Saturday, 6 June 2009

New Mondo - Total Control

New Mondo are better known as west coast deep house heroes Vincent Kwok and DJ MFR, but this debut long player is a bit of a surprise… cos Total Control is a far more accessible, dare I say poppy project than you'd expect from this pair.

Don't get me wrong, we're not in Spiller/Freemasons territory just yet. But still, this is the kind of slickly produced 'grown-up pop'-style house that's more familiar coming from fellow San Fran stable Om, than from the generally more underground Transport. I still quite like it, though. If you're not in the mood then it can easily start to sound a bit too sickly sweet (and those who are allergic to vocals should steer well clear), but if you're happy with a complete album of spangly (that's spangly, not spangled) vibes then there's plenty to love here, particularly Lisa Shaw's make-me-go-a-bit-funny-at-the-knees vocal on opener I Want Cha, which is coming out as a single soon, and the rumbling Chi-Town b-line on 909

[UPDATE Just found some audio previews on Soundcloud]

Actually, this album reminds me of  nothing so much as Stonebridge's Can't Get Enough. Which is a compliment BTW! Anyway, you can find out more about New Mondo here, or they've got a MySpace as well but they don't seem to have done much with it yet…

About the label: Surprisingly, as I said, this is on Transport… which is a wicked deep house label out of San Fran. If you don't know the label this probably isn't the best place to start, though. May I suggest a couple of label showcases instead, Julius Papp's Montreal Departure via Om or House Session: Transport Recordings on Soulstar, or better yet DJ MFR's Rome Departure on Transport itself? Yes, I may. In fact, I just have.

No comments:

Post a Comment