1. MaurizioM-Series
I know that this one is slightly pushing the limits of what could constitute an album, but this is essential for me. Moritz Von Oswald released these tracks as singles, and so M-Series is a pulling-together into a compilation format. This particular series are more like exercises, or studies, of a very detailed and precise purpose. ‘MØ4.5A’ was one of the first dance records I ever bought. I remember being in a record shop in Soho called Vinyl Junkies, one of my favourites, on a Saturday afternoon, when it was absolutely heaving, burning incense and with the sound system pumping – and hearing them put this track on.
The word "hypnotic" gets overused for dance music, but ‘MØ4.5A’ made me see how you can get absolutely lost in an 8 or 9-minute piece of music, one that on the surface might not appear to do very much, but gets you seriously sunk into a loop. As a 14-year-old, when you’re mostly just exposed to hooky, hyperactive pop music; to be presented with 10 minutes of loopy dub techno – it’s quite a shock. I think M-Series is a blueprint for minimal techno, or just minimalism in modern electronic music as a concept. The production standards are incredible and the Basic Channel discography is so enormous, and of such high quality, that I wanted to represent something from that on my list.
