Ben Sims – Smoke & Mirrors
With nearly 20 years experience behind the turntables and over a decade of releasing music under his belt, it’s a surprise that it’s taken so long for Ben Sims to release his debut album.
Adam Beyer’s Drumcode imprint is the lucky recipient of “Smoke & Mirrors”, 12 tracks of 4/4 goodness that showcase Sims production work and remind us of his skills behind the production desk.
The opener “Riots In London” is a statement of intent, wasting no time with drawn out ambient intros, we get straight to the meat of the matter and are delivered a plate full of classy techno with dubbed out stabs and low level acid warblings.
Continuing the theme throughout, Sims displays a mastery of atmosphere and depth while moving between grooves from full on techno bangers to old skool tinged house outings with each track being sufficiently bass packed to find a use for itself on the dancefloor.
Legendary techno names Blake Baxter and Tyree Cooper also pop up to add another string to Sims’ bow and he utilises their vocal work well within his framework.
It’s an impressive body of work and you can pick up the album digitally at Beatport or on vinyl and CD at Juno.
Over to Ben to tell us more…
You can also stream the rest of the album tracks below:
