Eddisco has been a major game changer in the electronic Tunisian scene, being the only operating record store in Tunis and acting as an essential venue for DJs and musicians in the underground scene. With their fifth release and their third EP drop, Hamdi Ryder’s Diaries of the XTNDD continues on the label’s immaculate productions from their local roster, with this groovy deep-tech with a dash of acid EP.
Throughout the EP, Ryder flexes his pristine production skills in creating four distinct tracks that move in different directions but are glued together with twin elements. The EP kicks off tenderly with ‘Ten More Times’, a deep-tech creation in which Ryder lays the main foundation for the EP, with non-stop progressions throughout the song, jolting-hi hats, sickening acid-bassline melodies that go fluidly with the panned pads and mad-as-a-hatter percussions that won’t stop your feet from moving, with a stupefying drop that adds a new melodic element to the track.
Then comes in the more tech-house centric ‘Sexual Content’, pushing a more-upbeat agenda using a heavier bassline, and flipping around the drum arrangement to make it more snare-heavy. What is really unique about this track is the use of the Tunisian dialect in a psychedelic effect-heavy manner.
Third enters the hardest-hitting track in the EP ‘Afterparty Echoes’, an instant dancing machine. As soon as the track begins, you just won’t stop bopping your head to it. With no intro, the track gets straight to the point with nearly all the main elements laid out with the percs and bell melody coming in later on, with the second part of the song introducing everyone’s favorite acid sounds.
The EP concludes with trip-hop extravagance in the bonus track ‘Lafayette Ride’, named after Ryder’s adventurous rides in his hood, Lafayette in Tunis. A hip-hop beat that is flipped into a lavish instrumental that needs no lyrics to accompany it. A mellow acid melody accompanying a funky bassline rather than acting as a bassline itself, syncopated hi-hats that lift the bounciness of the track, and ambient pads acting as the main body are all the elements needed for Hamdi to finish off his EP in style.
