Bangkok's More Rice Records Drops a New EBM EP From DZ

Four track titles, one word repeated four times: Metalwork, Drywork, Woodwork, and a remix of Metalwork that pushes the whole thing further into EBM. That's the new EP from an artist going by DZ, out since August 14 on More Rice Records, the Bangkok label that's spent nine years proving Southeast Asia doesn't need a major-label courtship to run a serious underground catalogue.

The EP is called Work, and it does what it says. More Rice's own copy describes it as "loopy and driving, with space left open to be filled," heavy in the sub with grit left in the texture rather than polished out. It's not a record built for a festival main stage. It's built for a DJ who wants four tools that do one job cleanly, which is exactly the kind of unglamorous, functional release a label like this one exists to put out.

A label built on refusing to globalize

More Rice Records started in 2016, founded by Sarayu (Jay Sriyuksiri), DOTT (Pakarapol "Top" Anantakritayathorn) and Mikhail Schemm as a vinyl-only outlet for Asian producers who had nowhere else pressing their records. Five years later they opened a physical home for it: a record store and listening bar on Sukhumvit 31 that doubles as the label's HQ, shelves of vinyl behind the counter, turntables branded with the label's own logo instead of a generic Pioneer badge.

Sarayu has put the label's whole philosophy in one line: "I think now it's about localization, not globalization. As we're from Asia, we're able to stand out from labels in Europe." It's not a slogan. In December 2024, More Rice proved it by releasing two anniversary compilations pulling in more than 30 producers from Cambodia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, India, Pakistan, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Thailand. That's not a regional label with an international guest slot. That's a regional label whose region happens to be enormous.

Bandcamp, not the algorithm

Work lives on More Rice's Bandcamp page under the label's digital-only imprint, More Rice Digital, the same channel that put out Bangkok producer Chalo's Portals EP with SaoTekNik back in March, remixed by both label co-founders. No press release blast, no playlist pitch, just a link and four tracks that do what a DJ tool is supposed to do. That's consistent with how this label has operated since day one: it built a physical shop before it built a marketing plan, and its biggest release to date was a 30-artist regional compilation nobody outside the scene really covered.

It's the same instinct that's kept Bangkok's wider underground alive through a rough few years: Durian Radio built a streaming station out of pandemic boredom and now funds itself selling T-shirts from a weed shop, and when Studio Lam closed this year, the molam and electronic scene it helped raise didn't go with it. More Rice fits the same pattern: small, stubborn, and running on its own supply chain rather than anyone else's algorithm.

If you want to hear Work, you won't find it queued up on a Spotify editorial playlist. You'll find it on Bandcamp, where More Rice has kept its catalogue since 2016, four tracks and nothing else. That's the point.

Cover photo and turntable detail: courtesy More Rice Records, via The Vinyl Factory (photography by Rui Rodrigues).