The producer best known as Huerco S. accompanies One Day, our record of the year, with two hours of minimal and dub introspections.

This summer, Kansas-raised DJ and producer Brian Leeds released One Day under his revived Loidis alias. Enamoured with the restrained, loopy sounds of early '00s dance music, the album’s eight tracks linger in the air, luxuriating in dubbed-out chords, swung beats and sub vibrations. It's our favourite record of 2024 for a reason.

It's a sound he's coined, in his typically teasing fashion, "dub mnml emo tech." All winks aside, it’s no wonder One Day became the soothing balm we all needed. In a scene overwhelmed by hard and fast trends, the softer—and Leeds might argue, more sincere—stylings of minimal and dub techno enjoyed a welcome second wind.

Not only was One Day one of our favourites of the year (more on that this week), but it also inspired us to break our usual no-repeats rule, inviting Leeds back to the RA Podcast under a different alias after his 2019 turn as Huerco S.

"The prevailing trends in dance music are more and more maximalist," Leeds noted. "I missed restraint, subtlety, and sensuality." Clocking in at just under two hours, RA.965 embodies that ethos in spades.

@huerco_s

Read more at ra.co/podcast/965

"I put all of my energy into what I do." The Italian DJ and producer talks about his undying passion for music, his take on "business techno" and how the scene has changed over the course of his long career.

Naples native Joseph Capriati has received criticism for being the "CEO of business techno." But the longtime artist is a genuine lover of all kinds of electronic music, from the incredibly niche to the more commercial strains he plays in Ibiza, intimate clubs and major festivals.

In this RA Exchange, Capriati talks about how he climbed to success in the electronic world, getting his start at the age of 11 (he's now 37) before being booked on the international circuit with breakout releases on CLR and Adam Beyer's Drumcode.

While Capriati has consistently ranked high in year-end polls and music roundups, no outside plaudits have impacted the choices he's made in his career. He's doggedly followed a lifelong passion for the underground and the community surrounding it. He opens up about the changes he's made in his personal life to facilitate his rise to the top, his struggle with his mental health, his turn towards sobriety and more. Listen to the episode in full.

The longtime Perlon affiliate goes for big basslines and big grooves.

It's 1996, and a young Fumiya Tanaka is shelling out hefty yet minimal percussive techno at Club Rockets in Osaka to an audience enraptured. Released as Mix-Up, the 90-minute recording captures Tanaka sounding rather like Jeff Mills or Surgeon. It's far cry from the sound he's known for today.

Fumiya Tanaka's creative arc has seen him move away from these thunderous sounds to warmer shades of house and minimal. Since 2016, he's found a home on the inimitable German minimal label, crafting out a distinctive sound within the labels roster with an affection for tumbling basslines and spooky atmospheres.

From 1996 to 2023, Tanaka ran a party series in Tokyo, Osaka and Berlin called "Chaos," which encapsulates the ethos of freedom Tanaka brings to a party. "When you hear music you've never heard before and encounter unknown territory, you will be so happy and totally absorbed," he told us back in 2019. "I want to keep that feeling."

RA.964 achieves exactly that. Nearly three decades removed from his burst onto the scene, and after a good few years of asking, Tanaka's RA Podcast captures him in full house mode. Recorded at a Slapfunk party in Manchester, the Perlon maestro keeps the vibe funked-up, chunky and warm, punctuated by the occasional big breakdown and the odd lick of garage rudeness. No tracklist for now—but as Tanaka knows well, half the fun lies in the mystery.

@fumiyatanaka_official

Read more at ra.co/podcast/964

"I was surrounded by all walks of life." Live from Dekmantel, the New York native talks about how the Bronx shaped her taste in music, her long-time love of radio and blowing up on the international DJ circuit.

Gabrielle Kwarteng is a product of her diverse musical environment. The Berlin-based New Yorker has a unique sound that's dynamic and house-heavy, incorporating elements of acid, techno and everything in between. In this interview recorded live at Dekmantel, she discussed her upbringing in a Ghanaian household in the Bronx, and how that environment (and the neighborhood itself) moulded her taste in music. The community she grew up in was culturally rich, filled with the sounds of reggaeton, bachata, merengue and freestyle from Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and beyond. As both of her parents moved from West Africa, she was introduced to a diet of highlife music and jazz from a young age.

Kwarteng's taste began to expand when she began exploring New York's record stores. Fast forward to university, and the aspiring DJ became deeply involved in her school radio station, which she describes as a turning point and a revelation. She speaks movingly about the abiding power that radio has had in her life—she continues to be involved with stations like Refuge Worldwide and The Lot, and soon NTS Radio, where she'll hold a residency beginning in 2025. She also talks about what it's like to be a female minority in the music industry, the experience of having her career take off at such rapid speed upon relocating to Europe and the importance of summoning optimism no matter the circumstances. Listen to the episode in full.

"We're getting better at what we do." The Australian dance music trio discuss their longtime creative collaboration and their new album, Inhale / Exhale.

Australian electronic dance trio Rüfüs Du Sol—composed of the artists Tyrone Lindqvist, Jon George and James Hunt—is synonymous with catchy, vocal-led bangers. They've received a huge amount of success in more commercial and underground scenes in the more than 10 years that they've been active. In fact, they hit it big from their very first release, Atlas, which peaked at #1 in the Australian charts when it came out in 2013. In the years that have elapsed since, they have won a Grammy Award (and multiple nominations) and sold out stadium shows around the world.

In this Exchange, they talk to RA editor Gabriel Szatan in a closed door interview recorded at San Francisco's Portola Festival. The trio took a break from music-making for a period and even moved to different cities. Since they've reconvened, they've undertaken a number of measures to refine their inter-group communication, which has included wellness exercises, group therapy and breath work. They talk about this in some detail, as well as the realities of touring as they've gotten older and started having families. The time required to "fill their bucket" in between tours, as they say, is more critical than ever.

As an outfit that's worked together for a long time, they also reveal the intricacies of their now well established creative process, such as how they create internal momentum in songwriting, and their newest album, Inhale / Exhale, which they will tour throughout 2025. Listen to the episode in full.

Punk house and techno from a modern Midwest icon.

Every DJ has their own genesis story: a pivotal sound, a formative scene, a defining philosophy. In Kiernan Laveaux's case, her philosophy, rooted in psychedelia and experimentation, sets her apart. Inspired by Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode and New Order, she came of age in Cleveland’s acid house and queer party scenes, developing an ethos that constantly pushes dance music’s limits. Her DJ style is scrambled (in the best way), with zany tricks like scratching, creative EQing and modulation.

This approach reflects the Midwest's DIY tradition, where artists thrive in isolation and cultivate a radical disobedience, as seen in contemporaries like Eris Drew and ADAB. As Laveaux recounted in a 2023 interview with GROOVE Magazin, "Titonton Duvante once told me that being a Midwest DJ is about playing music from anywhere and making it sound like a piece of your spirit."

Spanning two and a half hours, Laveaux's RA Podcast showcases this spirit. It’s a testament to her decade-long career, blending tracks from friends and cherished memories into a transcendent mix. It’s "music to shake your hips to and decalcify your pineal gland." (For the curious, the pineal gland helps regulate your circadian rhythm.) RA.963 will make you dance and think in equal measure—a beautiful, restless and resolutely wicked journey through a singular imagination.

@kiernan-laveaux

Read more at ra.co/podcast/963

A dubstep legend roars back.

When dubstep ruled the roost in the late '00s, electronic music had no shortage of icons and spinoff variants to rally around. But one rumble from Bristol stood out: the Purple sound. Popularised by Joker, AKA Liam Mclean, with Guido and Gemmy in support, it hit like a beam of bright light flooding through the basement dank.

When America cottoned onto bass quakes in the next decade, Mclean's taste for chiptune-coded synths and maximum intensity kept his vision alive at arena level, even while he retreated from view as an actively touring performer.

In 2023, "Tears," a collaboration with Skrillex and Sleepnet, helped remind the world just how much Joker's juddering sound could put us in a headlock. True to form, this year's gargantuan "Juggernaut"—Mclean's first solo single in six years—crashes through the speakers with as much glorious crunch as earlier classics like 2009's "Purple City."

Mclean has kept busy in the studio applying his perfectionist streak as a producer and engineer to many sound system anthems, which means his influence is never far from a dance floor being turned inside out. The fact that Joker had never laid down an RA Podcast before was, being honest, a blemish in our copybook. RA.962 fixes that in style.

@jokerkapsize

Read more at ra.co/podcast/962

"I do activism as much as I can." The Peruvian DJ and producer talks about the human rights issues close to her heart, fighting for human rights and the incredible story behind her LP for Ninja Tune.

Sofia Kourtesis is a Peruvian DJ and producer based in Berlin known for her buoyant, upbeat music that channels and transmutes sociopolitical activism and personal hardship. While she's put out a number of solo works, her EP Fresia Magdalena and her debut LP, Madres—both of which came out on Ninja Tune—have been received with exceptional critical acclaim and put her on the map as a headlining touring artist. Both speak to some of the discrimination Sofia has felt as a member of the LGBTQIA+ community in South America, as well as how she's confronted difficult topics like family caregiving, illness and death. 

In this RA Exchange recorded live at C2C Festival in Turin, she opened up about her mother's recent battle with cancer and the neurosurgeon who provided life-saving surgery (as a thank you, Kourtesis took him and his surgery team out to one of her shows in Berlin). She also discusses her commitment to human rights at length. For Kourtesis, music is a form of activism and healing; she uses it to talk about her Latin American community and the movements that are happening, to show the diverse range of demonstrations for equality, for the queer community and for abortion rights.

In a touching final moment of our talk, she opens up about the homophobia that ultimately caused her to leave her school in Lima and then to depart from Peru to Europe altogether. She's been based in Germany since she was 17. Listen to the episode in full.

Dubstep-tech hybrids from one of 2024's most forward-thinking breakouts.

Born in France to English parents, Beatrice M. is a product of two environments. And like many third culture kids, this lends the Rinse France resident and Bait label head a knack for seeing the realm of possibility beyond arbitrary borders and binaries.

Beatrice M. is a part of a wider cohort of artists spearheading an elastic take on dubstep: take Carré and Introspekt in the US, EMA in Dublin and Mia Koden in London, to name a few. Collectively, they are not only pushing greater representation and diversity, but ensuring a broader palette of sounds find home within the genre's renaissance.

Where dubstep got trapped down a brostep cul-de-sac in the early 2010s, 2020s already seems to be all about a charming phrase Beatrice M. employs: siblingstep. Their RA Podcast, a "full femme, non-binary, trans productions set," is testament to that.

RA.961 finds Beatrice M. embracing the softer, more intimate edges of their sonic world. There's cuts from Grace Jones and rRoxymore, a fresh tech-house venture under the alias B. McQueen and heaps of siblingstep. All in, it's an hour of past reverberations, present rhythms and glimmers of future horizons.

@beatricemasters

Read more at ra.co/podcast/961

"We need to give more people a seat at the table." The Australian DJ and producer talks about exclusivity in the music industry, neurodivergence and London's thriving lesbian scene.

The London-based Australian artist Teneil Throssell (AKA HAAi) doesn't have a typical DJ story. She moved to London in the early 2010s as part of a now defunct psych rock band, and once it broke up, she thought her stint in the music industry was over. Unsure what to do with herself, she started mixing dance music records at the bar where she was working at the time, Ridley Road Market. The right person happened to "discover" her, offering her a spot supporting Jacques Greene at the London club Phonox. She went on to hold a residency there for two years, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Throssell's career blew up almost immediately. For the last eight years that she's been DJing, she's toured internationally on a massive scale, sometimes going to six different countries in one week. She's also released a number of EPs and one LP on Mute Records, remixed Kylie Minogue and started two labels of her own: Coconut Beats and Radical New Theory, which she runs with her partner. Her style is eclectic, but fans of hers will know her for her upbeat, techno- and acid-inflected sound.

In this RA Exchange, Throssell dives into some emotional and complex topics, like the criticism she received from RA for her early EP Systems Up, Windows Down; London's lesbian scene; her ADHD diagnosis; and climate activism in the electronic music industry. Listen to the episode in full.