By: Mitchell Treend

I would call Jake Atlas an alchemist more than a producer. After bubbling up from underground shadows and creeping his way into dank bars and across dusty festival stages, it seems fitting that Thriftworks unveil a horde of new music, delightfully bundled into three full length releases, for us to sip and swallow like thick mystic syrup.

The first of these releases he calls Fade. Fourteen tracks traverse an immense collection of auditory notions, spells, and wobbles fit for the headiest of vibers. Thriftworks goes about telling his story as only he could. Introducing himself in quiet echoes, painting the sky blood-orange and wiping away the tears of rain with frantic balance. His style always sits below the surface of new compositions; emerging only at the right moment as if to say, “Go forth, I’ll be close behind.”

Opener “A Fuerza” sings like the wind, haunting and glorious in its sensual whisper. Tremors shiver through the thick air like waves and pique the senses into pulsing awareness.

If "Wooming" isn’t already a word, it should be added to Oxford’s immediately. The flow of these tracks and this one in particular seem to push and pull simultaneously, creating a sensation of motion that could only be described as...wooming. The slick-back chatter of cymbal rattles create enough room for wonky synths to play on the foundation of gorgeous harps and that sensational kick-clap bass line that is frankly too fresh for words.

Jumping ahead to “In EXS.” If one track screams PLAY-ME-100-MORE-TIMES this could be it. It is smashing boundaries of what any meager reviewer could lay across it, no genre, just pure melt-in-your-mouth goodness. Sexy wobbles, ghostly vocal samples and hearty drum lines that take any idea of hip-hop into seven new dimensions.

This is only beginning. By December, we will have three of the freshest releases of the whole year. Fade, Fader, and Fadest will prove to be not only a crowning achievement for the Thriftworks project, but a heavy statement against the malaise of commercial dance music. J Atlas and his insatiable candor show a glimpse into what will come, slowly, yet inevitably.