Peter Seiler - "Timebend" (feat Sheryl Hackett) (4:32)
Eoism - "Ultraverse" (5:00)
Voertuig - "Cego" (5:19)
Voertuig - "808 Ambient Jazz" (3:45)
Eoism - "Even Flow" (5:45)
Review: Colkin from Raw Soul and Mauke Club sets the tone on this new FUTUR compilation, which has been curated by Benedikt Meger with a spherical acid house meditation. Peter Seiler's track, a standout from the reissue of his debut album Flying Frames, features Sheryl Hackett's soulful vocals and merges song structure with jazz improvisation. Eoism from Pulse Drift, Undersound, and Inch By Inch delivers low-swung electro flavours perfect for sunset vibes while the B-side opens with Voertuig of Tonal Oceans and Cobra Club who presents a seriously raw acid jam followed by an experimental, jazzy piece, reminiscent of the 90s downtempo era. 'Eoism' closes things with a floating, futuristic banger, going to make a well rounded (in more ways than one) and ultimately very useful piece of vinyl.
Review: 'Suite For Chick' is a heartfelt tribute to the late jazz legend Chick Corea. This 12" was assembled to reimagine classics like 'City Gate, Rumble,' 'Time Track,' 'Hymn of the Heart' and Return to Forever's 'Romantic Warrior.' It finds Bangkok-based Maarten Goetheer collaborating with Thailand's jazz virtuoso Pong Nakornchai and blending Wurlitzer chords, Moog basslines, ARP leads and Rhodes phasings. Inspired by his jazz-pianist father, Maarten fuses classic jazz with modern genres like techno, cosmic disco and ambient for a fresh take on jazz fusion. These electrifying interpretations honour Corea's pioneering legacy in jazz and fusion from his groundbreaking work with Miles Davis to founding Return to Forever.
Review: The Fourier Transform label outlay an arresting sonic journey on their debut release, bringing together breakbeat, ambient IDM, ambient techno, and prog house under a single banner. Opening with Inkipak's 'Betwixt', we're met with sonorous low-mid square waves and machine-gun-fire breaks, recalling the breathtaking, verging on apocalyptic expanse of a warehouse rave turned laser light show turned warzone. We break from this warring weir with 'Omnicron Acid' and 'City Of Tomorrow' by Gimmik and Brian Kage respectively, which lowers the intensity and sonic flow via spacious atmospheres and dudding percussive pops. Finally, the perfect fusion of the former two moods is achieved on 'Corrosive Tongue', the lead synth on which sounds like just that.
Review: Pawsa has a reputation for delivering perfect party-starting music, often via funky, sub-heavy takes on tech-house. Who better, then, to remix The Adventires of Stevie V's infectious 1989 anthem 'Dirty Cash' - arguably, Jungle Brothers' 'I'll House You' aside, the most famous hip-house record of all time. Pawsa's 'Extended Mix' (side A) retains the warehouse-ready vibe of the original, placing the vocals, stabs and some wiggly new acid lines atop a squelchy TB-303 bassline and pumping house beats. Over on the B-side there's another chance to savour David Morales' 'Sold Out' mix, a slower, deeper, dreamier and lightly breakbeat driven interpretation that naturally earned plenty of plays when it was first released way back in 1990.
Review: Pawsa and Adventures of Stevie V breathe new life into an iconic dance classic with an exhilarating update, a gesture of Pawsa's innovative production skills adding a fresh dimension to Adventures of Stevie V's timeless vocals. The 'Extended Mix' is a pulsating journey through house music's vibrant landscape, capturing the raw energy of the original while injecting a contemporary twist. On the flip, David Morales delivers a masterful remix, his 'Sold Out Mix' taking the track into deeper, more soulful territory. A real double-sided gem.
Review: Star Creature is very much leading from the front right now if you like cosmic disco. Tim Zawada's label is back with another delicious dose of the stuff here as Plastic Bamboo heads out on a crime jazz exploration of the outer reaches of our galaxy. His lithe beats and rugged drums are laced up with marvellous synths that are ever on the move. They shine bright and bring real sugary rushes of joy as curious narratives and intergalactic intrigue come thick and fast. Amongst the big bright cuts are some more mellow moments like the wonderful 'A Scene At The Sea' with its hints of Afro percussion. Delightful.
Souled Out (Joe Claussell The Cosmic Arts interpretation mix) (8:10)
Souled Out (Joe Claussell Joaquin Sacred Rhythm version) (13:59)
Souled Out (Joe Claussell Joaquin Deep version FNL) (8:20)
Feed The Fire (Atjazz remix) (5:28)
Feed The Fire (Musclecars Dream dub) (9:05)
Review: Audrey Powne's eagerly anticipated debut album already had us all 'Souled Out', and now we find ourselves served more soul food than our dharmas can handle, with this new remix bundle from Atjazz, Joe Claussell and Musclecars. First comes Claussell with three exquisite and spiritual remixes, each highlighting unique elements of Audrey's original production. Joaquin's Deep Version is quintessential Claussell, merging the bassy textures of a vintage King Tubby dub with vibrant percussion and entraining beats. The 'Sacred Rhythm Mix' is especially apical and peaktime, weaving a threnody of layers that culminate in a boogied-out crescendo. Then come two new versions of Powne's album cut 'Feed The Fire', first by jazzdance maven Atjazz, then by the New York duo Musclecars.
Matra Murena (feat Local Suicide - Rafael Cerato remix) (5:41)
Review: Plenty of dark disco's finest practitioners come together on this new 12" on Iptamenos Discos, with Psycho Weazel serving up the original tune. They are two producers from Switzerland who mix up indie-dance, cold wave, breakbeat and EBM. Here they offer 'Mains D'Argile' featuring Curses which has sweeping, widescreen synths bring a retro feel to a stiff, kinetic beat. The wonderful Marvin & Guy offer an extended mix for extra long club fun and then it is Local Suicide who guests on 'Matra Murena' which brings a perfect mix of light and dark to stark grooves, and Rafael Cerato remixes to close out the package.
Review: Ron Moreli's famously sleazy LIEs welcomes back one of its regular artists in Lipelis, this time with his TMO project alongside extra goodness from keyboardist Eugene Piankov. The pair really go for it from the off, with anthemic house stomper 'Goes D Jam' offering up squealing 303 and 909s that ring out into the cosmos over crunchy drums. '112 Bright Jam' is slower, deeper, more heartfelt with its tender piano chords and 'Goes C Jam' is an acid laced piano celebration. Last of all is '107 Dark Jam' which is a heads down stomp with acid meditations for grotty warehouse spaces at 5am.
The Wonderland Band - "Thrill Me" (Joe T Vannelli Classic mix) (5:51)
The Wonderland Band - "Thrill Me (With Your Super Love)" (8:05)
Pure Energy - "Party On" (Vannelli Bros Classic mix) (7:31)
Pure Energy - "Party On" (8:24)
Review: Use Vinyl looks back to two iconic tracks from the 70s and 80s here for source material for a new remix EP by the Vannelli family. Joe T remixes 'Thrill Me' by The Wonderland Band into the sort of direct and funky house sound that brims with early dance music charm while the Vannelli Bros offer their rework of 'Party On' by Pure Energy which comes with plenty of energy for club contexts. Both tracks are presented as Classic Mix versions and bring plenty of new life to the original hits without forgoing the timeless, catchy and meaningful melodies that define the originals. House music like this is as authentic as it gets.
Review: One of New York deep house's foremost day ones returns to the limelight with a fresh 12-track mini-album, showing the yutes how it's done with an onslaught of unlikely-sounding beats, cuts and breaks. All tracks on Hear are loose and lackadaisical, often forgoing the need so behooved by many house music producers to get the transient design - the snap of the hit, the length of the tail - just right; Joey's drums are wide and ungated, seeming to prove the point that minutiae don't tend to make a tune. It's instead the ineffable quality of "nailing the vibe", the nuts and bolts of which we can't claim to know, that convince us of Pal Joey's expertise. 'We Show Off' is the gem on this self-released album, with its dreamy, vocoded and slowed acapella, crude car-horn synths and glossed-out backing washes.
Review: Theo Parrish and Maurissa Rose are Detroit musical veterans (even though Parrish was actually born in Chicago) and they have worked together on a number of superb singles in the last few years. After that fruitful start to their working relationship they finally flourish into a new full length that arrives soon in the form of Free Myself, It arrives, as you would expect, on triple vinyl on Parrish's own Sound Signature label, but also here as a CD. It is a lovely deep house exploration with smooth vocals of Rose - which come in the form of a soulful stream of consciousness - over Parrish's dusty, hypotonic beats.
Review: Theo Parrish is giving his new album with Maurissa Rose the full treatment - serving it up on his preferred vinyl, but also as a CD and here a cassette on his own label Sound Signature. It is a complete coming together of these two revered Detroit musical talents following a string of great singles with one another since 2019. As you can expect, the grooves are dusty, complex and rooted in house but with plenty of influences from soul, funk and jazz. The vocals from Rose are as smooth as you like and take the form of soulful streams of consciousness. Utterly vital.
Meftah - "When The Sun Falls" (feat Mohammed Meftah) (7:16)
De'Sean Jones - "Psalm 23" (2:13)
Ian Fink - "Moonlight" (Duality/Detroit live version) (8:05)
KESSWA - "Chasing Delerium" (feat Nova Zaii) (3:33)
Specter - "The Upper Room" (10:23)
Raj Mahal - "Hudsons" (2:01)
Raybone Jones - "Green Funk" (6:09)
Whodat & Sophiyah E - "Don't Know" (5:25)
Howard Thomas - "Experiment 10" (4:33)
MBtheLight - "aGAIN" (T edit) (2:48)
Sterling Toles - "Janis" (4:05)
Review: Theo Parrish is a world-renowned name in the global Detroit house and techno game, and he's thrown a fascinating curveball as the latest entrant for the acclaimed DJ-Kicks series. Mr. Parrish has gone above and beyond the duties of most invitees - rather than just licensing tracks from his favourite artists and big-name-friends, he's asked his own community from Detroit to each produce their own mixable tracks, exclusively for the comp. What's more, these are hardly established names - they're organic connections to Parrish, not occupying the top layer of attention and recognition. Bits from H-Fusion, Jon Dixon, Donald Lee Roland II, Ian Fink and Raybone Jones all dominate this anarchic new deconstruction of the otherwise exclusivist mix series.
She's Bliss On The Dancefloor (feat Grant & Nata) (6:03)
Rivers (feat Jesus Gonsev) (5:04)
Dream Delivery (4:55)
Deeper Imports (4:39)
Review: Passport is the inter-Atlantic duo of George Btp Dan Piu and Roger K. Versey and their all-new album is a truly global voyage of musical adventure. Wonderful Elixir is all about seeking the deeper grooves in dance music from a range of different genres. It's a seamless fusion of jazz and acid, deep house and street beat with special appearances from DJ Nata, Jesus Gonsev, and Grant. The likes of 'Prelude Turismo 97' is a Balearic beauty, 'Oceans of Emotional Wealth' is a shimmying groove with sensuous vocals and lush keys and 'Dream Delivery' is more prickly for those late-night dances.
Methods Of Dance - "Aggravation" (instrumental) (4:09)
Claudio D'Ignoti - "Anche Per Noi" (3:19)
Jennifer - "Come Into My Life" (3:51)
Lena - "Embrasse-Moi" (instrumental) (5:11)
Fabrithia - "I Want You" (instrumental) (3:59)
Jimmy D - "Rescue Me (Imagination)" (dub version) (6:40)
Alison Sheryll - "You're Not Alone" (3:21)
Precious Child - "Come Alone" (6:22)
Review: Inspired by his neon-lit walks around London's docklands, crate digger Ilan Pdahtzur's 2019 compilation Night City Life marked him out as a dusty-fingered crate digger and record collector with a distinctive, synth-heavy musical vision. It made him the toast of the selector/collector community, but more than that it was a genuinely superb selection of obscure, hard-to-find cuts. This belated sequel is every bit as essential and filled, unsurprisingly, with rare and lesser-known gems. Highlights are too plentiful to mention, but our current favourites include Sharon & Tracey's 'The Sheik' (a belly-dancing inspired slab of TB-303 bass-driven house hedonism), Jennifer's 1992 Euro-house gem 'Come Into My Life', Scicilian musician Claudio D'Ignoti's boogie-era treat 'Ache Per Noir', and the fashion scene inspired leftfield synth-pop of Lena's 'Embrasse-Moi (Strumentale)'.
Review: A cool piece of post-Apartheid South African pop history, and a major success for the blog-turned label Awesome Tapes From Africa. Originally re-discovered by the site in 2010, it's taken the label three years to track down Penny Penny - who is now a South African politician! Unashamed early 90s dance-informed pop music with a Shangaan twist, it's a fine balance of catchy chants, warm synth work and lush female harmonies. Completely of its time... But that's the idea. Stunning.
Review: Photek's masterpiece for the new millennium Solaris catches a repress on Proper recordings. From propulsive, metro-setting opener 'Terminus' to the elegiac, trouble-in-paradise closing synth meditation 'Under The Palms ', Rupert Parkes casually shakes off all expectation with a flurry of infectious head boppers channeling everything from the fragmentary half-step of the nascent broken beat stylie- read: 'Juno' (sic), to the snarling Valve-era techstep of Dillinja and Lemon D on 'Infinity' via Larry Heard's late 90s deep lounge leanings on the peerless 'Mine To Give' (note the similarity in artwork with Heard's Genesis). Solaris is very much a product of its time, the highest praise possible given the early 00s was one of the most amoebic and fluid periods in UK dance music history. It speaks to the undying british dancefloor tendency to allide tempo and atmosphere, casually felling boundaries in genre to create something as reverential as it is innovative. Classiq.
Review: Pilgrims of the Mind is the one and only album Vancouver's Stephane Novak released. It was back in 1997 and was a CD-only issue that now makes its debut on vinyl. The record fuses pop, downtempo, prog and house in a series of silky tunes high on emotion. It is awash with classic 90s melodies that are whimsical and dreamy, carefree and magical. Each track has a real sense of musicianship and adds up to a captivating listen overall - something all too many LPs of today seems to forget to focus on. In recent years this record has started to get some of the underground recognition it deserves, and this vinyl release will only hasten that positive contemporary reassessment.
Review: Back in 2021 Adam Pits heralded the start of the On Rotation label with his own debut album, A Recurring Nature. Now he's back with a follow-up which finds him stretching out as an artist ever more - a fact which is absolutely evident from the gorgeous ambient swathes of opening track 'Lost In The Ether'. Even when the drums kick in on 'Sleepless', they're more tilted towards fragmented patterns and organic tones rather than rote drum machine sounds. There's space for peppier electronica and steppy heads-down gear, but throughout Pits imbues his sound with the richest synthesis imaginable. In that sense, you can track the path of development from his earlier work while enjoying the adventurous new terrain he's exploring as an artist.
Review: Led by Luke Solomon, The Legion of Boogie Down returns with their second album, Powerdance II, eight years after the success of their debut The Lost Art of Getting Down. Since then the collective has evolved by adding more experimental sounds to their vision of nightclub and basement music. This album continues their journey of genre-blending with the addition of Chris Penny, rising star Josh Ludlow, and original members Alinka and Lance Desardi. Featuring wild synths, drums and percussion from Holly Madge, this left-of-centre record offers a trippy mix of disco, funk and house that leads to a cosmic musical adventure in some style.
Higher Than The Sun (A Dub Symphony In Two Parts) (7:28)
Shine Like Stars (3:35)
Review: In 1991 the UK is in a very different place to the one it occupies today. One thing that hasn't changed in the 30 years between then and now, though, is how incredibly, unbelievably good Primal Scream's Screamadelica was. And still is.
It might have been the studio mastery brought to the mix by the late, great Andrew Weatherall. Perhaps it hit the nail on the head of a year when the country's rock and dance scenes finally met somewhere on the outskirts of Blackburn, or along the M25. Maybe, just maybe, it's because the tracks themselves are just great. Whatever your personal take, this album should be on everyone's shelves. From the hedonism of 'Loaded' to the pseudo-rave euphoria of 'Come Together', and the self love of 'Movin' On Up' always inspires, the record is of its time but resonates through the ages.
Review: Belgian singer and producer Bolis Pupul releases his first solo debut album 'Letter to Yu' following his smash success with fellow DEEWEE artist Charlotte Adigery 'Topical Dancer', a satirical, yet hard-hitting, exploration of spirituality, racism and identity that the two experienced in Ghent as children of immigrant families. If you're a fan of the production of songs like 'Mantra', then this project is for you. Still keeping the witty elements from 'Topical Dancer' the LP, a reference to a great emperor of Chinese history, 'Completely Half' opens up with Pupuls hallmark 80s synthpop style, partnered with the typically Belgian cerebral approach to music and allusions to his mixed-race heritage. Pupul's beats feel pensive, yet danceable and the more deep-in-thought cuts like 'Goodnight Mr Yi' benefit from they dynamic contrast with more in-your-face cuts like the blaring 'Kowloon' and its siren-like supersaws.
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