LTF Cinematic Wax

LTF’s excursion into the unknown continues. Following the retrofuturistic Soviet jazz-funk sample madness on ‘Monolith,’ the productions on this album yet again spiral deep into dug-up sounds. To quote an article by Flea Market Funk about LTF’s music: “Sampling former Ussr wax and giving heads all around the world the chance to actually experience his version of that music—sample by sample—is what music is all about: sharing, learning, and preserving.”

For ‘Cinematic Wax,’ the producer from Omsk, Russia used rare records from countries including Russia, Georgia, Tarastan, Poland, Greece, and Hungary as his source material. “To this day, the 70s were the pinnacle years of musicians’ skill and imagination,” says LTF. “The only thing I can do is dig deeper and deeper into the crates and bring these masterpieces back to life.”

Since LTF’s first official record (2015’s ‘Light The Fuse’ on Black Milk Music), listeners kept telling him that his productions evoke a ‘cinematic feel.’ “I never really understood what they meant with that,” he admits. “I was just making jazzy, funky, boom-bap sh*t! Time went by, and people kept telling me how ‘cinematic’ my beats are. So this record is kind of an answer to the idea that was planted in my mind.”

Song titles like “Tbilisi City Walk” and “Tea Ceremony with Bamboo Monster” indicate the vivid approach to naming his funk breaks and boom-bap-minded productions. “I always try to put the feelings my production process evokes into the name of the tracks. To me, that’s quite hard to put into words. But in the end, finding the right way to describe those moods is extremely satisfying.”

There’s also a meaning to one of the vocal samples in the album’s intro track: a Secret Intelligence Agent from a Bond movie says how he “lights the fuse in any explosive situation.” A hint to the meaning of his artist name LTF (Light The Fuse), and a reference to his way of working with samples: explosive sounds of horn stabs, brass, bass, and breaks. Carefully digging for hidden material like a spy himself, distilling only the most treasured parts.

Roll the opening credits…