Back catalogue: House

Review: Samosa Records delivers another funk-fuelled feast with Vol2, a double-vinyl delight bursting with disco grooves. Dirty Elements & Drunkdrivers open with 'Koko,' which is a clavinet-driven, string-laced dancefloor gem and then Macchianera's 'Gotta Dance' gets the De Gama re-groove treatment-soulful, brassy and endlessly playable. Niels F.'s 'Trying To Love' grooves with filtered strings, brass and a slick vocal hook that is nicely enhanced by De Gama's re-drums. MP Soundworks closes with the Afro-tinged 'Gotta Get It,' a tribal-infused banger powered by looped vocals and a bouncing bassline. This is a very useful collection that underlines Samosa's fine ear for cutting talent.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Sleeve damaged but otherwise in excellent condition***


Volume One of a label retrospective of pioneering early 90s Prog House label Interactive Test Compiled by Alex from Utopia Records and enigmatic Interactive Test founder Franco Falsini. Falsini, responsible for many of the underground classics on the label he founded in Florence in 1991 was first known for his 70s Italian Prog / Cosmic group Sensations Fix. A trailblazer who continued to push the boundaries of electronic music two decades later with Interactive Test, accompanied by the up-and-coming talents of Trance hero DJ Miki the Dolphin, his brother Riccardo and an host of cult Italian music producers. Here we start with 5 tracks from the archive, all highly collectable, remastered for DJs and psychedelic music enthusiastic alike from the best sources possible. Authentic and original dance sounds still hitting the spot in our times.

Review: The sign of a truly great artist is that you can put on one of their records from some 15 years ago, as well as one out next week, and not tell which is which. Mr Pittman is one of those - a Detroit flag bearer with a raw, otherworldly take on house and techno that always sounds futuristic. 'The Midwest Advocates Part One' first dropped back in 2007 and is being repressed now and is just as good as ever with ramshackle and dusty grooves, wonky synths and eerie textures all getting you into a trance and keeping you there. Both cuts on this are standouts in his impressive discography.

Review: Japanese DJ, producer and remixer Makoto Nakatani is the man behind the M-Scape alias, and he straddles genre borders with the four cuts he serves up for evergreen UK staple Local Talk. 'Urban Reconstruction' is propulsive deep house with Detroit-style hi-tek synth magic colouring the airwaves. 'I Do' is an ass-wiggling heater with stylised vocals and colourful melodic motifs triggered by the drums. 'Freedom' is all early Chicago jack, cowbells and sugary chord progressions, then 'Let The Drums Play' taps into sun-kissed London broken beat with cosmic melodies adding a futuristic twist. There are a lot of different moods touched up on with this EP and they are all high-class.

Review: Hot on the heels of the release of Medlar's brilliant new album, Islands (a first solo set for 12 years, fact fans), Delusions of Grandeur has decided to deliver a swathe of club-ready remixes of key cuts. Predictably, the label has opted for an eclectic range of high-profile underground artists. Acid house revivalists Paranoid London step up first, re-framing 'Lub Interlude' as a dark, TB-303 fired chunk of electronic body music, before Crazy P's Ron Basejam turns 'Dot The T's', featuring rapper DeeVoNay, into a string-laden mutant electro shuffler. Over on side B, Josh Ludlow re-invents 'Atlantean' as an acid-flecked midtempo chugger, while Medlar himself delivers a gorgeous and colourful 'Sunset Dub' of 'Midnight Chicadas'.

Review: It seems as though Mike & Benney have come completely out of leftfield to drop this - details on the pair are exceedingly thin on the ground. That doesn't matter, though, cause this new EP is a big opening statement. 'Ready For Tonight?' It's thudding but well swung house with smart synth lines and a funky bassline, while 'What Can I Say?' Brings more kaleidoscopic colour and gurgling synths to a cruising groove. 'Les Oiseaux' has a militant snap to the drums that's softened by the gooey pads, and 'Bird Vocalization' is just that - found sounds that place you outdoors during a frenzied morning call.

Review: Heavyweight sonic Afro-botics from Nikodemus, Barzo and Mr Doris on 7" wax. The trio team up here with Dinked Records for a double-bill 7" in veins of amapiano and broken beat, primed for crate sifters and floor ambulants alike. On the A, 'Want Some More' delivers Mr. Doris' signature blend of rhythmic muscle and Afro-Latin swang, while the flip flops Nickodemus with Barzo and Zongo Abongo for 'Show Your Power': a bold, percussive cut straddling broken beat, house, and ska. Somewhere between 126 and 128 BPM, both are utter floor finishers and could easily intro your next Afro-house set as they could provide it a sense of continuous, mid-set body.

Review: Reborn Italo-disco label Fulltime Production's ongoing remix series, in which contemporary producers tackle gems from the vaults, reaches its tenth instalment. Da Lukas steps up first, re-imagining Rainbow Team's lightly funk-fuelled, string-laden 1982 disco jam 'Bite The Apple' as an action-packed disco-house anthem, before long-serving Italian producer Massimo Beradi turns Michael Baker's 1983 workout 'Don't You Want My Loving' into a hybrid boogie-soul/deep house treat. Over on side B, Souls Groove successfully 're-vibe' Say When's 'Save Me', an early house era European synth-pop anthem (and yes, you'll know it), while GAMM regular Black Truffle's take on Ma Gi C's 'Shampoo' is a gritty disco-funk delight.

Review: The eighth instalment in Running Back's playful Hits! series arrives with a globetrotting batch of quirky dancefloor charmers, spanning interstellar disco, Italo throwbacks and Berlin School eccentricity. Kicking things off, Skatman leans into sleazy synth funk and smoky melodrama with 'What I Am Feelin'', a crooning synth-pop number pitched somewhere between space cabaret and Metro Area. Baron Von Traxian Australian prince of peaktime pompibrings glitzy melancholy with 'If I Only Knew', layering ascending Italo arps and soft pads over a chugging disco pulse. Janis Zielinski and Sowhy3 (both Berlin-based) turn in 'In Your Eyes' twiceifirst as a vocal daydream of euro-pop yearning, then as a sleek instrumental. Morphena's 'Venus Underworld' dials up the noir with icy stabs and new wave propulsion, while Zoe Zoe's 'Palikau Dzemperi' signs off with a Tangerine Dream-style glide repurposed for the club. There's no unifying concept, but as with earlier volumes, that's the point: a polychrome snapshot of Running Back's curious, cosmopolitan world.

Review: New York legend Louie Vega and Detroit icon Moodymann - two titans of house with deep but divergent lineages - collide again on 'Seven Mile', reissued here as a hefty double pack with remixes. Originally released in 2022 on Vega's Expansions in the NYC LP, this expanded edition gathers fresh reworks from trusted names across the house spectrum. Dennis Quin goes punchy and percussive, Kai Alce turns in a soulful NDATL roller, and Rocco Rodamaal teams up with Alex Finkin before offering two lush solo interpretations across the C-side. Vega's own instrumental demo mix adds vintage bounce, while Charlie Soul Clap, here credited as Charlie Levine, delivers an ecstatic final pair - his 'Wild Version' the most unhinged of the lot.