Vega Vinilo y CD

Review: Few people have done as much to shape house music as Grammy winner Louie Vega. His next project finds him on an executive producer role as he assembles a crack team of world class musicians under the Elements of Life banner. With a sound inspired by greats like Stevie Wonder and Cymande, this fantastic record brims with musicality, joy and soul from front to back. The tracks are live sounding, richly percussive, sprinkled with Latin spice and various moods, grooves and tempos. For big hearted DJs and dancers, this is pure gold. Of course guests like Anane, Blaze and Lisa Fischer all help add their own special colour to the picture.

Review: One of the joys of Louie Vega's Elements of Life project is the Masters at Work man's enthusiasm for lengthy versions of the hands soul-fuelled tracks, which regularly join the dots between disco, Latin music, deep house, jazz-funk and, on rare occasions, NYC freestyle. It's for this reason that this second selection of extended versions of key tracks - some provided by remixers and re-editors - is such a vibrant set. For proof, check DJ Spinna's soft-focus, samba-influenced soulful house revision of "A Better Day", the broken beat-influenced Masters at Work version of salsa-house shuffler "Nos Vida", and Vega's own superbly percussion, soulful and life-affirming "Latin Soul Mix" of Blaze hook-up "Love Is On The Way".

Review: Vega Records presents Elements Of Life Extensions, the live orchestral project of label chief Louie Vega. For the project's first volume of reworks, the new tracks "Messin' About", "Our People", and the unreleased mix of "Love Is On The Way" are ones not to be missed, in addition to a wide range of talents have been especially chosen to give their take on tracks from the album. Masters At Work sidekick Kenny Dope's take on "Cerca De Mi" (with Raul Midon), Joe Claussell on the spiritual perspective of "Sunshine" (as Scared Rhythm) and a respectful remaster of the Candido classic "Thousand Finger Man".

Review: For his next album project, the Master at Work that is Louie Vega links with Luisito Quintero, a veteran percussionist who has played with La India and others in the New York scene. He is as creative and original as they come and fuses afro-Latin rhythms and bossa nova sounds into fresh new forms and now serves up Part One of his Percussion Madness album. It ranges from seductive deep house to swaggering Stevie Wonder style funk via irresistible afro beats. Luisito has shared the stage with Robert Plant, Lauryn Hill, Alicia Keys and more, but deserves just as many plaudits for his own solo work.

Review: Not to be confused with the 2007 remix album Percussion Madness Revisited, this excellent double-pack offers features some of the best bits of Latin percussionist Luisito Quintero's Louie Vega-produced Percussion Madness album. If you missed that set 14 years ago, it's well worth picking up. Heavily percussive and rich in South American rhythms from start to finish, the set sees Quintero, Vega and collaborators flitting between slick soulful house (see the Josh Milan-voiced 'Love Remains the Same'), heavy salsa ('Tumbao'), boogaloo ('Skinny Papa'), tech-tinged Afro-house (Francis Mbappe collaboration 'Gbagada, Gbagada, Gbogogo, Gbogodo'), bossanova ('Our Love', with Anane) and epic, jazz-flecked Latin house (12-minute closing cut 'Free My Soul').