This time 10 years ago I was sitting outside the Pav, not studying. Look at me now, rockin' the fur coat bringin' the blue fox out..

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Emma Ruth Rundle - Electric Guitar One
Emma Ruth Rundle was touring with her band Red Sparowes in 2010, and sitting staring out the back of a van she recorded a series of guitar improvisations. She came home and mixed and recorded these vignettes, and this is the result. "For fans of Grouper" she wrote in the description, by which time I was already sold on what I was hearing anyway, but yeah if you like Grouper you'll like this. It is a bit OC instrumental sequence as Ryan/Marissa/Seth goes by in a car and stares out the window. But I love that.

Billie Ray Martin - I Am... I Said
My parents didn't really push much music upon me - pretty much everything I've ever got into I've discovered on my own, or been introduced to by friends (mainly online) because we've shared musical interests. One of the only artists my mother ever played for me was Neil Diamond, we would listen to this 1992 compilation all the time in the car. I loved it, all of it, but then it became really uncool, and I was delighted to be too sick to attend his 1999 Dublin concert. Then I grew up and realised he wrote some great songs, from poppy stuff like 'Solitary Man', 'Cherry, Cherry' and 'You Got to Me' right up to the really emotional tracks like 'Brooklyn Roads' and, of course, 'I Am... I Said'. Here is that last one, covered by Billie Ray Martin, best known to most as the singer of 'Your Loving Arms' (also available on Bandcamp - it was the Junior Vasquez remix that you'll remember). Weird. You can see why I rambled so much now, I hope. Oh and while we're talking about Billie, go have a listen to 'Talking With Myself '98'. Man do I regret not getting to that Neil Diamond show...

Billie Ray Martin - Four Ambient Tales
Now usually I don't do this, I'd more likely group two together but this won't work that way. After finding the above cover I went looking through Billie Ray Martin's (extensive) Bandcamp and I discovered this, originally released on the R&S 'ambient' sublabel Apollo in 1993. Soft and ethereal tones underneath her really quite unique vocals, it's like a dream. The gorgeous instrumentals are here to boot.

Various Artists - Tales From The Dark Side 2014 Edition!
UTTU is a multi-platform label/YouTube channel with the perennially busy DJ Haus at the helm. here we have a stupidly cheap compilation under the UTTU banner featuring the likes of Logos, Detboi, DJ Q and, of course Haus himself. Sparse grime, Amerie-sampling bassline, clap-driven techno (?), it's a brilliantly exciting collection of party music that's angry and fun in equal measure.

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Boardwalk - I'm To Blame (Julia Holter Remix)
I've tried to get into Julia Holter's much-feted Ekstasis album but it never quite stuck. I love this, however. Boardwalk's shoegaze meets soulful 60s pop track 'I'm To Blame' is a delight, its wistfulness breezily emotive, yet Holter's take is haunting and eery. She's eschewed the original's wall-of-noise guitars and playful organs, adding in layers of clanking glass and creaking stones. Chills up the spine stuff.

Slumber Sessions: Chainless
Chainless recently put out the first record on my friend Ross J Platt's label Cohort, and now the shadowy Portuguese producer has made a contribution to the i-D Slumber Sessions mixes. I'm not sure how much slumber you'll get listening to this, though, as it's quite dark and sinister-sounding stuff. Props for the Art of Noise/Three 6 Mafia blend.

Maxillion Dunbar - Gorilla Bliss DJ Mix
Max D seems to be a great guy who makes great music, and this mix shows that he's a great DJ with great taste. It starts off with some noisey crap, moves into 90s techno, then bam out of nowhere comes Marvin and 'Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)'. And then he plays some piano and Fennesz and then it's back to chunky stuff (if anyone could tell me what the track is that comes in around 30 minutes in I'd be very grateful, it's wrecking my head), before rounding it out with jungle and whatnot. Good man Max.

Xosar - Prophylaxis
Seems I'm sharing Xosar tracks every week lately, but by her own admission she #cantstopjamming. This one is another excursion off road for her, opening up with her trademark space-age bleeps but moving into weirder, more percussive territory within seconds. The bleeps come back a few minutes in if you're worried.

Lucrecia Dalt - We Owned Repetition (Eternal Bliss 64kbps Edit)
RBMA did this Eternal Bliss thing, I'm not fully sure what it is and I don't have the patience to find out, but this is Lucrecia Dalt's bit and I like it. Nightwave did one too, and it's quite different from what you might be used to from her.

Ivy Barkakati - Quasi d'estiu
Dope mix this, moving from deep house (the good kind), into funk, outsider house (this glorious number from Terekke), disco and soul. The mixing is almost nonexistent, but trying to blend these disparate elements in time could be more than a bit shoe-horny. Ivy's tape for Hospital productions is ace.

Redahan - Before It's Too Late (demo)
Just a demo this, from Irish producer Sean Redahan, "playing with my new synth". It's a lot better than that modest description would have you believe, with gorgeously morose chords hovering over ominous basslines.

DJ Spinn & DJ Rashad - Welcome To Amsterdam
RIP Rashad. That's it.

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Sin a bhfuil.

All the best,

Aidan