Fabric has finished off a hat-trick of top-shelf FabricLive releases with Stanton Warriors’ ‘FabricLive 30’. Following up the maximal chunkiness on Evil Nine’s ‘28’ and Cut Copy’s hipster electro-disco epic ‘29’, the Warriors have crafted the perfect example of what the ‘FabricLive’ series stands for: set side-by-side (or month-by-month) to the ‘Fabric’ series, it’s about salty, sleazy, bonerific bodypopping from front to back, as opposed to living room wallpaper. Mark Yardley and Dom Butler prove themselves Jacks of all trades and then some: their production, compiling, mixing, remixing, and trademark “refixing” skills all stand out on this stellar mix.
First things first: ‘FabricLive 30’ would get everyone nice ‘n sweaty in da club. The boys proffer a masterstroke right off, mashing up Kerri Chandler’s old-school electro ‘Planet Sonic’ with Spank Rock’s nu-skool ghettotech ‘Bump’. Peace Division’s snide house track ‘Club Therapy’ and Claude Vonstroke’s minimal techno mischief-maker ‘Who’s Afraid of Detroit’ make appearances, after having featured on Wiggle’s ‘Fabric 28’ and Tiefschwarz’s ‘29’ respectively, but here the Warriors have gutted both and installed custom refix chrome: a beefy breakbeat and bigger buildups only make the songs better.
For Wahoo’s ‘Make Em Shake It’, the Warriors mercifully slice out the original’s reggaeton, speed up the vocals, and end up with what is arguably their best straight-ahead remix yet. They then effortlessly combine two of their biggest tracks: Twista’s ‘Pop Ya Cork’ vocals over 2001’s ‘Da Virus’. While the production sounds dated and Twista doesn’t have quite the same effect he did on the original, it’s still a novel idea seeing as how the tracks sync up so well despite a five-year age difference.
‘Pop Ya Cork’, a stellar opening to April’s ‘Stanton Sessions Vol. 2’, isn’t the only track off that comp to get mashed up on ‘FabricLive 30’. The Warriors grind their Beatnuts collaboration ‘Shake It Up’ over the jazzy beats from Deekline & Ed Solo’s remix of Busta Rhymes’ ‘Touch It’, and toss a bit of ‘Still Here’ featuring Eska right in the middle of Baobinga & ID’s storming ‘The Machine’. Elsewhere Dom & Mark give King Unique’s ‘To the Left’ a chunky but fairly typical Stanton Warriors remix, and just when you think it’s over, the Splack Pack PA announces, “SHAKE THAT AAAAAAASS, BITCH, AND LET ME SEE WHATCHA GOT!!” It’s that touch of class we can always count on from Stanton Warriors.
Considering ‘FabricLive 30’ is the first through-and-through breaks comp in the series since Meat Katie’s ‘21’, it’s worth comparing the two. At the time, Meat Katie turned in the same level of work as any DJ in either of Fabric’s series: throwing in one original production (‘Nu-Tron’), one remix (Dylan Rhymes’ ‘Salty’), and one mash-up (Infusion’s ‘Better World’ with UNKLE’s ‘Reign’) between tracks from unknown producers and fellow labelmates. But a year-and-a-half and nine installments later, the bar has been significantly raised. Stanton Warriors are easily the hardest-working DJ duo in the biz right now: chopping, tossing, and reworking like there were 25 hours in the day. They make a myriad of their own and others’ productions, which have been played to death in the past year, sound fresh as baby powder on a big booty. The only major fault worth noting is that, as always, ‘FabricLive 30’ comes in a tiny tin box, not booming out from Fabric’s floor-rattling speakers. So for everyone who wasn’t there the night Stanton Warriors rocked crotches in room one, I sympathize.
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