- Contrary to popular belief, tempo doesn't exist. Multiple speeds exist within a single BPM—it just depends how you listen and subdivide time. If you have a track that's 170 BPM, like a drum & bass tune, and subdivide the rhythms into triplets, you can seamlessly mix in another track at 128 BPM. The second Grey Area release invites you to try. The EP's four moody rollers use clear triplet pulses that open the door to creative polyrhythmic mixing. Although the theory might sound a little dry, the functional role these tracks play embodies the cross-genre ethos of the labels behind the project—namely, Auxiliary and Samurai.
What's important here isn't so much the individual character of the tracks, but how they facilitate genre-hopping. The clear hi-hats on the A1 and steady kick on the A2 make them the easiest tunes to work with. The B2 is the black diamond run, but also the most rewarding to mix. (If you're wondering what all this might sound like, head to the seven-minute mark of the latest Grey Area podcast.) Of course, you might traumatise the dance floor if you don't pull it off right, but getting your hands dirty with Grey Area Volume Two can reveal a rare side of rhythmic theory.
TracklistA1 1
A2 2
B1 3
B2 4