LISTEN: Fatboy Slim’s Back to Mine #31 Mix

Fatboy Slim has curated a panoramic mix for the 31st volume of the Back to Mine series. Spanning multiple decades and oscillating between genres, all while remaining truly cohesive, this selection is a real testament to the prolific DJ’s taste and talent.

The premise of the Back to Mine series is contained within its name; the DJ is invited to make a compilation based on what they judge to be appropriate for the afterparty at their house, not the main event at the club.

With this in mind, Fatboy Slim opens his mix with the welcoming sound of “Monkey Spanner”, a 1957 classic from the reggae duo Dave Barker and Ansel Collins, before dropping Betty Chung’s “Bang Bang”, a Mandarin-funk rendition of the classic made famous by Nancy Sinatra.

Throughout the mix, the more energetic runs of funk & soul hits tend to be punctuated and subdued by more mellow, contemplative tracks. In the first quarter, the mischief elicited by “The Pink Panther Theme” and Eunice Collins’s intimate “At the Hotel” is sharply punctured by the haunting remonstrations “strange man, strange man, why won’t you leave me alone” in Norwegian jazz singer Mari Kvien Brunvoll’s “Everywhere You Go”, as the grumbling instrumental evokes a Mica Levi soundtrack.

Every listener will detect Fatboy Slim’s fingerprints on this mix once the seventh song begins, which is Camile Yarbrough’s “Take Yo’ Praise”, famously sampled in his iconic single “Praise You”. Other selections notable for their history as samples include Donal Leace’s “Today Won’t Come Again”, which dictates the rhythm of “Hey Mama” by Kanye West.

This volume approaches its end with “Sunset 303”, which combines a pulsating beat reminiscent of Kate Tempest’s “Holy Elixir” with a motivational pep talk (unlike Kate Tempest’s “Holy Elixir”), and then signs off with “The Voice of Experience” by Fatboy Slim’s deliciously named alias Yum Yum Head Food in a reassuring close to the volume.