Dubstep's journey from off-kilter production houses to the media-trend-piece radar is best captured by the name James Blake. Literally. Think back a few years to Burial's willful obfuscation -- oblique project moniker, zero press photos --and here's dubstep's poster child mk. 2011: not just a proper name but also a face, blurred at first then focused in HD. Chase that with his mainstreamish press-baiting cover of Feist's "Limit To Your Love," a forthcoming full-length that repeatedly employs a remarkably distinctive voice for such an adeptly restrained and tasteful beat-based producer, and the hand-holding he and the BBC have going on, and we find a genre's media maturation point in the body of a 21 year old (Br)IT kid. (Also just in Brit.)
The BBC are giving the blog-reading public what they want with this film of a session James did for them. The embeddable track is "The Wilhelm Scream" -- austere and spare with a full band, swelling slowly to reverb and static -- so that's the one we have for you here.
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(via GvsB)
There's more songs from the session ("Lindisfarne," JB's cover of Feist's "Limit To Your Love") and an interview over at bbc.com. James's self-titled full-length debut is very good.
