[Hotflush Recordings]

Clearly cognizant of Mount Kimbie’s cross-border appeal to techno/house heads, Hotflush wisely spends the second remix EP on the 4×4 axis with mixes from its head honcho, Paul Rose, and Panorama Bar residents Prosumer and Tama Sumo. Rose’s effort on “Vertical,” under his SCB guise, is the only track labeled as an edit, and fittingly it exploits the richness of the original without imposing too much Scuba. Basically re-imagining the moody original for the jacking techno crowd, its restless clink figures prominently, offset by a throbbing kick-and-woodblock rhythm section. Several breakdowns are employed alongside noisy washes, and with each the track grows more monstrous. It’s linear, as an edit should be, but not monotonous; SCB magnifies everything for peak-of-the-night intensity.

“William” found Mount Kimbie at their most seasick, a somber little number that develops into a distant, obscured future-shanty before its unexpected immersion in heavy, drunken bass. Tama Sumo & Prosumer’s mix retains many of the original’s qualities, extending them for dance floor consumption. They harness the power of its bass line for a driving rather than disorienting effect by chopping it up and placing it throughout the energetic structure. Midway through, dramatic strings emerge, setting the tone for the vocal, now slightly more intelligible. It’s not so far from the indie-house crossovers of Pantha du Prince or the Dial label, a streamlined take on sentimentalism. In summation, Mount Kimbie could not have selected a more formidable group of artists to rework their catalog. The results are split equally between exploiting their rhythmic and emotional capabilities, somewhere between the dance floor and the anxious rest-of-the-world. This is the split at the heart of Mount Kimbie as well.