Joker (5) / 2000F* & J Kamata* ‎– Digidesign / You Don't Know What Love Is

This is one of those singles where the A- and B-side really pull against each other. Joker's got the first side, and this is one of his best cuts: recognizable but not formulaic, built on leads that Joker makes fuzzy and sharp at the same time ("velcro" is a term I've heard a few reviews throw around, and it seems apt). People have called the sound "purple," but what strikes me in it isn't so much the color as the texture. It's not a coincidence Zomby's seminal track is called "Liquid Dancehall"--"liquid" is a good term for most of this stuff, a bit viscous, a bit sloshy, pulsing and pushing against the compressors.

Anyway, the other track: "You Don't Know What Love Is." It's woozy, hyper-contemporary funk, fixing a gorgeous, cascading autotuned vocal onto an 808 beat processed to sound huge, echoing. Put the track on a good system and it seems to wrap around you, almost. This isn't dub, likely not even dubstep, but it's got that spaciousness. I haven't heard much about 2000F and J Kamata since--more the pity. This, at least, is an isolated gem.

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