Ice on the Decks, Non-Vanilla

Ice has a bit of a bad musical rap ever sense its unfortunate connection with a certain early 90’s caucasian rapper, but it’s grown musically sense then. While listening to the Merzbox 20 times in a row, it realized there’s more to creating sound than ripping of a Queen riff, so it teamed up with Ivan Abreau and took the decks last night at Pulse Miami’s opening night. 
The Havana-born, Mexico City-based Abreau creates molds of ice, complete with grooves, and the needle actually picks up songs. The frozen record plays as it melts until it eventually cracks, transforming the music from sounding like mistreated vinyl into weird, unsettling noise. 
His performance was a one night only thing for Basel week, but you can check the video above (not from last night, though there’s a pic behind the cut) to get a basic idea, and be kind of excited knowing that this exists. 
—Kyle Munzenrieder