hal | The Young Punx FM Podcast | Dance music and entertainment. Beats, banter and basslines since 2007.

ep46. TOO BIG FOR THE BUN

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:10:53 — 164.6MB)

After ten years apart, The Young Punx reunite for an unexpected adventure in Tokyo. Naturally, it all begins with Betto and an airport sausage. Hal runs 100 metres across an enormous stage, Hal and Nathan play a live DJ set on Japan’s block.fm, and the whole gang pick up pretty much where they left off a decade ago. Expect Japanese adventures, questionable conversations and a healthy selection of the finest disco, house and drum & bass that’s caught our ears. Too big for the bun? Aren’t we all?

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ep45. WELCOME TO MAISON J

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:21:40 — 150.3MB)

Tokyo’s Maison J takes over The Young Punx FM for 80 minutes of disco house, turbo-funk and Japanese city pop, with a generous helping of French-touch grooves. Better known as hip-hop producer Jackkn, Jay brings his MofoHifi release TATATA and a sneak preview of an unfinished dance rework of Yasuha’s 1980s city-pop classic Fly-Day Chinatown. Hal occasionally interrupts to reminisce about Japan and a Cassius-fuelled road trip through France, while tracing the sound back to Cassius and Phoenix. Otherwise, Maison J is left to get on with the music. No elaborate snack reviews, no catastrophic studio accidents. A suspiciously professional episode.

ep44. 100 DUCK SIZED HORSES

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:08:16 — 110.2MB)

DJ Mighty Mouse (Matthew Ward) comes to The Young Punx studio armed with a specially recorded house and nu-disco mix, plus a plan to tackle a horse-sized duck using superglue. Rescued from a snowbound 2013 Friday livestream, this lost episode finds Hal and friends quizzing the much-missed producer on DJ etiquette, the art of warming up a dancefloor and an Ibiza outing that earned him a memorable reputation with The Magician. There’s also a kazoo investigation, websites about dragons mating with muscle cars, and Hal’s dream about keeping pet puffins in pigeonholes. Music industry insight of the highest order.

ep42. DECADE OF GLORY

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:08:27 — 157.7MB)

A Memphis tornado, a doomed Arctic Circle road trip in a ’71 Mustang and a house track made from the BBC Shipping Forecast. The Young Punx’ first decade was fairly normal. Hal and Discosocks Greame revisit the remastered 2004–2014 best-of, from big beat, breaks and electro house to glorious mashup excess. There’s the chance email that brought Count Bass D into the studio, Japan’s unexpectedly enthusiastic crowds, Guthrie Govan’s impossible guitar tricks, and a meeting with Amanda Palmer that led to Map of Tasmania, an ode to pubic hair featuring Peaches. Ten years of musical ambition, happy accidents and occasional mechanical failure.

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ep41. THE RISE OF THE TRIBE OF GOOD

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:23:57 — 193.4MB)

Three years and £50,000 in the making, The Tribe of Good’s disco-soul debut finally gets the launch party it deserves: Hal and Discosocks Greame in a room. Hear how a Young Punx album became too soulful to chop up, growing into a live-recorded project with Vula Malinga, Rob Harris, Alex Reeves and a mountain of vintage gear. Thomas Gandey (Cagedbaby) delivers a house and disco guest mix, including one of Philippe Zdar’s last Cassius remixes. There’s also an investigation into the infamous jazz ‘lick’, a podcast superfan who somehow ended up on the album, and reflections on lockdown life. Which, for someone who already spends his days alone in a studio, hasn’t changed much.

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ep40. JUNGLE FIRE

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:46:42 — 245.1MB)

Drum & bass legend John B arrives with a blistering one-hour recreation of his Let It Roll festival set, plus a bottle of homemade Jungle Fire chilli sauce. The latter is arguably more dangerous. Spoonface and Chenai improvise vocals from John’s spectacularly middle-class shopping list, while Greek-food puns reach crisis levels. John explains his eyeliner-and-robot-dancing approach to drum & bass and tells the story of Nicki Minaj sampling his track Red Sky, followed by a rather less glamorous battle to get paid. There’s also Spoonface’s Star Wars LEGO fame, some house, disco and Fleetwood Mac, and increasingly questionable decisions about how much chilli sauce is reasonable.

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ep39. RIFF IN THE KEY OF E

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 2:31:01 — 346.5MB)

Basement Jaxx vocalist Vula Malinga drops into The Young Punx studio, fresh from performing with Quincy Jones, and casually sings Oh My Gosh over a house banger. Mike Mago delivers a guest DJ mix, while Discosocks Greame dodges increasingly determined attempts to find out what music he actually makes. There’s a gloriously retro funk lesson on riffs in the key of E courtesy of the legendary BBC series Rock School, an emergency hunt for fresh limes to satisfy Vula’s cocktail requirements, and a brand-new Young Punx collaboration, Bounce Jam Glow. Amid the house, disco and drum & bass, Hal pays a touching tribute to Cassius’s Philippe Zdar, sharing the last email he received from the producer shortly before his untimely death.

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ep38. REESE SANDWICH

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 2:19:31 — 320.2MB)

Phonat and Discosocks return to The Young Punx FM for a house, disco and drum & bass session that rapidly becomes a lovingly irreverent Phonat retrospective, from an early Avicii remix to his spectacularly anti-drop take on Skrillex. Newcomer James Yuill joins Hal and BOBBI, who performs two songs live, while the studio invents a ‘Reese Sandwich’ bass sound and conducts an unnecessarily intimate Peperami tasting. BOBBI attempts to explain Canadian cheese curds against a soundtrack of Napalm Death, and Hal discovers a stream of AI-generated death metal that might outlive humanity. Nice to have everyone back.

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