Back catalogue: Disco/Nu-Disco

Review: DJ Hunee afro monster gets an official repress for Hot Casa in France. Calling it massive would bit an understatement.

Review: Limited edition, hand-stamped white label 12"s from Smoove, reworking as though each of its remixed originals were axiomatic expressions of sonic perfection. 'Dance', for example, has a well known 80s classic reworked to stomping, heavyweight perfection - stretching its vocals to breathy ecstasy. Meanwhile EWF's 'Can't Hide Love' and 'Playing Your Game, Baby' by a certain Mr White, unite over a similar subject matter; there's no point in hiding your love. All aboard the underground love train.

Review: A really cool concept from Expansion here; one side is a reissued seminal classic, the other is a contemporary version. And what a way to start the start the series; hard bop hero Johnny Hammond influenced pretty much every soul, jazz, rare groove and funk artist who've followed in his path, and the joyously unpredictable "Los Conquistadores Chocolates" is one of his best. Naturally Japanese jazz outfit Quasimode are an ideal remix choice. Known for their wildstyle riffage and signature switches, they've paid the utmost respect to Hammond.

Review: Archeo know how to hunt down a rare jam and give it the kind of reissue it deserves, so who better to handle this job? Tonica & Dominante was a studio project conceived by Antonio Iglio and Antonio Moxedano, which yielded a couple of singles and an album at the end of the 70s. It's a warm, organic sound before Italo disco swerved hard towards synthesisers and drum machines, and you can see why anyone digging for the rarest grooves would go crazy for the two tracks on this previously rare-as-hell 7". This new Archeo version ports the original tracks onto 12" and folds in two tasteful, clubbed-up dub mixes from Leo Mas & Fabrice.

Review: Kalita Records are proud and honoured to announce the first ever official reissue of the four choice tracks from Randolph Baker's privately pressed sought-after 1982 disco album 'Reaching For The Stars', plus an unreleased instrumental take of 'Party Life' sourced from the original 24-track analogue master tapes.

Originally recorded at Jim Morris and Rick Miller's Tampa-based Morrisound Studios, 'Getting Next To You' features both a mixture of both local Florida talent plus jazz superstar Nat Adderley and bassist John Lamb at their finest. Originally pressed in a limited run of just one-thousand copies, with no distribution and most copies being sold in the local city and on Randolph's own merchandise table at the back of live gigs, original copies have long been sought-after by both collectors and DJs alike, acknowledged as a true grail and masterpiece in the disco scene and deservedly demanding extortionate figures to those lucky enough to find their own.

Here, in collaboration with Randolph, Kalita Records have chosen to re-release the four choice tracks from the album: 'Getting Next To You', 'Jazzman', 'Callin' Me' and 'Party Life'. The former is an in-demand horn and chant-filled disco masterpiece, which, as Randolph explains, concerns unity and "everyone on the same level in other words, everyone just loving life". It is arguably the song that Randolph is most well-known for in the disco and funk scene and perfect for the modern discerning dance floor. 'Jazzman' is an instrumental track with prominent trumpet and saxophone solos working with funky basslines to produce a truly great jazz-funk groove. It was "a tribute to Nat Adderley and Duke Ellington's bass player, John Lamb, for being so generous and saying yes to the project". 'Callin' Me' is a soulful disco number featuring the lead vocals of Laurie Erickson and is "about being on the road and ensuring loved ones that you will always come back home no matter what. It was like a promise to ensure loved ones they didn't have to worry". Lastly, 'Party Life' is a joyous disco track with a strong funk bassline and horns. As Randolph recalls, it "was the joy like after an actor finishes a movie. There was nothing but joy. It's finished; let's celebrate big time. Where everyone in the studio yelled at the top of their lungs - The End!" Here, with access to the 24-track master tapes we have been able to include the original version plus an unreleased instrumental take, allowing us to focus on the infectious bassline and make it even more ready for the modern dance floor.

Accompanied by extensive interview-based liner notes and never-before-seen photos.

Review: The Shapeshifters are bonafide dance music champions with some rare studio skills. Their golden era sound is as rich as they come and their on going relationship with Glitterbox now results in a new future classic, 'Finally Ready.' It follows on from jams like 'Try My Love' and 'Life Is A Dancefloor' and has a strong message that no matter where you come from, on the dance floor there is always acceptance and hope. Grammy, Tony and Emmy Award-winning singer, director, composer, actor and playwright Billy Porter is the co-writer and with all its big strings, live horns and sense of theatre, it's another winner.

Review: In 2016, Family Groove Records released a 12" of previously unheard 1979 demo recordings by Webster Station, a boogie-funk band from Dayton, Ohio whose studio efforts were initially binned by Warner Brothers for not being commercial enough. Demand for Family Groove's limited 12" of their recordings has remained high, so the label has decided to do a reissue. There's much to admire throughout, from the high-octane thrills of opener "Are You For Real" and the spacey warmth of the super-soulful "Can You Feel My Love", to the sugary sweetness of the Latin tinged ballad "Lady" and righteous closer "If You Feel Like Dancing", a killer combination of spacey synths, crunchy drums, urgent vocals and killer Clavinet lines.

Review: Veteran Newcastle-based producer Johnathan Watson aka Smoove is back with the third instalment in the Multitrack Reworks, a new series that will be putting out limited edition, hand-stamped white label 12's that are made from reworked tunes constructed from the original multitracks. This one features the deep down and dirty P-funk of A-side cut 'Deep', while over on the flip Watson lends his Midas touch to a solid reconstruction of a certain deep funk classic by Slave, as well as a spruced up soul classic for all the heads out there on 'Superman'.

Review: Labels Hot Mule and Secousse have teamed up to deliver something special: a killer EP of "lost gems from the golden era of Zouk and Gwo-Ka" in Guadeloupe (that's 1985 to '92, fact fans). The four tracks showcased here were performed and produced by an artist whose fame in Guadeloupe sadly never spread any further, Max Rambhojan. The A-side boasts two versions of the rather brilliant and suitably cheery "Tou't Jou Pa Min'm": the jaunty, sun-kissed, whistle-sporting 1986 original mix, and Rambhojan's heavily electronic, synthesizer-heavy, calypso-tinged 1992 re-make of his biggest local hit. Over on side B you'll find the bubby dub bass, sparse synths and flute solos of the decidedly tropical "Cecilia" and a suitably breezy, sunset-ready gem entitled "On Jou Matin".

Review: West End's double-pack re-edit series continues, with long-standing UK electrofunk hero and scalpel rework specialist Greg Wilson sharing a quartet of revisions. There are airings for two of Wilson's most sought-after scalpel works from the "Credit To The Edit" series - superb versions of Brenda Taylor's "You Can't Have Your Cake and Eat It Too" and Raw Silk's "Do It To The Music" - as well as a couple of previously heard rearrangements that are on-point as per usual. Wilson first adds even more mind-altering delays and low-slung dub disco flavour to Forrrce's "Keep On Dubbin'", before superbly stretching out the mostly instrumental "Melt Down Mix" of Shirley Lites' synth-laden peak-time classic "Heat You Up".

Review: Rather infamously, Donna Summer wasn't a fan when she heard the final version of this legendary disco tune. It was one of the earliest big disco tunes to use synthesizer sounds rather than live musicians and is still one of producer Giorgio Moroder's biggest-ever hits. Summer though didn't like the way her vocals had been so sexualized in the final edit. Either way, that didn't stop it from becoming an iconic disco cut that still gets floors in raptures today. This reissue comes on marbled red vinyl.

Review: Earlier this year, French disco and jazz-funk combo Chatobaron joined forces with fellow Parisian Dimitri From Paris for the rather good 'I Like (The Music That You Play)'. While that was a wholehearted disco workout, this speedy sequel sees the band (and their high-profile collaborator) explore their West Coast jazz-funk influences via an inspired workout full to bursting with killer instrumental solos, dusty grooves, memorable motifs and a genuinely killer, cowbell-sporting percussion brerak. This time round, there are no Dimitri From Paris remixes; instead, dubbed-out disco favourites the Idjut Boys are on hand to smother the track in tape echo and dub delay. The result is a typically spaced-out, low-slung affair that naturally makes the most of the band's killer bassline and layered percussion sounds.

Review: There can't be many out there who aren't familiar with Geraldine Hunt's 1980 single 'Can't Fake The Feeling', a genuine disco-boogie anthem whose Chic-style groove, tasty orchestration, gnarled guitars and sing-along vocals are so familiar they're almost iconic. Whether it needs remixing is open for debate, but Carl Cox has at least done a sympathetic job. His full vocal 'remix' adds a little house bounce to the track while retaining most of the original elements, while his 'rework' re-imagines it as a stomping disco-techno slammer of the sort that Dave Angel used to be famous for. Throw in the peerless original mix and a hard-to-find, late-'80s 'dub' mix and you have an excellent package.

Review: Philadelphia International Records continues to dip into its bulging archives and offer up double-packs containing some of the finest 1970s remixes from remix pioneer Tom Moulton. As you'd expect, there's plenty to get the juices flowing and the heart pounding on this third volume in the series. Record one opens up with Moulton's epic version of the O'Jays' "This Time Baby", a swirling Philly Soul classic that later became a favourite of sample-loving disco-house producers and disco re-editors, and continues with his sugary but floor-friendly version of the Futures' "Party Time Man". Over on record two, Moulton's inspired extension of Jean Carn's seductive "Love Don't Come Easy" is followed by his must-have version of the Jones Girls' "Nights Over Egypt".

Review: During the latter stages of the "Philly Soul" era, New York remixer Tom Moulton delivered a string of inspired, DJ friendly reworks for the Philadelphia International label. For proof, check this fine selection of classic Moulton mixes for the storied imprint. Check first his version of Archie Bell and the Drells' "Where Will You Go When The Party's Over", which he brilliantly teases out and increases in intensity over nine spellbinding minutes. The funkier flex of People's Choice's "Jam, Jam, Jam (All Night Long)" is a sweaty, low-down treat, while the Teddy Pendergrass rework is a soaring disco classic in the Philly Soul style. Best of all, though, is the string-drenched disco celebration that is his mix of Lou Rawls' "See You When I Git There".

Review: Originally released in 1979 on Dominant Records, this double single features production by Italian composers and vocalists Antonio Iglio and Antonio Moxedano. 'Tigre' and 'Gennarino 'O Sioux'' saw extreme demand after becoming instant cult classics. The bass is tight and the vocal melodies are instant foot tappers, you'll be humming it for hours. The original 7" is one of the most wanted and rarest around, with very few copies ever going on the second hand market - reaching the hundreds in some cases - a huge leap forward for the Neapolitan Disco Funk scene, and a testament to the pure talent of these artists in what was arguably the beginning of a golden era for Italian funk and soul.

Review: Australian DJ and producer Dave Mathmos serves up an obscure edits entree, sampling/reworking a whopping seven disco cuts from the late 1970s and early 1980s, but adding just enough modern flair to essentially make them his own. A well-rounded, sticky quality is heard on this septagonal crock of heaters, with the downtempo slink-funk of 'Late At Night' and the equally sumptuous, string-backed plod of 'Wonderful Feeling' remaining our highlights.

Review: In cahoots with the annual (not to mention excellent) Liverpool Disco Festival, celebrated editor and remixer Rahaan has been let loose on the West End Records catalogue. Happily, his new versions are rightfully respectful to the chosen disco and boogie classics with the Chicagoan simply adding choice effects here and there as well as some cranky old drum machine beats and occasional synthesizer flourishes. This is particularly evident on his raw but deep and slightly dubby take on Brenda Taylor's "You Can Have You Cake It Too", but also comes to the fore on the standout remix of Mahogany's spacey boogie jam "Ride on The Rhythm". String-laden disco bliss is provided via a bass-heavy re-arrangement of the Chuck Davis Orchestra's "Spirit of Sunshine", while Rahaan's Billy Nicholls rub is a high-octane, shirts-off treat.

Review: Vega Records finally drops this EP from Honeysweet having teased tunes from it on the Vega Records 5 Pack Unreleased III. It's a superb house offering with lashings of soulful groovers, all produced by Josh Milan. First out of the blocks is 'Last Night Changed It All' featuring Lawrence Clark on sax. It's a jam that will pack out the floor but brims with real musicality from the magical Rhodes, picked bass guitar, rhythm guitar and drums. 'Crazy' is a more raw, textured percussive sound but then come plenty more feel-good grooves for sun-kissed dance floors such as 'Being Free.'

Review: The third instalment of NeighbourSoul rhythm's limited vinyl-only treatment of space-age nu-disco and funk isn't to be messed with. Straight to the point, the opening 'Love Attack' is a fast-paced guitar-led disco-funk banger - no warm-up, just dancing. Track 2, 'Dream Machine' is out-of-this-world, literally, with its vocal cosmic pinings of an android-dominated future scape against a relentless synth pattern.

Side B brings us back down to earth, to the middle of the night in the dance hall, 'Never Gonna Let You Go' is a mid-tempo groover that commands your joints to keep busting shapes no matter how tired your body tells you to feel. The guitar leads you into a false sense of security before the vocal adlibs and hypnotic brass pump the fever directly into you. 'San Fran Jubilee' closes the four-track, a nostalgic and sweeping crescendo of uplifting mid-tempo disco with some damn good sax.

Review: First released in 1981 in the wake of the muscular, robo-disco epics 'Megatron Man' and 'Menergy', 'Get a Little' has long been one of Patrick Cowley's most underrated singles - or at least far-less celebrated. As this reissue proves, the track has lost none of its lustre over the years. A full-vocal number featuring a super-catchy chorus, the original mix (B1) and contemporaneous remix (B2) sit somewhere between electrofunk, Cowley's own brand of electronic disco and what we'd now call Italo-disco. It's a far-sighted sound that still sounds fresh all these years on. The A-side of this edition also boasts two contemporary updates from Alan Dixon, who adds subtly beefed-up house beats and a tidy nu-disco feel on both the 'Love Attack' and 'DJ Friendly Mix' variations.

Review: Last time out, back in 2021, Nassau Track Authority served up a swathe of previously unreleased instrumental mixes of songs recorded by Grace Jones at Compass Point Studios, Nassau. This 12" sees the shadowy collective once more dip into the archives of the legendary Barbados-based studio to recover more synth-laden, dub-wise disco instrumentals. They begin with 'Peanut', a Sly & Robbie-fuelled, vocal-free take on Gwen Guthrie's peerless Larry Levan fave 'Peanut Butter', before wallowing in the susp-enseful, slow motion boogie-dub brilliance of 'Adventures' (a take on an old Will Powers single). Over on side B, 'Seventh' is an infectious, musically detailed instrumental take on another Gwen Guthrie classic (the slap-bass propelled 'Seventh Heaven'), while 'Doctor' is a particularly dub-wise, slow-motion mix of what we think is a Thompson Twins classic.

Review: Indeep's 1982 'Last Night A DJ Saved My Life' is a stone cold classic. It has been remixed several times over the years and never stops attracting new audiences with each passing generation. On this latest reissue we get the 1980s New York-based trio's still hard-to-beat original version as well as the acapella and Smeddles's More Ass mix and More Ass dub. They are subtle reworkings that tweak the original for a little more dancefloor heft but do nothing to distill its still golden charms and catchy hooks.

Review: Taken from Lorraine Johnson's first 'Album The More You Want' released in 1977 on Prelude Records and produced by Jesse Boyce and Moses Dillard, this single has been reissued many times over the years but always shifts. It's a textbook bit of floor-filling r&b, disco and soul complete with a brilliantly well-defined bass riff, soaring Philly strings and an empowering vocal from Johnson. On the flip, 'Feed The Flame' is even more celebratory with its big horns and stomping rhythms. Both of these are timeless classics that will unite dance floors and music lovers of all shapes, shades and sizes.

Review: Fresh, bustling release magic by Tokyo-based edit/remix label Funtown, featuring a catchy and percussive disco cut replete with obscure, nigh-unidentifiable samples. Like scouring a neon-lit, Chevrolet-packed city at night - and being bowled over at the sheer wealth of nightclubs to visit and streets to drive down - the eponymous Funtown beefs up the percussion on 'Bigger Fun', extending and teasing the original elements of whichever obscurity made up the backbone of this texturally rich, limited-edition release.

Review: Texan psych-funk fun time outfit Golden Dawn Arkestra get some remix treatment via this double pack from Razor-N-Tape, which leads in with Austin Ato's positively dreamy deep house version of "Children Of The Sun". JKriv takes on "Cosmic Dancer" and makes it into a slick disco-fied workout that adheres to the RNT vibe, while Dicky Trisco takes the track and makes it into a suitably interstellar strutter heavy on the synth lines. Then then the second slab of wax offers up a side each to the original versions, from the Afrobeat-indebted "Children Of The Sun" to the sweet and starry-eyed disco of "Cosmic Dancer".

Review: Trans-X was Pascal Languirand, but the fantastic vocal from his biggest single, 1986's 'Living on Video,' was performed by Laurie Ann Gill, a Canadian who never got the credit at the time. This reissue will put her in the spotlight and rightly so - this is pure dance effort gold, with hi-nrg disco beats, flashy synth-pop styles and a native retro-future tint that still bangs. It's rather unusual source material for Claptone who normally favours deep and soulful sounds, but he does a fine job of flipping into a big, cheery, chugging, tooting Italo-disco stomper. A dub mix is also included for a more raw vibe.

Review: Parisian jazz-funk, disco and boogie band Chatobaron - an outfit helmed by multi-instrumentalist Frank Chatona - have previously worked in the studio with house and nu-disco mainstay Art of Tones, so it's no surprise to see them recruiting the mighty Dimitri From Paris to mix their latest single. His A-side 'Club Vocal' mix is a genuinely riotous and celebratory affair, with strong group vocals (singing about how much they love 'your' music) and heady horns rising a jolly and joyous, piano-sporting disco-funk groove rich in low-slung bass and Cerrone style percussion. It comes accompanied not by one of Dimitri's deconstructed dubs, but rather an equally excitable 'Club Instrumental' mix that boasts all the goodness of his A-side mix minus the vocals.

Review: If you don't have love for Rahsaan then you don't have love for life. The American is a veteran of the edit scene and someone who can flip any joint into a joyous groove. Here, Hot Biscuit have assembled a limited double 12" that brings together some of his best 'Disco Edits, Versions & Dubs." 'Big Bisou' opens up with a jumble of Afro drums and loose limbed rhythms, 'Mamoe Lowe' then has tribal vocal chants and raw percussive energy, and 'Preto Velho' then brings a little more laid back soul to the party. '77' is a funky disco strider and 'Secondo' closes with some hard assed funk.

Review: Rahaan is a Chicago legend and master of the most soulful sounds in the studio. His new EP for BBE, 'We Are The Ones,' sees him joining up with a whole host of top musicians such as Marcus J. Austin and Nancy Clayton on vocals, Carnell C. Newbill on keys, Todd Swope on guitar and Lou Terry on bass. Between them they bring real dance floor adventures that are steeped in proper musicality. Ohio Players' Kenny Anderson on the horns brings some real soul to these four-to-the-floor cuts which mix up disco and house in the finest of fashion.

Review: Reissued from the 1983 original press on House Of Music - and subject to many a reissue since, for good reason - the Italian duo BWH hear their enduring classic 'Livin' Up / Stop' rereleased once more. Something about the collaborative effrots of Stefano Zito and Helene Zito made for a dizzying concoction in Italo, and the lasting interest in this single is backed up by the song's squeezy-clean mix and Hi-NRG synth rollicks. 'Stop' on the B-side, too, is slower and more rapacious, and without it, the single wouldn't be the same.

Review: Chicago house mainstay Glenn Underground is as good at crafting neat edits of the classics as he is serving up his own superb original house compositions. It is the former which he does here on his own label and first up on the A-side he adds his signature smooth grooves to a track but the late, great funk master Amp Fiddler. The B-side begins with his Retro mix of beatmaker extraordinaire Mos Def which has loose-limbed drums and soulful pads that reach to the heavens, then he looks to acid jazz innovators Incognito and their 'I Can See The Future' and flips it into a nice funky and drawn out house groove for vibrant dance floor fun.

Review: Talc's 'De Gui Ding' is a much-deserved follow up to the duo's 2006 hit singles 'Modern Sleepover' parts 1 and 2, which lyrically detailed a failed romance between a hapless human lover and his own computer, against a futuristic yet slow disco backdrop. A listless love song for Linux laptops, it now comes repackaged with several new reworkings, as well as the much higher-energy 'De Gui Ding', filtered french house tropes and blue-note saxfunk aplenty.

Review: Unidisc's 40th anniversary series, which offers fresh editions of sought-after disco and boogie hits, each accompanied by a new remix, continues. This time, they've decided to revisit Saturday Night Band's 'Come On Dance, Dance', which first surfaced on legendary NYC label Prelude way back in 1978. The chosen remixer this time round is Z Records chief Dave Lee, in pure 'Remixed With Love' mode. His EP-opening 'Disco Mix' is a genuine bomb that expertly rearranges and re-EQs the Saturday Night Band's original mix - with the odd dash of delay here and there - in true Tom Moulton style. He also delivers an excitable, largely beat-free 'Reprise' mix and a tidy, dancefloor dub style 'Instrumental'. A lightly edited take on the 1978 original mix completes an excellent package.

Review: Best claims to be the first Italo-disco label to be based in Rome. It was founded in 1981 by pioneering DJ Claudio Casalini and sure does have plenty of gems in its catalogue. This is one of them from Carol Williams, whose charming and effortlessly cool vocals light up both sides of this mix of boogie, soul, disco and funk. 'What's The Deal' is a mid-tempo seducer with stepping chord sequences and bright synth work then 'Have You For My Love' ups the ante with more squelchy synth funk sounds and pixelated leads. It's the pick of the bunch if you ask us.

Review: Having previously produced two tidy remixes of overlooked Patrick Cowley gem 'Get a Little', Alan Dixon has returned to the late, great producer's catalogue in order to rework another lesser-celebrated cut. This time round, he's turned his hand to Megatron Man album track, 'Lift Off', a typically throbbing, muscular vocal number that sits somewhere between thrusting robo-disco, sparkling electrofunk and synth-pop. Dixon first adds a little low-end grunt on the re-edit style 'Love Attack Mix', before delivering a sturdier and easier-to-mix 'DJ Friendly version'. On the flip you'll find Cowley's original and a rare, club-ready remix from the early '80s.

Review: Blissful boogie reissue from Junko Ohashi, whose 7-inch promo for 'Dancin' here functioned as the promo material for the 1983 album 'Point Zero'. Sounding just as rough, farty and raw as its original LP cut, the track is a perfect example of what Japan brought to disco - blending it largely with city pop - at the time. 'In Your Lovin', as it did on the original album, brings up the B-side with a downer-tempo funk beat, and a lyrical subject dealing with a romanticized, ideal lover.

Review: Limited edition 12" dedicated to the Neve A Maggio song flavoured with four remixes. Three from Mushrooms Project and one with a 90's house style by Deep88. Wrapped in elegant electronics and an international flavour, Sara's voice recounts the unusual in these days characterized by strong anomalies and cold solitude. Like when it snows in May, like when you want to pick a rose and instead find yourself blinded by a white reflection, completely out of place. Yet there is life, under that white; breath, pulsation, a rhythm that presses and makes you dance: a song that drags you away from a daily life troubled by extraordinary events, which become intimate and confidential, but still unique, like every single snowflake.

Archeo Recordings is a reissue record label that regenerates old, lost, obscure and forgotten rare gems of mostly Italian music but also all over the world of the 70s, 80s and 90s.
All releases are licensed audio tracks re-mastered in their original form with sleeves recreated for today but all based on the original images. Archeo would like to make the music available to a wider audience of collectors, DJs, music lovers of a forgotten time.

Review: A decade has now passed since the birth of Harry 'Munir' Septiandry's Midnight Runners project, a studio outfit turned live band whose sound mines South-East Asian funk, soul and disco for inspiration. The Indonesian outfit's latest release, 'Nusantra Tropic Disco Volume 1', is arguably one of its' strongest yet. Rich in vintage 1970s synth sounds, tropical colour and live grooves that variously draw on disco, jazz-funk and library music, it feels fresh and exciting despite its nostalgic inspirations and authentic period instrumentation. Highlights include, but are no way limited to, vibrant and percussive disco opener 'Kaliuga', the spacey and warming 'Ratna and Galih' and soaring, future peak-time Indonesian disco anthem 'Kasih Bersemi'.

Review: Luca LTJ Trevisi is LTJ Xperience and he began his DJ and producer career in the 80s. He was a resident at two of Italy's most acclaimed clubs and sure knows how to craft a tune. As well as his own originals he is a master of the remix and someone who can rework any cut to be even more potent not he floor. He proves that here with four new versions that span deep and dreamy and cosmic disco. He tackles Vasquez, Black Mighty Wax, Soultrend Orchestra and Papik & Sarah Jane Morris and turns each into gold.

Review: As we roll further into the New Year we're still enjoying the arrival of plenty of new labels. Now Is Not The Time is one of them from the US that takes a bow here with its first EP, Lost In The Message. It's a three-way collab between the legendary Rahaan plus DJ Reg and Jerome O. What they do is chip up classic samples and killer grooves form the worlds of funk, soul, house and disco with 'Lost In The Message' kicking off in freewheeling fashion. 'Get Up Out Tha Water' has oems nice big horn energy and plenty of whistles and 'The M8 Track' is a deeper house sound with a belting diva vocal.

Review: Hitomi Toyama's 'Sweet Soul Music' originally made it to wax last year, when the track appeared as part of a rare Japanese funk compilation curated by the sound's brightest stars, Wamono. Now, though, it gets a proper release on 7", and is backended by the sultry B-side 'Wanna Kiss', which sounds pitched up and chirpy in its shrill alto vocals, which assure us we're held. The A, meanwhile, is as horny (in both senses of the word) as ever, quite obviously singing the praises of "sweet soul music... I love you!"

Review: Tema di Susie' is one of the main themes from the soundtrack composed by Alessandro Alessandroni for the 1976 Italian noir film Sangue di sbirro, known in English as Blood and Bullets, as well as Knell, Bloody Avenger (the Susie in the original title refers to the female love interest of the film's hero, who is on a mission to seek revenge for the gangland murder of his policeman father). At once sweet and sentimental, haunting and melancholic, 'Tema di Susie' stands out from the other tracks in the film, which are more action oriented. Like the rest of the score, however, it exemplifies the way in which, during the 70s, Italian film composers created their own version of the sound of American blaxploitation cinema, with its groovy blend of funk, jazz, and soul. Here, Neapolitan duo Fratelli Malibu have taken Alessandroni's melodic theme and woven it into a mesmerizing tapestry of rhythmic beats, world percussion and ethereal atmospheres. Drawing inspiration from funk/Afrobeat, synth-pop and Italo-disco, they've conjured a psychedelic-tinged, afro-cosmic groove that's bound to transport you to another dimension. Doubling that fun comes a vocal retouch version, courtesy of the Italian funk/soul collective Banda Maje, on the B-side.

Review: Newcastle's Hot Biscuit Recordings pull the strings behind many a white label sub-imprint, one of which is the elusive Funtown Records. The orchestrator of this edits series is obscure, and so are the sample sources for each of the edits heard on this 12". On the A-side, we hear a tight-lipped James Brown-style breakdown and ensuing boogie number, on which it is insisted that we "know what makes (this singer) feel alright". Good to know! The B-side, meanwhile, errs far further in the direction of instrumental synthfunk, proving the versatile mettle of this raucous reworker.

Review: Music producers do tend to be rare breeds, so it's not a surprise to hear of a label series exploring the theme. 'Uncommon Species II' is the second installment of the series from the Swiss label Phantom Island, bringing together various artists for five curios centring on oddball future disco, nu-disco, and re-edits. Highlights include the dream-pop-Balearic Kejeblos Remix of Moreeats' 'Forever Fun' - in which a rogue male vocal seductively implores us to light his fire - and CCO's 'Cyanea' - a standout acid disco number. Frankly, though, all the tracks here are unusual bangers, packed with extra additions that only a rare breed of artist could add.

Review: Mondo Groove is one of the leading purveys or disco, Italo and nu-disco and it has been for ages. This new and limited 12" is packed with four hard to find gems from between the years of 1983 and 1988. They have all been taken from the original master tapes for this special reissue. Camomilla's chugging and snappy 'Queen Of The Night' opens up with a squelchy arp and heavenly melodies, Noa-Noa gets more cosmic and De Dion offers the drama and neon colour of 'Sexy Cola' with a fine extended version while Sandy Samuel's 'I Like Sado Music' is a loose limbed percussive workout.

Review: Definitely one for the collectors, Lime was Canadian duo (then husband and wife) Denis and Denyse LePage, and 'Angel Eyes' was originally the second single from their third studio album, 1983's Lime III. Almost 40 years later, the track has returned as a short form release, offering the original synth pop anthem, and a clubbier dub mix.

For many, though, not least Unidisc Canada, the label carrying this re-release, the major selling point is a remix - and something of a remodelling - courtesy of Turbo Recordings boss and dance music icon Tiga. Forsaking the rather smiley and bouncy original work, in favour of something grittier and altogether more dystopian, it's a masterclass of rough, gnarly broken electro, reworking and chopping vocals into disorientating loops, before finally introducing a kind of warehouse synth pop sound.

Review: MF Robots' Dawn Joseph and Jan Kincaid dropped real heat back in 2021 with their Break The Wall album. 'Make The Call' was one of the standout tunes from it and now BBE has assembled a series of new remixes of it by Two Soul Fusion. That tackle all genres starting with a house remix full of soul and warm drums. The Boogie remix is an instrumental take that unfurls over nine minutes of ass-shaking and irresistible groovy goodness. Then comes the same tune with the lush vocal left in before an instrumental of the house remix to close the package.

Review: Sound Metaphors offshoot Miss You has been particularly astute at licensing and reissuing long-forgotten European disco gems. They've found another unknown classic here in the shape of two gorgeously string-laden 1977 disco covers of Andalucian folk songs by singing sisters Las Dablas, both of which originally appeared on the same Spanish seven-inch. 'Zorongo' is authentic-sounding, faintly threatening disco rich in heady Clavinet motifs, soaring orchestration, low-slung 'walking bass' and sprightly piano stabs, while 'Solo Y Sin Problemas' is a slightly funkier and sweeter slab of mid-tempo disco. Best of all, though, is the new 'No End Extension' - a breathlessly brilliant, dub disco-flecked revision that teases out the instrumental sections before finally dropping the sibling duo's lead vocals.

Review: Deep house on a 7" is a rather rather thing but this 45rpm certainly is worth your while. It is the first we have heard from Jazztronik, all producer and keysman Ryota Nozaki, since his Universal Language album last year. He has been at this now for 24 years and brings all that know how to these two jams. 'Evoke' is a lively broken beat workout with squelchy bass and improvised jazz keys that are restless and energizing with rich leads. 'Beat Hopper' (The 3rd Session) appears on the flip with more innovative keys and party-pumping broken beats. A tasteful duo for sure.