Feb 09, 2023
By Caleb Campbell
jLast year, Brooklyn-based electronic music duo Bottler shared their colorful debut full-length album, Journey Work. One of the record’s highlights, “Mako,” now serves as the focal point of an accompanying EP, out everywhere tomorrow. The EP sees bandmates Pat Butler and Phil Shore accompanying the track with two unreleased live favorites, “Sleeves” and “Bright Explanation.”
Additionally, the EP also features a remix of the title track from Colorado-based producer Colossi Rah. You can get an early listen to the Colossi Rah “Mako” remix below, premiering with Under the Radar.
“Mako” takes its name from the magical energy source in the 1997 video game, Final Fantasy VII, and the original track conjures a similarly shimmering aesthetic. Icy synths and skittering breakbeats coat the track in a mystical glow as Saige Smith of the band Smurai Velvet provides a dreamy vocal performance. In contrast, Colossi Rah’s reimagining of the track brings the track closer to its dance roots, putting a greater focus on its hypnotic percussive force and letting Smith’s vocals melt into an ethereal blend of airy melodies. The resulting track still evokes the original’s echoing beauty, yet it reframes that beauty into a new propulsive presence.
Colossi Rah says of the track, “I wrote the remix during my last couple weeks living in the Netherlands on the only piece of furniture we had sitting out. The weather was mainly crummy, as it tends to be in Den Haag, and writing it, it just worked really well in that environment – it is haunting, feels like I am being dragged around, but maintains its beauty.
The shimmer of Final Fantasy VII really roped me in. Bottler having that connection is right up my alley, and instead of completely turning the track upside down I wanted to maintain its core and inject my own production and emotion into it.”
Check out the remix below. The Mako EP is out everywhere tomorrow, February 10th.