- The Bay Area staple ends 2022 with a banner package of club tracks.
- Pay any attention to the Bay Area club scene and you should recognize the name bastiengoat. The Oakland artist has put out EP after EP of boisterous, catchy club music—much of it self-released—since emerging around 2013, and DJs worth their salt know that his discography is a goldmine. His formula of mixing recognizable vocal samples with precocious club beats that connect the dots between Baltimore, Jersey and Chicago has only become sharper with time, and he ended last year with the stellar SIDESHOW, gathering up seven more cuts that feed off their own indulgent, hyped-up hooks.
There are, of course, a few tributes to the Bay here—"Don't Slap Mainstream" is brisk but soulful techno with an E-40 sample and a killer jungle breakdown, while the addictive "I Need Bass" works around a Traxamillion flip with a backbone that sounds a little like a 2022 gabber kid discovering Dance Mania for the first time, both funky and rigid. "Sunday Pick Up" gestures at excitable filter house, while "Lick My," with its humourously chopped Nicki Minaj sample, is a perfect example of bastiengoat's style of East Coast club fusion. (See also "Bend That Thing," which feels like a Baltimore shot with a footwork chaser.)
Though all seven tracks are built on the same equation, the amount of variety is outstanding, as is bastiengoat's originality—"Wiggle Closer"'s guitar licks lend a soulful, almost jazzy glow to its hectic Jersey club arrangement. There's so much variety on this EP that you could play every single track here during a set and most people wouldn't be any the wiser. Which goes some way to explaining bastiongoat's appeal in the Bay and beyond: he's a club music chameleon who knows how to wring the best out of a vocal sample and dextrous drum programming. Start here and work backwards, and you'll have all the club material you'll need for 2023.
Tracklist01. Don't Slap Mainstream
02. I Need Bass
03. Wiggle Closer
04. Sunday Pick Up
05. Bend That Thing
06. Lick My
07. Your Body