Back catalogue: Techno (All)

Review: Released on lovely transparent blue vinyl, the fourth volume of Figure's Hardspace series offers six fresh reinterpretations of Len Faki's favourite tracks under his staunchly underground Hardspace alias. Josh Wink's 'Sixth Sense' gets a powerful low-end rework while Aoki Takamasa's minimalist dub transforms into a high-energy and peak-time slammer. DJ Yoav B's iconic 'Energize' reaches new rave heights with its relentless groove and Huxley's dark take on 'Weapon 3' comes on with explosive force. Tuttle's 'Function' ups the intensity with Faki's signature claps and sirens while Mike Parker's '90s classic 'Shakuhachi Two' gains extra drive with Hardspace's propulsive percussion for a dynamic techno workout.

Review: Hardspace is an alias of Len Faki, the renowned techno player and longtime Berghain associate. During Covid he reconnected with his studio and really got to grips with it on all new levels and that shows in the work he has put out since. This project is about adding his own spin to his favourite tunes, tweaking them for his own DJ sets and making older cuts sound right and function well on modern dancefloors. From the loop, thudding house of his take on Sound Stream to stripped back 90s techno sounds from Andrei Morant via the brain frying synth texture and unrelenting grooves of DJ Rush's 'Don't You Love Me,' this is a fine collection for any DJ.

Review: Is there a more vital label in all of underground electronic music than FXHE? It never ceases to amaze us how Omar S manages to put out so much music of such high quality, mostly of his own making, but also from plenty of satellite producers he lures under his wing. This time we're treated to a rare full-length from someone other than the boss as the Motor City's Hi Tech duo step up with a raw ghettotech workout. These are sleazy tracks with raw production, bumping basslines, high-speed rhythms and plenty of rapped vocals packed with juke and footwork attitude.

Review: After a recent release on CD following its first outing on Omar S's FXHE, Diners Club International now drops Hi Tech's self-titled album on cassette with some added bonus joints. It's a thrilling, pacey listen that whisks you off your feet and through a world of juke, footwork and ghetto beats that are all drenched in soul. The cuts are short and sweet, from the smudged and smeared r&b overtones of 'Funny Fuckits' (feat Nila & Stefan Xix) to the heavily filtered and trap-style 'Fitness By King Milo.' It's a futuristic sound steeped in fresh and inventive rhythms and heartfelt emotions.

Review: This is a new CD version including bonus tracks of Hi Tech's self-titled album which comes here on Diners Club International but first landed on Omar S's FXHE. It is a full ghetto tech workout with pumped-up booty-bouncing beats that traverse a wide range of tempos. The high energy highlights come thick and fast with the likes of 'Big Prism' riding on juke beats, 'Milf Milo' bringing some lithe synth chords and raw claps and 'I Swear It's A Bop' (feat KAYY & ALLGIRLSALLOWED) featuring broken drum patterns, glistening synth stabs and r&b vocals full of soul.

Review: After its initial release on vinyl on Omar S's FXHE last summer, Diners Club International have put together a new CD version of Hi Tech's Dttwat album featuring some new bonus cuts. It's a stylish blend of Motor City beats, ghetto energy and r&b vocals that all get cut up and chopped and spliced into short, quickfire but potent tunes that make a lasting impact. A wide range of guest vocals come from Cheapskate Skutta, Dastardly Kids, Nlghind and many more so these beats brim with colour and character. With the added bonus cuts this is a must-cop CD direct from the D.

Review: Diners Club International recently served up this Hi Tech album, Detwat, on CD, but now backs that up with a limited cassette version featuring some bonus cuts. It originally got released on Omar S's FHXE label and is a sleazy and high-speed ghetto workout with filthy low ends aimed well and truly at the rump. Juke, footwork and plenty of spin-off styles are all chewed up and spat out with plenty of top collars and guests adding colour. There are pumping beats and fractured vocals on 'Money Phone', Drake style trap vocoders on 'TakeOffOnnaPorsche' and bright, reflective, optimistic chords over hurried beats on 'Glitch N Ass' (feat Cheapskate Skutta, Dastardly Kids) amongst many more highlights.

Review: Jamal Moss aka Hieroglyphic Being is one of the most fearless experimentalists in house and techno. He confronts dancefloor disillusionment head-on with Dance Music 4 Bad People, his raw, uncompromising debut for Smalltown Supersound. A veteran of Chicago's club scene, Moss channels four decades of history, highs, lows and trauma into an album that defies escapism. These are not crowd-pleasers but cathartic confrontations dense with abrasive synths, molten drum loops and uneasy textures which all crash together in chaotic, transcendent layers. There's no clean resolution anywhere, instead just tension, dissonance and moments of stark beauty. Far from a nostalgic Windy City love-in, Moss' music reflects a dance culture in crisis and provides a place to rage against it.

Review: Chicago extraordinaire Jamal Moss aka Hieroglyphic Being's third solo album is titled There Is No Acid In This House, and sees him return to Soul Jazz Records. Using his idiosyncratic electronic sound, Moss takes influence from the experimental minds of fellow Windy City innovators such as The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, The Art Ensemble of Chicago and Sun Ra, through to icons of his hometown's house music scene like Ron Hardy, Marshall Jefferson, Lil Louis and others who have defined Chicago's musical universe over the last half a century.

Review: The inimitable Jamal Moss comes forth with his second offering for Madrid's Apnea records. 'The Moon Dance' unfurls over 11 tracks- in turns pensive, elegiac, and slammin'. Between the sedate expanse of opener 'When The Earths Shadow Falls On The Moon' and the final cymbal strokes of gauche, machine funk closer 'Mawu', Moss lifts us on yet another Afrofuturist space flight of fancy, passing through superclusters of deep house, tactile techno and stroboscopic piano jams along the way.
Standout moments include the smoove-as-u-like-it intergalactic lounge jazz diversion 'The Moondance Moon Walk Version'; its steezy stride-piano vamp seamlessly intertwining with Moss' signature babbling acid intrusions, the irresistibly groovy bump of 'Tethered 2 The Divinely Spaces With In' and the hypnotic sway of 'Celestial Poems Of The Lady With 10000 Names', which opens up from Terrence Dixon-esque introspection into broad windy city string washes and synapse-tickling bleeps. With this collection, Moss pens yet another crucial chapter in the seemingly bottomless hieroglyphic being scroll. While 'The Moon Dance' is one of his most accessible and harmonious works to date, it doesn't lose an ounce of the rawness and immediacy of his previous work. Essential listening!

Review: It's been seven years since Holden's debut album The Idiots Are Winning was released on his own Border Community imprint, and in that time new material has been scarce to say the least. Thankfully, The Inheritors was well worth the wait; produced with a combination of Holden's extensive analogue modular system and his own self-coded software, the album takes in influences as wide as The KLF, Elgar, ceilidh music, pentatonic folk scales and ancient pagan rituals, with each track recorded in one take with no overdubs. Border Community cohort Luke Abbott's Holkham Drones album would be the closest comparison, but even that superb record doesn't come close to the sprawling marvel that is The Inheritors, with highlights like the jazz sax of "The Caterpillar's Intervention" and twisting analogue techno of "Gone Feral" coming thick and fast.

Review: We have been digging in the warehouse and have found some copies of one of the faultless EPs that Detroit house royalty Mike Huckaby put out in his lifetime. It features three tracks that are all steeped in deepness and dubby goodness and are unlikely to ever age. 'Wavetable No. 9' is spaced out and rather menacing in a subtle, sparse way. 'Fantasy' is a more airy and light cut with meandering melodic leads and thinking keys that bring a cosmic feel. 'Jupiter' closes out with nimble bass and splashy hi hats joined by conversational synth leads that glow with a late-night warmth. Included in this is a CD featuring plenty of the samples used in the making of the tunes using the Waldorf synth.

Review: Much missed Detroit techno legend Mike Huckaby created The Down Under Kit for the Australian leg of the Red Bull Music Academy's world tour and it's so much more than a simple sample pack, as Huckaby gives a narrated tutorial on creating templates and generating ideas, a fascinating glimpse into his philosophy and techniques. Obviously, there are lots of thumping kicks, distinctively trademark pianos and pads and more to load up, but this pack not only gives you the means of production, it also gives you a guide to how to put it to its most effective use.

Review: As part of Amniote Editions' fifth birthday, the admirably experimental label has decided to release a full-length excursion from Mirror Zone founder Spekki Webu, AKA Heliobolus. The multi-disciplinary artist has decided to utilise both aliases on the album, a way of reinforcing the key conceptual idea behind it - that it is a "story of intertwined storylines" akin to "parallel universes that connect and diverge". Musically, it's an intriguing affair, with pulsating, full-throttle sci-fi techno workouts sitting side by side with darker, more intense cuts, sound design-heavy experimental techno soundscapes, and nods towards the horror end of the cinematic soundtrack spectrum. Throw in a few mutant, noise-laden post-IDM compositions and you have a genuinely impressive full-length excursion.