Sónar

22/11/2023SonarMix 030: Laura BCR - Deep, dubby grooves from a lifelong techno aficionado

Although Laura BCR describes herself as “hyperactive”, you wouldn’t pick that up from SonarMix 030, the first SonarMix to come from the Sónar Lisboa lineup. The French artist - now based in Rotterdam after a long stint in Berlin - mixes so seamlessly that it’s hard to tell where one track ends and the next begins. A DJ, producer, party promoter, booking agent and label manager (On Board Music), she attributes her boundless energy to over a decade spent working with “some of the most talented and passionate people in the game”.

To open this new season of SonarMix, she cycles through “dubs, breaks and high-energy rhythms”, providing a 57-minute sampler of her deep, psychedelic sound. Recorded “spontaneously at home in one take”, it’s almost entirely composed of recent or forthcoming tracks from the fertile worldwide deep techno underground. There’s a typically rolling, percussive cut from fellow Frenchwoman Gigi FM; spaced-out acid from Brussels’ Foreign Material; forthcoming tracks from On Board signees Polygonia and Steffi; a slice of jacking dub techno from prolific veteran producer Gunjack; and a yet-to-be-released track from Laura herself. It’s a tracklist that pays tribute to her friends and contemporaries, as well as her passion for new music; a lifelong vinyl junkie, she takes her name from the record store she used to own in Berlin, Bass Cadet Records (which sadly closed in 2019).

It also serves as an invitation to come see her play at Sónar Lisboa 2024 on the 22nd, 23rd and 24th March next year, where she’ll ask you to “leave your phone in your pocket and close your eyes” as you lose yourself on the dancefloor at Parque Eduardo VII.

Tracklist:
Zara - Quixotic

Doltz - Mimei (HI-C Remix)

Gigi FM - Amadamushies

Ben Buitendijk - XXX

Tammo Hesselink - Nut Wandel

Foreign Material - The Living Planet

Psyk - Parade

Steffi - Individuals From All Walks (Rosati Remix)

Luigi Tozzi - Haboob

Rene Wise - Gorilla

Polygonia - Forthcoming

Luigi Tozzi - Sorcery