Premiering Karolinski’s remix of Ivaylo’s The Walkers… from the forthcoming EP 2020 via his Bogota Records label.
2020 was the year that never happened. Many artists and DJs retreated into their introverted world, immersing themselves in their greatest passion only to be dismayed by the utter hopelessness of trying to release music; play a concert; or DJ during the exasperating circumstances of the pandemic. There was some solace to be found in the virtual realm of streaming, but that only lasted as long as the second wave before it too became over-saturated, and without that physical connection to an audience, unrewarding.
There were a few however that persevered regardless. They continued to make music, perform and DJ against all odds, and in some many cases even managed to make an indelible impact in their field. Ivaylo calls these people the walkers. “The Walkers,” explains Ivaylo over an email exchange, “are those creative souls who went through that period full of positive energy.”
“The walkers” arrives this week on a new EP called “2020” from Ivaylo’s Bogota Records, as the full-pupp affiliate and Jaeger resident channels that positive energy into defining the spectrum of sound for the next era of Bogota Records. Created in the “pre-zooming” era of 2019 and completed in 2020, “2020” only sees the light of day in 2021, and as much as it calls in a post-pandemic age for the artist and the DJ, it was also a way for Ivaylo to ”get all these emotions of my chest.”
*2020 is out on Bogota Records this Friday.
For the remix of the lead track, Ivaylo turned to one such “walker” in the form of Karolinski. The dub-techno artist and DJ has been a musical force, releasing music across the spectrum throughout this difficult time, and “The Walkers” finds the deep sounds of Ivaylo’s original submitting under her dub-infused charm of Karolinski’s musical idiom.
Karolinski shapes Ivaylo’s track from the percussion up. “The Drums!”; she exclaims via email, ”that’s the only original sound I ended up using apart from the short vocal sample.” Bells ringing out in the vast emptiness of space, flicker in and out of our orbit as wispy noise and ephemeral synth lines build into a progression over an intricate tapestry of percussive instruments. There’s a feeling of distance coursing through the track, like a gap in the passage of time. It’s subtle and immersive.
“I don’t know. I just wanted to tune it down, make it chill as well as danceable at the same time” explains Karolinski about the origins of the remix. Churning around 115 BPM and ineffable mood sinks in. In a similar fashion to her own music it simply started with a “synthesiser and kick, and then it just flows wherever it goes,” says Karolinski in a pragmatic exchange over email.
She made it in a few hours, but hung onto it for a while until she could grasp the intricacies of what she created. “I then felt something for it,” she says and then handed it over to Ivaylo to find its way out this Friday via any good digital outlet. We’re eager to hear it in full and as a preview, we’ve been given the opportunity to premiere the track ahead of its release.