PUNCH UP RECORDS - PRESS RELEASE
PUNCH003
Punch Up Records are proud to announce that they will be releasing PUNCH003 - Adam Oubkou’s ‘Involve Minds EP’ - in digital formats. The EP will be exclusively available on Beatport from the 12 February, and will be available on all other stores and platforms on the 26th February.
Contact Details
email Ian & Ed at punchuprecords@gmail.com
instagram: @punchuprecords
twitter: @punchuprecords
soundcloud: punchuprecords
ADAM OUBKOU
Adam Oubkou is somewhat of an enigma, even to us.
We signed him on the strength of one track he sent us on Submithub, and then discovered this EP (Involve Minds) on his Soundcloud.
Recognising similarities to early Richie Hawtin, recent releases by Radio Slave and techno minimalist godfather Stephan Bodzin, we signed it immediately.
We have never met him in person. We have never heard his voice. We have never even spoken to him on Zoom or Skype.
He communicates with us only via Whatsapp.
Based on the little evidence we have, he may not even exist.
Here’s what we think we know:
Adam is in his twenties.
2. Adam lives in the Piedmont region of Italy.
3. We’re pretty sure the picture above is of him, but we cannot confirm that for certain.
4. The below quote:
“Adam Oubkou, a boy born in northern Italy. From an early age he has a passion for electronic music.
For years he has dedicated himself to the production of techno music, to which he tries to give the sound its own dimension in space and time.
At the moment Adam is dedicating himself to the production of his first album, a project he considers a musical and spiritual journey.
The story continues, the music too.”
Adam’s Instagram
Listen to the EP
What Do We Think It Sounds Like?
Genre: Techno, Minimal Techno, Raw/Deep/Hypnotic Techno
Adam’s process for making these songs was a large part of why we were so keen to sign him, along with his ‘less-is-more’ approach generally.
For this EP he started by making loops in Native Instruments Maschine, and then recorded the performance of the arrangement, live, only once. Radioslave has done something similar on his ‘Variations’ release, and Richie Hawtin famously used this method for much of his earlier work as Platikman. This sense of performance offsets the minimal instrumentation of the tracks by letting the music flow in the moment, as opposed to being a pre-thought out arrangement on a computer screen.
We find Adam’s work very visually evocative of urban cityscapes, unforgiving and empty, in the same way Burial’s songs often are. We inagine the songs rattling around concrete warehouses, multi-storey car parks and abandoned streets. There is a sense of tension in them, a sense that something both thrilling and terrifying is just around the next corner.
Adam is still very young, and in our opinion he has the time and potential to grow into just as important a Techno artist as his heroes.
For fans of: Richie Hawtin/Plastikman, Dubfire, Tale Of Us, Stephan Bodzin, Radio Slave, Ben Klock, Marcel Dettman
Our Writing About ‘Involve Minds EP’
With his debut EP, Involve Minds, 21 year old Adam Oubkou of Piedmont, Italy announces himself with 4 tracks of uncompromising and affecting minimalist techno. It is a sparse landscape underscored by sustained and evolving drums that will reward purists and newcomers alike. North American and European influences (Hawtin, DubFire; Kraftwerk, Tale of Us) are worn lightly, set-off by a unique sensibility and subjected to a young man’s swagger.
Involve Minds showcases confidence, maturity and an understanding of simplicity that can take years to master. At the same time, the EP is unashamedly raw and unfiltered. These contrasts took root in the recording process itself. All the tracks on the EP were made in the same way: loops at the ready, each was performed and recorded live. In the pull and tension between programming and performing, mechanical artifice and human improvisation, the EP opens up a space that allows for both introspection and dance. Whether in the perpetually driving bass drums or looped vocal samples calling its audience to arms, there is emotion and room for contemplation here, but it is always singularly and unmistakably focussed on the shared experience of the dancefloor. Whatever the context; at home or in a club, alone or together, simultaneously introspective and outward facing, this is music in a minor key that speaks directly to both the individual AND the individual in the crowd in the dark.
- EK 2021
