DR PACKER Vinyl & CDs

Review: So far in his career, Dr Packer has mostly delivered remixes and re-edits, breathing new life into disco classics old and new. Here he tries something new, namely covering Candi Staton's 'You've Got The Love' - a track that famously became a hit via a bootleg remix that added her vocals to a house track based on Frankie Knuckles' 'Your Love'. Packer's version is an organic-sounding disco treat - all rubbery bass guitar, cut-glass strings and rolling drums - that sneakily replicates the breakdown from a classic electrofunk number midway through. The Aussie producer also delivers instrumental and acapella versions, while rising star St Croix re-imagines it as a rushing, bouncy, mid-90s style piano house anthem. A summer hit and then some.

Review: It's a while since we heard something brand new from Dr Packer, whose specialism in recent years has been breathing new life into disco cuts old and new. 'Get Some Soul' does naturally feature a few samples from old soul and disco cuts, but at its heart the track is a gloriously summery and funky classic house cut laden with squelchy synths, cut-glass strings, mazy organ solos, excellent disco-house drums and tons of additional percussion. Over on the flip, the Cut & Strig Mix takes the track in a more peak-time house direction, with filtered piano-house riffs, rumbling bass and colourful deep house chords catching the ear.

Review: Next up on the Fool's Paradise vinyl sampler is a four-tracker of glitzy and emphatic proportions. Vol. 3 opens with Dr. Packer and Elektrik Disko's 'My Lovin', which vexes us of our infidelities in the promise of being lent "all our love tonight", a vocal motif that swirls endlessly around its discoic mix. Mattei and Omich follow up with exactly the same theme, though it would seem that the former promise has been foreclosed upon, since the central vox is now asking the listener to "just give me your love", with an added dash of urgency to boot, and not the other way round. The B-side, not purely coincidentally, we think, dominated by the producer known as Re-tide, moves much more profligately, abandoning much of the A-side's glamour for the more immediate appetites that drive, but do not temper, disco's soul.

Review: Defected's disco-minded Glitterbox offshoot has decided to dip a toe into the choppy waters (sorry) of the re-edit scene. The man at the control is fun-time rework specialist Dr Packer, an Australian scalpel specialist who has spent the last few years contributing tidy edits to a variety of well-regarded labels. First, he adds a little late '80s house shuffle to a soul-fired, boogie-era disco classic, before turning the equally familiar "Still in Love" into a bouncy, club-ready chunk of disco-house full of swirling strings and Chic-style guitars. On the flip the good doctor gets his hands a much-sampled electrofunk workout, retaining the drum delays while adding a touch of nu-disco swagger, before brilliantly dubbing out and tooling up the synth-heavy swagger of 1985 hit "I'll Be Good".

Review: UK disco sensation Glitterbox light the touch paper on another fizzy summer with four gossamer smooth edits of four seminal house classics. Gliding us through time to soulful house's golden era with a sassy, loose groove shine to each edit; Soulsearcher's 96 anthem "Can't Get Enough!" gets respectfully plumped, Shapeshifter's 2003 sing-along bomb "Lola's Theme" is stripped back to a stark funk groove while Johnny Corporate's 2000 hit "Sunday Shoutin'" gets flipped into slinky bassline wriggler. Finally one of the best covers Stevie Wonder has ever had gets a luxurious rub down as Cleptomaniacs' 2000 swoon-fest enjoys the full Packer treatment. Summer starts here.