ISLAND TIMES Vinilo y CD

Review: Chubby Irish groove hounds Fatty Fatty return with another sublime funk-stacked V/A three tracker. Local lad Crown Prince Of Waterford (not to be confused with the legendary blues singer) lays down a furiously funky jam about having fun at the fairground while fellow Emerald Isle strutter Island Times returns Fatty Fatty with a loose-limbed falsetto-loaded twanger. Finally, we fly off into the Italian sunset with a stunning slow jam from Umberto Lumber. A twinkling slo-mo chugger with serious cosmic tendencies, what a way to finish an EP.

Review: Just in time for Pandemic Summer #2 comes the beach and poolside flavors of ABC Versions (Afro, Balearic, Cosmic) on Rocksteady Disco. For this hand-stamped white label Rocksteady Disco assembles a crew of deep diggers. While these reimaginings harken back to the golden era of dances on the shores of Lake Garda, the White Isle, or all-night bath houses, it's hardly a retrospective. Leading the release is label boss Mr. PC's edit of "Drum Song", a kalimba-driven ecstatic freakout for discerning dance floors. Next up is Blair French's flip of a classic MPB joint "Circo Marimbondo", beefed up and primed for your next poolside hangout. Moving to the flip side, Son of Lee delivers with his meditative and transcendent rework of "Groove Me". Island Times closes the release with his blissed out acoustic edit of "What's Going On", which made its debut in Belle Isle Balearic's The Chillout Tent set in June 2020, with police helicopters flying overhead. TIP.

Review: After a break of almost a year, Admin fires up his Community Disc-O's imprint with another selection of all-star edits. Sometime GAMM and Whiskey Disco dons The Patchouli Brothers kick things off via the seductive, low-slung disco-funk goodness of "Where's Walter?" - a traditional style re-edit that proves that you don't need modern studio trickery to successfully re-imagine an old record - before sometime Situation man (and one half of Divine Situation) Paulo Fulci expertly rearranges a dusty chunk of rousing, horn-heavy dancefloor disco. Admin himself offers up the hot-to-trot, horn-sporting goodness of "Get Up & Do!", while Island Times draws things to a close with the hazy goodtime grooves of "Penney's Finest".