Space Afrika Vinyl

With their slow-stepping, spacious urban dubscapes, Space Afrika harness ambient, Detroit techno and shades of early nineties Sheffield with a fresh and open approach to composition — this is dub techno stripped-down, sealed in a time capsule and sent back from the near future. Driving, echo-laden deep beats form the bed for a heavily subaquatic sound palette with undercurrents of cybernetic dread.

Friends for almost 2 decades, the two Joshuas formed Space Afrika after years of listening to music together, sequestered by harsh Northern winters. Heavily inspired by the industrial architecture of Northwest England and notions of travel, their sonic framework evokes images of rust and disintegrating concrete, and sensations of movement and redemption — exuding a distorted analogue soul offering escape into their overcast skies. Closely associated with Brighton/London label, Where to Now?, who slink along a vintage axis of post-punk, On-U Sound, minimal and no wave influences, Space Afrika's diverse and creative radio shows (notably their residencies on NTS and Reform Radio) also display a breadth of curiosities in experimental and avant-garde music, old and new.