A collection of Django Django’s favourite records
Some artists offer such a vibrant, kaleidoscopic collage of tesselating musical flavours that whether one’s a fan or not, the chance to peek at their record collection or private playlist is eagerly seized, guaranteeing a musical education and a discovery of acts you know you’ll love. London art-rockers Django Django are similarly gatekeepers to strange ethers of aural exploration, guided by a modern twist on the psychedelic genre and winning critical acclaim from 2012’s self-titled debut to last year’s Off Planet concept album.
Guesting on The Vinyl Factory‘s ‘The Records That Made Me’ series, Django Django drummer Dave Maclean met expectations, selecting several albums across the avant-garde, rave, old-school hip-hop, and “alien funk music from Chicago” for good measure.
First up was French-Canadian Bernard Bonnier’s 1984 oddity Casse-tête. A collection of electroacoustic experiments recorded in his Saint-Jean Chrysostôme studio Amaryllis across five years, the composer continued what he learnt under the tutelage of avant-garde giant Pierre Henry and crafted several heady cuts of classic musique concrète and innovative sampling, straddling the line between academic chin-stroking and sonic mirth with its bouncy synths and sequencer wobbles.
Maclean revelled in its otherwordly character: “I guess [it] influenced everyone from Mathew Herbert to Aphex Twin and still sounds totally mad. It’s got elements of what I love about great house music and techno music, too. Casse-tête makes funky grooves out of odd, abstract, and alien sounds, all done with tape loops in 1979.”
Jumping from the vanguard to the free rave, Maclean selected 1993’s Reactivate 7 – Aquasonic Trance compilation from techno and trance label React Music. Credited with pushing rave to international commercial attention and pushing the careers of Armin Van Buuren, Tiesto, and E-Trax, the series’ seventh edition held a nostalgic affection for Maclean: “I picked this up when it came out, played it to death and still love it,” he said. “Jaydee’s ‘Plastic Dreams’ brings back memories of endless Scottish summers as an early teen. It contains both a Polygon Window track and a killer Fierce Ruling Diva track that I still play out, and people always ask me what it is. Just a killer dance compilation.”
Rave got another representation with The Prodigy’s 1992 Experience, a debut far removed from the punk twisted big beat they’d later be defined by, delivering hardcore breakbeat its first real cohesive album. Its impact was seismic on Maclean, claiming to buy some decks and swap his Nirvana poster for a U.F.Orb one the moment he heard Liam Howlett’s bedroom beats.
Shifting toward the headier brew of hip-hop, jazz, soul, and funk in the mid-1990s, Classic Hip Hop Mastercuts Vol 1‘s collation of early rap from Run-DMC, A Tribe Called Quest, and Eric B & Rakim proved formative to Maclean’s burgeoning turntablism after becoming “obsessed” with Mantronix’s ‘King of the Beats’ cut. In need of a fresh copy after having mixed it to ruin, he remarked to The Vinyl Factory: “I ordered it from HMV in Dundee and remember getting home from school and being excited that it had arrived. I learned to beat juggle and scratch with ‘Peter Piper’ on this LP, so my copy is all worn out.
Finally, Maclean indulges in his love for Chicago house with 1995’s Cajual Relief (The Future Sound Of Chicago), a joint compilation between seminal Cajul and Relief records and issued by Ministry of Sound, the house comp arrived to Maclean from his love of Boo Williams, describing the feverish excitement of ordering the record: “When it arrived, I was so in love with the maroon sleeve, the logo, and the unique sound. I was hooked on Relief and since then have managed to collect most of the back catalogue. This LP is a really good best-of and perfect introduction to the sound.”
