shanti celeste: tangerine

Tangerine serves as a coda to the qualities that have established Shanti Celeste as one of the most instinctive and generous underground DJs in the current landscape of dance music. Beginning as a record store assistant at Idle Hands in Bristol and now a fixture of some of the world's most acclaimed clubs and festivals, Celeste's instincts and curiosity have forged a musical space that is very much her own. Here, whether in sweat-drenched basements or to vast numbers, she strikes a common cause between the melodic richness of the legacy of the music of Detroit, alongside the natural ease with which she carries across tempos that embody UK Soundsystem traditions. Tangerine is Celeste's most fully-realized contribution thus far to this continuum of musical culture. More than that, Tangerine is an innate extension of Shanti's self, telling stories beyond her record box and delving into her personal history. There is her manipulated voice serving as a bedrock in tracks. There's a kalimba, recorded at her father's home in Chile. There are, of course, her rich synthesizers that wrap her tracks like velvet cloaks, providing the familiar warmth and color you know from her work so far on labels such as Idle Hands and Future Times. There's even her characteristic paintings on the cover. Here, on her very own Peach Discs, the label she co-runs with good friend Gramrcy, Celeste naturally delivers her most impressive and wholly personal work. Creating Tangerine has been a space for Celeste to explore all of this with a freedom that has come with the easing of expectations that an artist earns with the passing of time. Striking a balance between deeper, understated sounds and building gradually towards the fleet-footed bursts of rave energy that Celeste is known for, Tangerine peels back layers of dreamy textures to reveal an optimistic afterglow, reflecting on a life devoted to club culture. "When I made music for EPs, sometimes I felt restricted," she says. "I would think too much about creating the moments on the dancefloor I love -- seeing visions of ecstatic people hugging, I didn't give myself free reign to express all of myself. Writing an album made me feel free of all this because it seemed like an open-ended project. I could just keep creating until I felt like stopping."