Planets in Alignment: Astral Black Kick off 2015

Astral Black’s first release of 2015 landed at the end of last month and sees them reaffirm their commitment to talented youngsters looking to put in work. This time they have brought in 20-year-old Glasgow-based producer Dressin’ Red, who unleashed his debut Head/Body EP to an encouragingly receptive audience. Fresh with radio support from the likes of Gilles Peterson, The Blessings and Grinel, his first sample-heavy release puts together two sets of tracks to provoke two separate listening experiences – one for the mind, and one for the chest. 

But what’s behind the decision to separate the two? Dressin Red, aka Lachlan Bolt, suggests it may be his response to a very 21^st century condition. “I've always found it hard to narrow down my influences,” he explains. “I get equal inspiration from music that I can chill to, that might be about the details, but then also club music and the effect it has on your body. I think that this was just a way of bringing both together.”

Bolt was singled out by label head Jon Phonics and Burberry-clad label-mate DJ Milktray, plucked from the now familiar online community of beatmakers ceaselessly bugging you to check out their Soundclouds. What kind of an environment is that for young producers, with a seemingly endless sea of voices crying out for attention? “I would say it's been one of my biggest influences,” replies Bolt, keen to emphasise the positives. “I don't think I'd be making anything decent without it.” Like previous releases on the label, Head/Body will get a tape release – an ideal format perhaps for a record with a duality at its core, looking to make a comment on how we perceive music differently in different places.

Club-friendly efforts like Ruff and Body Plan see the record fit nicely into the label’s existing catalogue. Ruff’s chopped up guitars are reminiscent of Milktray’s much-loved Hotel edit, while Body Plan’s quick fire vocals and quivering synths draw on the same rich mix of R&B and grime that’s characterised previous releases. Results are electric – last November’s Boiler Room takeover saw Phonics seamlessly drop the latter into a set of grime edits and hip-hop instrumentals, prompting a big response.

Elsewhere though, there are tracks like Our Love and Rudeboy with a focus on texture, similar to Koreless’s work on his Yungen EP. Bolt himself cites influences like Eno, Harold Budd and Glassworks, while giving the nod to LuckyMe contemporaries Sevendeaths and Claude Speeed. Bolt further flavours his work with field recordings, again perhaps tying the effect of environment on the experience of listening.

“It's partly a texture thing I think,” explains Bolt, “maybe just to add a bit more of a human quality too. I like the idea of going round the city listening to the tracks and not being able to tell whether it's the music or the sounds outside.” Such blurring of the senses is evident on a track like North Edge, over whose subterranean thud we hear what sounds a lot like a card stuck in the spokes of a bike. There’s lots of hungover playfulness going on here, charming and thoughtful in equal measure.

These fit neatly into the lighter end of a narrative that’s developed over the last year hailing the return of club-orientated ambient tracks – as if to say they ever really went away (spoiler: they didn’t). If, as some predict, the chill-out room is due a renaissance, we wouldn’t be at all surprised if these get a spin.