Oliver Heldens’ HI-LO project is back at last! “Impulse” is a hot new collab with Barong Family regular, Mike Cervello, and it’s been well worth the wait. This beastly new tracks follows another crazy summer for Heldens, with Heldeep Records stages at many of the scene’s biggest and best festivals like Tomorrowland, Electric Forest, Spring Awakening Music Festival and South West Four.
Filtered kick drums poke away at a rising, siren-style FX sound while white noise wave rise over snare rolls. The full weight of the kick is unleashed as a phat electro pulse plays out an ascending scale bass line. The heavily swung percussion gives the track a drunken, swaying feel, while a spoken vocal adds to the sense of intensity.
Less is more in this formidable, track, with each element carefully honed for maximum impact and layers of synths mirroring this ascending melody to make for a dizzying feel. A haunting breakdown lays buzzing sustained synths under twinkling, maniacal melodies before that phat, wonky groove slams back in. There’s a hardstyle-esque undertone to the whole thing that helps give it that dark energy, and as ever it’s all about blending and bending the genres for HI-LO.
Now the HI-LO beast has stirred, expect more high-grade weapons to emerge over the coming months…