Yazmin lands on Vinicius Honorio’s Liberta Records with “Control” for a set of heavy hypnotic techno cuts, kicking off the first week of the year with a top-tier release.
Hailing from Malta, 2024 was a great year for Yasmine Farrugia. Breaking new talent and with her other solo releases, “Consistenza” and “Spice”, she proved she could hang with the techno greats, putting forth a diverse and punchy, banging techno sound.
Here on this “Control” release, she turns to a style that has her characteristic bass vs. kick bounce but melds it with a strong, hypnotic sound full of force, tension, and deft aggression.
“Liquid Source” highlights this style of techno with an attitude. It’s a bassface, heads down, fists up kind of techno on the dance floor mood that skillfully navigates the tension with a great sense of release and machine-like clarity.
The track “Crowd Control” also executes a very knowledgeable and powerful sense of tension. It’s a tension mostly characterized by a distant raised hypnotic synth line, creating an intensity to a writhing and unrelenting level with sharp off-kilter dissonant synths. And it only barely lets it go at the main drop, fully blowing your hair back. The only reprieve, like “Liquid Source”, is in the tail end, where it’s a DJ’s turn to mix out and add even more tension. But on its own, it’s a sweet and satisfying resolution to a punishing and mental musical workout.
The final track, “What It Takes”, returns Yazmin to her punchy, bouncy kick-and-bass combo and accentuates it with an industrial-sounding call/response synth and drum groove. Interstitial parts and a tension synth work their way through the mix to keep things moving along.
This “Control” release in total is miles ahead of quite a few of the greater names out there this week. Maybe they’re all too busy touring while the next generation is coming in like Prometheus to steal the fire. Whatever the reason, there’s a new groundswell of talent that has been coming up as the new guard.
Yazmin and others seem to be a part of it, and it’s a good call by Liberta to recognize it.
-Sean Ocean
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