Mount Kimbie – Monroe
Mount Kimbie are taking on the next fabric presents mix, out July 31st, joining a list of curators that includes Daniel Avery, Midland, The Streets, Helena Hauff, and Overmono. The mix leans hard into the duo’s clubbier side and includes two original tracks, “Monroe” and “Jomox,” with “Monroe” out now as the lead single.
Kai Campos has been direct about the intent behind it: “I wanted to avoid over-thinking it or approaching it in a more conceptual or mix tape fashion and represent what I’ve actually been playing in clubs. A lot of these I have rinsed in the last couple of years so it is a good time to celebrate the music and stop playing them for a while.” That’s a refreshingly unpretentious way to describe a mix series people usually treat as a curatorial statement. “Monroe” itself builds gradually, loose percussion and driving synth work with vocal fragments drifting in and out, never quite settling into a hook but never losing momentum either. It’s pitched as an ode to “Marilyn,” their 2017 track with Micachu, and you can hear the connection in the reverb-washed vocal flourishes that echo through it, though “Monroe” is its own thing rather than a rework.
This doesn’t feel like a duo chasing a sound they’ve outgrown. Mount Kimbie have moved through post-dubstep, future garage, and the frosted techno and shoegaze turns of 2024’s The Sunset Violent, and “Monroe” sits comfortably as another waypoint rather than a retreat into nostalgia.
