Various – Work It Baby 10th Anniversary review

Artist: Various
Title: Work It Baby 10th Anniversary
Label: Work It Baby France
Genre: Funky House/Vocal House/Disco House/Soulful House
Format: CD, Digital
Buy From: Juno Records, Juno Download

Kris Menace has been a busy man. Last year’s efforts saw him stride past other stalwarts of the ‘French touch’ community. From turning out a batch of massive remixes (his euphoric space disco twist on Moby’s “Ooh Yeah” was particularly memorable) for everyone under the sun, delivering a mighty big-room WTF to his critics with the Scaler EP to releasing his own three CD retrospective compilation “Idiosyncracies”. All are apt reminders of why he’s been kicking-ass and chewing gum for so long. Makes you wonder why everyone paid so much attention to that Lifelike bro for a while.

In between dominating the house scene with his own productions, Menace finds the time to run two record labels; Compuphonic (for his own releases) and Work It Baby for developing new acts. Specialising in all things French and housey, Work It Baby has been dropping smooth, sidechained fire from the likes of Falke, Patrick Alavi and Serge Santiago for 10 years. So why not release a gratuitously awesome birthday compilation to remind the kiddies who’s boss.

Alongside big ticket tunes such as Alavi’s “Power” and Moonbootica’s “Strobelight” you’ll find a swag of unreleased and exclusive tunes from Menace, Falke, Xinobi, Jaunt/Vincent Fries and Charlie Fanclub. Princess Superstar steps in to contribute an exclusive vocal version of Serge Santiago’s “Trilogyyy” jam, “Apocalypse Rock”.

Work It Baby’s back catalogue is fully accounted for, making this an invaluable purchase for any house aficionado, it’s an instant injection of classic, disco-tinged french house and more modern ‘French touch’ house plus the odd electro-banger. Out of the bonus tracks, it’s great to see Charlie Fanclub blazing back to form with “The Rise Of The Colleseus”. The other various exclusives from Menace, Savage and Falke are a welcome nod to classic days of nu-disco and filter house, a sound that’s just as relevant today as it was last year. And the year before that. And the year before that…

Review: Duncan Byrne