Numbers

Review: Italian techno demi-god Lory D returns with the third instalment of the Strange Days series for Glasgow's Numbers! This guy is simply unstoppable and it's simply incredible to hear how he has managed to keep his sound so damn contemporary over the years. Oh, and it's rumoured that he used to be one of Aphex Twin's favourite techno artists back in the day! "Gm-HF" is a heads-down kinda nodder, packing a humongous bassline for the peak time floor, while "Acidspix", as the name suggests, is a beautifully odd 303 jam with enough stability to make it a perfectly usable dancefloor weapon. What more can we say? It's totally unmissable and warmly recommended.

Review: Have a word! Rustie's added a wily, technicolour body-slamming recipe to the trap cookbook. The result? A full-throttle audio rainbow but instead of a pot of gold sitting pretty at the end, there's massive bucket of bass. Heaviness doesn't begin to describe its visceral nature. "Slasherr", meanwhile, sees more classic Rustie theatrics - all halfstep and warped and twisted, as its title suggests, it will indeed tear your floor apart.

Review: Whilst Bipp has arrived out of nowhere, the fact vaguely mysterious UK producer Sophie is releasing on Glaswegian label Numbers should not come as a surprise. Numbers figurehead Jackmaster has been a fan of Sophie's music for a while, caning that Auntie Flo remix from last year and providing an official dub version Sophie's ubiquitous Huntleys & Palmers release "Nothing More To Say". With a clear mastery of dancefloor sounds filled with vivid colour, Sophie's Numbers debut makes even more sense given the label's last hyperactive release from Rustie. Lead track "Bipp" sounds like 90s diva house mangled and applied to a trap template, whilst "Elle" swings with a drunken sizzurp swagger.

Review: Proving that a track doesn't have to be lengthy and laborious experience, SOPHIE comes bowling up to Numbers with a second dose of rapid fire neon-lit madness to get heads a-spinning while marking another step towards a full-blown J-pop-meets-electronica zeitgeist. As singular as his approach is, you can hear how the beats powering SOPHIE's tracks reach out to bass weight ravers and teeny boppers alike. "Lemonade" is positively cheeky in its deployment of catchy hooks, garish choruses and occasional bursts of monstrous bass, sounding utterly futuristic in its vision of where chart-minded dance music might well head. "Hard" takes a more obtuse approach that actually seems to distil some of Plaid's starry-eyed melodic wonder and Aphex Twin's Drukqs-era sound design, while the lyrics nod to S&M in the most sinisterly cartoonish way possible. As such, it's a triumphant collision of styles and ideas.