CHARLES WEBSTER レコード& CD

Review: Dave Seaman and Steve Parry's Selador Recordings imprint releases most of its music digitally, serving up the most in-demand tracks on vinyl via the ongoing Magic Black Plastic Series. Volume five in the series boasts four more tried-and-tested treats, beginning with Clavis' gorgeous remix of Charles Webster and Ursula Rucker's 'Begin Anew' - all bubbly, hypnotic electronic bass, trippy tech-house noises, immersive chords, bouncy beats and poetic spoken word vocals. Timanto blurs the boundaries between warming deep house and melody-rich progressive house on 'Other Side', before Dave Seaman joins forces with Thomas Gandey on the low-slung dark room moodiness of 'Heavyweight Residue'. To round off the EP, Harcourt delivers a hypnotic, soft-touch tech-house take on 'Red James' by Robert Babicz.

Review: Charles Webster's 2020 album Decision Time - the veteran East Midlander's first full-lengthi 19 years - was predictably good, but more downtempo and immersive than dancefloor-ready. This EP of remixes from the album is therefore long overdue. The EP-opening Dazzle Drums remix of 'This Is Real' is a luscious slab of jazz and bossa-tinged deep house soul perfection, while Jazuelle's 'Retro Rhapsody' version of 'Music' effortlessly joins the dots between laidback breakbeat, street soul and warming deep house sonics. Over on the flip, Mark E reimagines 'The Spell' as an analogue-rich chunk of gently dreamy deep house hypnotism, while 'Luciano' channels the spirit of Matthew Herbert's greatest micro-house productions on an undulating, soul-enriching full vocal take on 'Music'. Grown-up fare that sounds as good at home as it does in the club.

Review: Anyone with at least a rudimentary knowledge of the history of UK dance music, and deep house in particular, will tell you that this album is a big deal. It's the first full-length in 19 years from Charles Webster, a producer whose atmospheric, smoky take on deep house and downtempo grooves has always been a cut above his UK contemporaries. The big question is this: is it any good? Predictably, it most certainly is. Featuring a wealth of guest vocalists (Sia, Shara Nelson and Terra Deva included), Decision Time sees Webster effortlessly blur the boundaries between smoky soul, trip-hop, jazz, future R&B, broken beat and house so deep it may take you a while to resurface. In a word: brilliant.