Berlin’s Hardwax, that Berghain-staffed den of alluringly anonymous white labels, might be the vinyl emporium of the moment. But what about London’s Phonica? Resembling more a design-minded record nerd’s studio apartment than a storefront adjacent to a Soho parking garage, Phonica has built an international reputation not by genre affiliation but on the high quality of the wax lining its walls. As a very green DJ studying abroad a few years back, I received my unofficial techno education at the shop, saddling up at a listening station once or twice a week with an employee-curated stack of new 12″s. I returned to the States with two suitcases full of Phonica’s wares (and a decimated savings account), and the bulk of my purchases still sound fresh today. So it’s no surprise that “Tension,” the first release on the shop’s eponymous label, features some of the most finely honed, built-to-last dance music on the shelves right now (not to mention some of the prettiest packaging).
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Dplay, Huub Sand
Running Back, managed by journalist, DJ, occasional producer and all-round good guy Gerd Janson, had a great 2008, cherrypicking three superb records by Mark E, Move D and Radio Slave. Quality over quantity seemed to be the year’s motto, but in 2009 the Frankfurt-based label has managed the trick of combining the two, with four fine releases in the first half of this year: The Melchior-esque “Forward Snipping” by Robert Dietz, the frankly ridiculous limited edition “The Voice From Planet Love” from Precious System, and a forthcoming disco smasher by Hamburg’s Tensnake all have their merits, but the real pick of the bunch has been Dplay’s “Huub Sand.”
Terence Fixmer, Machine EP
It’s somewhat surprising “Machine EP” is the first time Terence Fixmer and Speedy J, two veterans of hard and fast techno, have worked with each other’s music. Both have churned out banging twelves since the early 90s and have a workman-like quality about their productions. Appropriately, Speedy’s recently launched Electric Deluxe imprint is the venue for their meeting, marking the first time another solo artist is featured there. Fans of either man will find much the EP pleasing if not surprising.
DJ Koze, Mrs. Bojangels
Stefan Kozalla has been on a roll for an unnaturally long stretch of time in the mercurial dance music community. His particular take on house music is generally full of humor, energy, and some of the most killer earworms in existence, and his first single for 2009 is no exception.
Actress, Ghosts Have A Heaven
Releasing a gem of an album in Hazyville at the end of 2008 saw Actress (nee Darren Cunningham) passed over for the end of year accolades. But with several tracks from the album turning up on recent releases, the Werks Discs label manager is now receiving some overdue attention. His remix of Various Production’s “Lost” was a gobsmacking foray of compressed, blunted house music while the reappearance of album cut “Crushed” on a recent Prime Numbers sampler drew rave reviews from all who encountered it. Combining a touch of the new with further material lifted from Hazyville, “Ghosts Have A Heaven” will only further the reputation of the less than prolific producer.
Oleg Poliakov, Rainy Dayz
French producer Frederic Aubourg first debuted in 1997 as Skat, but his career didn’t take off until 2004 when started a string of releases for Karat, Sthmlaudio, and more recently Eklo. Aubourg can also be found producing under the Russian-sounding alias, Oleg Poliakov, turning in one Circus Company single per year since 2007. Despite the distinctive moniker, most Poliakov tracks blend in all too well with their nuevo “deep house” surroundings. “Rainy Dayz” makes headway towards a more distinguishable sound, though perhaps for the wrong reasons.
Kevin Gorman, Elements Part 1
Manchester’s Kevin Gorman isn’t one of those artists who tries to conceal the mechanics and methods of his trade. Nor is he one to dictate how and under what conditions his music should be experienced. His four-part Elements series for his own Mikrowave label will be available both on tangible vinyl and portable mp3 formats. The main talking points on the series, though, concern Gorman’s decision to offer each track’s individual components. In other words, you can get an mp3 of just the pads for “Hoodwinked,” or the bare percussion from “Insomnia.” You can even get “Cyclic”‘s toms as an isolated track. Not to mention alternate mixes. The first two installments are already out, and some of the material is even offered at no cost.
Baby Ford, Gravy Train
Baby Ford once said, “Voices on tracks have always been part of the sound, but that’s all it is, part of a whole sound.” “Gravy Train” and Soul Capsule’s “Waiting 4 A Way,” a track Baby Ford co-produced with Thomas Melchior in 2007, help us to understand this relationship of parts to wholes when it comes to vocals and instrumentation. There are similarities between the voices on “Gravy Train” and “Waiting 4 A Way,” both in execution and concept. Linguistically, they share a sexual “come on” croon, they’re worked with effects in equal measure, and both have been released as a cappellas. This last commonality suggests a logic where the voices are no longer just parts of a whole sound, but have become a whole sound in and of themselves.
Tony Lionni|Radio Slave, Berghain 03|Part 1
The first extracts from Len Faki’s curate’s egg of a mix CD showcases an established figure, and a relative newcomer. Radio Slave falls into the former category (if you haven’t heard one of his pounding remixes in the last couple of years, you haven’t been near a nightclub), while Tony Lionni is the fresh face in the Berghain finishing school.
Andy Stott, Brief Encounter/Drippin
When LWE interviewed Shlom, manager of Manchester’s Modern Love imprint, he described Andy Stott as “one of the most musically hungry people I’ve ever met.” It’s an apt characterization of a producer who gobbles up dance music sub-genres and spits back potent hybrids with little concern for which camps might enjoy them. Last year’s Unknown Exception compilation capably documented his approach by collecting wide-ranging singles such as the serrated dub monster “The Massacre” and bass bin-rattler “”Handle With Care.” Stott and his fans have worked up quite an appetite for fresh material after all this looking back, but whether his first single of 2009, “Brief Encounter/Drippin,” will leave listeners satisfied is open for debate.
Santiago Salazar, Arcade
If Salazar turned in his needles today he’d leave sporting a first-class resume: member of the legendary Underground Resistance, core contributor to live acts like Los Hermanos, and steady recording mercenary for Carl Craig’s Planet E. So it’s not like S2’s aching for a new belt-notch. If anything, his latest on Macro proves that he’s still out busting his hump like the rest of them to turn out quality music.
Osborne, Hovercrafting EP
Osborne’s “Hovercrafting EP” picks up where his Spectral Sound-released debut album left off last year, offering a breadth of styles rendered in characteristically bespoke timbres. The EP revisits “Wait A Minute Now,” first included on the free Ghostly Swim compilation, with two new versions and a potent Arto Mwambe remix. Osborne also slakes his thirst for crossing genre borders on two new tracks that deliver on the promise of his 2008 releases without simply reshuffling the deck.
Peter Van Hoesen, Attribute One EP
Whether by coincidence or design, Peter Van Hoesen seemed blessed with good timing in 2008. After spending the better part of the decade producing as Object and Vanno to little fanfare, the Belgian producer suddenly found an enthusiastic audience for the brawny techno cuts released under his own name on his own label, Time to Express, and Lan Music. Berghain residents Ben Klock, Marcel Dettmann and Norman Nodge were all noted fans, the audiences they decimated with his tracks were just as keen, and he easily topped LWE’s breakout artists list. Van Hoesen seems poised to leave his mark on 2009 as well, starting with the “Attribute One EP.”
Wolf + Lamb, Brooklynn EP
For the past couple years or so, Gadi Mizrahi and Zev have been two of Brooklyn’s key house entrepreneurs. Under the moniker Wolf + Lamb they DJ parties, produce tracks, and release records by themselves and some close friends, all from a dingy art space in Williamsburg known as The Marcy Hotel. Their most recent release, the aptly titled “Brooklynn EP,” finds Wolf + Lamb poised for a breakthrough as a production team and label.
Bloody Mary, Black Pearl
Much is made of producers who craft their tracks with a little help from their friends, as if the quality of the track somehow hinges on the authenticity of it being a solo effort. Loco Dice and Timo Maas both produce with Martin Buttrich, though their records sound nothing like each other, and Buttrich’s sound different again. French born Bloody Mary has been releasing some impressive minimal gears for the past couple of years, first with Tassilo Ippenberger and more recently has done so with the help of Sam Sierra. Her debut album, Black Pearl, will be out the first of June on Contexterrior (also their first artist album release) and will feature guest production appearances by Sam Sierra, Argenis Brito, Danton Eeprom, Jay Haze and Jona.
Culoe De Song, The Bright Forest
The back story to Culolethu Zulu’s debut release reads like a (energy drink sponsored, house music) fairytale. An eighteen year old kid who had previously never traveled outside his native South Africa, Culoe rocked up to the Red Bull Music Academy in Barcelona with a bunch of his Afrobeat-infused deep house tracks, blew the competition away and returned home with a contract with one of Germany’s premier house labels.
Jeff Mills, The Good Robot
Like death and taxes, Jeff Mills is something of an inevitability. Restlessly creative and prolific even now, more than 20 years after his first release, Mills shows no signs of slowing down, and may just be learning some new tricks at this late stage in the game. Always a vinyl purist — Mills’ famed three-turntable DJ sets are legendary — the Axis and Purpose Maker label boss has recently signed a deal with Beatport to make his tracks available digitally for the first time, even taking the opportunity to issue unreleased bonus tracks (somewhat irking his fellow vinyl purists, of course). With his embracing of today’s technology at long last, Mills’ legendary obsessions with sci-fi and futurism are appropriately on full display on his first release of 2009, “The Good Robot.” Which, of course, is not available digitally.
Kontext, Convex Curved Mirror/Hometown Swamp
Kontext is fast emerging as one of those artists who, like Pangaea, have very few titles to their name, but the astonishing quality of the few jewels they’ve dropped place them in a slightly different echelon to the majority. Also akin to Pangaea, Martyn, 2562 and Ramadanman, Kontext takes a wholly un-blinkered view of the music he produces. While journalists and bloggers scramble for suitable pigeon holes the producers set about crafting further genre-defying treats.
Donnacha Costello, The Only Way To Win Is Not To Play the Game
With his Minimise label laid to rest before it reached its tenth birthday (Costello felt the name had become almost cliché considering the last few years’ obsession with the genre) the Irishman returns for 2009 on his brand new Look Long imprint, the name reflective of its ethos. After ending 2008 with “It Simply Is” — the emotionally rousing swan song for Minimise — we find Costello in a pensive mood for his new label’s first release.
Alex Cortex, Non-Rigid Designator
With a discography dating back to 1996, Alex Cortex already has several tremendous records to his name on Out To Lunch, Ann Aimee, and Platzhirsch Schallplatten. Though probably a favorite of several of your own favorite artists, this discretely prolific Heidelberg resident’s name isn’t one that gets bandied about much. His latest, lane-shifting EP for Pomelo probably won’t change that, but that’s no reason for you not to get familiar.