Max Cooper and Rob Clouth - 8 Billion Realities [Mesh]

Format: Colored LP.

Acclaimed electronic musicians, producers, and sound architects Max Cooper and Rob Clouth team up for a new collaborative EP; a dark, playful, four-track dive into the subconscious flow of ambient, breakbeat, and techno, featuring a standout vocal performance from South London rapper FLOHIO.

Recorded over a series of spontaneous sessions in London, “8 Billion Realities” channels years of creative exchange between two of the genre’s most quietly innovative artists and stems from a decision between both friends to forgo conceptual over-intellectualisation in favour of instinct and enjoyment.

As long-standing admirers of each other’s audio-visual work, Cooper and Clouth collaborated in London after both coming off intense, idea-heavy album cycles. What followed was a series of exploratory sessions, half-improvised and half-built around barely formed ideas.
The result is a dancefloor-ready EP that feels alive and human — imperfect and richly hypnotic.

“Rob Clouth has been one of my favourite electronic music producers since I first heard his work in 2011,” says Cooper. “His work is more full of ideas and structure than anyone else’s.” “We were both coming off extensive concept studio albums and felt like simplifying things and having some fun with music, so that’s what we did.”

For Clouth, no stranger to Max Cooper’s Mesh imprint, where he previously released a series of EPs in addition to his 2020 debut album “Zero Point,” this record marks a new chapter both creatively and personally. “Something quite new for me is collaborating,” he comments. “You have to know when to stop, because if you develop an idea to its endpoint, the other person no longer has space to come in.”

The first track, “A Moment Set Aside,” began as a break from another idea: a live, unplanned improvisation based on arpeggios and atmospheres. “The track was written almost in the same amount of time it took to play it,” says Cooper. “It was extracted from an hour-long recording session, pretty much as heard… the energy and excitement grew as the unplanned moment gave way to some magic.”

“The lesson is that sometimes it’s useful to set aside a moment without forcing results and let the subconscious have something to say.” What followed was darker and heavier. “Asymptote” is detuned, subversive, euphoric techno in its descent. “We found a kind of detuned techno pulse, half consonant and half wandering, which we described as a spiraling well of body parts that we were falling into,” says Cooper. “It was a lot of fun to work on and let loose with bigger kicks than I usually allow myself to use.”

Then came “8 Billion Realities,” featuring an outstanding rap performance from FLOHIO, an emerging figure in the UK grime and rap scene. The track was inspired by conversations about algorithmic echo chambers and hyper-personalized digital worlds. Frenetic, direct, and deeply South London, FLOHIO brings this tension to life. Her sharp, intense flow cuts through the distortion and rhythm, situating the track somewhere between chaos and control, instantly making it one of the most impactful moments in both artists' catalogues. “A different reality for each of the 8 billion of us,” says Cooper. “We weren’t sure if it would work… but there was something about the energy of the percussive idea and the story that seemed to fit.” “Then FLOHIO played with it a bit, and from the first moment she smashed it, not only with the lyrics and energy, but also with the harmonies; it was a beautiful process.”

The final track on the EP, “Candeleda,” originated from Clouth’s solo experiments with a live set composed entirely of vocals and keys, using his self-developed “cheatbox” system. “He proposed a beautiful, wavering melodic sequence that we bounced back and forth, adding harmonies and synth layers,” says Cooper. “It closes a collection that covers some of the musical breadth we both love.”