Hypetrak Premiere: Union Analogtronics featuring Guilty Simpson - Digital Delight

Union emerges from the Paris underground with a fully-formed debut that ushers in an exciting new age for Fat Beats Records. A high-concept collection of space age hip-hop that, although not sent from the future as originally suspected, invented a brand new vocabulary for the fusion of electronics, found sounds and analog elements: Analogtronics.

Featuring MF Doom, Talib Kweli, Guilty Simpson, Elzhi of Slum Village, and soul singer Sly Johnson, Analogtronics’ science fiction aesthetic belies a hard-edged lyrical underbelly that, nevertheless, allows Union’s laser-beam atmospherics and abstract beats to take center stage. The team of OJ and Gold, longtime fixtures in the French hip-hop and electronic club scenes, cemented their style when OJ’s obsession for J Dilla, Kraftwerk and drum machines fused with Gold’s fascination with Herbie Hancock, dusty keyboards and modern synths. This bond, or “Union,” of beats and melody, of vintage and modern, catalyzed an outpouring of compositions unfit for the traditional mixtape market. Little more is known about Union’s origins, but their present day achievements herald a hopeful new direction for the hip-hop of tomorrow.

Analogtronics is available now through Fat Beats.