Feel Fly Electronic & Dance 3 Items

Perugia producer, synth collector and linchpin of the underground scene Feel Fly pokes his head above the trenches to deliver a consummate four track EP Mediterranean Dreams - Part 1. Onironauta rolls up all the best bits of spaced-out disco and italo house into an expansive dancefloor soundtrack that would sound equally at home in a Den Haag squat as by an Ibizan hillside pool. Sounding in turns both futuristic and nostalgic, it sets the tone for the dream-like timezone in which this EP resides. Meanwhile slowed-down 303 chugger Grace In Space sounds perfect for Room 2 - that is, if the room is on an orbiting space station and someone adjusted the gravity settings. The track concludes the side with timeless balearic drift and a dash of kosmiche afro percussion sprinkled on top. Flip the 12” over and the title track Mediterranean Dreams seeps through, with more than a slight nod to the summer of ‘88, like a faded photograph. The revolving chord progression and melodic synth phrases that weave through the groove fit together sweeter than the cogs in a swiss watch. EP closer Becalmed rounds proceedings out in fine cosmic disco style, firing more 16th note lasers through the dry ice than Kitt, as melancholic pads float over the rhythm section like a négligée. It’s a stylish way to sign off a collection of tracks that are equal parts fond memory, hopeful optimism, and hazy dance-fuelled hedonism.

With the two-part EP Mediterranean Dreams, Perugia producer and composer Feel Fly revisits his musical roots and pays tribute to the sounds and ‘sun-kissed nostalgia’ that informed his style. Mediterranean Dreams Part 1 collected four tracks, and added that Feel Fly touch of emotive chord progressions and layered production onto cosmic disco grooves to powerful dancefloor effect. Now with Mediterranean Dream Part 2, Feel Fly switches the tempo both up and down, to fully demonstrate his affinity for club moments of all shapes and sizes. Nebula flies out the gate with full intent, recalling classic Detroit techno while pushing the vibe even more wide-screen - it’s driving, melodic dance music that delivers on the fine details as much as it does on the life-affirming, big picture sentiment. Optical Bells opens in meditative style, not unlike a new dawn in a Tibetan monastery, before each element of the track slowly reveals itself and assumes its place. It’s an arrangement technique that Feel Fly employs masterfully, and gives the impression of a camera lens moving into focus, or a storyteller setting the scene. The revolving chord changes pull you in and while whisking you away, you’re compelled to engage with the moment - like being asked to dance by a mysterious stranger. The B side kicks off with Luce Eterna Ai Sognatori, still keeping the tempo high while cherry-picking disco house drum patterns and piano synths with a slight Italo flavor to create an irresistible slice of dancefloor dessert. This is a soundtrack for Sognatori, in whose dreams anything is possible. The EP finishes up with a superb cut of echoey balearic dub in the form of Templum Dub. Putting the drums through its mixing desk paces, Feel Fly reanimates the drum kit with delays, phasers and flangers, and wraps it up in hazy drifting pads that could accompany any moment of contemplation - from that morning espresso to a midnight phone call. Mediterranean Dreams Part 2 acts as the perfect compliment to its prequel Part 1, and shows a producer at the height of his powers, reimagining his musical roots and composing a love letter to the sounds and stories of his youth.

Born in 1989, Daniele Tomassini aka Feel Fly, dj, producer, sound composer (he recently completed the soundtrack for the movie I Santi by Giacomo Abbruzzese, awarded at the prestigious CineMed festival in Montpellier), co-founder of the Afro Templum party, already known for his previous works for labels such as Prins Thomas’ Norwegian Internasjonal or the Ibizenca International Feel, lands on Simona Faraone’s label, New Interplanetary Melodies, with his first EP, after having made his debut on the same label as remixer on the EP signed by Leo Young (nim005).

The entire EP is inspired by the ancient and mysterious Etruscan culture, whose peoples inhabited the historical-geographical region of central Italy: all the tracks that compose it were in fact conceived under the cloister of Manu (National Archaeological Museum of Umbria) in Perugia.

The title track, Sacrificio (a1) opens the album with an ecstatic drum-break on which powerful subs stand out, catapulting you directly into the obscure rituals of the haruspices, intent on interpreting the signs of the divine, with the help of mysterious pads and shimmering synths like fires in the night.

Side A continues with Hypnopedia (a2), House music characterised by pressing rhythms and sharp rides that transport us into a dreamy dimension, a nostalgic, evocative dream of worlds that now belong only to the sphere of memory. While in Aisna (a3), which closes the first side, the atmosphere changes decidedly towards progressive house, a sound that has become topical again in recent years, after having raged in the second half of the 90s in those lands that were once called Etruria. And just as the Aisna was an early morning ritual held in a field or a sacred wood, this track has all the makings of a rave at the crack of dawn.

The B side starts on the same wavelength with which the first side closed, Afro Trance Amnesia (b1), in fact it maintains that feeling with the most sweaty dancefloors thanks to its epic breaks and vaguely Trancey arrangements that rest on dragging and obsessive percussions able to smash any kind of dancefloor. With Thi Rie (b2) the groove becomes decidedly more disco thanks to a rolling bass line interspersed with powerful toms and full of suspense thanks to the skilful use of enigmatic pads.

Étoile Romance (b3) is the title of the beautiful piece of Ambient that closes this first EP by Feel Fly on NIM, 6 minutes and more of dreamy arpeggios that fit perfectly into the groove of that Italian tradition of soundtracks and library music that has produced so many masterpieces.