Selections: Ron Morelli

Welcome to Selections – our weekly series where we offer artists we love carte blanche to create a Spotify playlist. Reliable – but unpredictable – weekday listening from those who know

L.I.E.S. was one of those rare labels that, right from the off, defined a specific movement within club music. It’s singular, DIY informed aesthetic would become a reference point for a new wave of artists in the 2010s, its name shorthand for a noisy, machine-based sound and strangely misanthropist streak that defined itself against the slick, unremarkable sound design of so much contemporary house and techno.

This distinct vision was the product of label boss Ron Morelli, a former record store worker who, in true DIY style, ran the label out of his Greenpoint, NY apartment. Things have moved on since then, of course. Now based in Paris, he holds down a killer touring schedule while maintaining one of the more prodigious release schedules in club music. Nonetheless, he found time between stops on his US tour to compile a Selections. A debauched and gritty affair, it brings together grinder (Terrorizer), US punk (Black Flag), prog rock (King Crimson), heavy metal (Danzig) and a whole host of other wake-the-fuck-up sounds. Get to work.

Ron Morelli is a participating artist of the SHAPE platform for innovative music and audiovisual art, supported by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union.