Dekmantel Podcast Series dekmantel

There is nothing ordinary about Sepehr (@sepehr-a): he hails from the Bay Area of San Fran, is based in New York City but has Iranian heritage and takes great pleasure in pulling apart everything you think you know about dance music. His maverick approach results in versatile and genre-defiant sounds that collide EBM, drum & bass, techno, electro, acid and plenty more on some of the finest labels out there. He runs his own Shaytoon Records which is focussed on the Middle Eastern underground, and in May lands on our own Dekmanel Records with Genesis Domain, a varied EP full of intriguing sounds.

The same could be said of his mix for us this week. It's a deep dive into his eclectic and eccentric musical mind that spans several sounds and scenes. Although united by body-moving rhythms, there is everything from club to techno to broken beat and plenty more besides. Each track is packed with detail and surrealist sounds that will keep your head as busy as your heels.

JakoJako (@jakojako_live) always wanted to make music and her self-confessed hyperactivity ultimately led to her getting the most joy out of playing about with machines and patching up synths. These days the Berghain resident is a celebrated live act and DJ who draws on the considerable knowledge she picked up working at Berlin's legendary synth shop SchneidersLaden, but she has also worked on several high-profile motion sensor dance projects at places like The Royal Albert Hall. Her smart sound designs and unique rhythms have landed on Leisure System, Tresor and Figure and she has a new EP coming on Mute this June.

Her mix for us this week features a sneak preview of one of the tracks from that EP as well as mixing up music from Alaric, Siege, Altinbas and many more. It's full of high-speed sounds couched loosely in techno but with moods and textures borrowed from industrial, minimal and even trance as things reach an emotional peak late on. Though she broke through as a live act, this set shows JakoJako can now speak just as freely through the decks.

Answer Code Request (@answercoderequest) has long since mastered the art of mixing up the physical the with cerebral. His broken, industrial-tinged techno drums are powerful enough to have made him a long-time Berghain resident, while his harmonic pads make a lasting impact on your mind. While releasing on the likes of Ostgut Ton, Dolly Deluxe and Monkeytown Records, he has also established his own ACR label and never fails to blur boundaries between sub-genres whenever he steps out with a new sound or set.

He pulls no punches on this week's mix which is a broad showcase of his ability to thread together many different strains of techno and beyond into a coherent whole. There's everything from transcendental and linear rollers to dubby bangers, twitchy rave anthems blissed out deep space minimalism via party starting piano house. It's fun and functional in equal measure and is the sound of a DJ very much in full flow.

In very loose terms, James K's (@jamesk_1 music operates at the fringes of the pop world. It is experimental and industrial, packed with hooks and riddled with dreamy textures that show off her mastery of synths. She has released it in album form with Dial and Incenso, dropped EPs on AD 93 and collaborated with the likes of Drew McDowall and Stefan Maie, and always manages to imbue her adventurous arrangements with real-world emotions and anxieties. This year she will join us at Dekmantel Festival but not before serving up this week's podcast.

It's the sort of rhythmically thrilling workout that has always stood James apart: jittery drum patterns and kinetic grooves that unfold at 100 miles an hour as a barrage of caustic motifs, hypnagogic melodies and hyper-real colours all bounce about the mix. There is an ever-present sense of tension in the way things are assembled - it's as if they might implode or explode at any minute, and it all sounds fantastically futuristic.

Priori (@priori-ties) has always explored a wide range of techno from dense and introspective to more joyous, often against the backdrop of technological possibilities. He hails from Canada and has been prolific since first emerging with two full-lengths to his name on his own NAFF label. They pair dubby undercurrents with crystalline melodies and contain the sort of unresolved tensions that keep you locked in for the ride. This weekend he plays Dekmantel Naarm 2024 but first has served up this new mi for us.

Priori says this is the first dance mix he's done in a long time, adding "It's an hour and a half of fresh rhythms and rave sounds that I recorded while on tour in Australia. It features a few tracks I have been playing a lot lately and some forthcoming bits by myself and some friends." In just over 90 minutes he works through a rollercoaster of deep techno rhythms that are firmly focused on the future and flow as fluidly as water.

Mia Koden (@miakoden) first emerged as half of Sicaria Sound but since breaking out alone has established her own musical identity. It draws on her South Sudanese heritage and music from across the African continent and beyond, not least her current surroundings in South London and the city's rich sound system culture. Often operating around the 140BPM mark, she dropped two head-turning tracks ‘Hot Take' and 'I Did’ early last year then debuted on Ilian Tape with a dark and irresistible EP that traverses multiple bass-heavy genres.

Mia does the same with her mix for us this week with, in her words, "bass, percussive, 2step, 140BPM, dubstep, dub, dub techno and breaks" all coming thick and fast at up to 150 beats per minute. It's a breathless 90-minute selection of global body music packed with lively percussion, big on low ends and not afraid to get rhythmically inventive while also dropping in the odd playful vocal from the worlds of grime and r&b. Both technically sound and tastefully assembled, it's a thrilling statement from the vital Koden.