Mondo Phase Rec Vinilo y CD

Review: French label Cairo Xpress debuts with a first-ever vinyl outing and a fine one it is too, with six stylish house outings from an array of fresh talents. Wilt's 'Beoyon' has lovely gloppy drums and bass looping under harmonic chords - it's simple but effective. Hermit gets more full-bodied with his textured 'Who Dunnit' and DOTT strips it back to bumping drum track workouts on 'Twitching Softly.' There is more irresistible bounce to Lucho's 'Mesh', Artphorm layers in some old school pianos to 'Daown' and HATT D shuts down with maybe the best of the lot, 'Contrasts In Life,' which is a broken beat, analogue sound with celestial energy.

Review: Canadian electro stalwart Sneak-Thief has been off the radar for some ten years or so, but now he's back with the brilliantly titled Under The Synthfluence EP on Mondo Phase Rec. If you ever enjoyed Sneak-Thief in the past you'll be more than satisfied here as he leans in on that potent blend of EBM, Italo and machine funk with plenty of vocoder and nasty, throbbing baselines. 'All Let Go (dub)' is an unbridled party monster, while 'Der Herzenbrescher' has a smouldering, bombastic synth-pop feel which you'll be hard-pressed to resist. If you thirst for that turn-of-the-millennium electro sound, you'll be very happy with this record.