Imps - Imps Remixed
Last year’s Bring Out The Imps, was an album highlight for many people, myself included. Recorded live from sessions and jams and edited in post-production, Bring Out The Imps managed to balance the free form creativity of jazz with electronic aesthetics to devastating effect. I am not sure wha...
Benji B & Glenn Underground - Need2Soul Vol.2
Second installment of the Need2Soul mix series, an offshoot from the party of the same name. Organising events everywhere from the Big Chill festival, to London's Cargo club and the dirty basements in between, the Need2Soul crew peddle a sound of deep house with you guessed it; soul. Following...
Loud E - Loudefied
OK, So I have decided to ban the use of the word 'disco' in my reviews, for the moment at least. Loud E, is a DJ from Holland, who is also a bit handy with a blade and some splicing tape. He was also one of the founders of the sadly missed internet radio station CBS along with I-F. On...
Boogie Corporation - Bring Back The Boogie EP
Barry Reeves is a busy man, leading what can only be described as a boogie funk uprising in the more northern parts of the UK. Not only does Barry DJ and release records under the name Dicky Trisco, he runs the record label Disco Deviance releasing killer edits by the likes of Pete Herbert and...
Boozoo Bajou - Grains
Nuernberg based DJ Producer duo Boozoo Bajou is famous for his dubby soul and jazz influenced sound. However, his latest album ‘Grains’ is pretty different to his previous work. It is more of a consequential development, as it detaches from the familiar lounge music and moves more towards acid...
Antoni Maiovvi - Electro Muscle Cult
First of two very very different releases from the ever-dependable Seed Records. Antoni Maiovvi makes brash driving italo disco of the lasers in space variety, and like all (good) italo it balances out the 80’s soundtrack atmospherics, soaring synths and strobe light beats with the odd bit of c...
Sleeps In Oysters - How To Appreciate Someone Who Is Always Around
Imagine in your head the sounds that you would hear if Aphex Twin decided to make music to accompany an afternoon tea party for the Women's Institute. Got it? Well, now forget the terrible juxtaposition and imagine it as something that sounds really nice that you would actually want to hear, an...
Various Artists - Prime Numbers
Although less than a year old Prime Numbers, the label run by Manchester based DJ Trus’ Me, have carved themselves a reputation as a purveyors of some seriously deep and soulful music. This double pack of one mixed and one unmixed CD of the same songs, serves as a snapshot of the label, and the...
Various Artists - Dust Till Dawn 10 Years Of Drop Music
Funky house. What a horrible thought. But some house music has to be funky right? Right, and that’s where Drop Music come in. The English label run by the Inland Knights crew have been ploughing a furrow of particularly British house, similar to Glasgow’s Deep Freeze Recordings, for ten years n...
Various Artists - Sleepwalk: A Selection By Optimo
There must be something in the water up in Glasgow, a place always known for it's left field approach to music. Optimo is a club night that has been running in the Scottish city for over ten years, organised by JD Twich and JG Wilkes and well respected for it’s eclectic musical policy; if it’s...
Gang Gang Dance - Saint Dymphna
Like a blitzkrieg assault on the senses Gang Gang Dance’s 4th album, crams about 50 different ideas in to a CD lasting no more than 45 minutes. Although they have been around for over a decade, it is only in recent years along with contemporaries such as TV On The Radio and Animal Collective th...
VA - Secretsundaze Vol. 2 (mixed by Giles Smith & James Priestly)
Like Roots Manuva not so long ago, this is one those CD’s that makes me pine for home a little bit. Secretsundaze are somewhat of an institution in London, famed for ‘all dayers’ of the highest calibre with the nicest crowds (which is often very difficult for after-hours) and the most cutting e...
Squarepusher - Just A Souvenir
Somehow I managed to review Just A Souvenir by listening to another CD. I could scarcely believe, and was certainly not impressed, by Squarepusher’s move into mid-tempo Scissor Sisters style house, but I couldn’t discount his status as maverick genius either. So, my review was cautiously critic...
Mr. Oizo - Lambs Anger
When 'Flat Beat' came out all those years ago, it really was quite unlike anything else I had heard before. I loved it. A lot. Then I promptly forgot about it, just like all those other songs that Levi’s used on their adverts. Then a few years ago, I got reacquainted with that most monstrous of...