About

Matthew Dear’s contribution to the DJ-Kicks series is his most engaging commercial mix yet. Intricately and intuitively mixed, it incorporates a handful of his own unreleased tracks.

Dear’s mixing is a treat. Unless you know the tracks inside and out, it’s virtually impossible to tell where they begin and end; he favors long, careful blends, and rarely leaves a given track to play out by itself for long. His selections benefit from the hands-on style. Pay attention to the way energy pulses between two cuts running in parallel, and you imagine the motion of a pinball as it ricochets off bouncers and flippers: wildly kinetic and keenly controlled. - Pitchfork