Collection: Products

Over a decade after the first LiveJam collaboration surfaced - on a strictly vinyl-only basis - an entire cosmos of interconnected artists, labels and releases have spawned off its mystery - a perpetual praising of the shadows that is less and less present within the underground. At its core, it instilled an ethos and a clear aesthetic both for the label’s regulars, and for the wider house and techno spectrum as a measure of quality. The initial collective, led and curated by founders EMG and John Swing, gave rise, together with the Analogue Cops, to the tirelessly anonymous APPOINTMENT project - an improvisational, techno-minded session - and the SPS moniker that includes talented producer Battista, with both sets of crews making a return after a long break from the label. Ten years later and the cooperative expands, finding mutual respect and admiration among two heavyweights of the UK house and techno ecosystem - house maestro, Mr G, for the former, and British techno luminary, Ben Sims, for the latter. Even so, this remains consciously limited to vinyl, and while they now have official support from two of dance music’s legends, it’s been earned through a dogged pursuit of Livejam’s founding principles. Simply, a physical production ethos from conception through to performance.

Mella Dee

Bristol via NYC's DJ Nature makes house and beatdown so raw, dusty and dishevelled it feels like it's been put together in an old shed with rudimentary hand tools and might just collapse at any moment. But it is also brilliantly soulful and real, with synths infusing each loose arrangement with real heat and the drum patterns connecting deeply. Across four cuts here, he layers up those signature low ends with different motifs - funkier drums and watery melodies on 'Shattering Myths,', r&b vocal swirls on 'One' and unusual synth incantations on 'Medusa Weed', while 'Eternal Winter' is a subtle celebration with gentle charm. Another superb EP from a unique producer.

Polytechnic Recordings - sublabel of Disctechno Music - presents a split EP of jacking house and psychedelic rhythms from Detroit’s DJ Slush and Dretraxx. Label co-founder DJ Slush follows up his Model Collapse EP with 2 jacking, sleazy, 80's-tinged house tracks with garbled vocal samples on A1 and B2. Dretraxx - head of Detroit’s acid-forward Body Worx party - delivers dubbed out modular grooves and on A2. On B1, Interdimensional Transmissions’ BMG remixes Dretraxx for the No Way Back Mix, with some freaky heart-pumping analog techno. Recommended for fans of Midwest rhythms.

Moodymann

Hot Biscuit Recordings' has spent the last couple of years delivering killer re-edit EPs, mostly from veteran talents including Rahaan and the Idjut Boys. For this 12", they've recruited another long-established re-editor, Brooklyn-based Japanese-American producer (and East Village Edits main man) DJ Monchan. There is of course a big fat slice of heavily orchestrated disco on show - B-side 'Finally', which seemingly extends and rearranges Steve Bendner's 1977 version of 'The Final Thing' - but it's A-side 'Silent Dub' that hits home hardest. It's sees the Dailysession Records founder turn his attention to a sparse, spaced-out synth-pop record of (we think) the 1980s, re-imagining it as deliciously deep and dubby house record full of trippy effects, echoing vocal snippets and delay-laden percussive elements.

Various