Back catalogue: Electro

Review: Still no one makes electro quite like the OG that is The Egyptian Lover. He helped pioneer the genre back in the day and for proof look no further than 'Franky Girl' from way back in 1986. It still very much sounds future today with its ice-cold drum machine sounds, creepy, mystic bass lines and sci-fi synth leads all topped off with his own inimitable mic work. Extended and album versions are included with the flipside featuring 'We The Freaks'. It's a more crisp and raw cut but one that still makes you want to pop that body on the dance floor.

Review: Yes! Gerard Hanson returns to Frustrated Funk for more worthy Event Related Potential output! The celebrated rooftop alligator wrestler from Texas operates under numerous aliases - Convexation, Syne Language and Time Light Curve among them - but ERP is our favourite at Juno HQ, more so when it arrives via the superb Frustrated Funk label. Renowned for his emotive strings, Hanson brandishes them in abundance on Pith with lead track "Luctu" all about his compositional skills, as he orchestrates various melodic arrangements without losing sight of the funk. On the flip "Tuga" plays out like a charming ode to electro's classicisms as rasping 808s combine sublimely with the deviant analogue bass as Hanson works his string laden magic. It's left to the final title track for Hanson to adopt a pensive, more contemplative tone which contrasts nicely with the music that preceded it.

Review: We've lost count of the various projects Robert Witschakowski has been involved in this year, but the Some Other Places series of releases on Clone's West Coast Series is up there with the German's best work as The Exaltics. This hand-stamped purple 12" is the third and final part and contains some fine electro for both the dancefloor and the living room. Opening this five-track release is the snare shaking and in your face ambient intro of "Getting Closer" which is followed by a melodic and grouchy key driven "Never Be Enough". The EP's highlights are "Can You See It" and "SL-W D-WN", which respectively are dubby and mellow and dusty and break beat. Seriously, does Witschakowski sleep?

Review: As the title suggests, Some Other Place Volume 2 is the second installment of a triptych of releases from The Exaltics for The Clone West Coast series. As with previous music from the Solar One boss, the four tracks here see The Exaltics look to both American and Dutch schools of electro but the results are nonetheless distinguished by his own unique signifiers. The title track sets the tone nicely as waves of sumptuous blurred noise ride a supple skeletal rhythm, whilst "Waves Of Fear" lives up to it's paranoid title with a marauding low end bass line the dominating element on a classic slab of darkside electro. "The Way Out" is perhaps the most conventional track here, with Witschakowski laying down an atmospheric but club ready 808 workout which is still a cut above thanks to the German's arrangement skills. Which leaves room for the slower, weirder and mushy excellence of "Different Ways".

Review: Ralph Lawson's Leeds based 20/20 Vision label has made a distinctive shift into electro territory over the last couple years. It is a sound the boss has said has long been in his heart despite him being best known as a house head and longtime resident at Back to Basics, and the quality of the tunes he unearths to put out more than backs that up. The Exaltics & Paris The Black Fu kick off with a shiny, bright, visceral metallic electro workout then three further cuts take in dark wave drum machine rhythms and acid-laced bangers.

Review: 20/20 Vision are exiting planet Earth once again with the latest in their perfectly formed series of electro explorations, as Extrawelt leads the charge with an illustrious slice of braindance-tinted funk titled 'Hail The Whale (Coexisting Mix)'. Djedjotronic follows that up with a bold blast of mammoth synth work which hits pretty damn hard without being pointlessly brutal. Ste Roberts takes a break from his self-titled label run to offer up a freaky foray into acid-speckled territory, and Ivna Ji gets expressive with a rich palette of synths moving in harmony around a sharp and snappy beat.

Review: Night Defined Recordings is an Austrian electronic music label based in Salzburg that has featured previous releases by Spanish veteran Eduardo de la Calle, Romanian upstart Serb and label chief Juergen Vonbank. It now presents the second edition in the NDVAX various artist series, featuring Finnish producer Mesak (Klakson/Cleaning Tapes) with the hard minimalism of 'Palek', as well as Erfurt, Germany's Mary Yalex with the unsettling ambient house of 'Running Out Of Time' and Workshop affiliated Even Tuell with the dusty twilight dub of 'In Circles' delivered in typically understated fashion.

Review: Two And Half Records make the decision here to try and rid the A and B-side distinction on records that we are all very familiar with and instead they refer to each face of their latest 12" as 'dance' and 'listen.'' It makes sense frankly and is often how things go anyway. Swiss duo Quismi kick off this one with twitchy and narcotic tech house with an old school bent. French artist Groenogen then gets wild with bright melodies and grinding synths, r&b vocals and high speed tech funk on 'Twinkle Dance' while ILyes offers the tech silkiness of 'Starting Now.' On the flip is a trio of less direct, more experimental sounds that sure do offer plenty to get lost in on headphones.

Review: Written and programmed over a productive fourteen year period, ranging from 1996 to 2010, the 17th sonic tale on Childhood Intelligence emerges from the German Electro artist, E-Control. The debut album from the artist, D.N.E. is inspired by a long held passion for 80s electro, early bleep, techno and house. Transforming powerful rhythms into a mysticism for the future, the release also features guest appearances from Audiofusion, Tinky Kerruish and Silent Community. A riveting journey and a triumph of a debut.

Review: Craigie Knowes is a by-word for electronic quality and now Eluize keeps up that reputation with a mini-album that blends electro, techno, house and space age sounds into six superb cuts. 'Ennui' is the acid flecked opener which heads off into outer space on slippery electro and 'Wasn't Ready' offers a more hard hitting and high tempo sound with punishing drum work. Next to serve up this new EP, Eluize has also recently recently launched a mentoring programme focusing on supporting womxn, non-binary and trans people in production, performance and label management.

Review: Some 15 years have now passed since Solar One Music founder Robert Witschakowski debuted The Exaltics alias, and in that time the project has delivered some genuinely brilliant and far-sighted electro and techno. This compilation of highlights, which mines a variety of albums and EPs released between 2009 and 2019 (including some previously digital-only and long out of print material), is therefore well overdue. Highlights are naturally plentiful, with our picks of an extremely strong bunch including the acid-fired, mind-mangling peak-time aggression of 'Second Phases', the heavyweight star-fall intensity of 'Irresistible', the Drexcyian rush of 'Skyway Chase' and the near D&B-tempo, new wave influenced retro-futurism of 'Nothing's Too Late'.