TRENCH Radio 131: The Best Mixes Of The Week

Words: James Keith
Photography: Sofia Hiramatsu
Between SoundCloud, YouTube, Mixcloud and everything else, it can feel like we’re being overwhelmed by an impenetrable, almost infinite stream of music, often of varying quality. You need a soundtrack to start your weekend right, but you don’t have the requisite lifetime to trawl through the week’s new DJ mixes. To help you out, we’ve done the busy work for you. We’ll be running this series every single Friday of every single week to bring you the very finest house music, grime, techno, bashment, R&B, trap, D&B, Amapiano, and no doubt a bunch of stuff that doesn’t have a name yet.
Dive into TRENCH Radio’s best mixes of the week below.
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Fiyahdred for Crack Magazine
With Notting Hill Carnival upon us, Fiyahdred has put together pretty much the perfect primer for the Bank Holiday. Bridging the gap between Amapiano rollers, dancehall and funky, it’s a fitting meeting of bass-heavy sounds from across the UK, Caribbean and Africa. Rubbing shoulders with cuts from Spice, Vybz Kartel, Apple, Scratchclart and others, they’ve also included a few of their own recent creations in this massive 47-track session, including “Overtime” and “Wining Train”. And if all that wasn’t enough, they’ve also just dropped a track with South African artist Mxshi Mo titled “Kind To You” via More Time for you to indulge in this weekend.
DVS for Radio Študent
Slovenian DJ DVS has been diligently importing UK club sounds (as well as various other global dancefloor strains) for years now and his long-running ‘MP3 Player’ series—broadcast via local station Radio Študent 89.3 FM and uploaded to his own SoundCloud—has become a must-listen over here (it’s also earned him a monthly spot on Brooklyn online statin Half Moon BK). This week, he put out the 90th episode in the ‘MP3 Player’ series and it’s one of his best yet. There’s plenty of up-to-the-minute heat, kicking off with Tay Jordan and Vercetti James’ “Treason” and running through T.Williams’ collab with Julio Bashmore, some Karen Nyame, Pangaea, A.G, and a hot-n-heavy Mariah Carey edit.
Sammy Virji for DJ Mag
This absolute riot of a set has been doing the rounds all week—and with good reason. Sammy Virji’s been an exciting force in bassline for a little while now thanks to his chops as both producer and selector, not to mention an unrivalled likability factor. Highlights in this latest set include bouncy flips of Unknown T and Little Simz, a lovely little Cypress Hill moment, and a cameo from Flowdan who steals the show with his turn as a bassline MC. In truth, the best part of it all was Virji himself who looked like he had more fun on the decks than anyone has ever had.
Sir Hiss for Mixmag
For at least the first few years of his career, Bristol’s Sir Hiss was widely associated with dubstep, but while low-end frequencies remain central to his sound, this recent mix points to a much wider palette. Inspired by a recent US tour with Sam Binga and Addison Groove, Hiss has been toying with combinations of grime and electro to create a more energetic club sound, but one that’s still firmly rooted in soundsystem culture. You can hear that fizzing, squelchy sound on his and Binga’s “ADRL” and it’s set to be a regular fixture on his own No More Mailouts label, but for now the best place to hear it is in this mix of everything from DMX Krew and Skee Mask to Riko Dan and Mez.
MAUOQ for Diffrent Music
Big things are afoot over at Diffrent Recordings. The D&B label’s been going for 13 years now and this year they’re launching a new 17-track comp called Revolution Of The Giraffe. That drops next month in digital, cassette, and magazine form, with bits from Sheba Q, Hyroglifics, NoNation, and more. Ahead of that, they’ve also kicked off a new mix series with a mammoth session from Rome-born, London-based DJ and producer MAUOQ. 77 minutes of “deep, dark and deadly cuts” from Danny Scrilla, Skeptical, Subp Yao, at least half a dozen of his own tunes, and plenty more chuggers besides.