Hannah Lesser and Julius Dowson make up the Melbourne trip-hop duo ALTA, who last month made waves with their single "Moves"—which came with an eclectic mix of smoky vocals, glitchy synths and a variety of samples from all walks of life. With such an eccentric track release it's obvious that they would back it up with an icy cold EP, premiering today on THUMP.Awake for Days is infused with sample-heavy tribal beats that tease you throughout its complexity, a certain foreplay resonates within scratchy synth-like vocals layered over downtempo jungle fragments.Starting out with the track "Esses," from first listen it's clear these two possess extra terrestrial intelligence with Lesser's rhythmic, soulful vocals sitting beautifully atop the low synth sounds of gold coins that underpin the song, making all the right moves."Alive Again" seemingly lends itself to envision a torn past; brooding and burning with seductively engaging vocal loops, haunting till Lesser's last breath.Other standouts include the sultry self-titled track "Awake For Days," with sexual swamp samplings complete with dragon fly hums and cicada chirps. Vocally beautiful chants from the jungle morph with sounds of the deep encompassing all of what's best about ALTA.Just when you think you've got them all figured out. "Stashing The Loot" brings hip-hop glitchiness complete with orchestral undertones; tambourine rattlesnakes snare hypnotizing it's listener in an amphibious trance.Alta forever tease you, bringing heavier sounds then cutting it all back reconstructing your mind with every tantric track.Rounding home base on the EP is "Moves," complete with elephant trumpets amassing some pretty quirky production encouraging the initiation of intimacy. So fearlessly travel on Noah's Ark of encyclopaedic sounds; it'll literally leave you awake for days.Producer Julius Dowson breaks down some of the more far-out samples contained on the EP:Getting Animalistic
"There is a pretty loud elephant sample in 'Moves.' I think it's cool how it sounds like a trumpet. I also like it how it's just so loud and scary as shit. The track is a bit tongue in cheek and we wanted it to be weird and confusing so the elephant kind of slotted right in there."The Bomb
"In 'Alive Again' there is a bomb explosion which we down-sampled and added effects to it (high pass, reverb etc) to the point where it sounded like noise. Then we recorded in a whistley filter sweep to play just before the bomb hits to sound like a cartoon bomb dropping out of the sky. Also to go with the weird bomb theme I wanted the droney chords in the section before (0:55) to sort of sound like an old bomb warning siren in the distance. It wasn't my intention to make it actually sound like war though, but that was the thought process when putting the sounds together."Footsteps
"There are shortcuts to footsteps on concrete and grass throughout 'Awake For Days.' I was playing around with layering footsteps into percussion sounds and running them as loops. Sometimes we'll start a track with something kind of stupid like looped footsteps just to kick start things. Then after adding and taking away more and more there might be just a short sample that remains and is there as a little reminder 'oh this is that footstep song I was working on.' Sometimes they never make the cut. The number of times I have tried to use an audience clapping in a beat and then deleting it halfway through."Making Coin
"This ain't exactly groundbreaking stuff but in the track 'Esses,' Han was singing about money and we thought 'lets sample a coin hitting the ground and rolling around' and we replaced the word 'money' with the coin sound and thought it was a fun way to change between sections."Vocal Weirdness
"When we are writing we nearly always put a beat on loop and record scratch tracks for vocals and keys. Han always does really cool strange percussive breath sounds when working on melodies and that kind of thing. I love going through that stuff and incorporating it into the beat. In 'Stashing The Lot' we went all out on that and most of the effects like white noise and that kind of thing are layered with breaths. The one that sticks out for me is when Han goes 'too toooo' and then a big noise sound goes CHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO to bring in a new part."ALTA launch Awake For Days at Melbourne's Boney on Saturday July 4.ALTA on SoundCloud // Facebook // Twitter
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"There is a pretty loud elephant sample in 'Moves.' I think it's cool how it sounds like a trumpet. I also like it how it's just so loud and scary as shit. The track is a bit tongue in cheek and we wanted it to be weird and confusing so the elephant kind of slotted right in there."
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"In 'Alive Again' there is a bomb explosion which we down-sampled and added effects to it (high pass, reverb etc) to the point where it sounded like noise. Then we recorded in a whistley filter sweep to play just before the bomb hits to sound like a cartoon bomb dropping out of the sky. Also to go with the weird bomb theme I wanted the droney chords in the section before (0:55) to sort of sound like an old bomb warning siren in the distance. It wasn't my intention to make it actually sound like war though, but that was the thought process when putting the sounds together."Footsteps
"There are shortcuts to footsteps on concrete and grass throughout 'Awake For Days.' I was playing around with layering footsteps into percussion sounds and running them as loops. Sometimes we'll start a track with something kind of stupid like looped footsteps just to kick start things. Then after adding and taking away more and more there might be just a short sample that remains and is there as a little reminder 'oh this is that footstep song I was working on.' Sometimes they never make the cut. The number of times I have tried to use an audience clapping in a beat and then deleting it halfway through."Making Coin
"This ain't exactly groundbreaking stuff but in the track 'Esses,' Han was singing about money and we thought 'lets sample a coin hitting the ground and rolling around' and we replaced the word 'money' with the coin sound and thought it was a fun way to change between sections."Vocal Weirdness
"When we are writing we nearly always put a beat on loop and record scratch tracks for vocals and keys. Han always does really cool strange percussive breath sounds when working on melodies and that kind of thing. I love going through that stuff and incorporating it into the beat. In 'Stashing The Lot' we went all out on that and most of the effects like white noise and that kind of thing are layered with breaths. The one that sticks out for me is when Han goes 'too toooo' and then a big noise sound goes CHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO to bring in a new part."ALTA launch Awake For Days at Melbourne's Boney on Saturday July 4.ALTA on SoundCloud // Facebook // Twitter