The Internet is a big place and it’s easy to get lost, so we’re here to do the legwork for you. Slept On is where we take a few moments to hip you to DJs and producers you might have missed along the way.
You know how someone once told you about 8-bit music? I’m talking tunes made to sound like video games from the 80s. You know—old Ataris, C64s and Nintendos; Moon Patrol, Metroid, Zaxxon and all the rest.
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And you checked it out and it made you smile for a second ’cause you were like, “Aw, I remember those sounds.” But then you didn’t really listen to it again, probably because most of the new stuff is actually flat and doesn’t have any real kick or bounce or teeth to it. And it kinda hurts your ears after a while?
Well London duo The Naïve Machine completely fixed that problem by kicking 8-bit’s ass several notches up the scale. These are producers—Dave Pilcher and Jim O’Regan—who get teary-eyed over old video game sounds but also listen to real hip-hop and dance music. Then they make the tunes you always dreamed would exist if someone actually got their shit together to make real, heavy 8-bit hip-hop.
Every year NM give away a one of their Basket Bass beat tapes for free on their bandcamp. They’ve done lots of other remixes and full releases for labels like Saturate and Hit and Hope as well. They even do soundtracks for actual video games like Ace of Spades. So grab BBBT3 from their bandcamp and raise either your middle fingers or your joysticks up, whichever you prefer.
