Harthouse Germany レコード& CD

Review: Fresh off the acclaimed reissue of his Feuerfalter LP in both parts on Harthouse last year, the legendary Frankfurt label presents another reissue of a classic LP by hi-tech minimalism engineer Boris Brejcha. Die Maschinen Kontrollieren Uns ("The Machines Are Controlling Us"). was the Frankenthal native's second album released in 2007, where the masked crusader presented a whopping sixteen tracks. A true zeitgeist of a golden era in minimal techno, tracks like 'Brainstopper' with its atonal assortment of blips and bleeps underpinned by clipped rhythms will really take you back to the old says, as will the glitchy micro-funk of "Die Maschinen sind Gestrandet" (Second Edition) or the deep tech house of "Wellenreiter (2.0)" could have been played aboard a Sunday boat party along the River Main circa 2008.

Review: By the time they released Raumgleiter in 1998, Der Dritte Raum were already legends of the German techno-trance scene. This all-time classic album from the breakthrough years of the sound also saw the project move to a major label - Virgin - but now it's being brought back home to Harthouse, the iconic Frankfurt imprint which first nurtured the sound. The scope of the album is wide and playful, teasing ear catching synth lines which keep the mood fun and freaky, not least on the likes of 'Bedruck', while there's an epic tone to standout trance monster 'Hale Bopp' thanks to the cascading arps and relentless forwards thrust. Of its time but wholly relevant in the current zeitgeist, this is the kind of 90s techno reissue that makes perfect sense.