LEON VYNEHALL レコード& CD

Review: A decade ago, Leon Vynehall popped up on Martyn's 3024 label with Music For The Uninvited, a critically acclaimed debut album inspired by 'the formative cassette mixtapes' of his youth. This anniversary edition, which boasts reworked artwork and freshly re-mastered sounds, proves that the album has lost none of its allure. Musically, it offers a largely bass-heavy blend of deep house, Afro-house and techno rhythms, futuristic electronic instrumentation, immersive pads, sinewy strings and emotional resonance by the bucketload. This time round, we also get two bonus cuts, both of which were recorded during the same period in 2013: the Theo Parrish-esque excellence of 'Peaces' and the deep, jazzy and sample-rich broken house lusciousness of 'Blue'.

Review: Leon Vynehall's stunningly picturesque "Midnight On Rainbow Road" was one of the undoubted highlights of Gerd Jansen's second Musik For Autobahns compilation, which was released in the autumn of 2015 by Rush Hour. Here, it gets a deserved single release, with the original - a hypnotic, driving-inspired blend of fluid electronic melodies, a wispy percussion and Jonny Nash style glistening guitar lines - being complimented by a brand new "Beat Edit". This adds a slowly unfurling, head-nodding rhythm that takes the track further towards Detroit Beatdown territory. In essence, though, it sounds like an early '90s ambient house jam. That's no bad thing, given that Vynehall seems to have emphasised the sun-kissed beauty of the original in the process.