Marvin Gaye - "Lets Get It On" (Philly Vanilli mix) - (11:11) 85 BPM
Review: Germany's Philly Vanilli has been around since forever, it seems, but to these ears - and they're ears that have reviewed plenty of his previous releases for this very website - this new set of reworks for Deep Disco Edits is the best work he's turned out so far. He's working with some very well-known source tracks here, so there's no point insulting your intelligence by enumerating them: suffice to say that somehow he's managed to tease the funk out of these much-loved classics in a way that, in some cases, even the original artists didn't manage. Ohio Players' 'Love Rollercoaster' was, admittedly, always a personal fave of yours truly but in PV's hands it becomes a truly exceptional 10 minutes of sheer funk joy, while his reworkings of Marvin, Kool & The Gang and The Temptations are equally impressive. Essential!
Review: Casino Classix is one of several aliases for legendary minimal man Baby Ford. Here it is also the name of a four-track EP that finds the long time UK underground operative working alongside fellow British techno luminary Mark Broom on a quartet of devastating cuts. 'Ringer' opens up with some dark and nimble baselines darting about beneath a dense layer of percussion and FX. 'Hoppa' is then a more precise and minimalist cut with wonky bass snaking down low beneath the icy hi-hats and jumbled toms. There is a warm dub depth to 'Hot Pot' and 'Beach Club' shuts down with a restless mix of synth daubs and deft percussion over an ice cold groove.
Review: The Duca Bianco label swerves its usual various artists' format to allow CW - who has appeared on those before - to step up with his own solo EP. He is a mysterious artist but is well known for his immersive record collection and legendary sets on the London scene. He is one-third of the Beauty & The Beat party and brings his unique twists of Afro and soul to this quartet of tunes. 'Karambolage' opens up with lots of big horns and noodling string sounds over a ramshackle beat then things take a cosmic turn on the rather more psychedelic 'Six Times Seven' with its Nippon-koku polyriddims, while 'Ou Ka Jis Fe Kole' is a party starter with a Zouk dub edge and 'Nzimbab' is built on a low slung and swaggering rhythm.
Review: Legendary minimal - and acid house before that - pioneer Baby Ford very much set the blueprint for the genre back in the late 90s, both solo and with The Ifach Collective, who featured Ian Loveday, Mark Broom and Thomas Melchior (amongst others). Now they are reminding us of the greatness of that work with the first in a series of reissues coming in 2023. These tunes were originally put out back on the legendary Klang Elektronik in 2000. First up is 'Tea Party' by Eon, M-Core, and Baby Ford, an ice-cold rolling dub. 'On The Floor' with Mark Broom gets more percussive and then comes a solo cut from Baby Ford, 'The Healing' which is as heady as can be and finally 'Word For Word' featuring Cheru Amadi layers up slithers of silvery percussion and cuddly bass into dubbed-out tech heaven.
Review: If funk and jazz are your thing, don't sleep on this latest missive from Italy's Lego Edit stable, which packs six reworks of vintage cuts both highly familiar and somewhat less so, We start out with the instantly recognisable groove of Kool & The Gang's 'Jungle Boogie', now reinvented as 'Jazz-Ungle', while elsewhere you'll find fresh takes on the Dave Brubeck Quartet's jazz classic 'Take Five' (1959) and Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson's 'It's Your World' (1976). The sources for the other three will have to go sadly unindentified (though those piano licks on 'Jazzy Touch' are annoyingly familiar) but rest assured, this is classy stuff all round.
Review: Morlack has been a Katakana regular since Vol 10, and now he returns with four more re-edits for your dancing pleasure. First to get the treatment are Earth Wind & Fire, as Morlack revisits 'Spread Your Love' from 1983's 'Powerlight' album. He's dug a little deeper for the other three, whose sources have our disco detectives beat, but 'Dr Jekyll' features a spoken French male vocal, female backing vox and some fine organ work, 'Can't Fight The Feeling' has a west coast electrofunk feel and analogue synths a-gogo, while 'Mighty Fine' is a smoother groove from the soul/boogie school of thought.
Review: Katakana Edits first compilation, 2017's "Crate Diggin", was an epic collection of high-grade re-edits, mash-ups and reworks packed to the rafters with tried-and-tested dancefloor treats. This belated follow-up is even more epic, with the popular label squeezing in no less than 50 tracks that variously touch on riotous disco-funk, dub disco, new wave, disco-rock, deep funk, Afro-boogie, swamp funk, Latin beats, boogie, pitched-down chuggers, boogaloo, hip-hop and everything in between. You'd expect that standard to be high - it is a "best of" collection after all - and it is. If you need an instant armoury of scintillating club cuts, look no further.
Review: French reggae producer Mato has made a name for himself by giving Kingston-style makeovers to many hip-hop pop hits. Here Stix have rounded up the latest batch of reworks featuring, amongst others, "Suit & Tie" by Justin Timberlake, "Happy" by Pharrell Williams, "Fancy" by Iggy Azalea, "Rehab" by Amy Winehouse and, clearly not getting the memo, "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke.
Review: The undisputed king of reggae versions, Mato returns with his sixth series of dubbed out hip-hop covers. Far from the crass, crude mash-up culture, Mato's original instrumentation ensures a much more natural remix feel which, in some cases, sounds better than the original. Across the 10 track set we're treated a bouncy, sun-kissed take on Eve's "Gangsta Lovin", a tight skank-flexed take on The Beatnuts "Off The Books", a Vadim-style contemporary digi dub take on Nate Dogg's "Good Life" and a very authentic rendition of "Still Dre". Essential listening for both hip-hop and reggae heads.
Review: Beatnik City is one of the chief exponents of the Northern Soul sound and its crate digging culture. Here they present what they dub "BarBeat", which is a good way to describe the non-purist approach of the edits featured - perfect fodder for bars rather than big room clubs. Perfect examples of this approach include "Finti Cents" where In Da Club gets taken back into time to a shimmying Motown backing groove or the 90s-hip-hop-goes-retro-big-beat vibes of "Jurassic Jive".
Review: This impressively expansive collection from experienced remixer Valique showcases some of the best downtempo and Balearic edits from his popular V's Edits series. There's certainly plenty to get the blood pumping and the juices flowing throughout, from a chugging, ten-minute take on Pink Floyd ('Brickwall') and a pleasingly squelchy take on Daft Punk and Pharrell Williams' 'Lose Yourself To Dance' (here renamed 'Lose Your Elf'), to a chunky dub-house re-imagining of Jimmy Cliff classic 'The Harder They Come' and a loopy, hypnotic, mid-tempo disco-rock revision of T-Rex ('Jewelry'). Throw in party-hearty takes on cuts from Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson and the Beach Boys (an odd but impactful reimagining of 'Good Vibrations') and you have a great value compilation.
Review: Incredibly, brothers Robin & Simon Lee have been providing us with their slick updates of the classic disco and house sound since 1995! This bumper 25-track collection tells the story from the birth of FA Records in 2006. There's a lot to tell too; it's packed with enough vintage-sounding grooves to shame the Paradise Garage. Highlights include Jay Shepheard's breezy remix of FA's debut "Original Disco Motion", FA's own Rocker's Revenge-esque, "Hypnotic (disco mix)", the linear, chugging arpeggiation of "Touch It" by The Shack, the loopy robot-funk of "Lifestyle 101" by Rudy's Midnight Machine, the moody "revenge mix" of FA's "I Wanna Dancer" and the killer retro house-isms of Miss Cheesecake's "You Must Create", exclusively provided for us lucky folks!
Review: El Paso steps up to the plate for Vol 129 in the 'Katakana Edits' series. The original versions will sadly have to go unidentified this time around, but suffice to say Da Funk is in full effect across all four tracks, kicking off with 'Kitty Kitty', a rolling trop-funk groove with breathy female vocal snips. 'Grande' follows and operates in similar territory but in slightly more lazy n' laidback - and 100% more instrumental - fashion while 'Revolution Solution' brings the militant Black Power soul vibes with its conscious male vocal, before finally 'I Got To Be Kissed' plays us with out with its full-lunged 60s-style female soul vox.
Review: East Midlands producer Ant Plate (he of Rhythm Plate and YSE fame) dons his lesser-known YSE Saint Laur'ant moniker for a second outing on Whiskey Disco (his first dropped in 2012). As you'd expect from someone with a such a rich history of joining the dots between deep house and disco, the Swimwear EP delivers a quartet of breezy, positive cuts that should suit DJs in both styles. There's some smooth, soul-flecked grooves in the shape of "Never Be", a brilliantly wide-eyed slo-mo chugger ("Forever Mind", complete with classic AOR vocal samples), a thrilling exercise in low-slung disco house dirtiness ("Bozwa Locks") and an hypnotic, slowly unfurling chunk of dreamy deepness with quirky blue-eyed soul samples ("Walked in the Room").
Review: What better way to celebrate a decade in business than by getting Chicago deep house legend Larry Heard to select and mix a double-disc compilation of label highlights? Hats off, then, to Rebirth, who managed to persuade Mr Fingers himself to deliver his first commercially available DJ mix. As you'd expect from both label and DJ, it's a wonderfully atmospheric and melodious affair, with Heard selecting and blending emotion-rich tracks and mixes from Chromatic Filters, Bocca Grande, NuFrequency, Tevo Howard, Motor City Drum Ensemble and James Teej. The first disc, in which Heard races through 28 tracks in just over 70 minutes, is particularly memorable.
Review: Fresh-faced funkateer Manjah steps up to the party-hardy Katakana series, and does so with distinction. It's a game of two halves as the first two cuts are dedicated to chanteuses Smokey Robinson and Donna Hightower. Both powered by swashbuckling 60s funk riffs, these are authentic edits done with true creativity. Later on in the EP we head West to the Caribbean as Manjah gets his skank on with Dancehall Queen. Those with a penchant for Greek taverna flavours should hold tight for the rustic groove on "Orienta Patria". Nice work.
Review: If life teaches you anything it's to expect the unexpected. Here the mighty re-edit label Katakana deliver their 42nd instalment of scapel jobs. However, this time, rather than have a specific producer curate an EP, they've shaken up the formula and delivered a compilation of edits. There's a whopping 24 reworks to enjoy too, many thrills and spills, but our favourites include Morlack's explosive drum-lead MJ cover, "Don't Stop", Mister Vagz' corny 60s mash-up "Love Me Venus" and Dim Zach & Deem's baggy rework of the Happy Monday's sublime "Loose Fit".
Review: The Bas Lexter Ensample is a project by acclaimed multi-instrumentalist Bas Lexter who combines a love of jazz, big band music, reggae, funk and of course sampling to create a unique multi-genre sonic world of his own. This eight-track mini album features a multitude of sampled jazz breaks, ragga and hip-hop MC flows, all married to tight funk grooves and reggae skanks. Party starting stuff!
Review: Disco Tech's re-edit label DiscoDat has earned itself a strong reputation due to its relentless stream of high quality reworks. Here, on the Metropolis EP, they look towards Fritz Lang for some inspiration, but beyond the titles and cover, the mysterious Rare Cuts stick to '70s grooves. There are four tracks to immerse yourself in, with our favourites being the smooth and jazzy soul ballad "Sweetest Pain" and the suspended tension of tight and funky space jam "Get It Up".
Review: For this, their inaugural release, Beatnik City round up a pan-international squad (including British, Italians and Brazilians) in what proves to be a great homage to 'the world's sexiest city'. There's seven tracks here - all of which look back to the hazy golden 1960s and conjures up vintage Copacabana vibes through a combination of salsa and Latin loungey sounds and melodies all welded to tougher modern breaks for a contemporary slant.
Review: Los-Angeles boogie masher-uppers, Boogie Down Edits, are back with the second helping of their Cumbia Boogie chapter, a series reserved for Latin-influenced disco bombshells. Much like the previous outing, the second instalment of the series contains a gorgeous load of organic percussion and carnival-esque vocals; the shining moments reside in the piano-led "Espinas" and the reggaeton-leaning "It's A Pity". It's party time, people!
Review: From their recent online musings, it seems that the award-winning Scour Records seem to be as equally fond of the other type of swinging as they are the style of music they've done so well at releasing thus far. Thankfully here we're only about the music and what a lot of it there is on Scoured Swing Vol 1. Here label owner DJ Spinforth selects eight of the best new jams around. Highlights include the classy, laid back opener "About Me" by The Fritz, the dubstep-meets-Charleston vibes of "Swingers" by Father Funk and the epic electro-swing monster "Cufflinks & Caviar" by Tuxedo Junction.
Review: We've commented many times in the past about how, when it comes to re-edits and disco mash-ups, Gazeebo were there first and wore the t-shirt. Well, if the previous two action-packed instalments in this, their retrospective series, wasn't enough, they've decided to drop a third! So now we have a further 12 retro sizzlers to contend with including the dreamy Chic-esque "Disco Forever", the Bee Gees-ripping "I Love Me Some BJs" and the slightly unexpected (and bonkers) New York diva house of "Kasual Reverb".
Review: Tumble Audio has been providing us with seriously killer bass music for a few years now, and here they celebrate reaching their tenth release by recruiting Roadman Joel to curate a selection of the kind of seriously heavy tunes you might expect to hear at one of their many label nights. There's a whopping 18 tracks on here covering a wide spectrum of British urban dance music, including Majora's ridiculously amazing tribal UKF monster "T&C's", A Motion's ghetto 2-step hybrid "Back In Your Love" and Sentiment's wobble-heavy tropical jam, "Change You".
Review: The latest addition to the Katakana Edits party is the mysterious FH. Equally mysterious are the source tracks for the edits featured here. However there's no ambiguity about the standard of tunes though. There's five of them and unlike the more swingy vibes of the label's recent releases, "Vol 12" is going for a tougher funk vibe, almost rare groove in places. Highlights include the gritty "Down In The Basement", the percussive Latin jam "Diablos" and the loose and groovy "Yo-Yo Beat".
Review: The mysterious Crateditors is the man (it IS one man, we know that much!) at the controls for this latest in the long-running 'Katakana Edits' series. 'Jump Up Shake Down' (source unknown) finds us in party-hearty reggae territory with its lyrical homage to "a Kingston party in New York City," while 'Spaceship Love Affair' reworks 'Spaceship Lover', a space disco cut that was recorded in 1977 by Canada-based British singer Laurice (AKA Laurie Marshall) but not actually released until 2015. 'Memories' closes out the EP - again, the source has us beat but think torchy, hi-camp disco from the Grace Jones/Eartha Kitt school of thought.
Review: These re-edit EPs from Audaz usually feature a mix of the familiar and the obscure, with forgotten disco nuggets or hidden Afro treasures nestling alongside reworkings of massive pop and rock hits. There have been volumes that kept things more resolutely underground, though, and so it is here, on a 10-track EP that seems to draw largely on late 70s/early 80s Eurodisco for inspiration. The precise source material has our disco detectives beat this time around - though the familiar-sounding jaunty piano riff that backbones '222' has been driving us mad all week - but disco- and boogie-loving floors will find much to enjoy here.
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