‘RPM’ spins the black wax Local DJ mixes beyond hip-hop

Mat Young has a serious record fixation. The waxy black discs crowd his basement in piles. He logs hours on the weekends mining dusty boxes for gems at thrift stores, yard sales and any other place he can find them. The twentysomething isn’t just an average audiophile or nostalgia collector, he’s a DJ. No, not of the radio sort or wedding variety, but a kind of combined composer, musician and aural alchemist. He brings a record home not just to listen to it, but to deconstruct its choicest contents. It might be a bass line, a guitar riff, an organ drone, or vocal bit. Most times, it’s a simply a beat.

And in the basement of his Portland home, using two turntables, a mixer and PC, he rebuilds these pieces into his own music. These compositions are hip-hop, but in a loose sense. That is, the music is mostly beat-oriented, and draws from the shared roots of the jazz and soul genres, but it strays into deeper, more experimental sonic territory. Hip-hop, in the pop radio or MTV meaning of the word, it is not.

The sound of Young’s originals is in line with the work of DJ Shadow, Kid Koala and Buck 65, artists that have succeeded in stretching the boundaries of the hip-hop genre while receiving critical praise and a fair amount of popular attention.

A graduate of John Bapst High School and the University of Maine, Young released some vinyl of his own earlier this month, a 7-inch single on Bully Records titled “Illy Uno (Six Gun Alley Mix)/ Look at Me.”

Young also contributed material to last year’s “Drop the Needle: illy B Eats remixes and breakbeats,” an album that features tracks by various DJs who remixed beats provided by Billy Martin, drummer for the jazz trio Medeski, Martin & Wood.

Occasionally, Young takes his music up out of the basement and onto a stage, too. Under his nom-de-DJ of RPM, Young has done opening sets for Medeski Martin & Wood at the State Theatre, and plays fairly regularly at other venues in the Portland area, including the Free Street Taverna. He’s also been known to play an odd set or two up this way as well, so keep your eyes and ears peeled.

The “Illy Uno/ Look at Me” single is available online through Ninja Tune, at www.ninjatune.net, and through Turntable Lab at www.turntablelab.com.

George Bragdon can be reached at gbragdon@bangordailynews.net.