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For the first installment NS goes head to head with Fade To Mind, with respective label bosses Bok Bok & Kingdom both on the bill alongside FTM newcomer Rizzla and Turrbotax resident Rem Koolhaus

D’Angelo – Untitled (How Does It Feel) (L-Vis 1990′s Own Way Edit) 320  [right click save]

Tracklist:

Daytime Lover
01 Jam City “Intro”
02 Change “Mutual Attraction” (Interjection Disco Dance Label)
03 Hard Chops “Dirty” (Survival)
04 Serious Intention “You Don’t Know (Special Remix)” (Easy Street)
05 Kurt Harman Project “Comin Back” (Prescription)
06 James T. Cotton “Press Your Body” (Spectral Sound)
07 East 17 Division “Textures” (Big Sound Works)
08 Bok Bok & Tom Trago “White Type R” (Sound Pellegrino)
09 Hieroglyphic Being “Fingerprints of the Gods” (Mathematics)
10 Chaka Khan “Earth to Mickey (CK Duet Space Rap Version)” (Warner Bros)
11 Art of Noise “Who’s Afraid of the Art of Noise? (Jam City Edit)”
12 Parris Mitchell “All Night Long” (Dance Mania)
13 DJ Spen “Disco Dreams” (Black Vinyl)
14 Earth People “Dance” (Champion)

Into the Night
15 Members Only “Volume 2″ (Members Only)
16 Salamandos “We Invite You to Expand Your Total Self (Remix)” (Creme Organization)
17 Gwen Guthrie “Peanut Butter Prelude” (Garage)
18 Frozen Border “Frozen Border #3″ (white)
19 Vincent L. Traques “Make Some Love”
20 Jam City “Make It Right”
21 Unknown “Sex” (Extended Dub)
22 Jam City “The Courts”
23 Jay R Revlon “Jungle Drums”
24 Helix “Drum Traks” (Night Slugs)
25 Hieroglyphic Being “Dreams de Illusionaries” (Spectral Sound)
26 Hectic Boyz “Hectic Anthem Instrumental” (white)
27 Jam City “He Watches Over Us All”

Kingdom – XLR8R podcast # 188 (right click save)

01 Jacques Greene “Tell Me (Kingdom Edit)” (LuckyMe)
02 Kingdom “SFX”
03 Kingdom “Los Poderes (Edit ft. Floetry)” (Dutty Artz)
04 Kingdom “Stalker Ha” (Night Slugs)
05 Kingdom “Uptown Buck” (Scion/Trouble&Bass)
06 Jam City “Aqua Box” (Night Slugs)
07 Katy B “Lights On (Girl Unit Remix)” (Rinse)
08 Kingdom “Okay To Dance” (Fool’s Gold)
09 MikeQ & Angel X “Let It All Out 2011″ (Qween Beat)
10 Nguzunguzu “Timesup” (Fade to Mind)
11 Kingdom “Stadium Pass” (Enchufada)
12 Bok Bok “Silo Pass” (Night Slugs)
13 DJ Cabos x Kingdom “Snapduro + Appetite Edit”
14 Kid Ink “Keep It Rollin”
15 Kingdom “If You Buck”
16 Win Win “Interleave (Kingdom Remix)” (Vice)
17 Total Freedom “YB Voice Song”
18 DJ Exota Vs. DJ Vali “Pu**yf**ker (Kingdom Edit)” (Unreleased)
19 Jim Jones / Automatik “Go Cinderella (Kingdom Edit)” (Diplomats)
20 Ciara x Girl Unit “Ride + Every Time (Kingdom Blend)” (Night Slugs)

Meanwhile, Bleep place us at #5 in their list, Resident Advisor place us at #7 and Fact place us at #2.

Here’s what Juno had to say about us:

Night Slugs have enjoyed such a rich vein of success in 2010 it’s sometimes easy to forget Alex Sushon and James Connolly only started putting out records in January. The year has been a microcosmic story of accomplishment that most labels might hope to achieve in a lifespan. Widespread media coverage from Dazed to Pitchfork and feverish anticipation amongst the more discerning corners of the internet have been an organic side effect for a label whose every release has retained the standard in quality set by that inaugural white label from L Vis 1990. It’s pretty hard to find any new superlatives to pin on the label, and Juno Plus is unlikely to be the sole voice of praise in this season of lists and features. What has really impressed throughout the year is the determination of Sushon and Connolly to mould discontent with the direction their musical surroundings was heading into something nascent and exciting.

Central to this of course was the selfless drive of Sushon and Connolly to use the label as a platform to open the music of their friends and contemporaries to a wider and more than willing audience. Let’s not forget they are both respected DJs and producers in their own right, but other label endeavours have floundered by pandering to the egotistical endeavours of the decision makers. Night Slugs have succeeded because no one else was putting out Kingdom tracks and Egyptrixx somehow couldn’t get a DJ gig in hometown Toronto. It’s hard to even pick an outstanding release from the catalogue, although Girl Unit’s “Wut” has been rightly feted because it’s a track that demands to be played loud in clubs to really bask in its crunk glory. The label has really ended on a high with the unveiling of Jam City’s “Magic Drops” and Jacques Greene’s gloriously R&B soaked house anthem “(Baby I Don’t Know) What You Want”.

Read the whole list here

In the mean time, XLR8R place Bok Bok’s podcast for them at #1 in their list of their top mixes of the year! Check it out here.

Lil Silva XLR8R Podcast (right click save)

tracklist

01 Macabre Unit “It’s All About” (Unreleased)
02 Breach “Fatherless (Doc Daneeka MRR SNRZZ Remix)” (PTN)
03 Kenny Dope presents The Bucketheads “The Bomb (These Sounds Fall into My Mind)” (Positiva)
04 Redlight “Next Hype” (Digital Soundboy)
05 702 “You Don’t Know (acapella)”
06 Bingo Players “When I Dip” (Bingo Players)
07 DJ Gregory “Klappa” (Defected)
08 Lil Silva “Shutter”
09 Yolanda Be Cool “We No Speak Americano (Lil Silva Refix)”
10 DVA “Step 2 Funk” (Hyperdub)
11 Lil Silva “Patience” (Good Years)
12 MJ Cole ft Wiley “The Drop” (Prolific Recordings)
13 Fugative “Bad Girl (Lil Silva Dub)” (Ministry of Sound)
14 Seiji “Weed Killer” (Phonica)
15 Lil Silva “Don’t Mess Around”
16 Macabre Unit “Take Time”
17 DVA feat. Fatima “Just Vybe (Soule:Power Mix)” (Hyperdub)
18 Lil Silva “Risk that Sh**”
19 Redlight “Box of Secrets”
20 Lil Silva “Cheese & Bun”
21 Mark Ronson & the Business INTL. “The Bike Song (Lil Silva Remix)” (Columbia)

tracklist:

01 DJ Gazzeto “Cruel 22″
02 Egyptrixx “Liberation Front” (Night Slugs)
03 FaltyDL “St. Marks (Cosmin TRG Remix)” (Rush Hour)
04 Royal P “Between Us”
05 S-X x Ramadanman “Woo Glut”
06 Jam City “Magic Drops” (Night Slugs)
07 Geeneus “Unknown”
08 Untold “Come Follow We”
09 Lil Silva “Patience”
10 Ikonika “Sea Synth” (Hum & Buzz)
11 Fis-T x Wookie “Down On My Night Hunter (Martelo Edit)”
12 D1 “ET”
13 Girl Unit “IRL (Bok Bok Remix)” (Night Slugs)
14 Terror Danjah “Minimal Dub” (Hyperdub)
15 Jam City “Aqua Box” (Night Slugs)
16 Optimum “Broken Embrace” (Night Slugs)
17 Slimzee vs. Geeneus “Log Off” (Dumpvalve)
18 Azari & III “Indigo Dub” (Turbo)
19 Cubic Zirconia feat. Dam-Funk “I Got What You Need” (Lucky Me)

The same month XLR8R also ran a feature on us:

LONDON BASSHEADS L-VIS 1990 and BOK BOK SLITHER BETWEEN STYLES WHILE KEEPING IT DECEPTIVELY SIMPLE

At the bottom of the flyer for last October’s edition of Night Slugs, the London club night run by Alex “Bok Bok” Sushon and James “L-Vis 1990″ Connolly, it simply states: “house/bass.” Compared to the convoluted descriptions you see on most rave handbills and posters—full of buzzwords trying to tempt floating punters inside the door—it’s simultaneously simple and all-encompassing, and gives the first clue to the policy of what London’s best party is all about.

“It’s really all about keeping it simple,” Sushon explains. “‘House [and] bass’ is a simple way to explain exactly what’s going on without getting too specific or reductive… I’m hating the new genre toss-off that’s happening in the UK right now. Just because a new batch of producers are making tracks doesn’t mean they need a new name. It’s reductive.”

Reductive and, perhaps most vitally, restrictive. The lack of restrictions that the pair places on themselves—a result of their complete lack of elitism (“I hate stigma and purism in music. My aim has always been to obliterate these perceptions, and as seamlessly as possible,” says Bok Bok)—is what makes them so strong. London’s a city full of trends and hype, and musically that applies more than ever before. Producers are the next big thing before they’ve released their debut single, and over the hill by the time the tune is on the net. Promoters book the same next big things at the same time, resulting in a capital of identikit club nights.

But trends don’t matter at Night Slugs, which is why long after bandwagon jumpers stopped caring about bassline house, Bok Bok and L-Vis booked Rinse FM resident DJ Rekless, and still play tracks by TRC, Screema, and Nastee Boy. While other promoters were booking the same hyped funky DJs in slightly different combinations, these two paired scene queen Cooly G with San Francisco’s Christian Martin. “Both play deep, tough, off-the wall house music,” explains Sushon. Simple.

Let’s backtrack. Sushon, 24, a grime DJ from South London who cut his teeth as a resident at Camberwell’s Redstar (a “semi-legendary” pub venue where Skull Juice, Oneman, Ben UFO, and Ramadanman also played some of their first DJ sets) got in touch with Brighton’s Connolly, 25, after hearing his first single, “Change the Game,” in 2008. At that point, Connolly had been running Fallout, a drum & bass and breakstep night, for several years with locals High Ranking and Mumdance, and had recently started a new night called So Loud!, for which he booked Brooklyn bass king Drop the Lime. (“This was probably the best decision I ever made,” Connolly emphasizes. “The party was bananas, but more than that, Luca [Venezia, a.k.a. Drop the Lime] really helped set me on a path to where I am today. The week after the party, I wrote ‘Change the Game.’ The title signified a shift in my musical style.”)

Connolly had also booked Sushon and his girlfriend Manara for a party he was throwing in London, and they immediately hit it off due to their similar tastes. The pair stayed in touch until Connolly officially moved to London, and they decided to make their partnership professional, with L-Vis swiftly denouncing his complex Ableton sets. “My attitude towards music has totally changed since starting Slugs,” says Connolly. “I was wanting to do something really grand back then with my DJ sets, incorporating video, etc., but Slugs really brought me back to basics. There’s nothing better than the energy of playing bass music with turntables.”

Early Night Slugs events took place at the Redstar (guests included D1, Kingdom, and Oneman), but they soon outgrew the venue and made their debut at Shoreditch’s East Village late last year, booking Drop the Lime’s entire Trouble & Bass crew for an all-night back-toback session.

Night Slugs has grown in stature with almost every event since, thrice taking over London’s larger Egg club, and taking the show to Leicester and Brighton. Most recently, Bok Bok and L-Vis embarked on a Stateside tour, sharing bills with Christian Martin, Trouble & Bass, Bersa Discos, Kingdom, and fellow UK upstart Joker.

“I was blown away by how successful it was,” confesses Sushon. “Every town repped hard, people actually knew what we were about, and we can’t really ask for more. There’s a lot of love for the UK vibe in these cities.”

“I think in the past, say, 10 years, it would be pretty much unheard of for guys like us to be able to tour the States,” says Connolly. “But with the help of the internet, our music can stretch so much further afield.” One such example is Diplo, who commissioned Bok Bok and Manara to record a session for the Mad Decent podcast series, and later released L-Vis’ “United Groove” single on the label.

The pair’s own music has advanced at a similar rate. Their collaborative remix of Crazy Cousinz’ “Bongo Jam” gets played out by the king of UK funky, Marcus Nasty, and Glasgow label Dress 2 Sweat (now part of the Numbers label umbrella with Wireblock and Stuff) closed out its discography with a four-track EP of twisted, tribal-house mutants from the duo. Bok Bok’s recent remix of Jinder’s “Youth Blood” is a synth-soaked cyber-funk epic, while L-Vis’ new “Zahonda” single is a taut house banger stationed somewhere between Brackles and Buraka Som Sistema.

“I’m so excited about producing music right now,” Connolly proclaims. “There are so many amazing artists in our scene, everyone is just bouncing off each other. I think for the first time ever I’m looking at the producers around me for inspiration. I’m constantly looking forward.”

“My ears get tired of hearing the same thing,” Sushon adds. “Inspired by a Dexplicit quote, I try to bring the sweet with the sour, a kind of grime euphoria. I guess years of the dominance of greyness in post-UK garage music has left me and a lot of others hungry for color, and 2009 was really the year of feeding that hunger. It’s been the year of the neon synths!”

So the next step? Night Slugs the label, obviously. “That’s just a natural progression for us,” explains Connolly. “Over the last 18 months, Slugs has slowly been picking up a crew of really great producers [including Mosca, Greena, Jam City, Egyptrixx, and Kingdom], building tracks in a similar context to myself and Alex. It’s happened really naturally; it feels organic.”

Sushon continues: “This is Night Slugs coming of age. Our aim with it is to crystallize the spectrum of music we’ve been repping at our club nights, and to give a home and some stability to this new sound that’s emerging out of the mish-mash. We want to document what’s going on around us through releases that will hopefully feel timeless.” He rightfully points out that the first single, the brilliant “Square One” by Mosca, “pretty much nails down this whole crossover; a house track swallowed up by the UK soundsystem portal.” There’s the rub: Night Slugs is seeped in British dance culture but casts an eye abroad that allows it to break down barriers before they’re even established.

words: Tom Lea