- Sharp and catchy hard dance on Halcyon Veil.
- To win at football, you've got to be dogged and direct. Los Angeles-born producer Bapari knows this as well as anyone. When they first enrolled at the University of Southern California, they had their sights set on playing for the Haiti National Football Team, but those plans changed following freshman year when they started DJing on college radio and learning to play the drums. Now, their sporty side lives on in music: there's an urgency to their production that has the same cutting edge and drive as a world-class attacking midfielder. Clean breakbeats cut through sombre and distant keys on "The Flood" from their self-released debut, while techno kicks stormed up out of a swamp at 160 BPM on the follow-up single, Stamina. Their third release, Oasis, builds on these hard dance ideas, sharpening their percussion and deepening the atmospherics with industrial textures and guest vocals.
Chemical X affiliate Lolahol and RBMA alumnus Kidä add a raw, human side to Bapari's soundscapes. Lolahol's imagery on "Sore" is touching because of how sweet ("put your hand in my pocket") and sad it is ("can't hold your hand / or stay up late / anymore"), whereas the breaks that undercut Kidä's gated glossolalia on "Outskirts" make it epic in both a teary Gladiator sort of way and a rousing, "YouTube best goals compilation" way. The gnarly edge to the percussion is the most striking thing about Oasis. Grumbling-sub bass courses through the underbelly of "Void," rewind effects on "Solace" sound like a blade being sharpened on a grindstone and the breaks on "Stairwell" are the audio equivalent of Messi finishing off a passage of tiki taka football—polished and deliciously to the point. It turns out sporting prowess and music production aren't that different after all.
Tracklist01. Face To Face
02. Sore feat. Lolahol
03. Outskirts feat. Kidä
04. Void
05. Solace
06. Stairwell