Back catalogue: Deep House

Review: Back ion 2021, the relaunched Foliage Records imprint offered up a killer mix from NYC house legends Mood II Swing, the must-check Deep Rooted. Soon, the revitalised label will release a sequel, with long-serving British deep house don Atjazz at the helm. This sampler EP boasts six of the highlights from that set - all remixed and reworked by Atjazz himself. There's much to enjoy throughout, from the tense, slowly building deep-tech shuffle of Halo''s 'Glorty (Atjazz Galaxy Art Remix)'and the sun-splashed 6am bounce of Atjazz's remix of Dominique Fils-Aime's gorgeous 'Sun Rise', to the dreamy dancefloor wooziness of Ralf GUM's 'AWA' (re-imagined by Atjazz as an Osunlade-esque spiritual house workout) and the jazzy, bass-guitar-propelled broken house excellence of 'On The Road (Vocal Mix)', a three-way collab between Atjazz, Kelli Sae and The Realm.

Review: A San Francisco house producer who is taking jazz influenced house music to another level is Coflo aka Cody Ferreira 'Syncopatience' is a stunning deep house release that highlights his signature blend of soulful rhythms, intricate grooves, and rich musicality. Each track brims with personality, that blend clever and creative vocals and lyrics to a deeper level than just for the dancefloor. Side-1 starts off with 'Get Down, Show Love', a collaboration with Fenyan that exudes a hip, jazzy charm. Playful yet refined, it features catchy vocal work and a high-level jazz flair, effortlessly blending house with improvisational energy. Next, Coflo's remix of 'Cee.Side's Elektrify' brings atmospheric depth, wrapping Latin influences around a funky, sultry groove that's as hypnotic as it is danceable. Side-2 delivers Ecru, where Coflo, Steve Howerton, and Niya Wells craft a deeper, tech-tinged house cut with sharp, clever lyricism. Its polished production and layered instrumentation elevate it to a higher plane of jazzy house, demonstrating Coflo's versatility and artistry. 'Syncopatience' has the solution on how merge soulful textures with dancefloor energy in a unique way.

Review: The long-time preservers of house heritage at Chiwax welcome Nacho Marco for more timeless sounds that arrive perfectly for sunny days. Opener 'Cherry On Top' has a nice gentle Balearic feel with vocals off in the distance and supple piano chords in the foreground next to more widescreen synth smears. 'Tequila Sunrise' brings organ lines to the fore with a 90s New York feel while more Balearic energy comes from the lead sax. 'Black Velvet' is more strident and textured for the nighttime club sessions and 'Twinkle' closes with a joyous sense of celebration, old school bass and unbridled piano happiness.

Review: For the third release on the fast-rising Sounds of Style Records, label founder Bobby Hudson has turned to long-serving UK deep house don (and former Bent member) Nail Tolliday - a producer whose output is impressively consistent and rarely less than excellent. As if to the prove the point, Tolliday first slaps down a rubbery and sample-rich slab of soul-sampling deep house perfection - all chopped vocal snippets, sustained organ chords and irresistibly funky grooves - before opting for pots-and-pans percussion, chopped funky samples and copious amounts of dancefloor pressure on 'Hey'. Over on side B, 'Peanuts 3' is a mind-mangling disco-house-meets-wonky deep house roller underpinned by superbly sleazy sub-bass, while 'U Know What U Can Do' is sweet, woozy, soulful and informed by classic New Jersey garage-house.

Review: Naquil's produced a record that confidently straddles the line between chill-out grooves and driving, danceable rhythms. The opening track, 'Melod For Tre' (Jazz mix), teases with subtle jazz elements that are quickly swallowed up by a bubbling, deep house groove, before the 'Meltdown dub' shifts things into a darker, more atmospheric territory. 'State of Mind' arrives with a punch, its intricate percussion and bassline carrying the track with effortless cool. The final track, 'From Venus With Love,' brings everything full circle, with its ethereal synths and spacey feel, leaving you with a sense of calm satisfaction. It's a heady, immersive listen that balances complexity with accessibility.

Review: Toolroom's house imprint keeps the party pumping with another diverse selection of floor-filling weapons. Grant Nelson & Mark Knight lead the charge with 'Do It Y'all', a track that's been tearing up charts and dancefloors with its raw energy and irresistible rhythm for a while now. But this sampler doesn't simply rest on its laurels; it takes us on a winding path through the multifaceted sounds of house music. The Deepshakerz & Turntables Night Fever follow up with 'Oh Phunk!', a high-energy stomper fueled by a relentless rhythm section and soulful vocal samples that hark back to the golden age of house music. Richard Earnshaw, however, opts for a different approach, reimagining Fonda Rae's classic 'Touch Me' with a touch of soulful depth and emotion. Sebb Junior closes out the sampler with 'Makes Me Feel', a track brimming with bright melodies and feel-good vibes, showcasing the playful side of house music. This sampler is a showcase for the label's dedication to quality house music that offers listeners a diverse range of beats that are both good for the dancefloor and any discerning DJs.

Review: Since parting company with collaborator and mentor Ron Trent in the mid 2000s, Anthony Nicholson has built up a vast catalogue of evocatoive, emotion-rich and spiritually enhancing deep house EPs - mostly on his own long-serving Circular Motion label. Following the delivery of his first 12-inch for the imprint in three years, 'Sound Theories', last month, Nicholson returns with two more typically atmospheric treats. He begins with 'With You I Am Born Again (Space N Tone Rework)', a typically gorgeous and tactile vocal number in which layered deep space synths and jazz-funk electronics rise above Ron Trent-esque beats and a squelchy synth bassline. Over on the flip, he provides a fine 'InstruDub' of the same track, cannily showcasing the beats, bass, chords, acid-flecked electronics and all-round stargazing positivity.

Review: A predictably strong start to 2025 from long-serving US deep house producer Anthony Nicholson, who serves up two scintillating and subtly soulful 'Sound Theories' for us to enjoy. He begins with the stretched-out beacon of positivity that is 'Moondancing (The Rejoice)', where jazzy Clavinet licks, spacey chords, colourful synth solos and sun-bright piano motifs dance atop a pleasingly loose-limbed deep house groove. Flip-side 'Echoes of Music & You' is even deeper and squelchier, albeit with the same dizzyingly high level of intricate musicality and undeniably dancefloor friendly construction. In other words, it's another excellent two-tracker from the former Ron Trent collaborator.

Review: Nightlife Unlimited was a Canadian disco project active from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, spearheaded by key members Tony Bentivegna and Johnny D'Orazio; their curious sound blent lo-fi and hi-fi, carefully construed for maximal-minimal dance floor confounding. 'Peaches & Prunes' first surfaced as a B-side on the Uniwave 'Just Be Yourself' release in 1980, and it would seem that licensing loopholes lay behind its continued bootlegging and reissuing over the years, not to mention its auspiciously magic sequencing and sound design - DJs have snaffled it up over the years for its prophesied 4x4 mixability, achieved far before "quantisation" was even thought a thing. Ron Hardy lays down a tribute, evidencing his awareness of the record's lo-fi vocal charm, though boxing and springing out the mix to lend the record a further reaching, lowly textured agape.

Review: Picture a utopian twist on Akira, and you might land close to Nick Nikolov's vision for his NKLV project. With a nod to classic house elements, like bright piano riffs, he blends in the finely detailed sound design of IDM and ambient, adding a playful, French touch-inspired groove. Tracks like 'Speak to Me' and 'No More' dive straight into expressive, textured soundscapes, while the title cut 'Inbetween' radiates with serotonin-charged energy. Mixing the quirky beats of Basement Jaxx with KiNK's raw pulse, Nikolov crafts an escape filled with soul, spontaneity and unexpected joy.

Review: This 12" is the debut vinyl release from Noisy Neighbours, a Colombian label we're told will be dedicated to showcasing top South American club music producers. Featuring the label's founder A. Naranjo, Emilio Mustafa, Donnie Cosmo and FI-LO, this inaugural EP sets a fine standard from the off by delivering four high-energy tracks. Drawing influences from 90s deep house, UKG, tech house and breakbeat, these tracks are crafted to ignite the party and offer fresh weaponry for DJs. All bases are covered along the way and we're already looking forward to the next one.

Review: Cool house music retroactors Skylax return with a fresh one from North 90, billed as 'Liverpool's (newest) electronic sensation'. Yes - stadia fill, cameras flash, and pantaloons fly all around for this latest splash-act on the global euphoric house music circuit to perform for the masses once more. A supergroup like no other, their euphoric, lo-fi-style homages - the likes of 'I'll Say Yes', 'Fantasy' and 'Baracuda' - make clever use of cetacean pads and tape-warbly lilts to evoke the more underwater corners of post-punk-into-rave, recalling the nascent revivalist stylings of Real Lies, Saint Etienne or Bicep of decadal late. Yes - ring-roads whizz by dizzily, as comedowns are borne and afterses are spent imbibing yet more copious quantities of mystery powder; all while the watery wizardries of North 90 resound on the decks.

Review: Avidya is back with a third EP to build on the head-turning success of the first two and it is another trip to the outer edges of the dancefloor. Odopt from Born Free and 777 Recordings kicks off with a snappy cut that is deceptively simple but devastatingly effective with its gurgling and acidic bass. Remotif is a fast-rising talent who impresses with the heavy techno sludge of 'HAJKSD15' and Full Circle aka Alexis Le Tan and Joakim link with Kris Baha to offer a remix that is all twitchy electrons, busted drum loops and fizzing pads before 53X's 'Simulaatio' is another brilliantly loose jumbled of wiry electronics, sci-fi effects and techno chug for a fantastic closing beatdown.

Review: After a near two-year break, the shadowy CUE Point label - an imprint based in Valencia, Spain - returns to stores. To reintroduce itself, the imprint has decided to offer-up a multi-artist EP featuring cuts from new signings, old heads and friends of the label. Pad Union kicks things off with the deep, dusty and gently jazzy 'Holodnaya Para' - all rich Rhodes chords, languid bass guitar and crunchy drum machine beats - before storied producer ScruScru joins forces with Guydee on the acid-fired, funk bass-propelled house bounce of 'Nesting Down'. Over on side T, Negroove's ghostly, slipped tech-house jam 'Smoked Jazz' (a track blessed with Villalobos-influenced percussion programming) is paired with EP highlight 'Grisha (Soe)', a chunky and organ-rich slab of peak-time tech-house by label regular Heavenchord.

Review: Volume 4 of the Make Up series is another doozy and this one brings together accomplished house heads Camille, Chez Damier, and Nico Lahs in a celebration of underground disco classic "through the lens of 60's and 70's underground comix." Similar to these rebellious reads, the tracks on this release carved their niche with purists seeking distinct and thrilling sounds. Across the double album, Camille's contributions include Mystic Pleasure's 'Back Door (Getting Down)' and Cold Fire's 'Badder Than Bad' which both bring soulful melodies and infectious rhythms, Chez Damier adds Fascination's 'Shine My Love' and Bileo's 'You Can Win' with shimmering vocals and funky basslines and together, they make for an exhilarating mix of disco brilliance.

Review: NYC-based Anthony Naples returns with his sixth long-player, serving up a ten-track dub-house trip via his own ANS Recordings. Naples leans into loose, shuffling rhythms and worn textures, drawing from the fringes of classic house, albeit filtered into its most stripped components. There's a sense of movement throughout - from the swirling low-end of 'Hi Lo' to the playful glitch of 'Bounce' and the fervent tempo of 'Night. Pulsing but unhurried, the album builds a world of soft hallucination and heads-down propulsion, rooted in the club but reaching toward astral realms. Scanners feels like a late-night drive through mist: strange, beautiful, and strangely fleeting. A subtle but absorbing record from an artist continuing to chart his own trajectory.

Review: After years spent working alongside a talented pool of jazz musicians as the Neue Grafik Ensemble, Fred N'Thepe has decided to go solo for the first time this decade. Dalston Tapes Vol 1 is, according to Rhythm Section International, a conscious attempt by the artists to return to his beat-making roots. It's an album, then, rooted in hip-hop mixtape culture, where vocal numbers featuring guest MCs sit side by side with rap-free "beats" - lusciously and impeccably crafted instrumentals in which warming bass guitar lines, deep electronic sub-bass, sparkling electronic motifs and choice samples cluster around loosely swung, MPC-driven beat patterns. It's a great collection all told, with nods towards club-ready broken beat and deep house sitting side by side with Dilla-esque workouts and references towards London's vibrant hip-hop and grime underground.

Review: Al most ten years in the making, Tom Noble's debut album is that most rare of beasts: a decidedly dusty and loose-limbed revivalist disco album that genuinely sounds like a long-lost 'private press' set from the turn of the 1980s. Noble is a renowned crate-digger, DJ and disco-boogie specialist, so it's no surprised to find that the songs and instrumentals on show, which also offer nods to jazz-funk and dancefloor soul, is exceptionally well observed and painstakingly crafted via the contributions of many guest musicians and vocalists. For proof of the set's majesty, get your ears around the celebratory and synth-speckled 'Times Are Changin', deep disco treat 'Holding On', head-nodding soul slow jam 'Diamond Eyes' and warm, heady closing cut 'Moving Away'.