Juno Recommends Breakbeat May 2020

Review: It's now accepted that label anniversary compilations and EPs should be stacked with high-grade cuts, preferably offered up by sizable or notable artists. Even so, there's something extra-special about this first part of Digbeth-based One Records' 10th anniversary EP series. Fittingly, it begins with a fresh cut from label stalwart Subb-an, a suitably heavy chunk of locked-in, early morning techno titled "Sunrise Mood", before continuing via the cut-up breakbeat fills, spacey electronics and warehouse-ready analogue bass of Adam Pits' "Pungent Method". Over on side B, Los Angeles-based Steve Urulu serves up the groovy, percussion-rich deep house/techno fusion of retro-futurist treat "Mollare Qualcuno", while Yamen & Eda drift their way through the deep breakbeat-house shuffle of "Last Dance".

Review: For Those That Knoe kick off a new series of DJ-oriented heaters dug out of forgotten corners of the dance music sprawl, and the first installment finds label head Ben Boe doing the digging. He's picked out two absolute gems you may well have not heard before - Paul Rayner's Slaves Incorporated track "Baby" and Tom Gillieron's "The Fire". The former is a rare slice of mid '90s UK garage which teeters between New Jersey bounce and London tuffness, while the latter is a wonderfully clattering slice of jazz-funk laced broken beat for soul cats and breaks-minded ravers alike to flex to.

Review: Over the last couple of years, Aussie Katie Campbell has delivered a string of well-regarded EPs and 12" singles steeped in retro-futurist flavours. Here she delivers here most expansive release to date, a double-pack that officially counts as the Roza Terenzi debut album. Her usual aural trademarks are all present - think deep bass, dreamy synths, fluttering electronic melodies, euphoric melodic motifs, breakbeats and bustling beats that are anything but conformist - alongside nods towards turn-of-the-90s techno, weighty electro rhythms and snappy, ghetto-house inspired workouts. It's undeniably a Roza Terenzi release, and there's enough variety - coupled with smart sequencing - to make it hang together as an album. Oh, and bass-heavy, Bleep-inspired closer "My Reality Cheque Bounced" is one of the best things Campbell has released to date.

Review: Exuberant 1990s electronic music revivalist Ludwig Af Rohrscheid has released some of his most magical music of late, with December 2019's "Between Worlds" being one of his best to date. There's much to set the pulse racing on this four-tracker too, from the rushing, trance-influenced melodic positivity of breakbeat wiggler "Blissful Lie" (which, incidentally, lifts the same Aisha sample as the Orb's "Blue Room"), to the IDM/braindance fusion of "Psychiflux" and ultra-deep, spaced-out brilliance of "Cloud Walker", via the madcap insanity of "Weightless", which flips from a jazz-flecked ambient soundscape to a maniacal braindance stomper midway through.

Review: There's plenty to get the juices flowing on Ukrainian duo Hidden Element's second full-length excursion, which lands in stores four years after their debut long-player "Together". They hit the ground running with the live-style breakbeats and booming bass of "Sound Of", before exploring slightly slower and moodier breakbeat pastures on "The Content Has No Sense" and reaching for the rushing electronic riffs on hybrid breaks/house cut "Rplctr9". Over on side B, they brilliantly mangle mind-altering bass music and jungle on "Strayed In Comparison" and mess around with moody bass and trance-like riffs on "Being Nervous Is Just Fine". As a tasty bonus, Norwegian producer Andre Bratten turns "Strayed In Comparison" into an icy slab of drowsy IDM bliss to round off a rock solid set.