Back catalogue: Breakbeat

Review: Dance music is rife with megalomaniacal personalities eager to carve their names in, well, whatever the techno equivalence of blue-plaque posterity is. Here, however, the producer Brother Nebula (Lance DeSardi), from Texas, flips the desire to delusively status-climb for such trifles on its head, inverting the idiom "delusions of grandeur" in naming their EP 'The Grandeur Of Delusion'. Informed by delusion or not, this is a grand EP, rendering the problematic of grandiosity somewhat moot: from dark future garage faceoffs ('Ice Giant', 'God's Green Earth') to brooding halftime ice floes ('The Grandeur...'), Nebula has thoroughly honed his craft since relocating to London, not failing to blur genre categories across borders, nor to compel with huge, still technical broken beats.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Slight surface marks, record slightly warped***


In the summer of 2023, Upgrade Records launched via a nostalgic, party-starting EP from the previously unheard artist In 5 D (likely an alias for someone a bit better known, but don't quote us on that). For the label's return, long-serving DJ/producer Buckley Boland (best known for his releases on Made To Play, Black Riot and One Records) is the man at the controls. What he's delivered is a nostalgic, sample-rich affair that combines the angular wonkiness and mind-mangling noises of early-to-mid-2000s tech-house with nods towards vintage acid house, electro-house and the hard-to-pigeonhole house filth of the (long gone) Music For Freaks label. Basically, it's all fun-time, party-starting fare, with the bump-and-squelch of 'Daft Sandwich', the bustling brilliance of 'Nude Night' and the break-sporting hustle of 'S/A/M Real Man' standing out.

Review: Bobby Byrd's classic 'I Know You Got Soul' was originally recorded with James Brown's band The J.B.'s back in 1971 and soon became a club staple. It has endured in original form ever since but now it gets subtly reimagined by Mister Mushi. He offers a fresh, funky remix that's perfect for both crate diggers and DJ sets with the standout feature being the open drum break, which is a percussion lover's dream and has been designed to be sampled and looped for fun. Mister Mushi's impeccable mix stays true to the original funk spirit and the whole thing has been pressed on high-quality vinyl so it sounds superb.