37 articles
Nino Blink Left Glasgow's Techno Scene for Singapore's. Richie Hawtin Noticed.
A Scottish DJ who cut his teeth at a Glasgow basement club has spent the last year turning Singapore's underground into a launchpad. Richie Hawtin, Pan-Pot, Dax J and Paco Osuna all played the same record.
Manila's Twelve Points Records Marks Two Years With Pathways II
Twelve Points Records turns two with Pathways II, a homeward-leaning follow-up to the compilation that once pulled Bangkok and Hanoi into its Manila catalogue.
WILHELMINA Fuses Kulintang and Budots Into Jersey Club. His Liner Notes Thank Davao's DJ Love.
A New Jersey producer built two EPs out of Filipino gongs, budots swing and East Coast jersey club, and opened the credits by naming the Davao DJ who invented the sound he's borrowing.
RAMPAK G Gave Five Producers the Same Sample Pack. Here's What Yogyakarta's Gqom Label Got Back.
Symbiotic III sent one folder of sounds to five producers in Indonesia and Mexico and let them fight it out. The Yogyakarta label built on gamelan and Durban gqom just released the results.
Lilly Palmer Signs to Universal Music and Island Berlin
The German techno DJ's first release under her new Universal Music and Island Berlin deal is out now. Her only confirmed Southeast Asia show this year so far was Marquee Singapore, in January.
Oslated's 10th Anniversary Compilation Comes From an Island With No Club Scene
Jongmin Lee has run Oslated from Jeju Island since 2016, no club scene required. The label's 10th anniversary compilation, split across two volumes, pairs Korean and international artists in ambient, dub and organic techno.
A Hong Kong Producer Turned Cantopop Heartbreak Into 160BPM Footwork. DJ Mag Just Noticed.
Leo Cheng makes music as FINGERGAP, forcing romantic Cantonese pop ballads into Chicago footwork's 160BPM syncopation. DJ Mag just named him one to watch, on the back of a new single built around Hong Kong's own housing estates.
A Denpasar Producer Named His Debut EP After a Bali Club That Spent Seven Years Shut for Drug Trafficking
Funtime's debut EP names every track after a nightclub from Eurobeat's golden age, and closes on Akasaka, the Denpasar mega-club that stayed shuttered for seven years over a drug trafficking bust before reopening in 2024.
Sama Sama Records Just Gave a Lost 1980 Manila Jazz Record Its Second Life
A London DJ with Malaysian roots just launched a reissue label built for Asia-Pacific record collectors, and started with a 46-year-old Manila jazz-funk record nobody outside crate-digging circles had heard.
A Singapore Artist Turned Bicycle Frames Into Instruments. Every Sale Goes to Gaza.
bani haykal's new record turns bicycle frames into more than 90% of its sound. Every sale of the Strange Weather Dunia cassette goes to Palestine solidarity groups.
After a Decade of Singles, Jakarta's Cyda Finally Gets His Debut Album
Eri Septian has been releasing tracks under the name Cyda since 2016, scattered across half a dozen small labels. It took a Paris imprint called Minitel to finally give him a full album: nine tracks of 90s progressive house dressed up as a fake in-flight announcement.
Idiotape's Dguru Started a Label for the Sounds That Don't Fit Seoul's Dancefloors
Nineteen years after co-founding the Korean electro-rock trio Idiotape, Dguru has started his own label, Sangsu Records, built around Seoul's club and live scenes and the sounds that don't fit neatly into either.
Soundkoh Collective's Debut Sent One Bangkok Love Song to Korea and Germany
Thai vocalist Chucheewa Cheepchoke and producer Vichaya Vatanasapt wrote a stripped-back love song called Galactic Love. Their new label Soundkoh Collective's first release turns it into six versions, remixed across Thailand, Korea and Germany.
Ela Minus and Nick León Turned 'What Happened to Our Friends' Into a Three-Track EP
The two Colombian-heritage producers built their first extended collaboration from a 2024 meeting in Mexico City. It lands on Domino's Smugglers Way, out now, vinyl remixes due in November.
Habibi Funk Went Looking for Malaysian Gambus. It Found a Buried State Radio Jazz Archive Instead.
Habibi Funk's new sister label Audible Beauty has debuted with two reissues pulled from Radio Television Malaysia's 1960s and 70s jazz archive, Alfonso Soliano's Tiga Trombone and Johari Salleh's Jazz Dari Angkasapuri, licensed with help from Kuala Lumpur's Sputnik Rekordz.
A New Jersey Producer Is Turning Tikbalang Myths Into Jersey Club Records
On Book of Spells, New Jersey producer WILHELMINA folds tikbalang mythology, Bisaya vocals and a Filipino illustrator's occult artwork into jersey club and techno, then goes further on a new pan-Southeast Asian club compilation.
Maggie Tra Turned Her Mother's Death Into a House Record, With Hanoi Still in Its Bones
Maggie Tra's new single 'Holding On' is a house track about losing her Cambodian mother, made by an artist who learned to DJ in Hanoi and now runs her own label, Pho The Girls Records.
Hajar Asyura Scores Indonesian Horror Films by Day. His Techno Project Just Beat the World on Bandcamp.
As 8110118, Jakarta film composer Hajar Asyura just released Jiwa Krungu, the only Southeast Asian record on Bandcamp Daily's global best electronic list for July.
The Budots Three Turned Davao City's Most Mocked Sound Into a London Record Deal
DJ Love, DJ Danz and DJ Ericnem spent decades getting laughed at for budots. A London label, a Boiler Room comeback and a joint album later, nobody's laughing.
Munir Spent a Decade Splicing Indonesia's Lost Disco Records Back Together in Bandung
Bandung producer Munir has spent over a decade digging up and re-splicing Indonesia's forgotten 1970s and 80s disco records, from a Cultures of Soul compilation named after Jakarta's first discotheque to his own synth-driven Komputer EP.
Junoy Manalo's Inner Child Is Manila Deep House With No Label Behind It
Six tracks, zero labels, 356 Spotify listeners. Inner Child is what Manila house sounds like when nobody outside the city is watching.
Hoshina Anniversary Remixed His Own Album Into a Techno Tool Kit, No Label Required
Tokyo's Hoshina Anniversary spent five years fusing techno with Japanese traditional instruments under the name watechno. His answer to what comes next: remix the whole album himself, label every BPM, and give it away with no label attached.
How a Bangkok Label Turned Buddhist Chants and 90s Ghost Shows Into a House Genre
A Bangkok label samples 90s ghost-show intros and Buddhist chanting over four-to-the-floor drums and calls it Thai house. A UK label is now pressing it to vinyl.
Saigon Soul Revival Return With a New Album, and Brotha Lok Takes It to the Club
Ho Chi Minh City's Saigon Soul Revival announce Chốn Ta Về, out September 11 on Saigon Supersound, with lead single Trúc Xinh headed for a Brotha Lok remix built for the dancefloor.