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Jimmy Edgar has just shared his new album LIQUIDS HEAVEN. On a surface level, it is a starburst of avant-garde fusion, collecting a diverse cast of eccentric geniuses and re-configuring them into a psychedelic canvas of future R&B, euphoric bass, mutant tear-the-club-up rap, foundation-splintering noise, and gossamer soul. But as with all his work, there is a deeper and subversive intent.
LIQUIDS HEAVEN’s early gestation spawned from Edgar’s explorations of “material” in the digital world, and is part of his broader ambition to change belief and intention in the digital realm – a pseudo-invisible way to summon novel realities by infusing his ultra-sleek aesthetic into transformative conceptual art. LIQUIDS HEAVEN is the ultimate culmination of the idea of “phases of matter.”
LIQUIDS HEAVEN is not merely a technicolor dream of ethereal abstractions, however. It bangs as hard as anything to ever bump from a subwoofer. But for all the high energy propulsion, there is a counter-balance of melancholic beauty, and in a career of fascinating left-turns, it would be more surprising if LIQUIDS HEAVEN wasn’t surprising. The genius of it is that for all its cerebral intent, it remains replete with raw and visceral emotion. Out of sadness comes courage. Water, liquid, and light evaporate, become transparent, disappear peacefully. Nothing less than the sound and look of liquid are transmuted into powerful new sculptures – which are best experienced at a high volume on the far side of the sky.
Signed to Warp Records as a teenage electronic music prodigy, Edgar has recorded for the world’s most respected imprints (Warp, K7, Hotflush and his own New Reality Now). Raised in Detroit, with stints in Berlin, Atlanta, Los Angeles, and New York, his list of close collaborators includes Hudson Mohawke, Danny Brown, SOPHIE, DAWN, Mykki Blanco, Vince Staples, and Machinedrum (as one half of their duo J-E-T-S).
Read more about the project on FADER.
LIQUIDS HEAVEN Track Listing
1 - EUPHORIA (FT LIZY2K)
2 - EVERYBODY (FT 10KCAASH & ZELOOPERZ)
3 - DREAMS 1000000 (FT MILK)
4 - SLIP N SLIDE
5 - BITE THAT 2 (FT TRINIDAD JAMES)
6 - SIDEROOM
7 - BUNNY LAVA (FT VIRGEN MARIA)
8 - NO ANTIDOTE (FT RIPPARCHIE)
9 - STATIC (FT BANSHEE)
10 - YA! (FT 645AR)
11 - NEVER LEAVE (FT MILK)
JIMMY EDGAR releases his first solo album in 9 years, CHEETAH BEND. The album includes features from Danny Brown, Hudson Mohawke, SOPHIE, Millie Go Lightly, 24HRS, Rochelle Jordan, Matt Ox & more.
“Detroit experimentalist and texture king Jimmy Edgar is the kind of producer that opens a doorway in your mind.” - BILLBOARD
"A full-dive into his hybridised vision of modern hip-hop — a world where shape-shifting, liquid-metal Cyberdyne Systems beats are clothed in the fur coat of virtuoso West Coast funk." - DJ MAG (named CHEETAH BEND Album of the Month)
“Assisted by like-minded electronic vanguards like Hudson Mohawke and the late, great visionary SOPHIE, Edgar expands on the sound he’s established while working in the hip-hop world over the last several years.” - BANDCAMP
“Confident, bold and head-turning music” - CRACK
“No one does music like JIMMY EDGAR. He’s constantly explore new sounds and throwing everything we thought we knew about music into the wind, and we absolutely love it. We’ve been tracking this forward-thinking wizard as he’s steadily rolled out single after single, and today that work comes to a head with the release of his new album, CHEETAH BEND.” - THIS SONG IS SICK
Jimmy Edgar, one of electronic music's most versatile and unique producers, has just shared another forward-facing double A-side single, comprised of “BE WITH YOU” (featuring the vocal talents of Mille Go Lightly) and the instrumental “ZIG ZAG”. The new singles arrive in the wake of Edgar’s recently released double drop of tracks featuring Danny Brown (“GET UP”) and SOPHIE (“METAL”), as well as his collaboration with Hudson Mohawke earlier this year. The bevy of recent material makes for an ever-expanding body of new music from the genre-bending, boundary-pushing artist as he works toward his next full length project, Cheetah Bend.
As Clash reports: “I met Millie Go Lightly passing by my Atlanta studio; I heard some amazing vocals coming out of the room and my engineer offered to introduce us,” remembers Edgar. “We laughed cause we were wearing the exact same color coordination and couldn’t get past that. I played her some sounds and she went in and freestyled everything on the spot just like the other ATL rap artists I work with. I love her story, too: she’s from London but lasered in on Atlanta and started working with Young Thug, all on a string of inspiration. We are aligned in the sense that she has this infectious confidence and talent to back it up.”
And as Line of Best Fit puts it: “‘ZIGZAG’ is an Autumn song from an animated cauldron where magical beings cast spells on you to confuse and disturb you, causing many distractions in your life moments.,” he continues. “When it finally opens to the end melodies you realize your own power and the only spells cast on you are the ones that you allow.”
Jimmy Edgar, one of electronic music's most versatile and unique producers, has just shared a futuristic double A-side single for collaborations with hyperkinetic pop producer SOPHIE and fellow Detroiter/hip-hop mainstay Danny Brown. The new singles arrive in the wake of Edgar’s collaboration with Hudson Mohawke earlier this year, making for a sprawling trilogy of genre-bending, boundary-pushing forrays through underground electronica and hip-hop, illustrating the breadth of his vision and talent.
"SOPHIE and I met at Fabric in London in the 2010s and since then we have performed live together as well as worked together with artists such as Charli XCX and Vince Staples,” states Edgar. “‘METAL’ is reflective of our love for designer sounds finely sculpted on boutique computer equipment.” The song arrives alongside “GET UP," a tough love motivational set to springy synth flourishes and bass rattling throughout which Danny Brown does irreparable microphone damage.
More at: Pitchfork / Fader / Consequence of Sound / Stereogum / Clash / Line of Best Fit / Hypebeast