PRDCTV Guest Mix
A little heads up for y’all here. PRDCTV is a fledgling Ninja, and one to watch for 2011. More soon come……
In Oxford, England, crouched somewhere amongst the wires and implements in the attic of a farmhouse cottage, is where we find one of the freshest young sprigs of a musical laptop lineage – PRDCTV, aka Alex Lloyd. Not so long ago, sprung from the isolated rooms of boarding schools and penning papers for psychological study, PRDCTV (pronounced “Productive” for the less vowel-phobic amongst you) had his roots discovering the mappings of the mind. ‘I looked at delusions, mostly,’ he says. ‘I think what I studied probably did have an impact on the music…as much as any ideas you’re exposed to can, I guess.’ As careful with his words as with his sounds, PRDCTV has an eye for detail that is clearly reflected in his music: vocal hooks diced and heliumised, Farben-like pops and clicks, melodies glimmering and twisted in songs with fluid and surging arrangements, alongside the beef and chatter of his driving rhythms. As melodic as Four Tet’s ‘Rounds’, as dimensional as Bonobo’s ‘Days to Come’, at its heart the music fields colourful patterns, while still keeping you anchored and afloat. His DJ work also shows a soulful palate, dropping seamless sets of future bass slabs, the minimal without the techno and the dubstep without the dub – there’s plenty here to keep feet on the floor. What’s also exciting us is that his strengths are out, with the hotly flavoured These New Puritans a keen and remixed fan. El Guincho’s had a tune refurbushed too, and Dan Le Sac’s been swapping remix stems by candlelight, producing a version of Metropolis for the Ninja Tune XX compilation to great acclaim.
Branded the “Oxford Don” by XFM DJ and cult icon John Kennedy, PRDCTV is familiar with both sides of the fickle music industry table, having started a small label in 2008 to press friends’ EPs and spread the local toast. ‘I just about broke even,’ he says, with an air of hiatus, but noting plans for the future, as futures go.
And the future seems really as open as any for such a fresh signee to the Ninja status, now with a debut release dead in his sights. Tipped and ready, yet clicking still, there is much to follow from PRDCTV…and even more to look forward to.
