Review: London label Fourier Transform welcome back Rekab (James Baker) and label debuter Mre for 'Ace High'. 'Armadillos' rolls up its chassis for a serious exercise in minimal weight, reconstituting tuned percussions as it trundles along, while Rekab's 'Always Having Fun' posits an ideal life-mode: a steady, direct current of enjoyment, set to hedonically calculated beats. 'Climbing High' rebates the percussions for a subtle lark's ascent in deep acid, while 'Ace' complementarily descends across cross-rhythmic breaks and harmonies.
Review: Silias Records welcomes Marko Nastic, a venerated DJ and producer from Serbia who could rightly claim to be one of his country's biggest underground electronic music exports. He brings peak time renegers here with tracks rooted in techno and tech such as 'Sour Pie' with its mechanical drum loops and rickety rhythms run through with blasts of electricity. 'Circuits' is smoother, deeper, more rounded in design and jazzy in melody. 'Que Rico Enrigo' is packed with well-designed sounds and a hint of Latin flair in the vocal sample and 'Clockworksx' shuts down with a thudding, persuasive and chunky tech sound with clattering percussion adding some texture.
Review: Owen Ni invites us on a sonic exploration with this ten-track release, a journey through the realms of ambient electronica and deep listening techno music. 'Beyond Flyhigh' sets the tone, its expansive soundscapes and hypnotic rhythms drawing the listener into a world of introspection and wonder. The Raytek remix injects a pulsating energy, transforming the original into a dancefloor-ready odyssey. Elsewhere, tracks like 'Mover' and 'Arqs2600' delve deeper into hypnotic textures and intricate sound design, creating a sonic experience that's both arrestting and thought-provoking. 'We Are Here' and 'S7lverbox' offer moments of quiet contemplation, their delicate melodies and atmospheric soundscapes inviting a sense of peace and reflection. The release closes with 'Epilog', a fitting conclusion to this immersive journey through sound and emotion, leaving the listener with a lingering sense of wonder and possibility.
Review: UK electronic innovators Orbital have been revisiting their early roots with Orbital LEDs, a limited-edition series remastering their old greats. Now fully remastered and paired with striking new artwork by Julian House, the latest drop highlights the duo's groundbreaking early sound when tracks like 'Midnight' innovated with a blend of hypnotic house rhythms and minimalist influences from Philip Glass and Wim Mertens. Also included here is 'Choice' which stands out for its anarcho-punk edge and bold vocal sampling. Paul Hartnoll has often said he aimed to inject house music with a sense of rebellion and social commentary and these reissues reaffirm Orbital's ability to do that while pushing boundaries from the start.
Review: Heady house label Courtesy Of Balance only releases music that you know will stand the test of time. It's informed by the classic schools of deepness but always with a modern touch and unique character, and next to carry that torch is Ostrich aka Nadir Agha. He's in charge of curation at Montreal's legendary Stereo Club and shows his class here with opener 'Snake Charmer' which is built on a dynamic groove foundation and embellished with wispy pads that take your mind on a wander. 'Promiscuous' is heavy, dubby house stripped back to the core essentials and perfectly executed. 'Buttered Up' is a little more mobile but embellished with nothing chords and smoky vocal soul and 'Broken Science' closes with a brilliant broken beat flourish that is full of jazzy invention.
Review: Mr Banger keeps it tight and future-facing with this new offering from Oward. The opener is the title cut and it's a non-stop sound with bumping drums and bobbling rubbery bass topped with yelping vocals and scattered percussion that makes it super lively. There's a jazzy twist to 'Jardin Secret ' with its sunny strings but the busted bass and relentlessness of the dry, crisp tech drums make it a peak time bomb. On 'La Fete Du Tunnel' things get even quicker with more metallic drums and hits, bulbous bass and a speed tech house sound sweeping you offer your feet. Last of all, 'Spirit De La Fore' is a deeper cut with well-swung drums and fist-pumping energy.
Review: Long-serving Italian producer Marco Passarani continues his newly minted Studiomaster label project with its second instalment, serving a quintet of typically floor-focused jams on 'The Temple' EP. Arguably best known for being one half of the looped-up disco duo Tiger & Woods, Passarani is also known and loved for the more techno-tilted offerings he turns out from his hometown of Rome. His latest work sits somewhere in between his two trademark sounds, starting with the throbbing sleaze of opener 'The Empty Temple', with its purposeful bass, paranoid synths and dirty vocal whispers. The fierce, snare-driven rhythms of 'Night Walker' power grubby bass and glistening synths, while the descriptively titled 'Rotten Disco' offers a brilliantly wonky glimpse of future Italo. The distorted percussion and jagged bass of 'Dirty Hands' are aimed squarely at the floor, while the storming closer 'Cheater's Smile' bangs as hard as nails to complete a suitably stirring and tightly produced set.
Review: 'Let Me Go' is the debut EP from Italian duo Pathagonia, which is made up of Noha and Alex Tea. They are a pair of minimalists who craft sounds for the late-night hours, starting with the title cut. 'Let Me Go' has warm solar winds blowing over the kinetic, crispy drums so makes for a nice soulful sound while 'Swirl' is heavier. The dub quotient is upped, the chords rattle and there's a heads down feel to the way things move onwards. 'Atomic' takes another tack - it's more sparse, airy and shady with whimsical synths doing a nimble dance over tight, loopy drums. Last but not least, 'Boys Can Cry' is a turbocharged but serene tech house wafter. All four are well designed and sure to appeal to real heads.
Review: Neoclassic acid-from-garage movements from Peter Reilley aka. Persian, a favourite of the UK dance music scene since as long as anyone can remember. For 20 years, Reilly has gone his own way, operating in and on genre after genre, up-peggable as he is adept, blending breaks, digidub, electro, garage, house, and jungle across a repertoire of no less than 50 EPs. Though this release serves as his farewell, as Reilly formally steps back from music production, it beautifully showcases his skill in programming, with 'Questions 2' proving a sleight hand for twinging post-funk leads, and 'Questions 7' bringing unprecedented sci-fi desolations to an erstwhile jam-funky tune collection.
Review: Exarde Records welcome a new pair of engineered shock troops from The Netherlands: pH Project. Many a year spent raving and partystarting informed the basis of this turbulent affair in acid and psych-prog house, which consists in the murmurous 'Obvitrip' and the interstatic 'Intersafe' on the A1, tracks which complement each other's twin fluencies in both the downtrodden and the upbeat. 'Kres' completes the trifecta with a third round in the ring of squelchy, functional festi-house, while Levat's version of 'Thritrakk' casts any predilection or expectation aside with a cascadingly tense electro recto on the B2.
Maybe It Was A Dream (Mihai Popoviciu remix) (7:07)
YEAH (6:11)
Review: The Montreal-based boutique label, Aissa Records, a vinyl-only sub-imprint of Suleiman Records, continues to carve out a niche for sophisticated, nuanced techno with this new one from Pheek. 'Maybe It Was A Dream' merges ambient textures with crisp minimal techno that is dreamy and hypnotic. 'Goldfish Memory' is a track that feels both meditative and kinetic so is perfect for deep listening or late-night sets. On the flip, Mihai Popoviciu delivers a tight, club-ready remix that adds punch without losing the original's subtlety and lastly, 'YEAH' is a dubbed out and reverb-rich roller with abstract sonic details keeping the mind as busy as the body.
Review: Described as "the home of unnamed beats", North Macedonia label Pirka stand out as among the few to do it in their home locale of Skopje. On their fourth release, we've a new release from fresh but soon-to-stick producer PVC, who throws three new ones at the wall on an adhesive 12", and all them happen to stick. 'Door', 'Cocai' and 'Mode Dubs' chart a slow movement from functional to textural, stimulating every kind of floor-going soma out there, from thrill-seekingly impulsive through to the restrained and cerebral.
Review: Romanian artist Mihai Pol has the honour of serving up the first outing on Griffith and brings his signature atmospheric minimalism to the fore. His sound is both organic and immersive as evidenced by 'Nineteen' with its silky synth tones and wavy, stripped-back tech beats. It has a cheeky character that is replaced by a more dreamy and whimsical feeling in 'Lazer' which has soft harmonies and bubbly pads soothing the drums. 'Little Bit' gets more gritty with a kinetic kick and hit combo and percolating bass that gets more loose and acid-tinged as it unfolds. Last of all, 'Electric Night' shuts down with classy chords from dub techno, rippling melodies that melt off to the horizon and a heady vibe that gets you thinking.
Review: DBH welcome Mihai Popoviciu & David Delgado the the Pleasure Zone series with the 'Evolution' EP. Bringing jazzy, sloshy, jerking flavours to the tech house palette, 'Evolution' and 'Shifting' evolve and shift, convoking a delegated moot of propulsive chords and forward-driving janks, conveying the mood of a finely tuned closed clockwork system chugging away like the central engine of a wider contraption. Closer 'Black Light' operates more readily in the lower regions of things, proving unafraid of sounds that lean towards the more peripheral and umbral.
Review: Russia's Moonrover Records triple up as a vinyl, digital music and podcasting platform, exploring the outer spatial limits of our shared cosmotic consciousness through sublime, interstellar minimal tech house. Here Stanislav Gontar aka. PRT Stacho crosses the event horizon, as 'Time' and 'Sputnik' offer flux-continual swells between otherwise calculated and regrounded beats. It's like gazing out the satellite window, as warp-drive thrusters on the hull's flanks illume junky space debris as it whizzes past.
Review: Burnski's Constant Sound is back with more badman garage madness and this time it is Dennis Quinn in charge. 'Good Stuff' opens up with mad raw beats and menacing low ends, then 'Damage' picks up the pace with a mix of sleazy vocal samples and metallic hits. 'Sweatshop is a bumpy house cut with long-legged drums and swirling pads that bring the feel good vibes and 'Major Minority' shuts down with a more late-night sound, intriguing melodies and thudding kicks that you will not be able to ignore.
Review: Rayonas is both an artist and a record label founded in 2021 that has dealt in some smart underground house sounds. This new one from the imprint begins a sub-series called Speedy House that is about, well, speedy. 'Things As They Are' pairs pensive ambient piano and a recognisable melodic motif with thumping and driving drums. It works well, frankly. 'Liquid' is another chunky, pacey house thumper with 'Labas Rytas ' then veering more into uptempo, funky techno that never quits. 'Laser Tag' has a loopy, underlapping bassline and gloppy pads and 'Dreaming' shuts down with a richer array of non-melodic colours for peak time trips.
Review: RDS's latest for Jamming Is Life captures the essence of imperfection with raw, vintage machinery. The EP opens with 'Creek,' a deep acid-driven track that teases and builds, offering a mesmerizing, hypnotic rhythm. It's an immediate dancefloor mover, full of controlled chaos and shifting tension. Next, 'Chronicles' pulls us into darker, more mysterious territory. With tech-heavy beats and a tight, swirling atmosphere, it walks the line between groove and unpredictability. The driving rhythm never quite reveals its destination, keeping things fresh and engaging. On the B-side, 'Slappy Whappy Dub' stands out with its tribal, proggy undertones. The track builds slowly, adding layers of tension with each beat. Finally, 'Synergy-Lo' rounds things off with a subtle, trancy techno cut, bringing a satisfying, smooth close to a release built on unpredictability and rhythmic mastery.
Review: Italian artist Recut is back with a new four-track outing that comes steeped in the lovably mad energy of acid, the enduring rawness of the Chicago underground and the drum sounds of New York. He has been active since the 90s so has a great through-line to these foundational styles but makes them his own here. Interestingly he started producing with turntables and mixers after being inspired by DMC champion so brings a real live feel to his sounds. 'Narcotic Tango' is a full-throttle pumper, 'Acid Street' layers undulating 303 lines into silky and elastic drums and 'Jack O Acid' gets more intense and in your face. 'Feel The Heat' shuts down with some trippy synth colours.
Review: Rick 8 is the techno alias of Italy's Riccardo Falsini, and here he revives the pioneering spirit of his iconic Interactive Test label with this early gem, which offers an essential slice of trance, techno and progressive house history. Known for reshaping genre boundaries, the label was a beacon of innovation, as this EP shows. Each track is a potent club tool, designed for transcendental dancefloor moments and sonic ascension from the chunky tribalism of 'Hypernotes Velocity' to the standout remix of 'C'Mon' by Sound Metaphors affiliate Trent, who injects progressive firepower. 'Born To Sinthetize' is a deeper, spiritual sound with flashy synth work married to loose drum loops.
Review: Detroit-raised, London-based Demi Riquisimo assembles a dynamic mix of label favourites and fresh talent on Love State, the 22nd release from his Semi Delicious imprint. This six-track V/A hears offerings from Demi himself alongside Clint, Swoose, Lulah Francs, Dukwa, Anastasia Zem & Asa Tate, blending club modernity with classic analogue dance influences, sampling every sonic cate from Italo to tech house. Best among the bunch has to be Swoose's 'Re/Vision' and Anastasia Zems' 'Eternal Beauty', which bring together wasted electro, Italian new beat and trance for well-measured tinctures of dreaminess.
Review: With over 25 years in the game and a legacy as one half of the revered German electronic duo Wighnomy Brothers, this veteran artist shows no signs of slowing down. His latest EP delivers a slick blend of minimal and tech house flavors with undeniable character. 'Frandga' kicks off with a sultry vocal performance by Delhia, layered over a groovy, addictive minimal tech foundation i funky, hypnoti, and impossible to resist. 'Wortkabular' follows with a more stripped-back micro-tech approach, sharp and precise yet full of subtle movement. On Side-B, 'Beatkutter' flips the energy into a playful, techy party stormer, driven by a nasty, elastic bassline that's pure dancefloor mischief. 'Kopfnikker' closes things out with a surprising twist i a broken IDM-inspired rhythm paired with unique melodic touches, offering a textured and thoughtful finish. This EP proves why his influence still runs deep, blending masterful technique with a fresh, free-spirited edge.
Review: Deep house fans can rarely go wrong with the work of Praising mainstay Frank Rodger. He's on a good run of late and now he keeps the going with a return to Seasons Limited that again taps into his signature and timeless sound. A side 'Deep Squares' is one of those long and winding sounds that slowly but surely seduces you and sinks you into its deep, evocative groves. 'Sandton Skys' then brings heavy kicks and subtle pad work while rickety percussion brings off-balance goodness. The highlight might well come last with 'Come Together', which is playful and louche, smartly sampled and underpinned by a dusty deep house vibe.
Review: Franck Roger recently impressed with a vocal project alongside Arnold Jarvis and is now back on Seasons Limited with some of his signature house depths. Opener 'Don't Look Down' kicks off with louche, lovely drums and swirling pads and vocals that soon melt the heart. 'That's Alright' is a more thumping kick but is no less heartfelt with its warped bass and prickly hi-hats. 'Proscription' closes out with smooth, serene grooves that have your head in the stars and your heart locked into the romantic melodies. .
Review: Seasons Limited made a welcome return in 2024 and now keeps up that good momentum with another big single from French house mainstay Franck Roger with some fine vocals by Paul B. It's a super smooth sound with drum swaying back and forth, molten synth adding late night and tissue soul and the tender vocal adding intimacy and late night romance. Rocco Rodamaal steps up for remixes and first of all he pairs things back to a sedate, seductive deep house roll then fleshes out the drums with some dubby weight to finish.!
Review: Ryan Sadorus joins forces with vocalist Simon Black to craft a track that distills the essence of Detroit house into a modern, infectious groove. The production pulses with a deep, steady rhythm that evokes the city's legacy of soul-tinged, dancefloor-driven sound, adding a fresh sense of clarity and precision. There's a tension between the track's smooth, forward-moving momentum and the rawness of its elements that capture the city's spirit of innovation within the confines of a familiar, yet evolving, form. Sadorus's blend of modern sensibilities with classic Detroit influences makes this track feel both fresh and timeless. The accompanying remix from Delano Smith further enhances the original, adding his signature deep, rolling style. Smith's version takes the track in a more expansive direction, with subtle intricacies and a hypnotic build that brings an even greater sense of tension and release. His seasoned approach to Detroit house transforms 'Hot in the D' into something even more immersive, ensuring the track will continue to dominate dancefloors globally. It's a perfect example of how the city's legacy lives on through its new wave of artists and producers.
Review: ?aru is a non-profit label from Romania that sits at the sharp edge of the minimal underground. This new double pack of striped back tech gems will see all proceeds donated to dog shelters and NGOs supporting stray pups. Sensek opens with a slithering and groaning groove, 'Machine Morality,' for shadowy afterparties and Gringow brings a haunting melody to 'Towards The Dark & Cold.' Broascka's 'Epitelius' is an abstract affair with microscopic details scattered over a deep, dubby grove and Dragomir closes with two cuts - 'Alone With You' is a woozy late-night roller and 'Illusions feat Adina Oros' is a blissed out downtempo sound for the post-club hours.
Review: Houston's Seven Davis Jr continues his musical explorations via his Secret Angles imprint, serving three floor-focused cuts on 'Is This The Apocalypse'. The long-serving US producer, vocalist and DJ is unafraid of experimentation, and his latest offering delivers a set of forward-facing house and techno hybrids. Stripped, straight to the point, simultaneously familiar and fresh i the club room is very much the focus here. The energetic opener 'I Should Be In Japan' arrives with semi-sung vocals echoing over sleazy bass and fierce four-four rhythms, before 'PBS (Party & Bullshit)' ups the tempo with jacking drums driving spoken-word sass over a stripped-back topography. Finally, the title track powers over swung house drums, with its magnetic bass hook and looped samples providing the bed for paranoid bleeps and call-to-action vocals.
Review: Silat Beksi hails from Ukraine and has been serving up finely tuned minimal grooves for some time. This outing takes him to the young Duboka label for a trio of deft, lithe, sinewy sounds. 'Recognition' kicks off with a weighty and dubbed out low end but plenty of drive in the silky pads that loop in colourful patterns. It's a graceful groove which leads into the more lumpy and bubbly dub-tech of 'Sparkling Mouth', a Melchior Productions adjacent sound that is seductively smooth. 'Speak In A Whisper' gets more bitty and abstract with late-night afterparty energy and vinyl crackling bringing it to life. Fedo remixes it with more direct drum funk.
Review: German label Telum's sister label Aurum marks a return to wrecker rekids with another light-set payload, this time enlisting the aid of the talented Silat Beksi for chapter five in the so-named series. Through hypnotic, minimal grooves, deeper-shades bass and a life-before-your-eyes nostalgia - going heavy on the filtered samples on the likes of 'Sefirot' and 'Dao' - Beksi reproves those who'd doubt his craftmanship, submitting to the ancient way of the tao.
It's A Flesh Wound (Christopher Ledger remix) (7:35)
Review: Dubliner Noah Skelton brings a deep four-track helter-skelter to Zingiber Audio, topping up a well-travelled catalogue whose earprints are borne in the discographies of Amour, Daydream and Mayak. 'Formentario' and 'Pacer' deepen our hearts with fulsome beats n' bass, carefully constructed to manifest in the listener a looser, undammed destiny. 'It's A Flesh Wound', meanwhile, subtly balances emo-breaks and curious acid jazz, with a popout FM and dancing piano plinks proving particularly pacific, not least when set against *those* chords.
Review: Cracking the back window open, Sleep D aerate our inner herbaria with a gas exchange in progressive techno, letting us in again on their outdoorsy brand of photosynthetic dance music. Always deepeneing their connection to the natural world, the EP opens with 'Green Thumbs' before vine-whipping us into the curious perks of 'Mountain Ash'; both nail a blithe, fairylike spirit, and the flushed-out, unencumbered feel of braving a hike after a cucumber face mask. 'Acheron Cauldron' carries the listener to a volcanic peak, where relentless kick and pulsating bassline brings us to seismic climax, leaving only eerie whispers. Closer 'Magma Flow', finally, is a trance-inducing finale hearing a slowed but thicketed texture, as brambles and stamens cloud our vision of a synth aurora.
Review: Chicago born, Detroit-raised Delano Smith is one of the foundational artists of the contemporary house scenes. In 2023, he revealed he was suffering with a rare form of cancer but as this new EP title suggests, he is still here and still crafting high-grade sounds. 'When I Was Young' kicks off with his signature smoky drum loops and train travel sense of hypnosis. 'The Rush' is another heads down jam, this time marbled with eerie pads and wet clicks and claps that oil the groove while 'Rewired' shuts down with real late night delicacy and evocative minimalism.
Review: Lisbon's Hubble Recordings present their sixth release so far, keeping firm to their artist-specific EPs approach following brilliant releases from Kaesar, Costin RP, Miroloja, Octave and Alex Pervukhin. The latest is from tech house hurler Sublee aka Stefan Nicu, whose flight-booking impulse is as strong as ever, here having stopped over from far-flung Romania. After a string of both digital and vinyl stopovers, 'Personal Universal' appears as the pendular follow-up to 2024's Rawax debut 'Simple Two', bringing hugely doubled vocal cantata to a fervent acid build on the title track, while ensuers 'Simple One' and 'Laculesdesample' bring fidgety synth double bass and unorthodox percussions. A personal universe we'd never want to leave!
Review: Swayzak is a micro house, minimal and techno duo, aka James S Taylor and David Brown from the UK, whose name alone will get many older dancers hot under the collar. Their craft was second to none during their peak and here we get a reminder of that with a new outing on Rawax. 'Floyd' is a jazzy dancer with live claps, spinning hi-hats and louche grooves all topped with synthetic synths that never quit. 'Doobie' is a more deep sound with late-night headsy vibes. The drums are supple, the synths squeal and spoken word mutterings add a human touch. Two well-realised and effective cuts from Swayzak.
Review: First released in 1999, Swayzak's 'Floyd/Doobie' shook the British duo's catalogue. Though it wasn't 'Bueno' or 'Fukumachi', this deep house cut was the next best choice for followers of the then burgeoning tech house circuit. Swayzak were already favourites on this and the deep house scene, and had clawed in acclaim for their involvement in both as early as 1993. One particularly prolix bio deems them the incipients of "1st wave 2000-era progressive deep minimal", which is too analytic even for us manic categorisers. No, we prefer to take these two big-hitters as they are: brimming with enthusiasm for a gadget-packed future, 'Floyd' fizzes and twitches with the pulsing blurts of a saw synth, as if to suggest constant magnetic stimulation from above. 'Doobie', meanwhile, hears our protagonist disrobe the techno utility belt, returning to a wireless home, so to gaze out over a subtly detuned chord landscape set to munching percs.
Review: After a years' hiatus, we're hit round the face with the return of Germany's Telum, as though a repressed memory had come back to haunt us. Making up chapter 13 in the Telum story, this big-hitter record compiles three unknown authorial knowns onto a bite-sized but palette-testing green label. 'Track 1' riffles away with its high-fantasy sound design, while 'Track 2' hurtles through implacable FM harmonics, and 'Track 3' mobilises the very same set of sounds for a brilliantly breathable, nocturnal knee-nudger.
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