After the sad liquidation of Orbital (the greatest electronic band on the planet - period) on July 28th 2004, this 12" sees the return of Paul Hartnoll to the music scene. While brother Phil kept himself busy crossing the planet as a breaks DJ and producing as one half of Long Range, younger sibling Paul disappeared from view, locking himself away in a secret Brighton based studio.
His eagerly awaited first solo album will be released soon, but these two tracks are the first to emerge.
While Phil's productions lack identity and depth, these tracks have the Orbital signature written all over.
The heavenly atmospherics and multitonal synthwork clarifies the fact that Paul still is the better songwriter of the two brothers. 'Patchwork Guilt' could have been an unreleased track from the Blue Album, while my favourite 'Gloopy' would not be out of place on In Sides or The Altogether.
Hearing this for the first time gave me the same shivering of excitement as when a new Orbital album was released in the mid 90's.
Welcome back, Paul!

Richie has done it again: taking musical minimalism to the next level by incorporating the endless possibilities of today's technology to the fullest.
Third part in the DE9 series, this is indeed a giant leap forward with regard to its precursor 'Closer to the edit'.
On the DVD, Richie explains the advanced process in simple words, so that even my mother can understand what he's talking about.
Musically, the individual tracks have been stripped to their bare essentials and then used to build new tracks like a brick wall; but I've never seen a plasterer do such a precise job > in fact, Richie is probably the only artist in the world who can make this happen!
As extra features you get the full 5.1 Surround mix, two video clips which in my opinion are a bit too arty-farty, and twelve minutes of his DJ set at Timewarp, with a really cool visual backdrop.
But the best feature is that while listening, you can exactly follow on-screen which tracks are flown in and out of the mix.

In short: this is where technology is today, with the best electronic music has to offer. The man still is number one.

This is the first and (so far) only release on Smartbreaks, Precision Cuts' own label.
"Psychedelic Squeezebox" was recorded in the "Big Room" studio and features some fairly far-out production techniques. These include recording a synced minimoog through a 50's Binson echo box through a Marshall stack guitar amplifier. The main breakdown sound is a stereo miked accordian played by all 3 PC members at once. Surely a first?
"The Herta" was recorded entirely using "Reason" software and is named after a sausage!
Both tracks are awesome party-crackers, situated at the deeper end of the breaks spectrum but with more than enough punch to lose yourself on the dancefloor.
As always with these guys the tracks contain a wide variety of original sounds with a healthy dose of FONK as the main ingredient.
If you have the opportunity to see them doing a live show, be sure not to miss it! (And find out where the after-party is, too!!)

This has to be my all-time favorite record of which I know absolutely nothing about.
White label, unknown label, and I haven't encountered anyone else who has it ever.
Musical it's techno in general, but with ravey synths, haunting spiritual vocals, thundering breakbeats underneath but what really makes it stand out is the heavy clonking bass sound which in 1991 was unheard of, and well, still is today really!
Way ahead of its time, and in my box forever.

'Bout time someone gives this label the credit it deserves:
all releases are absolutely essential purchases if you like your techno minimal, stripped down and way deep.
The production is so clean and clear, it's scary.
I hear lovers comparing this to old-school Plastikman, and that's a massive compliment, but it's actually still much better than that.
My favorite still is release #1, but I'm playing all releases to death.
A worthy new entry in the minimal Hall of Fame, and a statue in Madame Tussauds to boot!

One of the best mixed 2xCD's sets I have ever heard. Disc 2 is pure and simple madness. This journey starts out with an amazing track with incredible female vocals... and the ride gets better and better as time goes on. These CD's show the true power of the Perlon label. I haven't found one release that hasn't been just great. If you want something exciting and innovative, check out ANYTHING on Perlon. I love these guys... And this label.

After a hard day's work or a weekend of drug-induced extravaganza, this is the perfect CD to unwind.
For me it works best on a cold winterday close to a soft knispering fireplace, but during sunset in a hammock at a tropical beach it equally does the trick.
Are you sitting comfortable? Now prepare yourself for an hour of PURE RELAXATION.
The track uses a minimal amount of elements from a piano, a bass and different kinds of percussion to create a musical palette which slowly but surely builds by adding a new element at just the right moments.
It's the ultimate hybrid of JAZZ and AMBIENT an sounds like an improvised JAMsession: by mixing these three words together I hereby invented a brand new musical style >
this is JAMBIENT !
One of my alltime favorite chillout CD's, now go buy it!

Sideshow is the alter-ego of Fink who releases on Ninjatune.
The Slide ep is his second for Simple, and offers us three
tracks with different flavours. Simple's trademark breaks aren't present here, instead we get the original mix of Slide, which is a lush, dub-infected summery housegroove, totally in place on hot beaches by adding a slide guitar to cool you down.
A2 is a orchestral instrumental downtempo delight called 'Buttaface'.
The real delight is on the flipside, where Canada's minimalist Mathew Jonson ( his Typerope ep from last year was one of the most played records in minimal circles ) takes the best elements of both tracks from the A side, adds his own deep groovy bassline, throws in some excellent high-hats, thus creating an absolute corker
of a minitech track which certainly get lost of airplay
this summer and beyond.

A side was voted 'song of the year' on Gilles Peterson's
BBC Radio1 Worldwide show, and it's indeed something really special. It samples an Eastern-Europe folklore song,
which together with the zooming bassline creates a monster of a tune, crossing musical boundaries unheard of so far.
I just came back from a DJ-trip to Hurghada in Egypt, and even in the desert this was one of my biggest tracks, with euphoric reactions from both Arabic locals as well as the western tourists.

I don't know who asked who, but the Abe-Blake combi is indeed a match made in heaven. Abe keeps the production basic with the Chicago oldskool as leading reference.
He thereby lowers the tempo and increases the groovyness compared to the other releases on this reliable and always
interesting label.
Blake Baxter's vocals are instantly recognisable and he
hasn't lost his trademark sex-factor after all these years.

My favorite is the B1 track, due to the irresistible
combination of Blake's lyrics "I got my mind made up,
come on, you can do it... anytime, tonight is fine" & Abe's
funky and devastating use of the 303.
A timeless record and serious contender for this year's
greatest hits listings.

Yellow vinyl is limited and quickly sold out,
but there's also a repress on black vinyl available.