SHORTCUT, the new EP from Belgian producer and drummer VAAGUE, lands today with a clear step forward in his studio practice. Instead of revisiting what he built on Oktopus Mekaniks, he focuses on tighter structures and a sound shaped by the club sets he has been performing in recent months. His jazz background remains part of his vocabulary, though now it operates more as a technical foundation than a stylistic reference.
Much of the EP’s identity comes from its production method. VAAGUE recorded live drums at Jet Studio in Brussels last April, later translating those recordings into a sequencer to create a virtual version of his own playing. This process allowed him to treat acoustic material with the flexibility of electronic programming, opening space for patterns that merge human feel with digital precision.
The lead single, Modern Jazz?, illustrates this approach in detail. Its concept started with a specific image: “I wanted to imagine a doomed pianist trapped in a nightmare forced to be played by his own piano.” Working with homemade prepared-piano samples, he processed those sounds inside an MPC until they acted like rhythmic cells. “I wanted that layer to be rhythmical and to compete with the drum pattern, hence treating it as a drum machine.” The track echoes the experimental spirit of Aphex Twin’s Computer Controlled Acoustic Instruments Pt2 EP, yet the way the elements lock together reflects VAAGUE’s own method.
The EP expands on this framework with different intentions. Talk It Up and Shortcut Jenny adopt more direct arrangements built around forward-moving drums, while Krill and Swirl function as short interludes. Originally composed for his collaboration with choreographer Isabella Soupart, these pieces introduce brief pauses that adjust the record’s pacing without breaking its continuity.
Mixed by Pierre Dozin at Studio Panthéon and mastered by Lukas Turza at Snap Mastering, SHORTCUT presents a focused snapshot of where VAAGUE’s project stands now. The final track, Himalaya, featuring pianist Shai Maestro, shifts the tone once more through layered vocals and a concluding solo that anchors the EP’s closing moment without turning it into a definitive ending.