New releases last eight weeks: Broken Beat/Nu Jazz/Nu Soul

Review: Oooh! Angie Stone's "Wish I Didn't Miss You" definitely belongs in the canon of all time modern soul classics. Taken from her 2001 second album Mahogany Soul, the Swizz Beats produced track made optimum usage of an O' Jays sample and was instrumental in that LP going gold and propelling the former D'Angelo collaborator to stardom. It also inspired countless official and under the counter remixes with Blaze's perhaps the most recognisable. So yes this reissue on 7" from Outta Sight is worthy if you don't have the original in your collection and features a housed up remix from Hex Hector on the flip.

Review: Much loved Michigan techno and ambient virtuoso John Beltran wraps up the so far so excellent Back to Bahia 7 series with the a final volume that proves to be the most dancefloor focussed offering yet. Leading with 'O Patio,' Beltran shows his class with a blend of jazz-funk and MPB that comes with a rather sunny Ibiza-inspired twist while echoing the vibes of Latin greats like Robson Jorge and Lincoln Olivetti. On the flip side, 'Belle Isle' is a perfect party anthem for those outdoor sessions - think beach gatherings or cookouts and you won't go wrong. This has been a brilliant series and while it's a shame it's over, this is a fitting way to end it.

Review: Luminaries of the St. Louis and Atlantan experimental dance circuits, Blvck Spade and Stefan Ringer reign over similar territories in the niche downland of raw, soulful house. Here the pair team up for the first time ever for a notable Touching Bass debut, with Ringer handling production and Spvde masterminding all things poetic, choral and verbal. Building on both artists' slowly accrued, and now prolific, contributions to such labels as Eglo, FWM and Dolfin Records, this newly erected album-temple hears the duo shift impossible sacral brickwork by the force of composition alone, with star relic 'YOURZZZ' especially cultivating an inner sanctum of humid cowbell, funky acid line, and theophanic vocal run.

Review: To bear a name like Breakbeat Lou, you'd have to have earned it. And Louis Flores is indeed arch-digger numero uno: mainly having cut his teeth as a co-creator of the Ultimate Break And Beats compilations on New York's Streetbeat Records, Lou was born anew as a DJ as way back as 1974 (!), amassing a boss pile of vinyl and thus music intel, largely as to where and how to source the best breakbeats out there. With elite producers like DJ Premier, Large Professor, The Bomb Squad, Pete Rock, Dr Dre and Marley Marl all having sampled Lou's wholesale procurements over the years, the man himself now steps back up to flaunt his very own pump-action breaks works. From KRS-One to Loose Ends, the samples on this are electric, and the original beats bombastic.

Review: The cover of this new one from Tomi Chair is a whole lot darker, more menacing and moodier than the music within. 'Waiting For The Typhoon To Pass' is in fact a beautifully plaintive sound with a slow, calming rhythm. Gentle chords are draped over the top and no one is in an hurry to go anywhere as curious synth keys come and go like passing memories. On the flip, 'Dream Universe' is a more propulsive sound with metallic drums cascading over raw hits and distant winds howling with a hint of danger.

Review: Charlie Charlie's 'Save Us' is a track brimming with raw emotion, and Mondag's remix feels like a perfect counterpart, bringing a subtle touch of melancholy with its soft saxophone solo. The track maintains its weight, but Mondag's approach gives it a dream-like quality, coaxing out the depths of its aching beauty. Bella Boo's edit brings a noticeable shift, tightening the rhythms and infusing the track with a sharper energy, but it never loses the soul of the original. Gerd Janson, meanwhile, offers an ambient version that feels like an entirely different experience - less immediate, but no less absorbing. On the other side, Hypernatural's remixes expand on the dreamlike, almost otherworldly feeling of the originals. Knightlife's take on 'Spirit Walk' stretches the song's already fluid nature, making it feel weightless, while Gerd Janson's remix of 'Stormfront' adds a darker, more reflective mood.

Review: Massive jazzdance and UK bass fusions on the new e-glowup from Eglo (though the record is also released physically). Celebrating 15 years of the nominal "post-dubstep" label, this limited 12" EP hears four exclusive, unreleased tracks from an upcoming label-definer compilation, the third in a series. Born from the basement of Plastic People, the pressure has remained continuously on Eglo to keep the same foment of bass musical innovation that the club nurtured alive. Plastic People is a routinised object of nostalgia, and it is often deemed the last proper place for innovation in bass music before austerity Britain militated against it. Zed Bias's remix of Chunky's 'Dancing On Tables' with Metrodome - and the deep, bruk-inspired track, 'Minerals,' from Liverpool's rising star Sticky Dub - both prove this assessment totally wrong. Genius thrives. On the flip, we've also house legend Giles Smith (formerly of Secretsundaze) delivering fresh material, as well as label boss Alexander Nut making his official debut with the lo-fi electro house track 'Arcade Fun Pt. 1.' The full compilation, featuring artists like Shy One, Steve Spacek, and Fatima, drops in April.

Review: It may have been seven years since DJ Koze last delivered an artist album, but in defence the popular Hamburg producer had his hands full working with other artists (most notably Roisin Murphy). He has managed to put out the odd single, though, to which you can add this typically interesting and off-kilter two-tracker. A-side 'Buschtaxi' is deep house with a subtle Latin tinge - rhythmically at least - and layered with dreamy chords, African vocal samples, twittering melodies and attractive, sun-soaked synthesiser sounds. The long-serving producer flips the script on side B, reaching for crunchy, house-tempo breakbeats, moody bass, rising chords, what sound like mangled electric guitar motifs and effects-laden vocals courtesy of Marley Waters. More, please!

Review: Calling all locked-groove stickerers, needle twisters, and/or tonearm weight worriers, prepare your ears and needles for a wonderful trove of breakbeat bullion, ripe for the looping and the zealous hunching over. This modern rare groove emulation by Florence, 'Funky Song', lays down a phantasmically funky original breakbeat, fleshed out and swollen unto the most maximal of proportions. Then, don't forget, there's 'Let's Dance', which reworks Jimmy Bo Horne's 'Dance Across The Floor' for a rare and never-edited-before take on the perseverant, provocative hip roller of a track.

Review: Holo makes a welcome return to Shall Not Fade, delivering four tracks that strike a perfect balance between deep house nostalgia and contemporary groove. His signature soundilush synth work, crisp percussion, and a delicate emotional pulliis on full display, weaving a rich, transportive atmosphere throughout. 'Pink Wax' sets the scene with warm, enveloping pads and a rolling low-end, effortlessly drawing us in. 'Flipper' leans into more playful territory, its shimmering melodies and tight drum programming keeping the energy light yet propulsive. Across the record, Holo's ability to craft emotive, immersive dance music remains undeniable, blending hazy textures with infectious rhythms in a way that feels both timeless and forward-thinking.

Review: Space Echo returns with a bold funk-fuelled trip here that is powered by irresistible rhythms built on downtempo grooves. The track reflects on war-driven forces destabilising communities and Gianluca Petrella's trombone work channels pure Fred Wesley-esque funk energy while 1970s-inspired choral arrangements amplify its introspective message. Alongside this, Agosta's remix of 'Mother Forgive Us' from The Invisible Session's Echoes Of Africa transforms the track into a futuristic Afro-funk odyssey with tribal percussion tubing up next to pulsating electronics. A great package with a message of climate urgency that calls for a reconnection to nature.

Review: This one oozes more cool than George Clooney sat poolside and sipping on Kool-Aid. It is the seventh offering in this fine series which features the most iconic reworked, retouched and edited tracks from the legendary soundscapes of Pikes Hotel in Ibiza. There is no better place to ask up the gorgeous vibrations of 'Mata' with its steamy trumpets and genre-breaking beats than under the Mediterranean sun. The flipside 'Xiprell' captures the essence of laid-back sophistication and the warmth of Ibiza with arching prog guitars and pensive chords draped over the most go-slow live drums.

Review: After releasing two 10" and 12" records in 2019 and 2020, Paris-based punk-jazz duo La Recre are back to complete their EP trilogy with this fresh 45 rpm. '137' brings together the worlds of jazz and electronica with shimmering, skyward and celestial synths bringing mysticism to shimmering jazz drums and warped synths. 'La Lune' is another intense and cinematic sound with spoken words from a spacecraft launch adding grandeur to the cascading melodies and ever-evolving beats.

Review: Unusually adept, jazzdancey sonic handicraft from new Rekids signee, Quiet Village. If we at Juno could issue some kind of official rosette or emblem for 'wicked production skills'- on par with a master builder's sextant-engraved headstone - then we'd award Quiet Village with one such memento in a heartbeat. 'Reunion', pressed onto vinyl for the first time here, hears a loose yet effortlessly rhythmic drum break furl, dance about a smooth, nighttime jazz progression for sax and piano. It's giving visions of a down-and-out PI in an 80s neo-noir/romantic drama genre fusion, except this protagonist has just tuned into Rinse FM for the first time - and Rinse FM, in this alternate reality, exists in the 80s. The 'Reprise' version is equally as evocative, sans-ing the drums to allow space to listen to just the melodics, just the overarching ambiences. It's as if Quiet Village know that the true force of the tune, its essence, rests in the core mystique of the aforementioned instrumental combo; the ghost of the drums may continue to play back only in our minds, yet we continue to dance.

Review: True to the name, Nervous Records have always kept us on our toes, biting our fingernails, hind-waddling to the edges of our seats. That being said, they themselves have kept rather relaxed on the releasing front in recent times; any residual nervousness is mostly on our side. In a rare original EP move from the veteran garage house label comes Shaka with 'Hidden Lover'; this is the wisened work of a battle-torn Swiss producer, whose many previous outings on Yore, Mate, Selections and Vibes & Grooves has all paid off with this inclusion in said anxious pantheon. 'Sing With Me' brings nostalgic feet-sweeping recollections from singer Eva against modular rack rides and cowbells, while 'Sill Groovin'' sounds like the same location but revamped for the anniversary present: its grooving, cool, vitreous sound design recalls the clinking of martini glasses and the tinging of wine measures in a svelte art deco backroom.

Review: Four artists with a taste for classic deep house infused with more than a touch of house line on the Silver Walker label's sixth release. Following releases on the likes of Local Talk, Balance, Traxx Underground, Mate, Quintessentials and upcoming projects on Nervous and NDATL, Shaka opens proceedings with a flurry of Hammond and plenty of exotic percussion, lie Alan Hawkshaw riffing with Underground Resistance. Glenn Davis (Wolf, Yore Records, Deeper Groove and Selections Records) delivers a deeper house workout on the A2 house track, the jazzy keyboard chords, fluttering flute and restless synths working real magic. One of the masterminds behind the Silver Walker label, Diego aka DFRA, comes on all perky with the saxes and soloing Rhodes, on the second side's opener, 'Nitewax'. Then we close with Damien aka Keymono (founder of several labels including Monocturne Records and Funkyshirts) laying on the handclaps of classic disco strings, the snippets of funk guitar and vibes the cherry on top.

Review: Get your lugs around this, the first single from Leo Vidal & The Rayvelles, and you will soon be keen to know more. 'Haunted By Your Love' is a modern take on the West Coast oldies sound from Leo Vidal, a 70s soul singer from rural Virginia who brings his East Coast harmonies to croon about lost love. The Rayvelles is the duo of Fergal McBride and Tuck Nelson and are the creative force behind Echo Ray Studios in London, a space that channels the soul of Motown into contemporary music. Backing vocals are provided by Cassandra Dali and Marietta Smith while the flip has a remix by Call Sender who layers in some inviting dub weight.