SoundCloud asked us if we’d like to pick a track from our last album and talk through it, commenting on some of the components and methods that went into its creation.

Who better for the task than Michael Blu Mar Ten, the driving force behind all things technical in our studio.

You can see his comments in the player below, or view the track on SoundCloud if you’d like to read them more clearly or make comments of your own.

If you’d like to ask him more questions about the track you can email him here.

Blu Mar Ten – Close (VIP): Production Close-up by Blu Mar Ten

About Michael:

Michael Tognarelli is one third of London production trio Blu Mar Ten.
Born in Manchester, UK, Michael spent his youth working in records shops alongside Marcus Intalex and Sappo, and formed an encyclopedic knowledge of dance music at a frighteningly early age. After laying his hands on some gear to write music of his own, Michael moved to London in 2003 and linked up with Leo & Chris, the other two members of Blu Mar Ten. Absorbed into the outfit Michael rapidly became the driving force behind Blu Mar Ten’s production ethic and is responsible for consistently pushing the boundaries of the trio’s engineering. You can hear Michael’s work on the Blu Mar Ten album, Natural History, available now on CD, MP3 and limited edition vinyl

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Here’s a handful of videos from Fabric a couple of weeks ago, including some sneak previews of the Stray and Kastle reworks from our forthcoming Natural History Remix series.

Thanks to Lily for passing these on.

Click to see more…

Blu Mar Ten – Natural History: CD / 12″ Vinyl / Digital

Returning to their ancestral roots, Natural History is the long-awaited first full drum & bass album from Blu Mar Ten, leaving you in no doubt of their position at the cutting edge of the genre.

From the storming remix of vocal opener Starting Over, through the deeply abstract Grey Area to the VIP rework of massive club hit Close and the epic Last Dance, Natural History showcases the trio’s ability to enrich and develop their DNA, resulting in an album full of surprising twists and turns that all carry the Blu Mar Ten stamp of quality.

CD Tracklisting:
01. Starting Over (2009 Remix)
02. Above Words
03. God’s Lonely Man
04. By The Time My Light Reaches You I’ll Be Gone
05. Grey Area
06. Believe Me
07. Close (VIP)
08. Clipjoint
09. If I Could Tell You
10. Nobody Here
11. Last Dance
12. Overwhelm
13. Bedroom Eyes

Digital Version will feature the following Bonus Tracks:
(14). Made Of Air
(15). Eight Rounds Rapid

12″ Vinyl Tracklist:
A) Close (VIP)
B) Clipjoint
C) If I Could Tell You
D) Last Dance

Visit his site for more graphical niceness, including previews of his artwork for the forthcoming Bop album on Hospital subsidiary Medschool. Also watch out for his work on all our forthcoming releases

If you didn’t already know, Finyl Tweek is home to our great friend Shane McEnhill who is recognised as one of the best cutters of dance music in the business and has been taking care of our tracks since 1996.

This is Shane mastering our new single a couple of months ago.

The Finyl Tweek studios remain fully featured and now include a completely refitted pre-production and mixdown room, so all you need to do is bring your laptop, plug it into their firewire port and you’re off.

Visit the new Finyl Tweek site here.
You can also follow Finyl Tweek and Shane the Cutter on Twitter

Redeye Records have a handful of promos of our new single ‘Close’ / ‘Above Words’ in stock ahead of the full release on April 6th.

Vinyl for this single is going to be limited to 500 copies, so unless you want to be ripped off on ebay in six months time, we suggest you pick up a cheap copy right now. Click HERE to get yours.

Full release will be April 6th with these two tracks and the digital exclusive ‘If I Could Tell You’ in all the usual vinyl and digital shops

In shops April 6th.

As we’ve mentioned previously, the vinyl will be ‘Close’ b/w ‘Above Words’, with ‘If I Could Tell You’ as a digital exclusive. You can hear clips of all three tracks below.
Just so you know, we’re working closely with our distributor to try and ensure that the vinyl and MP3s hit the stores on exactly the same day.

BMT001A: Blu Mar Ten – Close

BMT001AA: Blu Mar Ten – Above Words

BMT001D: Blu Mar Ten – If I Could Tell You (digital exclusive)

First thing to say is that our new material will be self-released, under the label name “Blu Mar Ten“, (that’s right, we didn’t come up with anything flashier), and will be distributed by the wonderful ST Holdings.

The single will be ‘Close’ and ‘Above Words’, which will be available both on vinyl and for digital download, and also ‘If I Could Tell You’ which will be a digital-only exclusive.

The tracks have seen some great support from right across the d&b spectrum, including Marky, London Elektricity, Ed Rush, D Bridge, Instra:mental, Ink, Marcus Intalex, John B, Logistics, Lomax, Teebee, Utah Jazz, Alley Cat and many more.

All being well, the single will be out around the end of March and will feature brilliant artwork from a new face on the scene. We’ll be revealing an artwork preview, and the man behind it’s magic very soon, so watch this space…

This is a short video of a mastering session we did for the new single with Shane down at Finyl Tweek (formerly Heathmans).
The track you can hear in the video is ‘Close’

Hear ‘Above Words’ on the fantastic Autonomic podcast from D Bridge & Instra:mental

Hear ‘Close’ on the Hospital Records Kiss FM show

Hear ‘If I Could Tell You’ on the Hospital Records podcast #77,on John B’s Pirate Station Special and also on the Mary Anne Hobbs show on Radio 1

All three of these tracks will be out around the end of March sometime