Der in Los Angeles beheimatete Stephen „Thundercat“ Burner nun also mit seinem zweiten Album auf Brainfeeder, das wie schon der Solo-Erstling „The Golden Age Of The Apokalypse“ von Flying Lotus als Koproduzent betreut wurde. Mehr noch als auf dem in 2011 erschienen Debut legt Burner hier seine langjährige Erfahrung als Session- und Bandmusiker für Snoop Dogg, Erykah Baduh, Suicidal Tendencies oder gar die Red Hot Chili Peppers in die Waagschale und liefert mit „Apocalypse“ ein astreines, elektronisches Funkalbum, das zwar an einigen Stellen zu sehr in seichten Gewässern schwimmt, aber dennoch für Fans der eher Easy Listening-bezogenen und vocallastigen Elektronik ein homogenes – und deshalb angenehmes - Gesamtbild abgibt.
6 Points (of 10)

This review was originally written for the german print magazine FAZE but remained unpublished for unknown reasons.

[ baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]

Set for release on September 13th via Blu Fin is Pierre Deutschmann's newest longplay audio assault named "Betroit", a name paying homage to the two essential cities mainly responsible for the rise of the underground dance music they use to call TECHNO. And so is the album - instead of riding the so-called, slowed down Nu Wave Of Techno like many others Mr. Deutschmann focuses on the very essence of this music - straightforward drums, dark'ish and sci-fi-sounding tones, shifting patterns and a straight "no bullshit" attitude when it comes to pure dancefloor functionality. But "Betroit" serves more than that, especially when it comes to the electroid excursions of "Area 1507" that unveil a certain deepness lying within the string melancholia covered beat abstractions and sub low basslines or the futuristic stomper "Looking Backwards" that - although causing kickdrum induced devastation on the dancefloor - has a bit of a 28th Century Jazz feel to it when one listens quite closely. And it's these little twists and turns that keep the attention level high when one listens to the thirteen tracks and two skits of "Betroit" as a whole album which, in clear opposite to a lot of other Techno albums, is an exciting and partly even anthemic - "Hunch & Guess" ! - journey. Plus a recommended one for the lovers of raw, uncut but still advanced electronic dance music.         
[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]

Deep listening music has come a long way. From it's appreciated heydays in the so-called ChillOut areas of the Rave scene or at great festivals like Interference to a near to total ignorance throughout the noughties. Now it's time for a backlash again and Jette Von Roth's album "Komische Welt" is - at least hopefully - the start of a huge wave of releases to come, taking care of soothing beauty, beatless floating and uber-lovely swathing sonic affairs for those who want to sit back and relax, no matter if coming straight from the dancefloor in need of a break or just close-eyedly converting your personal armchair into a psychoacoustic spaceship drifting through calm, rainbow-cloured multidimensional spheres. Released on Roter Punkt run by herself and Schöneberg-based legend of german electronic music Mijk Van Dijk "Komische Welt" is available on the digital circuit right now and to be purchased from all reasonable download stores. Super nice. Get.     
[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]

Forthcoming and scheduled for August 2013 ist the fourth release on Sascha Müllers self-run Sascha Müller Music-imprint, holding another three sweet tracks from his large archive of previously unreleased pieces. With "On The Run" he unleashes a trippy, hypnotic tune sweetly amalgamating Acid visions and Trance-induced spheres that are able to take you off into outer space whilst "Blueprint" fuses dry, unprocessed Chicago drumsets with an electroid twist and sweet background synths unveiling only an echo of Trance and melody for special late night moments that need a special kind of musical magick. Finally "Ice Man" can be filed under the flag of AmbientElectro with some deep 1998-like Electronica synths and sweet melancholia fused with frolicking beats and an ever spiralling 303-backing. Coffeetable Acid for autumnal sessions. We like this.
[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]   

When it comes to the most productive underground producers ever Sascha Müller's name has to mentioned for sure as this guy has - according to discogs - amassed a massive back catalogue of 400+ releases within the past 15 years and with "1000003" he adds another great eight track piece to his immense musical history - this time dealing with short but uplifting and well-positive sketches dedicated to the ca. 1993/94 ClubHouse era with its jumping basslines, hardbag tempos and jubilating, high energy piano stabs that "keep a smile on your faces" as the great quote from Jens' alltime favorite "Loops & Tings" goes. Listening to this one my mind recalls drag queens going wild, punters getting loose, bodies covered in sweat and ecstasy and me and my innocent clubbing crush of 1994 having a great time whilst Celvin Rotane's "I Believe" was blasting in our favorite club of that era. Uh!
[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]     

Having moved on from being the ElectroPunk-focused label of the early days the Hamburg-based Audiolith Records has transformed into an ever growing outfit for all kinds of good music that more recently embraced styles like HipHop with a political, leftwing attitude, proper Punkrock as well as Drum'n'Bass and - that's what we're talking here - 4/4 based electronic club music that can be filed under the flag of DeepHouse , SlowHouse and/or (Neo)Cosmic by specialists with two releases that surely are sticking out these days. First of all it's Rampue's latest solo 12" release named "Mama Was A Progrocker" that perfectly showcases his ability to amalgamize sweet, heart touching melodies, lovely vocal cut-ups and overall beauty with club and open air functionality whilst developing a unique and overall seductive musical language of his own. Especially the EPs title track "Mama Was A Progrocker" is an essetial work of art but tunes like "That's", "Katz Und Maus" and "Find Someone" are as good as gold, too.

The second essential club shot from the Audiolith camp these days is Volume 3 of the labels Stiff Little Spinners 12" series featuring six not to miss tunes including Gimmix' uplifting TechHouse / Future Garage fusion "Bonnie", Torsun Teichgräber's tongue-in-cheek "Dr.Sommer" with its warm, overwhelmingly embracing bassline and Kalipo's analogue workout "Fraktal" amongs others. Strictly limited, highly recommended and not to be repressed.

[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]

Sascha Müller is back with a new release on his very own Super 6 Recordings imprint that is released in three formats these days: available as CDr, digital download and limited tape - yeah: cassette ! - edition. And once again he proves that he's a man that experienced the ruff experimentalism that used to happen throughout the nineties in every genre of electronic music although it might be hard to imagine for youngsters that even House went through some weirdness in these days and quirky beats, distortion attacks or high speed tribalism used to set dancefloors on fire. But it is true for sure and this is what this album is all about. There's weirdness, there's ClubTechno, there's stuttering beats at some points and there's speed but still in a lot of these tunes House music can be felt - more or less as sometimes there's only echoes of shadows of House but still: even in proper Techno bangers like "Rotation" it's the use of filters that are reminiscing to the golden era of uptempo French House paying respect to this musics roots. But there's even more to be found here - uber-compressed Acid, ass-shaking Tribal Techno, deep AcidTrance, dry Minimalism or Rave-infused TechnoPhonk. Sascha Müller totally nails the feel of an era with this one and it's an era that I personally do miss. Sweet.
[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de]

After its relaunch in 2010 and a string of more or less non-impressive releases it seems like R&S Records is coming back to former grandness with the release of the first MPIA3 mini album. Named "Your Orders" the 2x12" contains six tracks delving deep to the varieties of Acid with the title track being the most exciting tune, serving a nerve wrecking fusion of distorted Electro and screaming Acid lines for all the dark and dirty dancefloors - created by a Tom Russell who is also known as Meibion or Truss.
This one's not to miss and the first essential in the new wave of R&S Records releases.

[baze.djunkiii / www.nitestylez.de] 

This quite unpronouncable vinyl EP coming from way up north - Finland !!! - is just a quick recommendation for all lovers of Chiptune Techno, 8bit Acid and ElectroPhonk. It's the second release for the Sewer Leak label from the scandinavian underground which took a long long break after releasing cat.no. 001 back in 2005. As far as information is available on that topic this item is not available via regular distribution channels as the mysterious men acting in the background prefer the diy self-distribution side of things but a few copies can be picked up via Otaku Records / Hamburg in Germany. Enjoy the Phonk.
[baze.djunkiii]

Freshly released and available only as mp3 or CD on demand via Amazon is Sascha Müllers latest album output named "Freestyle Acid" and all those who do trust the works of this ever busy Acid activist which seems to have petabytes of unreleased tracks sitting somewhere in his vaults know what they're about to get with this one. Again, as one has to admit. Making waves with two sought after limited 7" releases on the Psychocandies label these days Sascha Müller rolls out the Acid vibe with a whole bunch of ten tracks here, all of them serving a quite stripped down and reduced to the max but still spiralling feel and - especially talking "Drumsequencer (Acid Mix)" and it's Tribal drums here - sometimes reminisces about projects like Steve Stolls HypnoAcid one-off-alias Datacloud or the shrieking madness unveiled by labels like Communique, Drop Bass Network or Labworks Germany which have been playing an influential if not essential role in the musical upbringing of this man from Uelsen / Germany which for some weird reason is not playing out much on the DJ circuit nor has a big overall reputation although discogs states an amount of 396 releases and appearances from 1998 until today, most of them on the digital circuit including 57 albums, 240 Singles / EP and vinyl releases on Gary Martins Teknotika Records, the Cologne-based Shot Tools, my own Intrauterin Recordings imprint and more recently on Shhhh Records. Most of these release cater a certain quality and an obviously raw analogue vibe, so one might guess that Sascha Müller spent a good amount of the 90s in semi-legal underground venues and at massive raves, inhaling the special spirit of a growing movement gaining momentum in excess and ecstasy that's still innate in his musical works. Big up. Me likey.
 
[baze.djunkiii]