Astrophonica 32 de Flobama Follow, Fracture Follow

Astrophonica 32 Commentaire

Astrophonica welcomes Austin, TX-based finger-drumming beatmaker Flobama to the label for the first time with Orion Sound — a raw, undiluted, and psychedelic take on Jungle, infused with shades of classic Hip-Hop, Jungle, and that indefinable celestial fusion underpinning Astrophonica.

With a background in instrumental Hip-Hop, Flobama has performed live alongside Blue Lab Beats, Shigeto, and The Alkaholiks using a Roland SP-404 sampling workstation. He has also built a dedicated online community on Patreon and Instagram, creating official live video content for Red Bull Music Academy and Roland.

Orion Sound takes this U.S. instrumental Hip-Hop foundation and blends it with modern UK Jungle through a cosmic lo-fi lens. The entire EP was crafted using PotenzaDSP’s recently developed Amigo Sampler, which emulates the signature gritty sound of the 1980s Commodore Amiga—the machine that helped define early UK Hardcore and Jungle music.

Despite Andy Warhol and Debbie Harry being part of the world premiere of the Amiga 500 in 1985, the affordable home computer never penetrated the studios of underground producers in the U.S. as it did in the UK. While the U.S. is known for lo-fi beat machines like Akai’s MPC range and the E-Mu SP1200—pushed to the limits by greats like Dilla, Pete Rock, and Madlib—the original Amiga alumni were dominated by a crew of UK junglists such as Bizzy B, Equinox, Urban Shakedown, Dlux, TDK, Zinc, and Paradox. It’s suggested that megastars like Aphex Twin, Calvin Harris, Mike Oldfield, and Kanye West have used Amigas running various pieces of tracker software, but that distinctive sound will forever be linked with raw, DIY bedroom Jungle.

Orion Sound takes all of this and mixes it into a well-seasoned sauce that is as tear-out as it is cook-out—combining the laid-back, loud-pack sunshine of Texas with the wall-slapping intensity of an East London rewind. Low-riding at higher tempos, it’s not Footwork Jungle, but it occupies a similar furtive U.S./UK mash-up space once held by Machinedrum, Om Unit, Rashad, and DJ Spinn.

To celebrate the EP’s crunchy, cosmic origins, Fracture and Flobama have collaborated on the Orion Sound Sample Pack, created with the Amigo Sampler and available separately from the EP on the Astrophonica page. The pack features 255 scratch-built, handcrafted sounds using hardware such as Korg SV2 keys, a Mackie 1604 desk, and more—all sampled and processed in Amigo. It includes breaks, pads, and bass samples drenched in glorious 8-bit, low-sample-rate sonics—go wild.

Orion Sound is available as a four-track 12” vinyl and digital release, featuring a collaboration with label boss Fracture and artwork by Utile Creative.