With the catastrophic explosion that rocked Beirut’s port area on Friday, August 4th still massively impacting it’s now widely displaced residents Maher Daniel and his The Other Side imprint have hooked up with Impact Lebanon to deliver one of the biggest VA’s of the year. Daniel has called in a host of our scene’s biggest players with each dialing up their studio prowess to 11 to deliver a track worthy of this charity project.
The non-profit charity collaboration features 14 tracks that yet again prove that the underground music community stands with those that are less fortunate than others and will look to offer any assistance they can to the people of Lebanon that have suffered a great deal in recent years with little to no help from their own government. As well as around 300,000 people being made homeless as a result of the huge blast the explosion has also decimated most of the cities nightlife which was situated in the port area.
Alci kicks off the Bandcamp release with the abstract groove of ‘Denayi’ and is closely followed by the lush breaks of Costin Rp’s ‘Tajo’, Dragutesku turns in an excellently intricate microflow on ‘Muza, while Faster’s ‘Surveyor’ impresses on a cosmic level. Moving on to Guy From Downstairs and his ‘Coast To Coast’ allows him to flex his melodic side while retaining an infectious rattling percussive vibe, joining in is the rolling bass-led hit ‘Suave’ from Lowris.
What would a TOS release be without tracks from the bossman and Maher Daniel turns in a trio of tracks that are worth the money on their own. First is Maher’s original solo cut ‘Wasted Liquid’ and it is one of the standout tracks of the release. A finely poised track that weaves ethereal elements in and out of view at ease, next Priku steps up to re-rub Maher’s ’One Drop’ into one of his signature flowing pieces. Completing the musical input from Maher is the undulating bass workout from trio Mandar and again points to one of the standout points in the release. On the home stretch of the release Pirvu is in deep bleepy mode on ‘Ev-Uh-Nes-Uhnt’, Pheek and Kike Mayor combine on atmospheric ‘Costa Verde’, minimal talisman Ricardo Villalobos ups the BPM’s considerably with his breakneck rounded effort ‘Sauvage’. Down to the business end of the release and Romanian’s close things out with Sepp in emotive mode on ‘Cairnholm’ and SIT deliver a masterclass in suspense and release on ‘Transit’. There is no other word to describe this VA than cohesive and when you take into consideration that mastering engineer, studio hotshot, and featured artist Pheek is responsible for tying these ridiculously good tracks together via his insanely deft mastering skills it all makes sense. With each of these artists selling out each of their own releases, it is clear that this comprehensive release will produce a sizeable charity contribution to Impact Lebanon.
You can grab the TOS x Impact Lebanon VA from Bandcamp now.
More info on Maher Daniel
Trommel Podcast | Facebook | Resident Advisor | SoundCloud | Discogs
More info on The Other Side
SoundCloud | Resident Advisor | Soundcloud | Bandcamp | Discogs
More info on Impact Lebanon
Facebook | Website
