Trust the opener at your own risk: St.Ego's 'Lose Control' sets off at 120 BPM in E-flat minor, nearly six minutes promising an orderly ride through melodic electronica. It's a trap. Two tracks in, Venetian Snares tears up the map with 'Dreamt Person (v3)', a sub-two-minute miniature lifted from the tenth-anniversary edition of Traditional Synthesizer Music that Timesig put out this year. From there, the selection behaves like a proper dig: every find contradicts the last.
The first major landmark arrives at slot six: Squarepusher's 'K7 Museum', at nearly seven minutes the longest cut on the program, taken from Kammerkonzert, the record where Jenkinson crosses breakbeats with a string quartet for Warp. Three positions later, Loraine James and Sydney Spann answer with 'In a Rut', the single that previewed Detached From The Rest Of You, the Hyperdub album James herself described as her 'IDM pop star' record.
The 75 BPM Valley
Just before the halfway mark, the journey hits its stillest point: Domax's 'Goldcoast' and 'K2 Central' — Squarepusher again, Kammerkonzert again — share 75 BPM, the tempo floor of the whole set. Then the whiplash: Neon Fog's 'Softness' leaps to 160, an 85-beat jump nobody sees coming. That contrast rules the second half, where Guti slips away to Medellín with 'Suelto en Medallo' at 144 for El Nuevo Sonido Latino and Audio Print's 'Drop Hop' sets the speed ceiling at 162.
The ending restores calm with real craft: Jam City's 'angels' lands in C major at 126 BPM for Mad Decent, the same luminous key that Doc Sleep's 'Hug' and Jerome Chassagnard's 'Timeless Travelers III' had already tested in the final stretch. Thirty-six stations later, the trip ends where it should: on an open chord that resolves nothing and illuminates everything.
Sources: RA · DJ Mag · Planet Mu
