Another strong Bokhari release. Beautiful deep house tracks with a hint to early Chicago and bits of the mid 90’s IDM techno wave from the UK. Side a by Life Recorder and flip side by French producer Semerka (incl Fudge Fingas remix).
house
Magic Mountain High live @ Tape @ Trouw (Amsterdam) 29.02.2014
Joe Drive – Buried Truth [LXRC017]
Joe Drive’s music is always an intricate affair, it spirals you down and never lets you go. His freeform composition dwell within the depth of machines. Exposing their buried truth. And so is this EP. A journey into electric catacombs of forgotten impulses where at every corner menacing shadows await you. Spine shivers, ghosts of children or unthinkable creatures? It is all there, and yet you can’t see. To enter Joe Drive’s dreams you need a key, Lux Rec provides it.
Portable – XLR8R Podcast 333
Punknown – Heartbeat [LOD002]
Punknown is Orazio Bongiovanni, dj and producer from Italy. His tracks appeared on Jam Traxx Records. Since his childhood Orazio’s felt in love with Chicago and Detroit sound. Roland TR 606, 707, 808, 909, Roland TB 303, Juno 106 and Korg M1 are the ”weapons” which he uses to create his music. All the vocals are his own recordings, using vocoder and fx. He loves melodies, often introspective and never granted, he loves powerful rhythmics, he loves to transmit his mind and feelings through the music… He loves…. The EP is named as ”Heartbeat”…. His heart beats for the music.
Jay Daniel – Karmatic Equations [WOJD01]
Wild Oats come through with the double plated goodness, as the oft-hinted label debut of Jay Daniel arrives in the shape of the Karmatic Equations EP. A resident at Detroit party Fundamentals alongside Kyle Hall, Jay Daniel has been a hot tip ever since he made his 12″ debut last year in illustrious fashion with the rugged Scorpio Rising EP for Theo’s Sound Signature label. Since then, Daniel has become an increasingly regular presence on the European club circuit – recently making his debut at Panorama Bar – lauded by FACT and dropped a guest mix on Benji B. So you could say there was a sense of expectation surrounding young Jay’s next release. The five track Karmatic Equations is likely to be as popular as that SS release, further refining Daniel’s rugged approach with C Side cut “Change 4 Me” and the bumping final track “4 Red” likely to be the cuts most selectors pull for again and again. Housed in a full colour reverse board record sleeve and full colour centre labels, Daniel’s EP for Wild Oats precedes the promised launch of his own Watusi High label later this year.
VA – Pleasure Unit 1 [PLEASUREUNTZ001]
Pleasure Unit is the new label from the excellent Keyboard Masher and it gets off to a fine start here with a selection of reworks from Norwegian producer Telephones that’s been issued in conjunction with the Berlin crew Untz Untz. By no means the most prolific of producers, Bergen-based Henning Severud has nonetheless graced the likes of Full Pupp, Sex Tags UFO and most recently The Very Polish Cut-Outs under the Telephones guise so you expect quality. And that’s what you get as Severud reworks tracks from Skatebard, Love Nation and Dove Station in his own inimitable style. The lead take on Skatebard’s “Confirmation Bias” is a particularly wonderful thing to behold, utilising a whole eight minutes to take flight into what the label quite aptly describe as a long lost Larry Levan remix of Manuel Gottsching’s epic “E2 E4”.
Gemini Sound – R U Afraid EP [CGTX003]
Repress of this amazing Spencer Kincy 1998 release on Earth Recordings. Pure & honest house music as they don’t make it anymore.
Aroy Dee – Digital Tsunami 020
Gary Martin – Post Techno Life [GG050]
After 20 years of experience, Gary Martin couldn’t resist a 12” that is also the 50th release for Teknotika: a label from Detroit that didn’t exactly stick with the game when it switched to the mp3 format. “Basking In Blackness” is a composition of textured broken beat then classic four on the floor old school soul.“Synthotika” is what would happen if a synthasizer could take over an orchestra. A track inspired by Detroit peers no doubt. “Every Bit As Beautiful” goes sensative deep house piano, a lil Latin percussion and soaring Eno-esque synths to top it off. The title is a bit sarcastic, let’s face it, there is no life after techno.
Optimo @ Boiler Room x Sub Club (Glasgow) 22.01.2014
The Central Executives – A Walk in The Dark [CHANNEL035]
Those cheeky scamps at Golf Channel come through with a surprise here with A Walk In The Dark, the debut album from a mysterious group of individuals known only as The Central Executives. Concerted internet searching as to the exact identity of The Central Executives has proved fruitless, as have attempts to coerce the label for information. However given how extensive Phil South’s figurative rolodex is, not to mention the sheer breadth of talent that’s appeared on Golf Channel over the years, we are willing to wager there is some high profile disco talent behind The Central Executives. Certainly A Walk In The Dark is filled with loose limbed punk funk and supple house that’s quite aptly described by the label as “Sound Signature style machine jams, bare bones vocal led improvisations, discordant Arthur Russell moments & the distorted reflections of roots House that run to the very core of the big apple.”
Al Kent – Love & Care [KKS002]
Kalakuta Soul Records come back with another deep set of disco gems, touched by the hand of one of the most respected heads of the genre. Glasgow’s disco godfather, the almighty Al Kent, has delivered three eclectic masterpieces, due to take the international dancefloors to a further level of musical consciousness. A further pack of deep dug bombs that confront the functionality in music many labels have always strived for. The A Side keeps every imaginable sound system busy with a drifty percussive harvester adorned with an eclectic instrumentation that splits flesh from bones and mind from soul. “Colder Than Cold” on the B Side is a perfect example of how a dancefloor should sound like. A thick bassdrum, a bass slapped by the fingers of a giant, keys and chords from heaven and horns hailing from the utmost depth of Kalakuta’s soul. Bringing you back to where it all started, the almighty Al Kent does an immense work on an evergreen, you might have bumped into as a munchkin. “Gee Wiz” closes this opus with a orchestral beauty that once gathered all the souls behind what we call music today.
Guillaumes Des Bois – Disco Adjustements [MME808]
After a serie of great edits on the previous Macadam Mambo Edits records, Guillaume Des Bois brings us 3 super cool Re-edits of deep Balearic, Afro and Funky stuff.
VA – RDY #13 [RDY013]
Thirteen is unlucky for some, but that’s not the case when it comes to the hugely popular RDY label which digs through the vast archives of Muzic Box favourites pioneered by the legend that was Ron Hardy for a thirteenth time. On the A Side is a classic example of Ron’s style, extending the intro to “Adventure” by The Dells into 8 minutes of blissful disco excellence, whilst the take on “Love Surge” embellishes the electronic nuances of Jules Shear’s mid 80s synth pop curio. House heads will be all over the final cut, a “Untitled” production/edit Hardy collaborated with fellow Chi-town House pioneer Jesse Saunders which has box jam brilliance written into it’s DNA.
Intergalactic Gary @ BSMNT (Zagreb) 21.02.2014
Kassem Mosse – Workshop 019 [WORKSHOP019]
Strong release with advanced abstract house tracks. Exceptional killer leftfield House trips in true Kassem Mosse style.
Romansoff – Raw Tools 4 [RWT004]
Ondo Fudd – Coup D’Etat [TTT017]
Following on from his releases on Fabric’s Houndstooth label, Call Super takes his contemporary take on low-slung, lo-fi referencing techno to The Trilogy Tapes, dropping this three track EP under the Ondo Fudd moniker. Hinting at the deeper influences of the Workshop stable together with swirling lysergic synths that provide some welcome melodic relief from the thick, crunchy rhythms. Title track ‘Coup D’Etat’ has the sprightly synths of early Detroit techno allied to clattering metallic percussion and ghostly voices. ‘Harbour’ reflects retro electro back at us through a dust-covered mirror. ‘There Will Be A Time’ reimagines a rainforest populated by robot birds and mechanical creatures.
The Hipodrome Of Music 