Back catalogue: House

Review: Derek Carr's brand of Detroit-influenced electronic futurism has always oozed class, with the Irish producer prioritising mood, melody and ear-pleasing synth sounds above all else. It's this blend - both club-ready and perfect for home listening - that makes his releases worth checking. We'd highly recommend Electro Statik Part One, the first in a series of vinyl excursions that as usual blur the boundaries between styles. He begins with the immersive chords, jumpy lead lines and smooth house beats of 'In Transit', before diving headlong into deep electro-meets-IDM waters on the impeccable 'Mimas'. Turn to side B for the skittish, far-sighted and picturesque electro-not-electro number 'A Star Dies', as well as the warming, pitched-down electronic melancholia of 'Dione'.

Review: Armed with analogue and modular synthesisers, Southern Italian producers Marco Cassanelli and Deckard take you on an emotive journey inspired by geometry and symmetry for T.A. Rock Records - a small indie label out of sunny Trani, Puglia established 2010. The Splitted EP starts out with the desolate dub techno textures of 'Abandoned Town' while the spaced-out cut 'Triangle' and the hypnotising 'Rectangle' (part 1) make for more experimentally minded tracks.

Review: Three distinctly outer space-themed cuts from Greece's Alex Celler, each with a linear minimal/tech skeleton that has other, interloping musical influences draped elegantly and classily across it. 'Ancient Astronuats' has the weird, wired mystical stirrings of early Black Dog about it, complete with melting, bendy electro notations that coax it along and add a psychedelic dimension. 'Stargate To Cosmos' has a playful, Drexciyan feel to it, with crunchy, organic drum beats flirting alongside the more rigid electrics. 'Object In The Sky' is the most minimal of the pack, sleek and stalker-like, but still contains enough action - mainly floating around up there in the ether - to hold and build attention.

Review: Aniara is a label that ostensibly deals in deep house but you will never hear a standard tune on any of their releases. There is always an innovative sense of melody or intriguing balance between drive and emotion in everything they put out. Next to prove that point is Chefone with Storm. The title track opens up with a dubbed-out cut that is backed by the celestial glow of an angelic pad. Glistening shards of light also puncture the groove to make for something delightfully unusual. 'Hondo' takes up the whole of the flip with a heavy but mid-tempo deep house rhythm embellished with wispy pads and flickering static.

Review: Bristol's cultured Innate label is back with a first outing of the year and it returns to their various artists format with a mix of talents all making their mark. UK veteran Tom Churchill opens up with 'Unknown Unknowns (Edit)', which brings plenty of fuzzy and lo-fi aesthetic to jacked up drums and spaced-out pads. Rai Scott then shows her class with 'Suasion' that sinks down deep into immersive drums and is subtly lit up with simmering strings. Innate co-founders Owain K and Gilbert then hook-up under their brand new alias Curved Space and showcase their love of electro with 'Reverie,' a dreamy cut that glows with nice celestial melodies and will have dance floors in a zoned-out state. Last of all it's Lisbon mainstay Jorge Caiado who debuts with the chord-laced 'Floating Without Lifting,' a sophisticated and serene jazz-techno cut that takes you to the stars.

Review: Some would deny that sound could be at all malevolent, or carry an innately evil intent. Greek techno producer Cirkel Square may think differently; his latest red-label EP for Ukrainian imprint Jerelo makes the argument quite clear that since sound does not exist without an ear to receive it, and a subject to perceive it, all sound is thus subjective. Its emotional contents are as contingent on the presence of a human mind as is the capacity to hear the sound itself: if we hear a sound, we cannot avoid ascribing it an intention. Cirkel Square, meanwhile, refrains from bad philosophy of this kind and draws on Ancient Greek mythology to inform his tutelary four track EP, each of which is named after the Greek gods of time, hell, war and hell again. The Greeks believed in four "sinister harmonies", and Cirkel Square has finely tuned each track to conform to each of said grave frequencies, to harrowingly electric effect. It's not all doom and gloom, though: make it to the end for the calmest balm in sound there is here, 'Persefone's Whisper'.

Review: Notorious internet motormouth Thomas Cox dropped the first EP on his own new QED label back in 2020, but only now is the vinyl arriving with us. It was worth the wait, however, because as much as it would be fun to find the sort of faults in his music that he does in everyone else's, these are three raw as you like tracks that go direct to the soul. Detroit influences of course loom large throughout, with each cut layering up dirt and grime, dusty drums and rusty synths to hypnotic effect. The standout might be the unresolved loops and cosmic-gaze of 'Starry Ave,' but any of these will make an impact on the right dance floor.

Review: Reissue of in-demand 2017 Peter Croce 12" on navy blue vinyl.

Review: Ecuadorian maestro Nicolas Cruz is back on Rhythm Seciton to follow up his last EP Subtropique which proved a big hit. "I'm always trying to re-interpret this Afro-Caribbean feeling, and trying to figure out how I could humanize this through the machines," he says of his approach and it certain is the case here. He mixes up some worlds rhythms with twitchy techno drums and electronic synths to make for something totally new on all of the tracks. The heavy, skipping kicks of 'Residual Heat' is a real favourite while 'Self Oscillation' is a catering percussive jam to pack the floor. Another great outing.

Review: You can always count on Capracara to bring something a little spicy to the table, but the results are even more unpredictable when you throw UK house magician Simbad into the mix. If you like your house music extremely grubby, blippy, analogue and slightly unhinged, but still soulful, you're in the right place. 'Roubaix Cube' jerks and bumps along with all kinds of bleeps and rugged beats, and the pads sound delirious but still inject some real heart into the track. 'Prowler Report' heads further off into discordant freakiness, but there's still plenty of punch down low. 'The Ozone' is the smoother offering, with some gorgeous keys, chords and pads interweaving for a still-rugged but oh-so-sweet strain of deep house music.

Review: One Eye Witness rounds up another four acts for their periodic V/A series, spewing forth four breaks-driven whooshers crossing into progressive techno territory. The Hague duo Young Adults nod to a 1997 Loveparade anthem with 'It's Only Temporary', while breaks and kick implants converge on Christopher Ledger's 'Change That', a track which sounds like the starting firings of an interplanetary expedition pod after years of disuse. Joely brings cosmic chug on the cocooning B1 'Transitional', while the Samesame closer 'Novel End' is just that, traversing a noxious atmosphere with a flexoskeletal electro beat.

Review: The fully mixed version of Confidence Man's debut Fabric mix record is here on CD. In contrast to the selectors' LP version - also sold by us - this full version is a seamless, singular slab of optical laser-read musical licence, espousing the central vibe-theme of Confidence Man's message: have confidence. Well, except for want of a receiving ear, we find ourselves tentatively able to confide in Confidence Man's Fabric mix ("better than therapy" joke happily dodged) as a substitution in the meantime; for it too shows us that real, authentic, and boundless confidence can, believably, indeed, be found in bouncy dance exclusives available on CD only. Among these are Patrick Prins' kitsch chipmunk banger 'Fiesta Conga' and Cygnus X's steezy-cheesy trance stutterer 'Positron'03'. With both many a throwback and a present promo in tow, Confidence Man dice up and dole out a small slice of their huge stash of their patented auricular confidence dust.