Wah Wah 45s are very proud to present a very timely re-imagining of a turn of the century crossover classic. It’s been over 25 years since musician and film-maker Quentin Dupieux, AKAMr Oizo, unleashedFlat Beat, an instantly catchy, relentless, machine drum led hit record, which gained global recognition due to a hugely successful Levis campaign and a small, yellow puppet named Flat Eric.


Fast forward to late 2026 and Eric is back, this time thanks to the imagination and playful musicality of Italian producer and multi-instrumentalist Isaac de Martin, better known asIKE. His unique take on the 1999 anthem takes in jazz, electronica and West Asian influences to transform the song into something startlingly fresh, but no less of an ear-worm.


IKE explains more:


“Flat Beatby Mr. Oizo is one of those songs that marked my teenage years. I vividly remember watching the video on MTV, Flat Eric sitting in an office, eating sausages and later seeing it in the iconic denim ads. The puppet initially disturbed me a little, but over time it became a symbol of a very specific era: the dawn of the new millennium.


Years later, while preparing the London and Brighton shows, I wanted to bring an old electronic track into the live setting with the band, andFlat Beatsuddenly came back to me. We tried it a few times and it immediately sounded massive. As we play it live, the audience goes mad: those who remember the original seem to be thrown back in time, while those who don't know it are hypnotized by the four-to-the-floor kick of Jacopo on drums, enriched by a jungle of jazzy rhythms, Valerio's analog synth basses, and IKE's solid melody and psychedelic guitar solo. I added a B section and a guitar solo with Balkan and SWANA flavors, bringing the track into IKE's musical universe.”


Bonus track,La Porta Solare, featuring Mojgan Hoseyni playing the Qanun (a traditional West Asian zither) tells a completely different story.


“Last year, I met the singer Ahu on Dom Servini's show on Soho Radio, where I was presentingOn Higher Dreams. She told me about a friend of hers, a qanun player from Tehran, and suggested that we might collaborate. I contacted her and we began exchanging ideas - a kind of sonic ping-pong.


That's how I began working remotely with Mojgan Hoseyni, a virtuoso of this traditional Persian instrument. We started developing several pieces together, andLa Porta Solare (which means The Door of the Sun in Italian) became the first track to emerge from this collaboration.


The song is an invitation to turn our inner gaze towards the East, where the sun rises, where new things begin.