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Music

Manchester's Tape Warped Maestro Ruf Dug Reveals All

Straight out of his Dane Bank Observatory, Ruf Dug returns with another tape's worth of psychotropically smoothed out screamers

Deep in the heart of Northern suburbia hyperclocked, powering-down, swampy synth sounds spool into pools of liquid gold, coagulating lines of juiced melody are wrung dry over drier-than-dry-ice drum machines. These are the cosmically altered transmissions beamed into club consciousness from the Dane Bank Observatory, home of battered-boogie badman Ruf Dug.

Dug's been putting out zonked virtual C86s through his Ruf Tapes blog for years now, before finally getting physical and releasing the first volume of his Ruf Kutz Ruf Tapes series – two sides of melted, molten dark house and dreamy disco. The Manchester man's also racked up a series of wacked out releases on labels like Unknown to the Unknown and Süd Electronic; soapy slabs of soil-sodden circuit-bent dance music.

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He's very recently dropped a real winter warmer in the guise of the second installment of the Ruf Tapes cassettes. Pause-Button Edge-Blunters contains hazily globular material from Dug and a few of his acolytes. It's deliciously distorted, deliriously damaged, and doggedly danceable. Ruf Dug was kind enough to disengage himself from the telescopes that litter his observatory for a bit and have a quick chat with THUMP.

Why not stream his selection of edge blunters while reading what he's got to say about them below?

THUMP: How would you define an edge blunter?
Ruf Dug: You know… something to take the edge off… it could be a long hot bath or a blast on a chillum. In this case, our particular relaxants are twelve very pleasant beats swirling around in a sedate haze of tape hiss.

You've talked about James Ferraro in past interviews, is that kind of hypnagogic/dreamy/subliminal thing he had going on for a while a precursor to the kind of tunes you're spinning on the new tape?
You can definitely draw a line between Ferraro's tape stuff and many of the tracks on the compilation. From a personal perspective I'd count him as a key influence for some time now, I get blown away by everything he does.

With tapes themselves, what's the appeal? Is it a strictly audio-based decision? What about cassette-deniers who claim it's nothing more than an ironised affectation?
OK, the number one appeal for me is that they are cheap and quick to do, and having witnessed firsthand the continual increase in vinyl delays, I thought it'd be really good to be able to go from an idea to the finished product in a matter of weeks.

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The audio quality definitely is a thing for me – I do like the crunch and wobble and that's probably nostalgic. For people who've never had Walkmans, I don't know what informs the sonic appeal but the idea of the "lo-fi sound" has been around for a long time, predating any current trend so maybe this is just the latest incarnation of that concept.

About the affectation thing, ironic or not, in certain cases that's definitely true. I'd say maybe a third of people who buy my cassettes don't have tape players and are just going to use the download code. But I'd suggest that the physical cassette still has an aesthetic value, even if it's absolutely useless as a music format, because it informs or contextualises the music in the same way that an album cover might. Having the physical thing makes it feel like something a bit more than just a download, even if that's how many people will access the music the majority of the time.

Who's putting out the rawest lo-fi dance music? Are L.I.E.S. still a thing?
Hell yeah L.I.E.S. are still a thing! They are really nicely established now, I think they're gonna be like Hyperdub or something… they had the chance to go massive and shit or just run out of ideas and did neither. They are still pushing loads of wicked stuff, I fucking adore Delroy Edwards too. But in terms of straight rawness the answer to this question has always got to be Jamal Moss hasn't it?

Do you shout from the rooftops about being an RBMA graduate? Or is it like having a birthmark: those that know, know.
No birthmark but there is a secret handshake! It was a super experience and no I don't bang on about it too much… nobody likes a loudmouth and it was actually quite an important magical two weeks of my life and I don't really want to reduce it to a bunch of showbiz stories or some sort of ennobled title to blag some gigs with.

What's the scene in Manchester like? How often do you escape the Dane Bank Observatory and hit the Arndale?
Things are totally kicking right now here. We have plenty happening on all levels: on any weekend you can easily pick between four genuinely interesting nights, all of which seem to be getting good support. There are more venues now of various shapes and sizes from the illegal kind right through to The Warehouse Project. There are lots of producers making waves in lots of different sounds, loads of good DJs, the record shops are doing OK. Things are healthy and pretty much everybody is very friendly and supportive, and it's very close-knit.

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Josh is on Twitter too: @bain3z