TENDING TROPIC Schallplatten & CDs

Review: Moustache Records has long ploughed a synth-heavy, retro-futurist furrow in which 21st century producers showcase their love of muscular, body-shaking styles of the 1980s, most frequently Italo-disco and Hi-NRG. The playfully named Trending Topic fit neatly into this blueprint, with this debut EP framing them as lovers of Bobby Orlando style Hi-NRG, the camper end of Italo-disco and the formative years of Euro-dance. This approach is best exemplified by lead cut 'Terpentine', where colossal synth riffs and lead lines climb above a thickset sequenced bassline and snappy drum machine beats. That is given a slightly harder and more pulsating tweak courtesy of Machinegewhr, before our heroes return with two more tracks: the Hi-NRG-goes-trance style 'Our Adventure Begins' and the on-the-dancefloor-at-Heaven-in-1986 flex of 'Mowing The Lawn'.