For his first release since 2020, Om Unit’s Phillip D. Kick alias makes its long awaited return on Fracture’s Astrophonica imprint.
‘Om’ is the supreme and most sacred syllable in Hinduism whereas ‘Unit,’ a single thing or person; and Jim Coles signifies its collective essence to perfection. For over two decades, Om Unit has been one of the greatest innovators of bass-fueled music through his ability to excavate sonic tropes that cross-breed a plethora of styles and genres.
Om Unit’s deeper explorations into his fluid take on sound system music released on labels like Civil Music, Metalheadz, 31 Records, Exit Records and many more, until he set up his own imprint – Cosmic Bridge. Since its inception, the label has been pushing Om Unit’s signature “slow/fast” sound while being home to heavyweights like Kromestar, J:Kenzo, DJ Madd, Graphs, and TMSV, to name a few.
It’s not just his Om Unit alias that Jim Coles blows our mind with. Set up in 2012 with Machinedrum, Dream Continuum is a project which explores the sweet spot between mid-90’s euphoric jungle and footwork. Inspired by the same aesthetics, Om Unit also started his solo footwork and jungle inspired alias called Phillip D Kick.
Phillip D Kick began as a project that was put together to give the finest jungle and drum & bass classics a delightful footwork spin. Some notable reworks from Phillip D Kick’s famous Footwork Jungle series were edits for Adam F’s iconic ‘Circles,’ LTJ Bukem’s ‘Atlantis, and Omni Trio’s ‘Renegade Snares,’ among many others.
Om Unit then discontinued his Phillip D Kick project before bringing it back up in 2018 with a deeper and re-imagined sense of approach. The comeback release landed on Fracture’s Astrophonica label where we were taken on ride into rhythmic, deep and rolling bass-heavy music. Shortly after, Phillip D Kick landed the ‘As We Continue’ EP on the same label which was a re-defined extension of his first release on Astrophonica.
Phillip D Kick then went into another brief hiatus before making a return once again on Fracture’s imprint for a weighty 8-tracker called ‘Off World Tales’, which will bring a close to the pioneering producer’s trilogy of releases on Astrophonica. Since this might finally call curtains on Phillip D Kick, we couldn’t have let go of the chance to give the EP a deep dive, experiencing the otherworldly enchantment one last time.
The ‘Off World Tales’ EP begins with the producer’s trademark footwork claps on the intense and slow-burning ‘Predator’. Phillip D Kick spoke about the EP being centered around tales about “apparently having been abducted by aliens”. It seems like the abduction did happen and the second track ‘Clappin Alien Cheekz’ is a musical rendition of his encounter in a world we don’t know about yet.
Then comes a serene wave of chords and synth strings before collapsing into a skull-breaking amen drop on ‘Orbit’ before bringing his “slowfast” rhythm into the fore again with a haunting atmosphere on ‘Future Shock.’ Next is the drum & bass and footwork crossover in the form of ‘Hyperspanner’ followed by the modular journey of ‘Replicant.’ Bringing the EP to a close is Phillip D Kick taking a leaf out of his ‘Acid Dub Studies’ series and infusing it with a groovy footwork rhythm.
The ‘Off World Tales’ EP is yet another testament to Om Unit’s inspiring range of music that will continue to inspire future generations of bass music prodigies.
Listen to the EP:
Grab your copy of the ‘Off World Tales’: HERE
