DJ Narciso constitutes with Nuno Beats, Nulo and Dj Lima (the emigrated Farucox and the honorary MC Pimenta) the RS Produções. The collective from Bagdad (Rinchoa, Rio de Mouro), formed in 2016, reached a wider audience from the release of their debut EP Bagdad Style on Príncipe 3 years ago. DJ Narciso stands out in the crew as the producer in continuous creative flow of new themes and DJ tools proportionally dense and flexible, working melody and metallic beats with equal proficiency, in low and high rotations. He has just released NXE, a collaborative EP with British producer Endgame on Shanghai’s SVBKVLT label.

Two of the minds that lead Príncipe and who also accumulate already extensive experience, knowledge, and energy behind the plates, here in collusion of vision and driving force for dance. Fantasia is the name used by Nelson Gomes of Filho Único and Gala Drop for his stays in the booth and the production of cosmic meshes informed by disco and house. Radical is the most recent alias of Márcio Matos, a DJ and visual artist who has been designing a total language – both in his line and his choices for the dancefloor – as much his own as it is essential to the state of things. BS

In a time of (over)consumption of information, of the digital swallowing up the world, and the world regurgitating a delirium of excesses, how many artistic proposals are really essential? And it’s worth clarifying the question: by essential we mean that rare sensation of arousing immediate admiration, of making us question what we experience, or of causing us amusement and terror, almost simultaneously. After all, much has been invented and reinvented and Gabber Modus Operandi doesn’t exactly offer a new universe. They do offer a new dimension, the like of which has not been heard for a long time – and which has been so lacking; it’s a diverse palette, as poisoned as it is heavenly, of extreme sounds and performances, in one of the most motherfucking incarnations of the times we live in. It’s a genuine riot by nature, of ancient and futuristic blood, erupting. It’s a punk delirium turbocharged by 4G and 90s rave memory. Or it could simply be one of those little miracles only witnessed from time to time.

Far from the so-called first art capitals of the world, it is from Indonesia that all this magic arrives. Irredeemably exotic to the eyes of an urban westerner, the truth is that Gabber Modus Operandi are part of a larger wave of sonic vanguardism coming from other parts of the globe. With a past connected to metal and industrial, passing through noise and techno, there were several projects and lives that the duo composed by the unstoppable Kasimyn and Ican Harem had until reaching this common chapter. Faithful to DIY teachings and sonic experimentation, trance is a state of mind, which seems to liberate and unite.

The raw productions, based on unrestrained rhythms (over 200 BPM) and raw noise, meet with echoes of traditional Indonesian music (where the gamelan and other percussions are heard in a surprising tone). To this dark matter add a vocal hurricane, often guttural and intense, evil as it could only be. HOXXXYA is the album that lands 2019 with more than deserved reverence. They’ve been burning up every stage they’ve passed through and to be able to experience, first-person, this kind of damage is too serious a thing for anyone with a need for life. NA

It was precisely eight years ago and at the same venue (ZDB) that Sara Rafael presented herself for the first time as Jejuno, a pseudonym referring to a section of the human intestine, to show her solo work of cascades of keyboards from which ethereal melodies rise, subterranean drones and rhythms that, over the years, have become more and more complex and accelerated. Although Jejuno’s music has been edited on labels such as Urubu, Labareda, Nariz Entupido, and Discos Extendes, it is mainly live that we can get to know his compositions produced at the moment. Alongside his solos, he has collaborated with Filipe Felizardo, Raw Forest, Diana Policarpo, Odete, Maria Reis, Olan Monk, Paul Abbott, and visual artists Hugo Canoilas, Lydia Nsiah, Sara Graça, and Svenja Tiger.

She was born and lives in Porto, a city where she has frequented club booths for over a decade, as well as a bit all over the country. She’s not part of the first or the last generation of female DJs born in Porto, but she is part of the first generation of women to break through and gain a foothold in the city’s club scene – a cause she has never hidden being one of her top priorities. Talking about musical styles, one could say that her family is electronic music, but she invites all her distant relatives to appear on her sets, forming a happy and balanced family. As manager and programmer of a multifaceted space like Passos Manuel, she favours, above all, the underground culture in which she herself was involved from an early age.

oseias. is the biblically inspired alter ego of a prolific young instrumental hip-hop producer blazing his own trail, who uses, in his words, the “language of jazz” to work in the tradition of broken rhythms and narcotics invented by J. Dilla with a predilection for the succession of Knxwledge. He made his debut in physical format with the album [thirty&seven] released in 2017 on Think Music Records by ProfJam and associates, and his most recent release loops[2]. dates from November last year in an edit on his Bandcamp.

Tropa Macaca, formed in 2005 and based in Lisbon, are André Abel and Joana da Conceição. Both consider that their poetic music has its own being, its own dynamism. It comes from a direct ontology and through it forces that transcend the circuits of knowledge are manifested. With records published by Siltbreeze, Software and The Trilogy Tapes, as well as in author’s edition, they have performed live in Brazil, Europe, and the UK. In recent years they have presented aesthetic proposals such as Síntese Radiante and Vai e vem in spaces such as Passos Manuel and the Walk&Talk festival.