Djrum "DJ Kicks: DjRUM" [Ecorecord w/ Playing Card]

DjRUM is one of the most revered DJs of his generation and also a virtuoso musician and producer, but he’s a long, long way from what most people would imagine when they see the words “DJ/producer”.

His all-vinyl, three-deck DJ sets, while technically expert, are spontaneous, sometimes extreme and hardcore, unafraid to make stylistic and sonic handbrake turns, “I like things to be a bit bumpy,” as he puts it; “to have ups and downs and f*ck with expectations!”

His productions, on the other hand, are lovingly and meticulously structured – he describes his process in the studio as “meditational” – and even when they, too, reject genre boundaries or ramp up tempos and bass, the finesse is the point: they’re as close to post-classical composition as they are to rave tracks as such.

This mix is the moment where he brings together all the elements that have made him what he is, and becomes a more integrated musical whole than ever before. As a basis he composed four new pieces which move between different sonic registers, and asked likeminded experimentalists Skee Mask and Clark for exclusives “Flip” and “Clonk Dual”, using these as coordinates to map out the mix.

Rather than get into the painstaking headspace he used for building tracks, he let himself take the free, first-thought-best-thought feeling of DJing into the studio, knowing that the cerebral work had already gone into the track selection. He mixed vinyl live, then chopped up those mixes, collaged and overdubbed them, conscious of not trying too hard, but working it until it felt right.

Ambient and breakcore, classical and punk, deep acid and chaotic percussion flow into a river of sound on this mix. It has the kind of elegance that only someone who’s put in billions of sweaty rave moments holding utter chaos just in check can manage, it joins together things that should never work with uncanny perfection, and then moments later knocks you sideways with a ragged cut or foolish sample.

You’ll never quite know if this is the DjRUM of the lawless derelict building party full of punks and freaks, or the DjRUM who will sit at home sculpting a single minute-long string ensemble recording until it perfectly matches his conceptual vision. Because, of course, it’s both, the whole time and his DJ-Kicks mix connects these two modes of expression. He was always both, and on this mix, he’s shed both skins, and – once again – become himself.