DJS: MOST CHARTED - DEEP HOUSE - MOST CHARTED IN NOVEMBER 2015

Review: This year, Theo Parrish seems to be doing his best to breathe new life into the careers of broken beat-era producers and musicians. Having previously released an excellent EP from Dego and Kaidi Tatham on Sound Signature, his latest missive comes from one-time conscious hip-hop producer Ge ology and one-time go-to jazz keys-man Mark De Clive-Lowe. The latter's brilliant synthesizer and piano work is arguably the highlight of both tracks here. On the spacey, P-funk influenced space-house swing of "Moon Circuitry" he does his best impression of Herbie Hancock, while "Escape On The Lodge Freeway" boasts intricate jazz solos atop a slightly tougher, chunkier deep house groove. Both tracks are, of course, impeccable.

Review: One of the most respected producers in the underground, Anaxander, contributes two beautiful pieces of original music, and has one of them reworked by Deep House heavy hitter, the mighty Amir Alexander. Lost My Soul (in Yours) is twisted little number, with dual synth riffs echoing off each other for maximum effect. A Question About You uses jazzy chords and flutes over its undeniable bassline to retain some soulful flavoring, but Amir strips all of that away on his interpretation, preffering instead to let the acid and the warehouse vibes have their way, taking things right into a 6am rave nightmare. This is absolute must-have piece of wax!

Review: Dusty and soulful deep house jams from Richmond, Virginia's DJ Aakmael aka Greg Stewart who has actually been producing since 2004 on a variety of labels but mainly his own imprint, UnXpozd Entertainment. First track "Roses" utilises some stunning grand piano and trumpet solos as well as a sample from 'Jean" by Rod McKuen to accompany some tight rhythm patterns and rich strings. "Fourpoint-5" is classic deep house reminiscent of old Mr. Fingers, in all its emotive and melancholic glory. On the flip there's "Equinox" keeping on with a deep and soulful Detroit deep house sound that fans of Kai Alce would appreciate while "H4" ends things on truly uplifting note, with its dreamy xylophone vibes working with some more nice trumpet sounds and rich strings on a seven minute epic reminiscent of Chris Brann's Wamdue Project from way back. This is quality!

Review: The fifth release on the ever-improving Church label comes from Chaos In The CBD, a duo who switched from sweatier, bumpin' flavours to deeper, jazzier pastures via a fine recent EP on Rhythm Section International. The three tracks here are similarly blazed and musically expansive, beginning with the stargazing chords, intergalactic melodies and zippy rhythms of "Constraints of Time Travel". It's a little different to what we've come to expect, but no less thrilling. The duo cover more familiar ground with the Theo Parrish influenced bossa-house loveliness of "Phantom Melodies", and the deep, Rhodes-laden broken-house haziness of "Similar Stories".

Review: REPRESS ALERT: A fine 2015 for UntilMyHeartStops so far has seen the label usher in superb 12" releases from Zach Lubin, Arnaldo, and Duckett with the latter's pair of records a particular highlight. Label co-founder Leif is next up with Taraxacum, his second album and UMHS's debut long-player and it may be their finest work to date. Building on Dinas Oleu, his well-received 2013 debut album for Fear of Flying, the nine tracks on Taraxacum show Leif channelling all-new levels of immersion in his productions right now. Very much an album you sink into, there are still tracks on Taraxacum that will work on the dancefloor when you require something a bit hypnotic; we'd love to see a small club reacting to the startling "An Elephant Madness" for example. Great work Leif!

Review: Berlin's Alex Seidel is up next on Max Graef and Glenn Astro's new Money $ex Records and keeping on with the simply titled EP, which features five tracks fully in line with the label's aesthetic of dusty, sampled based, hip-hop derived deep house. Starting things off with the eerie soundscape of "-Encounter+" he soon launches into the usual biz you know him for, with the rusty acid workout of "Boogie Down Sessions" and the right party starter "Midnight Circle" which is reminiscent of Motor City Drum Ensemble's Raw Cuts series. Finally "W.T.T.D." presents us with yet another wacky VHS sci-fi soundscape.

Review: With 8 sell-out releases under the Contrast-Wax belt so far, the boutique label invites, Ben boe "Boe Recordings/For Those That Knoe" Label head to the family & he joins the likes of BLM, Ethyl & Flori, Gauss & Laak, With a killer 3 track EP, Hand-Stamped & Hand-Numbered in true Contrast-Wax style.
The lead of the 3 cuts, "Steel City Fly By" is built around a lo-slung bassline & subtle atmospheric pads that swell & drift in and out throughout, The B-side: what starts off with soft subtle pads & skipping hats soon rises into a bubbling acid line to compliment the latter in "Hope for Enceladus" That leave's the final cut of the EP "Byzantine Times" a laidback, groover, layered with delayed snares & synth lines make this emotive piece the perfect end to a solid 3 tracker.

Review: Fred P's Soul People Music has been diversifying more as of late, branching its sunken, moody strains of house through new talents from around the house sphere. This week we have a new artist, Jordan, who surfaces on the label's Boards edition, marking number ten in this edition of the imprint. The music from this newcomer fits in perfectly with the label's past and present output, and "DSM V" is the perfect opener to this EP - a bumping but contained house monster with subtle acid nuances and rugged beat patterns. "Mud Bells", instead, is a much moodier and sparser affair thanks to its almost total lack of beats, while "Seventeentwentyfive" marks the return to familiarly glitchy house structures on the B side. "Body, Curtain, Advance" is a gorgeous Chicago melter in the style of Brian Harden, and "What We Have Forgotten" goes into a deep, spacey trance with its broken bass drums and aqueous synths. A fitting addition to the catalogue, and an altogether great piece of seductive house music.

Review: Banoffee Pies Records launches its first white label to date, and it's a three-pronged collaboration by new and exciting faces in the scene. First up is Philou Louzolo and his excellent "Afrofuturism Dance", a solid house jerker with lively tribal influences, folloed siftly by Wendel Sield and his moodier, jazzier piece entitled "History Of Black People". On the flip, Huntleys & Palmers MMT proceeds to drop some Gipsy King house in the form of "Ton A Ton", backed by the more funky disco shades of "Pangae Flute". Nice and diverse for ya!

Review: After their contribution to "Far & Beyond" compilation, Owen Jay & Melchior Sultana get back to Deep Explorer finally with a full EP, where they combine different styles in just 4 tracks. Deep instrumental, vocals and even electro vibes.Everything under the smooth shield of the Batti Batti team. The circle is completed by the remix of "Make me feel" (the track that opened the doors of Deep Explorer to the Batti Batti family) by the legendary Mike Grant (Moods & Grooves).

Review: Ludovic Navarre aka St Germain requires no introduction, and the French house legend has literally seen and done it all ever since his first productions began to surface and influence other house artists back in the early 1990's golden era. The majority of his music has been released on F Communications, but his latest studio album drops on EMI's Parlophone sublabel. The self-titled St Germain is a proper LP, not a mere collection of house tracks put together helter-skelter. Inside, you'll hear many of Navarre's influences and inspirations, from Afro tribal melodies, to jazzy influences and even Middle-Eastern chimes. It's a house album in structure, but much more than that beneath the surface...as it always was from the legend of French dance music.

Review: Following the success of his Storm Queen project a couple of years back, Morgan Geist has kept a low profile. Having returned to action earlier in the year with the Latin freestyle-inspired Calling Card 12" under The Galleria alias, the Metro Area man veers off in another direction with the architecture-inspired Megaprojects One. Created, in his words, using "cheap little drum machines and rejected old synths", the four tracks draw on his most famous early inspirations, most notably vintage Detroit techno and early Chicago house. Of course, the curious melodies of Metro Area are still present, but the quartet of dancefloor workouts - the futurist "Clarence", quirky "The Idiot Track" and bumpin' "Trackstar" being our picks - are arguably more in keeping with his earliest, mid 1990s releases.

Review: For the best part of a decade, Fred Peterkin has impressed with his ultra-deep, soul-flecked take on deep house and techno. Here, his Soul People Music imprint gives birth to a new sub-label, Energy of Sound, with the New York producer delivering a double-pack's worth of previously unreleased cuts. Naturally, the standard is abnormally high throughout, with Peterkin variously serving up sumptuous, dreamy fare ("Down Under", the San Francisco '90s deep house revivalism of "Don't Be Afraid"), chunkier deep house rollers ("Memory P"), crunchy dub house ("Dub In The Sky"), and throbbing, tech-tinged brilliance ("Tokyo To Chiba" and the European-sounding "Sybian").

Review: New imprint Blorp is described by its' creators as an outlet for "dream music from outer space". It's a fairly accurate description, because the four tracks showcased on this first label sampler deliver spacey, Motor City-influenced deep house goodness in spades. No Moon opens proceedings with the gentle acid lines, reverb-heavy dream chords and undulating machine drums of "AoE Cutz", before Gnork doffs a cap to early '90s ambient house and intelligent techno with the luscious "Lose Control". Flip for Douala's "Untitled 1", a broken beat/ultra deep house hybrid that evokes memories of Neo Image's recent work for Pacific Rhythm, and the deep space sludge of S Channel's trippy "Polar Express Pigeon".

Review: REPRESS ALERT: Brawther and Alixkun present a collection of 15 underground Japanese house tracks from the early days of electronic dance music, back when the genre was sweeping across the globe. Ahead of a related documentary project titled 'HOUSE' in Japanese characters, the compilation is the first to showcase the works of Japanese house on an historical and global level, with classics and rare-as-a-hen's teeth tracks. Carefully selected by Brawther and his sidekick Ailxkun, this is a nectar of deep grooves and blissful melodies that form the blueprint of the Japanese House Sound. Legends like Soichi Terada, Yukihiro Fukutomi or The Ecstasy Boys are back to back with unsung hearoes like Takecha, Magic Ware or Katsumi Hidano. Aimed at the house music lover and overall music enthousiasts, this compilation is the one stop shop of all things early Japanese House, unveiling the mystery behind it all and shining a brand new light on it, dusted and remastered, for your listening pleasure.

Review: Shadeleaf Music are back in 2016 with this little house scorcher form newcomer Jonna, and it's precisely the sort of gear to wet our appetites on a Thursday morning, now anxiously counting down the clock till the weekend, and some much needed shaking. "Through The Night" moves the groove in fine style with a funky bassline and a soulful touch, but "Without Drugs" gives us our deep house fix - minus the narcs, of course - and "Music For People" drops a wet, slamming guitar bassline over distant samples and gorgeous drums. Detroit's very own Kai Alce - long-time Omar S collaborator - gives us a remix of "Through The Night", alongside KZR's own wonderful dub version. Lovely.

Review: REPRESS ALERT: Plastik People is proud to bring you a new collection of vinyl classics that takes us back to those House & Garage vibes from our most loved era, the 90's. all are rare & hard to find track compiled with love by label owner Marc Cotterell.

Review: That deep house thing between Berlin and Balearic.

Review: Al Zanders aka Lodger from Sheffield presents us with some dusty deep house on the mysterious Karakul Records. Starting off is "Slender" with its mesmerising piano solo that soon gives way to some sublime deepness for lovers and night people alike. On the flip is "I Dont Want You To Judge" which rolls deep with an infectious Rhodes and bongo workout, alongside some cheeky, cut up samples to nice effect. "Let Me Be Lonely" is deep and soulful funky house with an adequate amount of filtering to boot! This guy is definitely influenced by the likes of Andres and Rick Wilhite and we like his style!

Review: Stump Valley's Recorded At Forest Summer Camp EP, released earlier this year, was rather special - a forest-damp collection of misty-eyed deep house that impressed with its melodic freshness. Here, the Italian production outfit returns to Rush Hour's 'No Label' offshoot with more attractive, ear-pleasing fare. There's a slightly more sun-kissed feel to Magica Movida, with opener "Oceans Refuse No River" coming on like a dusty and tactile nu-disco take on the dreamy, new age influenced Mood Hut sound. There's plenty more to enjoy across the EP, with the dawn-over-the-Adriatic feel of "Sunshine Hotel" standing out.

Review: With Jonny Nash and Red Light's Tako Reyenga at the controls, this second Sombrero Galaxy release - the first for five years - was never going to be anything less than a spacey gem. That's exactly what they deliver, blending gentle but surprisingly tough drum machine rhythms with outer-space chords, lilting melodies and yearning, almost heart-aching melodies. Reyenga's Japanese roots come to the fore on "Planetary Dance", which wraps oriental synthesizer melodies around Motor City electronics, shimmering guitar passages and a metronomic groove. "The Edge of Space" is similarly inclined, with fluttering acid lines and throbbing sub-bass only serving to increase the spaced-out, Detroit-goes-deep mood.

Review: Pablo Valentino's Faces label gets 2016 off to a flyer with a rather hefty double LP compilation called Le Sampler Des Copains. Translating simply as The Friends Sampler, this ten track compilation features productions from friends old and new of the label and will appeal to anyone that likes their house deep, soulful and all about the groove. Nestled inbetween are the occasional interlude of a slower tempo that ensures the label's roots in instrumental hip hop are not forgotten. Roman Rauch, Not Danilo (Plessow?), Simbad and Valentino himself contribute tracks along the way, and S3A set the tone with the burning, insistent house business of "Boiler Lyon (The Ravist's Face)". The superbly titled "My Tax Agent Fucked It Up" from Not Danilo is the best cut here for many more reasons than the name. That bassline, pow!

Review: Boom! Super Rhythm Trax deliver the absolute freshness and quality thanks to a rare appearance from one of Chicago's fathers of house music, the legendary "Fast" Eddie Smith, who was spinning early WAREhouse cuts on radio stations like WBMX while most of us here were but a twinkle in our parents' eyes. "My Melody" is a super smooth, super soothing house cut with both piano keys and subtle bubbles of acid, whereas "Keep On Dancing" is a heavy drum machine cut complete with sirens and bursts of 303, of course. "Clap Your Hands" is another floor killer, an energetic house missile with organic DJ spin-back samples, followed by the naughtier, hip-hop driven "Hip House". Absolutely unmissable!

Review: Retro Balearic sounds delivered as tastefully as only an International Feel Record can. A collaboration between Frankfurt virtuoso Phillip Lauer and Berlin's Fabrizio Mammarella of Slow Motion. Their studio prowess is so impressive, you'd have thought this was a lost tape from 1989 that's just resurfaced. "Hype Around" is reminiscent of 808 State, its summery and anthemic and a classic take on the first wave techno sound while "Spumatix" is the kind of track you could imagine playing while Axel Foley snoops on the bad guys in Beverley Hills Cop. On the flip is the title track, it's just has that unmistakeable Lauer sound all over it, like all his Tuff City kids stuff. Finally "Emozioni Miste" gets back on that 80's soundtrack vibe using that classic xylophone preset accompanying one seriously funky synth bass.