Darkstar announce remix 12

The release will be available August 7th on Warp

Today, Darkstar announce a new 12” of remixes from their recent album Civic Jams. This release pairs a selection of works by John Talabot, Parris, Horsepower Productions and Loraine James, whose haunting club remix of “Wolf” can be heard for the first time today. James effortlessly skims over the softer sonics of the original, adding harder punctuations that clatter and clamour like corrugated sheet metal, a nod to the warehouse raves it deserves to be heard in. Civic Jams Remixes will be available on Warp 7th August.

Debuted on her NTS guest show, Loraine James explains more about her intentions for where this remix sits: “I felt honoured to be contacted to do this remix because I remember listening to Darkstar back when I was sixteen. With remixes I like to create an atmosphere that’s the opposite of the original song, so here I’ve taken Darkstar’s downtempo track and made it into a proper dance tune. I played it out a few times in sets before lockdown and it got the crowd going.”

Darkstar find themselves at once looking homeward and venturing further into their own psychic hinterland with each record. They’ve covered a lot of ground from the introspective expanse of their debut ‘North’ [2010], to utopian visions of society in ‘News From Nowhere’ [2013] and the unique dynamics of a pre-Brexit northern England on ‘Foam Island’ [2015]. On their latest offering ‘Civic Jams’, home is within reach. Inspired by the intervening years, Darkstar (aka Aiden Whalley and James Young) show how the personal can be political and reveal more of themselves than they’ve ever done before. Imagine emotional realism built from spectral rave echoes, anchored in timeless songs of love and loss in the digital now and you’ve got it.

Darkstar’s (aka Aiden Whalley and James Young) idiosyncratic take on electronic pop music has positioned them as key voices within the scene for the best part of two decades. In recent years, Darkstar have worked with the likes of Actress, Wild Beasts and Zomby. They have also released music with Empress Of (XL) and Gaika, collaborating with director Lucy Luscombe and Random Acts for Channel 4, working on ground-breaking live dance performances with choreographer Holly Blakey (Mica Levi) and scoring the Palme d’Or nominated short film ‘Dreamlands’.

Darkstar have continued their dedication to collaboration and been commissioned by PRS to create a piece for the New Music Biennial, in a response to the 2017 City of Culture, which was performed at Royal Festival Hall with organist James McVinnie. This collaboration with McVinnie has since continued and saw Darkstar compose a new work for Organ Reframed festival which they performed together with the London Contemporary Orchestra in 2018 at Union Chapel. In 2019 they performed two of their new compositions at Queen Elizabeth Hall for Unclassified Live.

Alongside these, the band has worked with St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, in Minneapolis, Metal Liverpool, Arts Council England and Harthill Community centre to create an installation and performance piece with teens from migrant communities. The final performance, TRACKBED, was performed at the Barbican in London.

Civic Jams Remixes 12”
1. Wolf (John Talabot’s Euphoric Remix)
2. Wolf (Loraine James Remix)
3. Jam (Parris Remix)
4. Jam (Horsepower Productions Remix)
5. Wolf (John Talabot’s Materia Dub)

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