Neonlight and Blackout go hand-in-hand. Their dark and brooding style of DnB complement each other perfectly, and as a label, Blackout is lucky to have held onto Neonlight. The German duo have a new EP coming out titled Edge and with five banging tracks, it was difficult for me to choose which one to premiere. Ultimately, I came to “Guinea Pig.”
As far as normal drum n bass tracks go, this isn’t one of them – not that I would expect anything “normal” from a collab EP between Neonlight and Wintermute anyway, but I digress. The build up is largely for show, adding essentially nothing to the track other than to provide a little bit of hype; there is no continued melody, nor drum loop, that follows from the build to the drop. Instead, I suppose you could say that the build is an hors d’oeuvre before the main course. The drop is no discernible style of DnB – it’s mildly jump up, with perhaps some neuro tendencies. But ultimately, the bouncy and staggered rhythm and continuous laser samples provide an odd sort of groove to fall into. Even the introduction of a much odder synth at 1:30 doesn’t detract from the overlying beat of the tune.
“Guinea Pig,” like much of the EP, is something that you generally need to listen to a couple times before you catch onto the rhythm. But once you do, I guarantee you this will be one of your new favorite tracks… until the next time Neonlight releases something, that is.