Tag: Wet Dreams Recordings

Rose Bonica doesn’t want it to get to your head

Since her beginnings in 2016, Rose Bonica has quietly made a name for herself as a fresh and innovative producer of electronic music that, thanks to its many influences, defies classification within a specific genre. Unbound by the rules and structures inherent in club music, her productions instead are highly textured and often play with the listener’s expectations while still referencing the foundational elements of dance music. “I stick to a loose idea, like when there’s a break [the track] has to develop, but I still live arrange. I feel like copy-pasting, sticking to that structure, loses that kind of feeling and makes it really rigid, but I do try keep the live arrangement within the realms of the rules of what people actually resonate with,” Rose Bonica explains.

Her second EP after 2017’s “Rosy Disposition”, “Don’t Let It Get To Your Head” sees Rose Bonica pushing herself more as a producer and artist, exploring new territories and honing her sound. Explaining her move to include her own vocals on this release Rose Bonica says, “I wanted to fuck with vocals. I found you can actually do a lot with vocals and I was tired of waiting for people to come to Hout Bay, so it was definitely a natural progression I wanted to push. I don’t know why I should sample someone else’s voice if I can attempt it first.” As a producer she is also pushing herself to incorporate more melody in her music, something she felt was lacking in her first release.

Photography by Tatyana Levana

Viewing production as a therapeutic outlet, Rose Bonica sees “Don’t Let It Get To Your Head” as a release that deals with how quickly one can veer off one’s own path, dealing with the industry and how easy it is for all these things to get to you. “I would say it’s just a culmination of everything like a break up in relationship terms and with the [industry]. Trying to step away from everything and the politics that go around this little city, and the world.”

As on her previous release, the sounds and moods of “Don’t Let It Get To Your Head” are varied, with Rose Bonica’s sonic palette featuring everything from deep, droning techno basslines to drum patterns with a distinct afro-house feel, serene synth-leads and industrial percussion. Over the course of 6 tracks, Rose Bonica shows her versatility and originality as a producer, with the tracks on this EP each having their own sound yet fitting together as a coherent whole.

With a visual treatment in partnership with Tamzyn Limb on the way and yet-to-be-announced festival bookings on the calendar, Rose Bonica is looking to bring her EP to life in way that is fun to experience and perform, all while remembering not to let it go to her head.

24 July 2018
The Pontifications of Big Space

“My girlfriend tells me there’s an SABC job to be done, I’m the assistant stylist, R1000 a day for 8 days, that’s R8000, I firmly agree. We wait for production budget of R21000 to be deposited. It never arrives. We have no electricity, we drink wine, I smoke weed and play 30 seconds in the dark until we fall asleep.”

So begins one of the stories that form part of the novella Big Space is releasing along with his latest album. “To pontificate is the stillborn child of the union between solitude and loneliness. These are my pontifications in text and sound, a collection of moments entrenched in my pursuit to not only make music, but to create a world inside myself where I can be King, ruler of the troglodytes, the lord of the flies. I have lived a thousand lives and I have died a million deaths, behold my truth and eat my shit.”

When it comes to producers forging their own path through South Africa’s music landscape, there are few who are as firmly committed to producing original music that pushes boundaries as Big Space. Over the years he has worked with the likes of Schlachthofbronx, Scratcha DVA, and Spoek Mathambo, local producers 7FT Soundsystem, Leeu & Jumping Back Slash as well as having a slew of original releases under his belt.

“PONTIFICATIONS”, out on the 8th of February, continues this tradition of seeking originality and is an insight into the world he has created for himself. Released through his label, Wet Dreams Recordings, which he runs with label-mate Rose Bonica, “PONTIFICATIONS” is electronic music, but refuses to stick to the limits of this genre. Taking bits and pieces from well-known and not so well-known musical genres, it has an underlying familiarity while still managing to sound like nothing before it.

With a playtime just short of 90 minutes, the album is filled with diverse tracks that still form a cohesive collection, a testament to Big Space’s relentless pursuit of originality. Highly layered, with non-traditional structures, the music on “PONTIFICATIONS” requires a few listens before the nuances become apparent. From touches of drum ‘n bass on “Innocent Hands” to the psych-rock tinged “Serpent Moon” featuring Young Om, it’s impossible to know what is coming next on the album, which is precisely the point. It’s clear that “PONTIFICATIONS” is the product of solitude and loneliness because it sounds like nothing else.

Have a listen below to ‘DAT SINKING LIFE’ from “PONITFICATIONS”

24 January 2018
Bubblegum Club mix Vol 11 by Lost Lover

Lost Lover has recently released a song on Wet Dreams Recordings new compilation, ‘Work Not Hype’. The exclusive mix that Lost Lover made for us will take listeners on a sonic journey through dark electronic beats. For a little more insight I interviewed Lost Lover about the inspiration for the mix.

Can you please tell us more about yourself?

Lost Lover was conceived in Johannesburg about 3 years ago and born in December 2016, inspired by the city’s infamous advertisements to retrieve lost Lovers.

Everybody remembers a Lost Lover and with remembering also creates one every day. Memory is not stagnant. It changes with every present moment and inevitably adapts for the sake of necessary projections of the future. Your Lost Lover(s) shapes future Lovers and the lives with and without them.

Lost Lover will tell stories, wear faces, speak tongues and dance in languages of many within a world inhabited by Animals, plants and Spirits. We will exoticise each other in ways and stare only through kaleidoscopic lenses of all colours, except White and Black.

Lost Lover is a projection space, a piece of Art created by many. Lost Lover is generally not one person and if so then tomorrow it would be someone else.

What are your influences regarding your music and how would you describe your music?

The music is influenced by a need to shed over-self awareness, or imagined and assumed outside views of self. A search to find a calm relationship based on embrace and capitulation and trust. To have the freedom to speak powerfully through beauty and fight with affirmation.

This hopefully leads to a sound that is forward and playful, patient, angry, committed. Embracing and dramatic at times.

Your sound has a pretty distinct, refined darkness about it; to what extent do you think these hypnotic dark elements and atonality are part of the whole aesthetic of your music?

Darkness is not intentionally there but maybe it is a strong part of the aesthetic. Time will tell.

There always has been an affinity for dissonance on many levels and Atonality is a result of focus being set on rhythm and sound more than harmony based on a musical school or tempering.

Tell us your inspiration behind this Bubblegum Club mix.

The main idea was to make a long set. In the past years people have been uploading sets of 30 minutes, sometimes even less and rarely playing sets longer than one hour. This approach ignores the potential and force a set can have with enough time and only with enough time. Some of the strongest tracks in the set are over 10 minutes long and they need space around them.

It is a challenge to listeners to trust and give themselves into something deeply for their own sake and to encourage a listening culture which promotes patience and concentration and which embraces depth.

When you produce and mix, do you go with the flow of what you are feeling or are the tracks conceptualized before they are produced or included in a mix?

A mix like this is very conceptual and carefully selected. There is a reason for each track to be in the set. Flow comes into play in the transitioning between the tracks.

In Production it is slightly different. It is not a concept but a state and a sound. A state of being is the equivalent of a concept in a sense that it connects everything together but it is different because it is not an intellectual but a spiritual and emotional child.

How were you first introduced to electronic music and have you had a formal music education at all?

Lost Lover has only existed digitally so far and is only a few months old. Education is still to come and nobody knows if it will be formal. What has been created so far are results of what was brought along from previous lives, genetic programming and ancestral conditioning. No questions have been formulated yet.

Where do you draw the most inspiration when producing music and what are your primary tools for building your sound?

As mentioned earlier, Inspiration is really a state and very rarely a reference. A inspirational state is reached through being alone and finding a pure state not digested through any human beings reflection.

The tools for the sound are mainly very processed field recordings, especially most of the complex textural sounds. Different kinds of syntheses also but more important is sequencing and through that how sound moves in relation to time.

Can you tell us about some of your future projects being released soon and your work on ‘Wet Dreams Recordings’ new upcoming ‘Work Not Hype’ compilation?

The Only released so far has been one track on ‘Wet Dreams Recordings’ titled ‘Your Lost Lover’ Which was the first Lost Lover track finished, It is intense, someone on soundcloud commented with ‘Yoh this is cold’.

The ‘Work not Hype’ compilation is very different to other South African Releases. The courage in the curation should inspire many.

There is an EP and an Album Ready to find a home. Future projects will be in many different forms and energy through sound will always be a companion to it if not always in form of Music.

What was your creative approach on these up and coming releases and what was the process of creating these songs?

The Album was inspired by 24 hours in a far eastern city and the approach to composition was almost rigidly conceptual. The main ideas were laid down on a song per day basis whilst inspiration was fresh, then refined later.

The EP is more recent and probably more mature sounding, The track ‘Your Lost Lover’ is part of it.

What are your current thoughts on the growing South African scene? Who are some of your biggest inspirations at the moment and why?

South Africa is a country which keeps on giving birth to new and pure cultural movements and Artists. It is a privilege to witness and share a time with them. There are lots from different directions but my favourites at the moment are:

Jazzuelle, Vukazithathe, Hlasko/Kaang, Nonku Phiri, Jakinda, BCUC, Urban Village, TheGooddokta, Big Space, Sibusile Xaba, Stiff Pap, Jumping Back Slash.

All mentioned are pioneers. Some in music and some also in a life besides music. They all are working with the world in their very own unique and powerful way. They symbolize a strong curiosity and courage to explore and experience.

21 June 2017
The Emotional Electronica of Rose Bonica

Rose Bonica is a relatively new name on the 4/4 dancefloor but one that is steadily building, beat after beat, layer after layer. She hasn’t had much press (until now) but she’s been put on by artists who know their shit, like Jumping Back Slash, and has put out some enchanting and hypnotic releases worthy of your time (One of which is the live mix she did for JBS). I got to Skype the producer/quite-a-few-things just after she returned from the from the Wet Dreams compilation launch in Jozi (in association with this fine publication). “It was a cool turn out, the bar didn’t have a card machine though.” She jokingly nitpicks when I ask how it went.

Rose Bonica, real name Natalie Rose Perel, is a bit of a perfectionist and comes across as hyper-aware, but also candid and open. She’s dabbled in a few things, like, she has her honours in video editing and learned to code so she could work on her dad’s company’s website, but it’s with music that she’s finding a way to express herself. “I’m an emotional person,” she explains, “But only in the last 2 years have I really been a bit more open. Although I’m emotional, I’m very, you know, just put a smile on my face and move on. I guess not a lot of people very close to me know what I’m feeling, but music’s helping me with that.”

Personally, I find it harder to connect emotionally with house and techno music, but Rose explained how she expresses herself through sampling,”I think it’s the sampling aspect of music, how you can use samples and how that can be your story. I always found in editing, what always carried a film or a video or anything was the music behind it. You could change the mood by changing the music behind it. When I was watching Montle make music, which is what made me want to try, he’s also very expressive, the way he makes his songs is storytelling. Chopping samples together you can literally show someone who you are, and I think that that’s what I want from Rose Bonica.”

Montle aka Big Space is Rose’s boyfriend and watching him create music is what sparked her interest in music. “I didn’t even really listen to music before I started making it,” she says jokingly, but not as a joke. Montle is also the reason why she has had some doors open for her. “I definitely was lucky in that I had a jump start being with Montle and having access to his connections that he already had. Nepotism, for once, has actually worked in my favour. But I do know that the people who have been backing me and what I’ve been doing- most of them are 40 year old men who, if they didn’t like something, wouldn’t support it.”

The thing is, whilst Montle has helped open some doors, others have closed because some people think Montle is making Rose’s music. “I know a lot of people, at least in Cape Town, think Montle is my ghostwriter, which kinda blows my mind seeing as I’ve used computers all my life. It’s not actually that hard, most electronic “musicians”, producers, aren’t musicians, they’re not trained, like, at all. I think that could be something else. It’s quite a common thing I think, with women, is men are always waiting for you to be exposed by playing premixes.”

Now I can’t tell if Rose is making her own music all the way from my flat in Umbilo, but if she got booked to play live more, she could show what she’s made of. “I was booked over woman’s day week,” she tells me when I ask if she plays live much. “That sounds like tokenism,” I reply. She laughs, “And by female bookers. So I played 3 gigs in 1 week, it was quite amazing, it was really fun, I would love to play again.”

It’s been a bit of a rollercoaster for Rose since she’s started making music. Whilst jaded 40-year-olds are putting her on, cynical youth are blocking her from making moves. That just means that Rose will have to find ways to change things and put herself on, which, after the Wet Dreams launch, is exactly what she plans on doing “I’m thinking of actually trying to make a change because I know in life that you can’t expect things to change unless you change them yourself.”

(more…)

2 June 2017
Wet Dreams Recordings presents Work Not Hype

With the launch of their first official compilation Work Not Hype, South African underground electronic label Wet Dreams Recordings is coming out of the bedroom and announcing itself as a real label. Featuring artists such as Rose Bonica, Jumping Back Slash, Dion Monti, Lorenzo, DJ 909 Clap, Yezzah and vGrrr. Altered Natives will be the final artist to feature. Label founder and producer Big Space is proud of the release. “This is the first one that’s actually going to be mastered. I paid lots of time carefully selecting the tunes. It’s very well curated.”

Wet Dreams Recordings started off as a high school fantasy for Johannesburg based Big Space. “I guess I always wanted a place where myself and my friends or like-minded people could release stuff because it was different and there was never anything like that in South Africa except for say African Dope.”

While the music on Wet Dreams Recordings spans a variety of electronic genres, the common thread running throughout is that they all take a different form of expression. “Aesthetic wise in South Africa it’s very hard to find people that think about music outside of cash or just pushing the levels of ideas. So I just look for that.”

Wet Dreams Recordings’ first release, Night Sweats Vol. 1, featured a handful of artists that shared this mindset. “Apart from Jumping Back Slash, who’s a friend, the other guys are just guys that I met on the internet. Either I contacted them or they came up to me and just said they like my stuff and vice versa.”

Work Not Hype will be available online as well as on CD. “We’re going to do a limited run of some CDs with some very nice art to accompany it so you don’t just feel like you’re buying a piece of plastic that you’ll never use. It’s gonna have a nice story, just talking shit about everyone, because people like that. There’s something for everyone I guess. If you don’t like music there’s some great gossip. Me shitting on people. Pictures of dicks. Pictures of dicks shitting on people. You know, art.”

When it comes to how his approach towards the label has changed Big Space is frank. “Shit, it’s a bit fucking scary because now I have other people’s careers in my hand not just mine. It’s just basically following strategy, something I never did before. I guess playing the game of the game, but on my own terms. The way I plan to infiltrate the game is literally by just putting out consistently good quality stuff, because it’s not just gqom and Goldfish and Freshlyground. There’s tons of other stuff that’s coming from here.”

With their aim to be a platform for different yet high quality music, Wet Dreams Recordings is carving out a niche locally at a time when the focus on South African music is greater than ever and the need for such a platform even more so. “I’m tired of trying to impress South Africa because they don’t even care about anything different unless it’s a copy of international stuff. So I want it to be heard by the right people that want to hear different music.”

13 April 2017