Heard this one first through a friend’s phone speaker at a kitchen table, which is the worst imaginable way to meet a Dabin record, and it still got me. “Flutters” is peak melodic dubstep comfort food, and I mean the good kind — Dabin and William Black are two of the best alive at this exact sound, and Audra Miller’s vocal lends it a genuine ache instead of the usual placeholder topline. The build is all shimmering guitar and rising synths, and the drop trades aggression for these huge emotional stabs that land somewhere between a festival and a good cry. The second drop slips in a guitar lead I didn’t expect and now can’t unhear. This is unashamedly pretty music for people who like feeling things at 130 with the sub cranked, executed clean enough that the usual formula complaints slide right off. On a proper system those drops are going to flatten a room. Comfort food, cooked by chefs who could open a restaurant.
January
Chrome Daydream
Chrome stars, jelly hearts and holographic colour. A nod to the glossy, optimistic graphics of the early web.