meserole) at 8:00. Free Admission:)))))

2.12.10 at Lake Johnson

RIOUX 2.12.10 LIVE at Lake Johnson from RIOUX on Vimeo.

In Bb 2.0

Today I was shown something really awesome. In Bb 2.0. I recommend starting with row 1 column 3 (the spoken part) and adding layers from there.