Amir Alexander Releases The Lands Beyond Part.2 EP
“We welcome to the label Chicago’s Maestro Amir Alexander with The Land’s Beyond EP
A straight to the floor 4 dance tracker.”
Cat: RS026
Artist: Amir Alexander
Released : 17 August 2017
House, Techno.
Official press release text:
With the Recent Releases stepping up in the vinyl outlets and including artists on the label roster such as Vakula, Chicago’s Vincent Floyd, Detroit’s Norm Talley, Simoncino, Losoul, Reggie Dokes, Dj Aakmael and with also their excellent digital series featuring up and coming Artists Release sustain is getting common ground for forward thinking and quality 21st century dance music.
This Time they are back on Vinyl with no one else than Chicago’s own son Amir Alexander ! who features an EP of His continuing work since the super successful ‘the lands beyond EP’
The Land’s beyond part 2 comes with 4 awesome tracks that so represent the artists signature, dark and groovy dancefloor music !
It is with great pleasure then that we share with you this great EP by one of the most interesting underground producers out there.
Laurent Garnier: ” Very cool tracks — will play!”
Orlando Voorn: ” Been bumping How you make me feel for a while..REAL proper stuff i love it will check the others as well thanks! “
Luciano: ” very very cool! thank you”
Molly: It’s always quality music from Amir Alexander !! Thanks
Buy :
https://www.decks.de/t/amir_alexander-the_lands_beyond_pt2/cag-c0
https://www.deejay.de/Amir_Alexander_The_Lands_Beyond_Pt2_RS026_Vinyl__282740
http://www.juno.co.uk/products/amir-alexander-the-lands-beyond-pt-2/658875-01/
My two cents, thoughts, comments, etc…
“The Lands Beyond” concept was inspired by my research into the “Hollow Earth” and “The Inner Earth & Realm of Aghartha”. Upon learning of the supposed “Ascended Masters” and “The Lands Beyond” I began to try to imagine what the vibes of this place might sound like. Dark, cold, dusty, mechanical, distant, and other-worldly sub-subterranean Earth. The year would have been about late 2008 or very early 2009. Just about the time my first vinyl with G. Marcell was released. “The Experience EP” (more on that in a future post).
At the time the tracks were first made my engineering skills were not equal to that of my production and compositional skills so they sat for several years on an old spare hard drive. Some of the only music left from that pre- Gutter Flex era. In 2014 when finally my time came to release a solo vinyl EP for Plan B Recordings NYC, Spider requested the track “The lands Beyond” from the original demo package I sent him and Lola. During this time I had yet to build a proper studio in Sweden, so trying to do final mix-downs in my ex-girlfriends living room in my ad-hock porta-studio was the only option. Needless to say, the conditions were less than ideal.
Regardless, I did the best I could do at the time with the resources I had available to me. The result is a crusty dusty record that has found it’s way into the collections of many eclectic DJs all around the world.
“The Lands Beyond” is for me, one of “those” records. The people’s release. Many consider it classic Amir Alexander. Lola and Spider, the consumsmate A&R people they are, most certainly did. Spider’s got an ear for that distinct “Plan B” vibe/back bone that was the bedrock of each of our distinctive sounds. I love it! Totally Plan B. Yet totally me. This is the exact record Gabbi Lopez referenced when requesting a sound pallet for a record he would like to release with me.
This came shortly after a singe track for a V/A comp he was doing for his label “Release-Sustain” was submitted and confirmed.
He had already released artists I hold in high esteem on this series. Names like Norm Talley, Reggie Dokes, Vakula, and Nick Anthony Simoncino to name a few. This had already caught my attention. So that, along with the good vibes I got from chatting with Gabbi led to the creation and release of what would become “The Lands Beyond Pt. 2”
A1 – “How You Make Me Feel” The original track was for a remix I did for a Swedish label that actually rejected it. They liked the music, but knew it would not work for their audience. At the time I was stunned, as I felt that the track was Bomb and would be well received by the heads as well as the party people. The vox are from one of my favorite altos of all times. I had them in my mpc chop folder and decided to lay them over the instrumental just to see how it sounded. The “eureka moment” was profound to say the least. I’m so glad they rejected that remix.
A2 – “Walk The Talk” One of the tracks from back in the late 00s that was made around the same time period as the original EPs material. I never released it because it was an engineering nightmare. It took 8 years for me to lean how to fix all the built in fidelity killers. While at the same time, preserving the original synth patches and arrangement, etc. It was so NOT fun, but I learned a lot as I basically had to re-create this one (as well as the next 2) completely from scratch.
I had to re-write tracks I made almost a decade ago. Every producer should try it sometime. It’s a very humbling experience.
B1- “Telepathy” A big “club” track made for the peak hour. I rarely set out to make one of those specifically, but this time I did just that. Fat bass-line. Epic break-down (LOL, or at least for me), ghostly lead synth, rolling vibes. Totally rewritten using all the same sounds. Having to chase down obscure vst’s from the early 00s and then try to recreate some patches by ear was a cool learning experience. I’m a better producer now than I was before I completed these tasks.
B2- “Bunker Buster” This one was written in late 2011. Chris and I had just sent our first Vanguard Sound! release of the be mastered and then pressed in Detroit’s Archer Record Pressing. It was one of two tracks I made as catharsis for the loss of my dog Rufus. I had him for 13 years. I made a “sad” track, ” Komm, Süßer, Tod Komm Selge Ruh that was released on my debut album “Love And Fear“ – (Anunnaki Cartel) 2015. The second was a banger entitled “Bunker Buster”. I loved this track from the moment I made it, but knew that I could not release it until I could figure out how to “clean it up”. The lead, the kick and the bass-line all competed for the same frequency range.
It was the toughest to re-write.
I originally intended for it to be the A1 track. Gabbi wanted “Telepathy”. We decided on “How You Make Me Feel” after we got back the 3rd set of masters.
We had mad delays due to the record just not sounding right the first 2 times. We will never even break even with this one but, at least we’re happy with the fidelity. Hopefully we can at least sell the existing stock.
The record is available now and the tracks are getting an excellent reception from every dance floor that gets to hear them. Heavy hitters like Laurent Garnier, Orlando Voorn, Luciano, and Molly are showing love. Perhaps you will too.
Respect,
Amir Alexander
