Cassegrain´s brilliant Tiamat releases are back. After the amazing original tracks from Cassegrain, well known and respected Remixers like Svreca, Mike Parker, TM404 and Inland aka. Ed Davenport have designed 4 Tiamat tracks in order to provide a completely dedicated view on Cassegrain´s fantastic EP.
The penultimate Theory release is a highly limited double pack 7” of road tested club bangers, featuring 3 previously unreleased tracks from Ben and a collab with Paul Mac
Three tracks of pickled, tripped techno-not-techno and crushed house from the Dubliners, backed with a wry remix from Tuff Sherm aka Dro Carey. Mastered by Helmut Erler at D&M, this is a vinyl-only release.
The tenth release on Acoustic Division is coming from Claire. “Perfume” is a techno that sucks the air out of the room and charges the void with an inescapable atmosphere of enchantment and control. Distilled from smoke and mirrors and spun from the hypnotist’s lyre, her machinery leaves its trace everywhere, as fragments of desire dissolve into the presence of total submission.
After more than a decade of releasing raw and emotional house music, Dutch producer and architect Aroy Dee is about to drop his debut album on his own M>O>S label. The man has established himself as someone who creates misty analogue music that nods to a Chicago heyday at the same time as coming imbued with plenty of its own deep emotions, mystic melodies and jacking beats. His M>O>S label has become a go-to outlet for fans of no nonsense house and that tradition continues on this full-length album. Incidentally, M>O>S stands for Muziek Over Steden – Dutch for ‘music about cities’ – because Dee has a close tie to buildings: during the day he works as an architect so has an unrivalled grasp of space, structure and urban environments that surely translates into his well built house music, and more specifically into this debut album. Made with the same hardware that defines the rest of his discography, including his first synth, the Poly 800, which he bought from his friend NWAQ, Sketches is a truly idiosyncratic project.
“For me, my musical output and development feels like an on going history of my life. In this perspective I worked steadily over the last two years on my first full-length album, Sketches. It’s a very personal document, not intended to make anybody happy but myself, which is why it has taken so long. It’s like a diary or ghost-script written about a part of my life and my fascinations, honoring my biggest musical inspirations.”
From the shores of the Great Lakes comes a 3 track floor filler from MI duo 2AM/FM aka JTC & D’Marc Cantu. Confronting the canons of Techno & House head on, this 12″ takes you beyond the dance. Best experienced loud though, preferably in a darkened smoke filled room.
‘Fizic’ is the next natural step for accomplished techno producer Cosmin TRG. Having released on an influential array of labels in the last few years, the Romanian is now branching out on his own with an imprint that will serve as a further extension of himself, his sonic preferences and his interest in artistic imagery. Releasing esoteric techno aimed largely at the dancefloor and purely from his own studio, Fizic releases will come accompanied with Cosmin’s own photography as well as occasional videos. Coming in both vinyl and digital format, the label serves as a combination of a need for a more personal, dedicated approach, a desire for artistic freedom and is born from ‘a slightly egocentric tendency, with the sole purpose of creating unique, high quality audio-visual products.
Glaswegian producer Marco Bernardi offers up 4 tracks of unsettling, quirky, off the wall techno and electro. Along with his heavy release schedule, Marco has also launched his own label Take the Elevator that focuses on non-conventional house and techno.
The next release on Contemporary Scarecrow comes from Chicago house legend Boo Williams. This double pack features 8 tracks of quality Chicago house to complete another solid release on this rising Australian label.
The original Adventures in Techno Soul compilation was released back in 1996 with remixes of Ferox tracks from the likes of Derrick Carter, Carl Craig and Kenny Dixon Jr. A full 16 year’s after its follow up “Further Adventures in Techno Soul” comes this 8 track album of new and unreleased material on double vinyl from 8 different and exciting artists. Ferox is proud to welcome established and respected producers such as Fred P and Germany’s Move D to the roster, as well as a welcome return from Affie Yusuf, Nebraska and Bush Funk (Steve O’Sullivan and Winlord X) who were last seen on Soma Records back in 1996. The label is also proud to introduce two new artists, Darren Harris and Spain’s Hoax Believers who alongside label boss Russ Gabriel round off this package of soulful electronica.
Home Invasion is the new label from Real Tone man Franck Roger, a man whose career has scaled the full depths of house music over the past decade or so. Evidently seeking a new challenge, the Parisian’s new imprint promises to adhere to a vehemently underground way of working, with every EP released on vinyl-only terms and produced exclusively on analogue equipment.
Jet-setting Irish duo Bicep return to Will Saul’s Aus label with two steady analog techno grooves ready for deployment in either their own wildly celebrated sets or those of any DJ looking for modern dance tracks that are still faithful to the classics. Using gritty, vintage-sounding rhythm sections as solid foundations, each track gradually builds up its own lush, melodic embellishments overtop – ‘Circles’ stays true to its name with a cyclical main melody, shadowy bass and fuzzy house pads, whereas ‘NRG106 sets spacey, dramatic chords and breathy vocals against the insistent, chittering machine percussion. As usual these two esteemed bloggers / DJs / artists / all around polymaths prove themselves to be paragons of taste, but here it’s clear that they are also steadily growing as producers, taking on different styles with aplomb and making it all look much easier than it really is.
The Mosaic split series is beginning to gather pace and is throwing together some interesting names of old and new vintage with truly compelling results. Volume three of the series draws for tracks from Ed Davenport and Ozka with the resultant tone most definitely one for fans of techno with a darker hue. echno veteran Aubrey turns in a storming techno monster of a remix of Ed Davenport’s unreleased “Islands”. Representing the new school is rising Belgian techno talent, David Nizet (aka Ozka) comes with the wonderful bass line driven dub-stab-fest “Thirteen Years”.
The new imprint for Stroboscopic Artefacts: Terzo Giorno – or Third Day – by Italian producer Donato Dozzy. It is an EP of great textural dexterity, traversing the moving and the misanthropic. First track ‘Il Canto Della Maga’ presages the onset of Part II’s kick drum with mordant wind chimes, tinkling outside a house of pain and disturbance. The chimes reverberate around impressions of capacious depth – a distant factory whirring, lorries creeping in a tunnel – and that depth is incessantly, resolutely emphatic. And on that goes to ‘…Part II’, an immediate thrust into the deepest corners of techno. The third eponymous track is another made for the floor, and has a reasonably friendly upper line. The final track, ‘Sotto Ma Sotto’, comes in like a train with an alarm going off. Its machine-like run, jumpy in tone and beat, is as delicate as its kick is deep. This is a wonderful track, built on insistence and executed with precision.
Long time colleagues David Sumner (aka Function) and Ed Davenport (aka Inland) have teamed up to relaunch Sumner’s esteemed imprint, Infrastructure. They kick things off with a collaboration under the guise Function/Inland with this new EP, Odeon/Rhyl.
The Monkey Bar has proved to have no boundaries music-wise. This composition of tracks pictures a state of mind, a bridge between the past and the future. A selection made by producers that can speak with the heart, the mind and the soul. The Primates #01 is a great techno EP with tracks by Eduardo De La Calle, Hinode, 333 aka Alfonso & Diego Gamez and a Marco Shuttle remix.
