[Mobilee]

Miss Kittin’s debut on Mobilee feels like a long-anticipated hangover after the bombastic bender she’s been on for much of her career. While it’s rather refreshingly pared down to the bare essentials, “All You Need” is not completely removed from her past. With its somewhat vulgar throb, it’s a little like her earliest electro-clash work, and the gruff textures aren’t exactly all smooth marble and granite. But it’s laid down tight with a snug tech-house sensibility: this Kittin has finally been housebroken. Even the vocal refrain is limited to a repeated couplet, and there’s nothing close to obscene about it — but for once, politeness isn’t a step backward. By keeping her vocal to an amiable croon, it becomes a dulcet siren that rides the track’s subtle ebb, accentuating its melodic touches rather than hogging the center stage.

“All You Need” courses in acidic spurts, thrusting in stasis; held in line by some weighty force, Kittin’s noisier tendencies are released through distorted chords like pipes bursting in rhythmic tandem. When she mentions “love,” a lazy, decayed chime picks up on the wind, charting out a Pantha Du Prince-esque melody as the breeze picks up and twirls it around. It’s accessible, melodic, and gentle, all underpinned by that subtly erotic acid bass line. Club-ready tech-house doesn’t get much sweeter than this. The single comes backed with a Lee Van Dowski remix that unfortunately decides “All You Need” isn’t quite club-ready enough and completely removes the track’s sensual vigor. Nailing it down at the edges into a pathetically straightforward progression, it unwisely places emphasis on the monotonous chords and pretends the charming chime section never existed. Gesaffelstein’s remix enters more risky territory, gutting the song completely, turning Kittin’s monotone into an angelic incantation over glowing 8-bit embers, pitch-bent notes and rattling bass. I’ll admit that when I saw the Miss Kittin and Mobilee mentioned together, my expectations were rather low; but “All You Need” goes a long way in proving that preconceived notions really can’t be trusted, sparking a little bit of that magic Kittin mentions in the lyrics.

[Mobilee]

The past couple years have seen Watergate become a sensation in Berlin for steadfast techno lovers as well as semi-oblivious party people. While its billing reflects an intimate knowledge of underground dance culture, its eye-popping light show and posh décor attract plenty of average punters. As one of Watergate’s resident DJs, Sebo K’s style suits this shade of gray perfectly. His Back Up Vol.1 mix balanced gloomy atmospheres with shamelessly romantic lyrics (Efdemin’s “Just a Track” and Larry Heard’s “Sun Can’t Compare” being standout moments). “Far Out,” his late 2007 single on Mobilee, sounded playfully mean and appeared in plenty of pounding tech-house sets, but also found its way onto Club Azuli’s Miami 2008 mix, thrown in amidst names like Laidback Luke and Fred Falke, and most notably a nauseating club remix of Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer.” As its title might suggest, “Diva” is R&B-inflected house that certainly won’t freak out any squares and will surely repel dance music’s chin-strokers. Nonetheless, it’s well worth a spin for the rest of us.

Very little is surprising about “Diva,” aside from its ability to juice so much excitement out of tired clichés. Basic house elements introduce themselves in an orderly fashion — first peppy high hats, then the abbreviated bass line, bass kicks, single note synth stabs, and finally the sassy Diva and her incoherent word fragment of choice. About three minutes in the beat disappears and two syllables repeat faster and faster, while a bit of delay turns the heat up, and finally the bass kick returns, joined by a pseudo-orgasmic “ohhh!” It’s a cookie-cutter breakdown, but for some reason it works. Mavens may find their tastes too well honed to tolerate it, but much like SIS’ “Nesrib,” “Diva” boasts an unembarrassed tackiness that makes it a good one for any DJ to keep in tow — there is definitely a time of night calling out for this sort of thing. As conceptually unoriginal as it may be, “Diva” will perfectly suit plenty of euphoric moments in the months ahead, not least in that flashing box along the River Spree.

After a few days’ rest, LWE’s Nate DeYoung files his report:

In the Sonar coverage I’ve seen over the years, I never read too much between the lines -– the fact is that this is a festival built upon the principle of overwhelming you. Take a couple of sweat-drenched summer days, add four official stages which end only at sunrise, mix with dozens upon dozens of parties happening at night/day/roof/beach/club/bar/stadium and you’ll find a recipe for letting go. And for my first Sonar, I let it wash over me. The only real decisions of the festival could be summed up with a short bullet point list: A. when to go to the next party B. when to eat and C. when to sleep. So with a hyper-saturated Sonar, it’s safe to say that it’s an experience where you drink as much as you can from a fire-hose. No matter how many favorite artists you catch, there’ll be just as many you miss. In my case, big gaps are named Shackleton, Kalabrese and Loco Dice/Luciano -– but spoken without regret. For such a festival, there’s no recap, just a highlight reel.

Claude Von Stroke was all smiles

Directly off the plane and taxied straight to the hotel Diagonal Barcelona for Mobilee’s first roof-top party of the weekend, I caught the last hour or so of Radio Slave’s set. Decked in a dripping inside-out Mickey Mouse shirt, Matt Edwards played his trademark hypnotic slow build techno. Sure, it was probably better suited for dark rooms than afternoon rooftops but Edwards had the good sense to finish up the set with a little sun-drenched house, spinning hit after hit ’til the staff pulled the plug. After the success of the party last year, Mobilee doubled up this year, hosting a second party the next afternoon/evening. Always graceful when DJing, Anja Schneider provided a nice set of simmering techno and Claude Van Stroke pounded away at an endless parade of minimal bangers. All told, the setting was hard to beat -– a gentle breeze, pool, and the 21st century homage to a dildo, the Agbar Tower, looming in the background.

The view from above

Architecture and space made a huge difference for parties. For Raum’s Open Air at Velodrome de Horta, everything pretty damn underwhelming. The line-up of Cadenza, Desolat and Get Physical DJs looked like the best ticket of the weekend, but the cavernous space swallowed the music alive – both dance floors were sparse, devoid of energy or excitement. Thankfully, I got out before I became bitterly disappointed. On the other end of the spectrum the Innervisions Night party packed into BeCool’s tight basement space. It might’ve been as dense as any dance floor at Sonar, muggy and full of cigarette smoke clouds, but it was impossible to not get sucked into Henrik Schwarz’s set immediately. Same went for Resident Advisor’s Night at the tiny Macarena club -– Dan Bell played a great set to a crowd jumping in the back, spilling drinks in the front. Smaller venues all seemed to have a bigger sweet spot for a proverbial hit.

Martyn and Conforce at RA’s party

The programming for the official Sonar events was varied enough to experience as a nice potpourri. How about this for an example — when M_nus launched to its latest victims of the Cube, Mala was dropping bass, Roisin Murphy was playing a deranged pop-superstar and Justice were lighting up their stack of Marshall speakers. A little schizoid, but it was hard to be disappointed with anything for too long. Probably my favorite Sonar line-up was the D*I*R*T*Y crew of Pilooski, Discodeine and Dirty Soundsystem picking up a crowd that had hitherto been content to just laze around.

Pilooski’s set was smoking

Thankfully, there was little pretension (*cough* outside of the cube *cough*) to get in the way of fun at Sonar — artists mingled around in crowds like fans and shit-eating grins were infectious. For a festival so overloaded, so full of missed shows and connections, my only regret was leaving too early. Some friendly advice to future Sonar attendees: make sure to stay until Monday to soak it all in.

Wolfgang Voigt ain’t no one to fuck with!

[Leena Music]

Mobilee’s choosy younger sister, Leena Music, deserves praise for getting established producers away from their usual hangouts for one off singles. Their first salvo of records came from Holger Zilske, Catz N’ Dogz (3 Channels trying on another moniker) and Paul Brtschitsch. Olivier Mateu, one half of Parisian duo The Youngsters, adds his name — or rather his seldom used Rodriguez Jr. alias — to the list with his single, “Rubbo Swingo.”

Listen to “Rubbo Swingo”:

“Rubbo Swingo” varies between minute detail (such as flecks of scraping noises and sub-melodies placed deep in the mix) and an overt hook to keep listeners interested on both sides of the turntable. Its thrumming riff careens up and down the scale like an elephant’s war cry, alternating between sharper and softer attacks as it carves itself into dancers’ frontal lobes. But whereas “Rubbo” sticks in the mind, “Soledad” likely already exist in many enthusiasts’ memory. Intentionally or not, the track’s main progression is cribbed almost note for note from one of 2006′s biggest hits, Loco Dice’s “Seeing Through Shadows.” While the number of notes and the surrounding bittersweet pads are markedly different, the shadow of its exemplar looms large over the unremarkable progeny. Though “Rubbo Swingo” is an upside, Mateu might still need the other Youngster on hand for quality control.

[Mobilee]

How much stock listeners put into track titles is usually relative to how it sounds. For example, Martin Buttrich’s “Hunter” aurally portrayed the food chain in progress and Daniel Wang’s “Berlin Sunrise” captured the glowing warmth emerging from the horizon. By contrast, Tiger Stripes’ “Mad At Me” is hardly an aggressive or even upset tune and Argy’s “Unreliable Virgin,” well, you get the picture. And it’s not that track titles necessarily need to mirror their contents; plenty of artists I know name their work at the very end as merely a necessary afterthought. But sometimes the disparity between a track’s title and sound practically writes its own critique. Take Sebo K’s latest single, a single-sided limited run release on Mobilee. Emblazoned with loud, colorful cover art (by Paul Snowden, who also designed the flipside etching) and entitled “Far Out,” one might expect a wonky romp to wild out to.

Listen to Sebo K’s “Far Out”:

In reality, “Far Out” offers something much more buttoned down and far inside Sebo’s comfort zone. It’s not an awful track, don’t get me wrong; the knifing, distorted synth riff which rips through rhythm and melody alike is enough to justify its existence (a slew of DJs listed on the Word&Sound page tend to agree). Besides that, there’s little to distinguish “Far Out” as Sebo K’s, or from the hundreds of other producers with the same VSTs who add me on Myspace. He puts forth a conventional house beat, two rote marimba progressions, a couple percussive touches, a few spacey synth doodles and calls it a day. Given his year of solid remixes (the “Bell Clap Dance” remix is huge and underrated, for one) and DJing (Back Up Vol. 1, for two), I know Sebo is capable of more. It’s just going to take a little more effort and maybe a better title or two.