Subb An

Review: With such a heavyweight trio of tech-house talents involved, you'd expect this surprise studio hook-up between Enzo Siragusa, Archie Hamilton and Subb-An to be rather good. Predictably, both tracks hit the spot. A-side "Playdem" hits all the right notes, with the experienced threesome wrapping creepy chords, jaunty piano motifs and carefully chosen spoken word snippets around a fireside-warm bassline and snappy, handclap-heavy machine drums. The fun continues on flipside "Shimmering", a ludicrously loose and bass-heavy roller blessed with deep and trippy electronics and just the right of late night funk. Really, though, it's the weightiness of the sub-bass that hits home hardest.

Review: Given the amount of labels he's appeared on over the years, it's something of a surprise to find that this is Subb An's first outing on INFUSE. As usual, the experienced tech-house producer delivers the goods, beginning with the undulating, bass-heavy late night hustle of funk-fuelled A-side "Future-Wise". While it's little more than a killer, bassline-driven groove with a few tweaked acid lines and strange effects now and then, there's no denying the track's dancefloor chops. He continues on a similar theme on "111", wrapping watery riffs and spacey electronic motifs around a locked-in rhythm and booming bassline, while "Move (5Am Dub)" is a similarly trippy and hypnotic affair tailor-made for early morning sets.

Review: Diego Krause seems to have been doing a tour of European studios throughout 2017. This three-track hook-up with prolific producer Subb-An is his second collaborative release of the year. Interestingly, all three tracks put bold, bustling and occasionally bass-heavy percussion to the fore. This is particularly noticeable on booming opener "Atlantic 1", whose weighty kicks, snares and drum machine cymbals are accompanied by a sizeable bassline and druggy aural textures. There's a looser and jazzier feel to "Atlantis 2", where jaunty stabs dance around a swinging late night backing track, while "Atlantis 3" is a more traditional tech-house take on the same theme.

Review: Berlin's Beste Modus is run by local stalwarts Cinthie, Diego Krause, Ed Herbst, stevn.aint.leavn & Albert Vogt. For the third edition of Beste Freunde, they have onboard some of the biggest names in tech house at present and they're all throwing down some wicked grooves. On the A side Birmingham's Subb-An gives us the raw, stripped and jacking "Feel For You" which beats that 808 good and hard with some familiar samples over the top. Next, the stripped dub techno of Walker's "Confessions" lends some variety to the release; fans of the Fachwerk sound will dig this one. On the flip, London's The Willers Brother gives us the rolling and minimal deep house of "Can You Get Up?" which is perfect for afterhours hypnotism and finally back into the jackin' house side of things courtesy of Frenchman Julien Sandre with tough yet sexy groove of "Ordinary Madness"