Back catalogue: Minimal House/Tech House

Review: Two prime time techno tunes, each dry as dust and kicking like a mule.

Review: Kompakt Speicher has always been a diverse 12" outlet for the long running Cologne imprint, happily garnering productions from the likes of Perc, Steve Moore and DJ Koze alongside more familiar Kompakt names such as Superpitcher, Gui Boratto and Wolfgang Voigt. Speicher 72 looks to debutants in the shape of Ostgut Ton label chief Nick Hoppner and Huntleys & Palmers affiliate Auntie Flo and both productions are resolutely heads down affairs. Hoppner leads with "Ipso Facto", a loopy techno cut packed with subtle, moody sonic nuances and gentle builds and drops that's very much a continuation of his recent refined output on Ostgut. Complementing this, Auntie Flo elects to go conceptual with the final part of a trilogy of tracks that explore themes of ritual music, citing Ellen Dissanayake's essay on Ritual and Ritualization as inspiration. You need to check Mule Musiq to hear the other two thirds, but "Sun Ritual" still works as a standalone affair, a heavily percussive production with swirling electronic pulses giving the track an air of fuzzy psychedelia.