Portals: Atmospheric Drum & Bass Vistas

  After we announced Illuvia’s, ‘Iridescence of Clouds’ on the label earlier this year, the nostalgia and admiration for atmospheric Drum and Bass within both myself (and I’m sure many of you) it seemed, was quick to rear its head once again. There were two things I wanted to make sure would happen around the same time of the Illuvia release. First, was inviting Ludvig (Illuvia) to record an isolatedmix with some of his many inspirations behind the record (listen here), and second, to create an in-depth Portals feature on the genre. Not only to keep the conversation going but for me to also learn a thing or two, amongst a style I would never profess to be an expert in. There are no-doubt many experts on the atmospheric Drum and Bass genre, and indeed, many artists to this day still creating music in this style who would be more than suitable to provide a feature. But there’s been one blog/website that I can draw many parallels to ASIP in approach, that also obsesses over this style of music and became the perfect candidate to help out. Spyros Papatzitzes began God Is No Longer A DJ in 2012 and the blog has become (like many ‘blogs’ nowadays) a rare gem of a resource on the Drum and Bass genre. Paraphrasing Nick Horby: “What came first, the music or the obsession?” I’ve always had this vague idea of keeping a musical diary to capture blurry memories and reflect on the arrogance and naivety of an earlier life I wasn’t quite ready to leave behind, with drum & bass being the focal point. Thoughts and scribbled notes gradually took the form of this blog, which went timidly online in 2012. Fast-forward to the present, this has been a unique opportunity to connect with some of my musical icons, as well as with many like-minded people across the world and celebrate the music we all love. Along the years, the content and the scope of the blog expanded to contemporary music, as well as non-d&b material, mainly ambient and modern electronica; music I enjoy when I am not listening to drum & bass, emphasizing on the ‘encyclopedic’ aspect, if I am allowed this self-indulgent term. - Spyros/God Is No Longer A DJIt was an easy decision to invite Spyros to help create this Portals feature, and along with his encyclopedic knowledge and passion, he partnered up with an old friend, DJ Sin, whom he used to run a DnB radio show with to provide the Portals-specific mix. For this accompanying journey, all tracks were hand-picked from Spyros' record collection bar three, (‘Callisto’, ‘Icefields of Proxima’ and ‘Exhale’) which are only available in digital format.When I started listening to drum & bass I was intrigued, inspired and seduced by the faceless mystique and the self-reliant attitude of so many artists and labels exploring this bold new cultural form. That experimental fearlessness, an entry point and an outlier both at the same time, captured a vital moment – one that could probably never be replicated – where no approach was off-limits. In the early 90s, the connections with my musical heroes were the odd dj gig, cassette tapes changing hands, magazines and the liner notes/credits on the record sleeves. Then the internet revolution came, which provided a portal to a (brave) new world and unprecedented access to all of us who had been on the outside looking in.Tracks with long intros, string sections, artful vocal fragments and long emotional breakdowns, which sometimes had been met with cynicism, became an art form with an elevated degree of musicality, rather than formulaic dj tools to facilitate the transition from one track to another. It’s beautiful music inviting the listener to a long idyllic journey, beyond the walls of a mundane reality. So, essentially, this playlist consists of snapshots that capture and reflect various moments from my musical journey in the realm of atmospheric music (and drum & bass in particular) for more than 25 years. To be more precise, as I see purists’ eyebrows