Sotofett handing out the party plants again. Modern Classic? One of the ones for sure. Home listener or dancefloor warmer → levitation guaranteed. I surrender one thousand golden camels in full downward dog to the dancelord.

what is this? lardcore?
Im afraid you couldnt sell me enough dripping to pay for one of my trips

The artwork looks great, the record sounds great, all good.

Killer package! House and Dub rule and so does this 2LP-Album here! Nice work from Sotofett and his cohorts! Future classic alert...

Absolutely great tunes on this one, I wouldn't miss if I were you

This Sotofett plus Lauer Nimbus-Mix is very Pacific 202-y, no?

So nice, been waking up with this for a few weeks

Dj Sotofett <3 !!!!
Great record, great guy, great producer & great DJ!!!

Enter DJ Sotofett, with a hand-shake from Wania, presented and released by Honest Jons. The serial collaborator outta’ Moss links up with producers known or otherwise under-the-radar for a double disc set of leftfield, tribal-flava house music.

Each of the four sides here lend themselves to particular headspaces - while this makes for an interesting, diverse selection of sounds it could be said that it doesn’t make for a cohesive package, a criticism leveled on some online message boards. That’s not to detract from the high quality of production here, by any means.

The first plate opens up with that gorgeous, new-age ambience which has found revived appreciation in recent times; as can be the case with new-age tinged music it’s easy to stray into tiresome, dated territory. Sotofett and Jaakko Eino Kalevi's sounds avoid that here, presenting a serene, relaxed soundscape without sounding strained and cheesy - Kalevi's subtle guitar and keys work harmoniously with Sotofett's new-age sounds and effects recalling the latter's work on Prins Thomas’ Bobletekno. Subtly transitioning into the Main Bar Mix the first side moves into a more energetic territory which feels like a strange collision between genres - it fleshes out the guitar licks and keys to form a thick, dubby groove not like anything I’ve heard - only with reggaeton, perhaps, could I draw a parallel, and even then the two sounds feels somewhat distant.

On the flip rests a collaboration with Phillip Lauer out of Frankfurt. Whilst the opening track of this side is panoramic and ascendent, it feels somewhat like it’s rehashing the ideas of the Ibiza Dub that opens the record. Space Dub is an imposing, beatless track with multiple synth lines, not far off the sounds of Tim Blake’s 1977 LP Crystal Machine. Fading off into a bath of white noise we’re introduced to the Nimbus Mix, again heading into energetic moods. It’s a spacier affair - not necessarily new for Sotofett but it feels like a new realm in his discography. There’s a nice progression through this track where it picks up the meandering elements of the Space Dub and mixes it effectively with the propulsive percussion. The Spaced Outtro stuck on the end of the B-side feels like an afterthought, just shy of two minutes in length, rendering some of the sounds of the previous two tracks in a collage of dubby effects.

Nondo (Original Mix) wastes no time introducing itself on the C-side. Here Sotofett links up with two new, unknown contributors - Karolin Tampere on the keys and Maimouna Haugen providing vocals. The two tracks on this side explore afrobeat riddims - they’re exotic, heady affairs replete with jangly keys and complex, skittering rhythms not dissimilar to that of Soca music . Nondo (Riddimix) could be seen as the instrumental, alternative version of the original, employing a sparser arrangement with delayed vocals and more prominent percussion. It’s a unique set of tracks on this second plate proving again why we all pay attention to DJ Sotofett’s productions; he’s not always inventing new sounds, but instead expertly extracting the best elements of many different localised sounds and creating vivid, colourful hybrids.

You might feel a strange sense of familiarity as you drop the needle on the flip. For those following the semi-frequent releases emerging from the Sex Tags universe you might recognise the gorgeous pads and jungle sounds from Pulehouse (Reggi Mix) released on Wania back in 2012. On this revised, new version of sorts, Gilb’R, an earlier collaborator, enters the fray assisting Sotofett in re-purposing the pastoral, languid rhythms of the original into something distinctly tribal, with thick, heavy drums; it’s a welcome return of this track, with the percussive elements giving a feeling that’s more organic, uplifting and ultimately danceable. The 97-Riddim-Run isolates the drum-track heard previously, rendering the dense, propulsive rhythms naked. This dissection of the track continues of 97-Drop-Outtro which presents the quirky synth licks up next to the sounds of loon-birds and insects. Though this concept has been done many times on countless records, these three tracks show just how many elements go into these tracks, making you appreciate them all the more.

It says a lot about the talents of Sotofett and his collaborators presenting a package like this - it’s a lot more substantial than any of his previous efforts and a welcome change to the jungle-indebted oddities that’s he’s put out in the last couple of years. Although it could work more cohesively this double-pack serves as a diverse document of deep, nordic house music out here in 2015.