RA Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Ask Berlin's network of revered deep diggers who their favourite "DJ's DJ" is, and there's a strong chance you'll hear one name immediately pop up: KRN. Phil Kearney, AKA KRN, is one of those rare types who has built a reputation away from the limelight. Formerly a resident at The Ghost's Hoppetosse party as well as a Get Perlonized devotee (plus, full disclosure, reviewing events and working at RA in the mid-2010s), he's well-versed in both wiggle and waft. The hubbub around KRN can be put down to the fastidiousness of his approach: he unearths rare gems from the roots of the underground, before mixing it up with a deft hand. Kearney's RA Podcast, sweetly subtitled "Dadhouse," is an ode to his partner and newborn, as well as a window into his personal palette. He starts in serene IDM territory, before shifting into playful grooves and tactile house oddities. Good lucking ID'ing many of the tunes—we asked for a tracklist but, deep down, already knew the answer. We know this, too: one listen and you'll be hooked. @k_rn @theghost Read more at ra.co/podcast/951

DJ Flight has been a constant throughout the many peaks and troughs of drum & bass. She's one of the genre's key chroniclers, with a real-time history of drum & bass in her archives as a radio presenter, and a level of behind the scenes involvement that spans decades. While Flight's advocacy for equitable gender representation in drum & bass through her EQ50 collective is the most visible, it's by no means the sole initiative. Her work also extends to the Prison Radio Association—the only radio station made specifically for incarcerated people—as well as the Windrush Stories series, which focuses on the cultural history and contributions of Afro-Caribbean migrants to the UK. Flight is also, plainly, a wicked DJ, who doesn't prefer one scene or subgenre over another—which also makes her a font of knowledge. (Her history of 2000s drum & bass is among the best genre deep dives we've ever published.) This RA Podcast is two hours of majestic, freewheeling beats that touch on every corner of drum & bass: from the minimalistic and razor-edged to ragga looseness, with a killer downtempo outro to smooth out the final landing. RA.942 is a first class journey from one of the scene's most enduring heroes. Big up Flight. @djflight Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/942

The first thing you might realise during a MUSCLECARS set is the sheer musicality of the duo's selections. Vocals glimmer at the centre, unfolding into enchanting, soulful coos, while drums strike captivating rhythms and gilded synths reach towards the sky. It's a jazzy New York house sound mythologised by pioneers like Joe Claussell, Carlos Sanchez and Timmy Regisford (whose songs all make it to this RA Podcast). For years, New York natives Brandon Weems and Craig Handfield have run their Coloring Lessons party as a way to introduce a younger generation to this vital piece of dance music history. In a city that prides itself on fast walking, fast talking and, as of late, fast BPMs, their music is an invitation to ease into a more relaxing pace. This RA Podcast comes at a golden time for MUSCLECARS. In May, they released their RA-recommended debut album, Sugar Honey Iced Tea!, whose sultry (and undeniably catchy) lead single "Tonight" has gotten the stamp of approval, and a remix, from New York legend Louie Vega. And this Sunday, they hosted their annual Juneteenth block party outside the Lot Radio, where scores of Black dancers latched onto one another during sets from a multigenerational crew of Black DJs including Ron Trent, Lovie, Shawn Dub and MUSCLECARS themselves. This two-hour-plus mix takes us through the spiralling jazz of Herbie Hancock, the flashy disco of The Originals and lands us, finally, in "Water," the track that also closes out Sugar Honey Iced Tea!. @musclecarsnyc Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/941

Young partygoers might know Man Power, AKA Geoff Kirkwood, as the earnest geezer going back-to-back with DJs like Ewan McVicar, Paul Woolford, La La and Skream—peak-time specialists with a fine line in boofy bangers and ravey techno. Kirkwood is also a dab hand at the kind of elliptical house and deep cut detours favored by '00s labels like DFA and Optimo. In spite of a long track record as a producer and promoter, if you had to boil Kirkwood's work in recent years down to a single quality, it might be altruism. He hails from North Shields, a small town fringing the boundary of Newcastle in England's oft-neglected North East, and wears his heritage proudly. The Me Me Me label boss's involvement in a flurry of civic restoration, and no-filter paeans to the importance of working class involvement in culture, have become as central to his life as music-making itself. For an accomplished DJ who has played at nearly every good club you could name, that’s no small feat. So which side of Man Power were we in for? The answer on RA.940 is: both. '60s free verse poetry, Zebra Katz, Gesaffelstein and John Carpenter in the opening stretch? Makes sense. Octave One punching through Rozalla? You got it. An extended Joe Claussell workout atop Radiohead's "Everything In Its Right Place"? Why not. In Kirkwood's hands, it all goes down as smooth as a pint of Newcastle Brown. @manpower-1 Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/940

People tend to remember the first time they see BEIGE DJ—and a lot of the times after, too. One RA editor described them as "doing some crazy shit" after seeing a set. The Detroit DJ is all about playing to party rock, but also gently subverting expectations. It's a cliché now that good DJs can make whole new tracks out of blending existing songs together. Few embody this as easily or effortlessly as BEIGE, who loves to take sounds you already know and present them in a context you've never heard them in before. BEIGE started DJing after they moved to Detroit roughly a decade ago, and has since become a vital DJ in the Motor City's ecosystem, bridging gaps, scenes and genres. Their DJing style is adaptable and versatile, but you can count on a few things: a techno foundation, rollicking drums, throbbing basslines and vocals coming at you from all angles. Their RA Podcast flows beautifully, with just the right amount of bumps and left turns to keep you from getting comfortable. And the edits? There's plenty of head-turning moments here, like DJ Chap's downtempo drum & bass remix of seminal emo band American Football, a 150 BPM version of "Energy Flash," a cheeky Skrillex flip from Darian and excellent weirdo beats from the freakier ends of the US underground, including producers like Davis Galvin, Alien D and the late Jasen Loveland. @justbeige Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/939

Actress' highlight reel needs little exposition. Darren J. Cunningham has been a prominent yet inscrutable figure in electronic music since the late 2000s, typically flickering to life from the margins before receding into the shadows. Beloved albums like R.I.P., Karma & Desire and Splazsh may switch up the template, but the Actress hallmarks of haze, murk and showstopping beauty remain. As you'll see in the interview below, he's a man of few words—that's in character for him. What's characteristic, too, is a taste for surprises. Ahead of the release of tenth studio album Statik on esteemed Norwegian label Smalltown Supersound next month, here's the "Дарен Дж. Каннінгем RA Mix"—a tapestry of 100 percent original and exclusive Actress music you won't find anywhere else. Flowing between pensive, rugged and stargazing moods across an album's worth of unaired tracks, Actress' first time stepping up on the RA Podcast was clearly worth the wait. @actress1 Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/938

Julia Govor is one of those artists who can take the fundamentals of techno and make it sound hers. At this point in her career, the Georgia-born, New York City-based artist has established a style that feels half-Rome school, half Japanese hypnotic techno, but fully Julia Govor. Her label Jujuka has become a home for the stuff, featuring plenty of her own work along with like-minded folks like EMIT and Victoria Mussi, and she recently put out the biggest and best release of her career with the hefty Laika And Ulka Were Here on Semantica. Her production style carries over to her DJing. Govor's RA Podcast is made up over half her own tracks, and the cuts she picks from others match her style: twirling arpeggios, rushing cascades of synth, heavy but groovy kicks. Much has been made of her childhood in a military family, and how she fell in love with techno via her classical musical education, where she felt drawn to the darker, romantic shades of composition. You get some of that here, but to call Govor's style "dark" would be overly simplistic. Instead it's sleek, aerodynamic and fluid, the kind of techno that gets you lost in a wormhole. @juliagovor Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/937

"All in my life, I've gone back and forth between North and East London," Karen Nyame KG said in a recent mini-doc about her studio process. "These areas are multicultural [...] you just become a sponge for that type of energy." More than two decades into her career, these parts of the UK capital remain a defining influence on The Rhythm Goddess, whose music weaves together ideas from across London and the diaspora, blending R&B and soul with global dance music forms. A leading face of London's hybrid club sound, KG's sound is seductive and luxurious. Her excellent productions, which span UK funky, amapiano and East Coast club, have a velvety touch, as if cut from high-end fabric. Her ear for smoky, sultry grooves, showcased on her Rhythm In The City party-turned-label, is impeccable, and her tracks have become more song-oriented, ranging from sultry to braggadocious. Her classy DJ mixes are a study in bounce and groove, incorporating everything from highlife to Afrotech to dubby rollers. Since re-entering the club circuit in 2018 after a six-year hiatus, KG has become a role model for women talents in the electronic music world. Her stance on racial and gender disparities within the industry has helped orchestrate safer spaces in music, inspiring aspiring Black creatives in the process. KG's RA Podcast is nothing short of sexy, loaded with swung rhythms and lithe drums across gqom, Afrohouse and jazzy deep house. It radiates a level of confidence and intimacy that can only come from years of vision—and a constant passion for sensual, soulful music. @KARENNYAMEKG Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/936

This past February, Tesfa Williams released his debut album—over 20 years into his career. Raves Of Future Past distilled decades of experience on London dance floors into a potent and powerful blend of grime, house, rave and techno. Made with an Elektron Digitakt to imitate the rough textures of early '00s UK dance music, the LP is an anachronistic history lesson that throws everything in a blender, imagining what gqom might sound like as an Eski track and giving new life to the short-lived "sublow" sound Williams helped invent with classic tracks like "Invasion," released under his earlier alias DJ Dread D. Since the sublow days, however, Williams has become a torchbearer for UK house music and African diasporic sounds like Afro house and gqom in London. He's put out soulful hits like "Heartbeat"—recently reissued by Local Action—and released a steady stream of dance records for PMR and Strictly Rhythm. He's what you might call a jack of all trades, except for that he's actually a master of them all. His RA Podcast charts his musical journey in reverse chronological order, starting with smooth, African-influenced sounds and winding through grime and dubstep, eventually landing at jungle. He threads a needle through diverse genres (and eras), and posits that the traditional UK hardcore continuum is a bigger spectrum than you might think, with gqom's heave and amapiano's log drum equally important in the musical equation. It's nearly two hours of UK dance music past and present, from a DJ who has lived it all. @twilliamsmusic Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/935

Simon Aussel is known for a particularly wild DJing style and leftfield bassy bangers, and it's his curious and playful approach to clubland that's won him loyal fans over the years. Whether photographing drink tokens from gigs or creating an 8-bit version of his debut album on a Game Boy cartridge, he seems to approach every endeavour with childlike joy and wonder—rare qualities in an industry that can leave so many jaded. The Nantes-born, Paris-based artist's love of club culture, digging and world-building has set him on a blazing path in club music. He's released an exceptionally wide range of music, including a Memphis rap tape for Trilogy Tapes, dubstep-trap-jazz hybrids with Egyptian singer Abdullah Miniawy and deadly hard drum for Livity Sound. His mixes, meanwhile, are fast becoming DJ lore thanks to his knack for connecting seemingly opposed genres like new wave and fast techno. Look no further than his now-infamous Dekmantel Selectors set from 2021 or a marathon back-to-back with Skee Mask in 2022. As the French DJ gets more comfortable with story-telling, he's getting more personal and focusing on deeper, slower sounds. That's evident on this RA Podcast—six months in the works—which incorporates woozy downtempo, weighty dub and bleepy beats. Of course, in the chaotic middle section there's plenty of huge basslines, plus old-school electro, acidic techno and even a bouncy edit of the Montell Jordan classic "This Is How We Do It." Showcasing his quirks, influences and growth, this is Simo Cell in prime time. @simocell Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/934