Over the course of the last two years whilst still successfully pushing his original alias and label, GRAMZ has carved a solid little niche for himself, straying slightly away from the dubstep side of things and towards a brazen clash of experimental trap, grime and hip hop. The tunes tend to speak for themselves. From the get go on his debut self released EP, GRAMZ has captured the attention of many heads with a thirst for heavy 808’s, classic hip hop and grime sampling, and off beat patterns. This most recently has lead to a debut vinyl release on Youngsta‘s growing and future classic label SENTRY and now, a release on Crucial Recordings.
CRUCIAL019 features two highly anticipated tracks that have both been doing the rounds for the best part of the last year, receiving high praise and plenty of plays. So it was only a matter of time that they’d find themselves on a high profile release. Not much can be considered high profile in the genre these days more so than a release on Crucial Recordings, a label that’s recently seen some of the finest forward thinking releases over the last year or so thus solidifying itself as one of my absolute favourite labels.
For the A-side of CRUCIAL019, the long awaited ‘Joken’ is unleashed to the masses. It begins fairly mellow like a few of GRAMZ’ past productions. It teases its way in with wavy chords and punchy 808s before hitting a wall of silence, holding its breath. The chaotic drop then smashes its way in as the beat is filled with a ferocious mid range and a slapping snare. ‘Joken’ is certainly an intense dancefloor banger. My favourite of the two however is found on the flip. ‘Get Them Bags‘ is about as laid back as it gets with GRAMZ, bringing in a cutting edge minimal style with beautifully chopped and placed vocal samples filling the gaps between a sparse yet hard hitting sub heavy beat. Pardon the overused expression but this one is certainly ‘a vibe’.
Although the 10″ vinyl gets its release on October 26th, the digital is due to drop on the Crucial Recordings Bandcamp on Friday (19th October).
Check out GRAMZ on Soundcloud and Twitter.
Check out Crucial Recordings on Soundcloud and Twitter.