DJ 3000 releases his fourth artist album ‘Besa’ on his own Motech label. Born and raised in the Detroit enclave of Hamtramck, DJ 3000 (aka Franki Juncaj) was inundated with both the sights and sounds of his neighborhood, a highly ethnic area of Detroit, as well as with the influence of the music of his parent’s native Albania. This diverse collection of influence has molded the current make-up of both DJ 3000 and the vision and direction of the sound that he is producing. ‘Besa’ expands his sound even further with a depth of electronic styles that collage to make his most cohesive work to date.Juncaj discovered the rich history of Detroit techno by going straight to the source.
Third Ear’s Detroit Beatdown series was instrumental in redefining the perception of Detroit electronic music abroad. Now we come to the final Detroit Beatdown release. Four Detroit artists giving us as good an ep as any of the releases in the series. The tracks by Mike Clark and Rick Wade rank amongst their best, for sure. DJ-T1000, a Detroit producer and DJ known for some of the city’s hardest Techno, surprises with a stripped-back groove that is pure electronic Funk. Wrapping up the ep is Scott Ferguson’s A Groove, a heavy skanking groove with that classic Beatdown rawness.
Andy Ash appears on French label Dessous for the first time with an energetic three-track 12″. Cast your mind back to some of the 6th Borough Project’s early releases and you’ll have an idea of the low-slung, Chicago house that have inspired this release’s title-track. The BPM ranged is scaled on the B-side’s killer cut “Mindflow” for something dancier, while a combination of the elements heard throughout the aforementioned mixes, with some added acid, create a joyous “Release & Check (part 1)”.
New album by the irrepressible Dutchman… The ‘2080’ part of the album title is taken from the Roland JV2080, a legendary digital synthesizer from the nineties that was used a lot in the making of the album. Bought second-hand in Tokyo for a couple of hundred dollars, it lends the record a very dewy eyed soul, whilst the ‘Crystal’ part of the title stands for the self-made ‘DIY germanium crystal compressor’ Legowelt used throughout the writing process. The album itself features ten new tracks of pure Legowelt music mainly recorded in De Hague in the past year, but also on the road during tours of LA, the Californian desert, Tokyo (which spawned ‘Crystal Cult 2080’) and Tejada Gran Canaria (where ‘The Future of Myself’ was written.) Where his last album The Paranormal Soul was an organic trip into misty forests, this one seems more concerned with medieval spirits; it’s deeper, darker and the whole thing is tied together by a more coherent sense of ancient alchemy. Given the use of a DIY germanium crystal compressor during production, it’s no wonder everything feels warm, fuzzy and mystic in a way that draws your attention in like that fabled philosopher’s stone… glare too long and you might just turn to stone. Right from the opening track the mood is so encapsulating you are drawn right into Danny Wolfers’ mysterious electronic world. From there various different tempos are explored and plenty of famed synthesiser work comes to the fore, wrapping grooves in trippy themes, impish spirits and plenty of organic lushness.
Kuba Sojka is a rising techno and house producer from Poland who’s picked up critical acclaim in recent years for his releases on Mathematics, Matrix Records, Souliner and more recently Dogmatik. Kuba returns to fledging deep tech UK based label Souliner with three original cuts and one remix by label boss Souliner. The lead cut “What You Know” is an exemplary lesson in cross referencing techno with house. The track builds with layers of sounds bonding with each other to breeze into a track that will pick up much critical acclaim for those in the know. “Sunny Day” is a bright and breezy fusion of horn with technology, a jazzed up be-bop bomb. “Long Trip” takes us through a journey with incessant chords jamming along with a rolling bassline. “What You Know (Souliner remix)” finishes the release off with a steady interpretation of the lead cut.
New release by Phillip Lauer on Running Back imprint. Post-house-proto-disco-trance rockets fuelled by new wave and sound transmissions from middle-wave Caucasus.
The debut full-length by Achterbahn D’amour (Johannes “Iron Curtis” Paluka and Jurgen “Jool” Albert), captures two artists coaxing the most emotional sounds to date out of classic Roland boxes. The album is the natural extension of the duo’s live-rooted sound, further defining the oblique dance moves contained on their three Acid Test EPs. They demonstrate a true reverence for the 303 and 606. On “Odd Movements”, lush pads and abrupt toms create a literal pedestal for the bassline machine. The duo have hit on a sound well-suited for dark rooms and towering sound systems.
Bio Rhythm seems to be spiraling deeper & deeper into the rabbit hole… Six brand new tracks by Villa Abo (a Frak side project) and his first release since the 1997 Borft releases. Fix yourself the full-length audio package and get lost on the other side through these six little Scandinavian fairy tales full of desolate techno mysticizm, pressed on 2×12” for maximum dj delight.
Myriadd is Craig Stainton, a producer that has also released as Acid Phreex and Mantra on labels such as Pinkman, Signals and Creme Organization, to where he returns now with a new four track EP that explores plenty of mystic house and techno territory. Kicking off the release is Time Will Tell, which is a nicely frayed, rough round the edges bit of house music with a deep and lashing bassline as well as some rich and rounded melodic hooks. Forever Yours kicks that bit harder and more insistently but bares the same sense of misty melodic lushness. Various lines fly about like spirits in the night and bring a haunting sense of melancholy to proceedings before B1 Gold Section hiccups and stutters pleasingly. Like everything here, its a fairly rich, dense track that layers everything on top of each other with little break for breath. Final track At One is backed with the sort of serene pads that have you day dreaming about the future as jacked up beats kick below and all manner of synths whip around in the foreground. House music never sounded as magical as when in the hands of the talented Myriadd.
Willie Burns returns on the great Trilogy Tapes. The title track is akin to traveling in a time machine to 4am on a Saturday night in Den Haag circa 1994 – real grotty basement acid techno! Providing contrast in a way Burnett does so well, the B-side offers two tracks of a more immersive nature, with “She Left In Spring” an exercise in dubby techno as pensive as the title would suggest.
Ghettoville is the bleached out and black tinted conclusion of the Actress image. Where the demands of writing caught the artist slumped and reclined, devoid of any soul, acutely aware of the simulated prism that required breakout. Four albums in and the notes and compositions no longer contain decipherable language. The scripts now carry tears, the world has returned to a flattened state, and out through that window, the birds look back into the cage they once inhabited. Spitting flames behind a white wall of silence. The machines have turned to stone, data reads like an obituary to its user. A fix is no longer a release, it’s a brittle curse. Zero satisfaction, no teeth, pseudo artists running rampant, but the path continues.
Ron Morelli returns to stare down the ‘floor with four pieces written during the stress-busting sessions for ‘Spit’. The muggy, droning welt of ‘Public Consumption’ kicks off with the sound of New York techno shot from the hip, while ‘Another Hit’ vents a vintage era-Regis style built on skull-chipping snares and effluent acid modulation. The album’s writhing batacuda banger, ‘Crack Microbes’ reappears here as an extra-ferric extended Version, sustaining the hypnotic intensity for nine minutes of panic attack acid and febrile cowbells, while ‘’Rushing Again’ escorts us to a close with triplet techno shook down by railgun snares and a grotty synthline.
Hexagon Cloud RMXD 2.0“ celebrates even more of the diverse influences on Erika‘s debut solo release, the critically acclaimed „Hexagon Cloud“ 2xLP on Interdimensional Transmissions. Deep Space & Midwestern Underdog mixes by Donato Dozzy, Isreal Vines, Outer Space (Emeralds) & Patrick Russel.
The first release on the Adelaide Soundworks label comes from producer TX Connect. He delivers 3 diverse lo-fi techno jams; lovely oldschool vive on the A side while the tracks on the flip are a bit more fierce
