He's a Gemini, So Stay on the Friendly Side...

About the only thing I'm listening to this week is the work of a DJ duo composed of Hadji Bakara, who also plays in the band Wolf Parade, and Rob Squire, a producer I came to know as a teenager as Sixtoo, then making plodding, petulant production that fit peripherally into the backpacker hip-hop genre, but even then was industrially influenced in a way that made it a sort of class of its own. Squire has recently recast himself as Speakerbruiser. He and Bakara are based in Montreal, a city where French electro, British drum and bass, and Caribbean soca and reggae clash as a result of the city's immigrant strongholds and unique cultural history. Squire relocated to the city (he is originally from its rural Canadian outskirts), which is home now more than ever to a burgeoning club rap and hipster party scene that's given birth to senior and freshman acts like Chromeo, A-Trak, Thunderheist and Wolf Parade. His DJ sets -- far from the isolationist (maybe even nihilist) production of his younger years -- are suddenly reflective of that relevance, with playlists akin to those of taste making, party-pleasing DJs, albeit with a unique twist. He and Bakara haven't abandoned the weird industrial palate of sounds: Their sets are composed of mostly original remixes of popular mainstream rap, reggae or indie rap acapellas, but laden with heavy synthetic overlays. Even their version of Justin Timberlake's "My Love" is infused with a dark, futuristic Caribbean flavor, replete with low, elastic, synthetic bass and metal drums. Here's an original remix of a Ghislain Poirier and Face-T track; and here's an extended mixtape.