Listen: Grown Folk / Druture

Earlier this year, San Francisco’s Icee Hot label officially introduced us to Montreal production duo, Grown Folk, with the release of their “The Boat / Keep Few Near” release. Since then, the duo have released a long awaited collaborative EP, Cloud City, with bay area rappers, Main Attrakionz, which includes two stellar remixes from futuristic producer, Kuedo, and today, the duo explores another dimension of their creativity with one half of Grown Folk, Drew Kim’s new endeavour he’s dubbed, Druture.

Experimenting with pitch and bpms throughout a track is a fascinating ability that not enough producers utilize, probably because they’ve never thought to. It’s also an art. Looping possibly the coolest line ever uttered, ‘I Get Paid’, through oscillating beats that reflect kaleidoscopic fragments of light at the most fantastic of angels, Grown Folk draw you towards their pretty, sparkly things almost instantly.

Building a track from the ground up, that will eventually become more than just digitized drums and a 4/4 beat, Grown Folk’s love of vintage synthesizers can be heard billowing through excruciatingly precise xylophone pings, and insanely infectious loopa. Reconstructing beats out of pitched vocals that rasp, and rub your speakers raw, juxtapozed with wildly dancing bells, ass slapping rhythm divised through cleverly EQ’d claps, and bass that chugs along as if climbing a mountain, Grown Folk take the concept of house music and graudate it five steps forward.

With Druture, Kim explores his love of southern rap, taking the beats behind those lyrics to new heights through a handful of freshly released hip hop tracks. Ranging from ethereal, spaced out ripples of drum patterns and pulsing effects of the headbob persuasion on ‘Purple City Fashion Week’, to the ode to dupstep hero, Skream on ‘Texas Skresh’, consisting of a collection of throbbing, desolate pulses surrounded by shuddering percussion and Kim’s signature clouds of big bass airiness. With Druture, Kim proves his production style and musical tastes run deep.

When Drew Kim was little and he asked for more bass, what they got instead was heaps and heaps of VERSATILITY. It’s safe to say, the Future for this emerging producer is looking extremely bright.