Hostage At Juno Download

Review: Out on Herve's new imprint, Deep Thrills, Edinburgh-based bass/garage/tech merchant Hostage takes a step away from his hyper-rave styles of previous releases and instead allows these four new tunes to breathe a little. The results still make for peak-time bangers, but songs like "House It Up" are given deeper textures and more grooves, whilst still working a subby bottom end and classy percussion. Check out the Zinc-esque "Tunnels" or the grimey stomp of "Fade To Black" to see what we mean.

Review: Edinburgh producer Hostage has no intention of losing the heat garnered from a host of important releases on labels like Herve's Deep Thrills and Black Butter. The newfound interest in the deeper side of things is kept up on "How We Go Down" which features buzzing low bass and tough house beats. "Keep Dark" is sultry speed garage, the sparse "Conscious" veers into 4 x 4 territory and ""Show Ya" wraps things up with a warped rave organ riff and some very late night UKF grooves.

Review: Scotland isn't exactly the first place you think of when listening to Edinburgh dwelling Hostage's Listen EP, (his first for the esteemed Black Butter imprint), soaked as it is in the essence of Rinse FM circa 2002 grime instrumentals. You can pick out the far off eski synths in opener "Listen", and closer "No Bitch Equal", but they're joined by echoes of dub as well as searing basslines - it's quite a cocktail but one that Hostage balances finely. "Dutty Horn" melds a similarly rude bass, and ridiculous horn sample to similarly fine effect, whilst "Dreams" distils the essence of classic hardcore into a UK Funky package, but it's the savage crunch on the kick drum that is bound to impress. The second half of the EP is undoubtedly the most effective - seeing him drop the tempo and allowing his music to breathe a bit more. "Desire" is a bizarrely slowed down but wonderful version of a jungle track, whilst the jackhammer bass of "Razrr" offers some visceral onomatopoeic thrills, made all the more effective for its slowed down pace.

Review: Some raucous electro house fun here from Hostage, with his new original track in the shape of "Mochachos", released on Jack Knife, fitting happily into the 'silly and fun' category of dance music. Calvertron's remix comes in at the halfway point between tearout dubstep and Boys Noize circa Oi Oi Oi, while the Aural Trash version sounds like Zombie Nation on speed! Rounding off the package is the incendiary Attic Kings remix, which boasts some particularly memorable builds and drops - our pick of the bunch.

Review: With a title like Party Animals Volume 3 - not to mention a label name such as Party Like Us - it's pretty obvious what we can expect from this UK funky single! As expected, "Energize" is a party-friendly whirlwind of scattergun beats, constipation-curing sub-bass, silly rave riffage and sped-up hardcore vocal samples. If that sounds a little hectic, that's because it is - though there's no denying the impact it would make on UK funky floors if dropped at the right time. If you consider yourself - or your crowd - to be party animals, dive in.

Review: Building from an ominous start into a mechanical stepper, "Charger Cube" has an alluring presence right from the start. Crackled vocal snatches and Apocalypse Now-esque film samples battle with smacking, ritualistic tribal breaks and industrial screeches, underpinned with an eerie oriental wail. Over on the flipside, the terror continues in "Goose Neck Stew" where hoover sweeps, sword clashing SFX and echoes go full flow Calyx & Teebee-style for the duration. One for the heads.