Angelo Donorio – Dance!

And so we move on, inexorably, to this week's releases, and the latest from Amsterdam's 90Watts.

If you want to endear your new record to these old ears, then lifting the vocal from The Untouchables' early 90s Strictly Rhythm classic Dance To The Rhythm isn't a bad way of going about it, to be fair… though the Original mix here is a slice of shiny, spangly big-room house that's a little TOO shiny, spangly and big-room for me, to be honest. There are slightly deeper vibes on the Live Mix, but it's the two rolling tech-house rubs from Hi-Fi Mystery School that are doing it best for me.

And THOSE, I should add, are doing it most pleasingly. 90Watts on-point as ever!

Out: This week

About: The Untouchables were actually Kenny 'Dope' Gonzalez, for those not in the know (for which read: over 40). Anyway, back in the present day, here's the 90Watts website, Soundcloud and MySpace.

PrinsJan – Now Is The Time

Regular readers will know 90watts is a favourite label of TIWWD's, and this latest – fully titled Now Is The Time (Remember The Light) – doesn't disappoint.

There's a range of mixes to suit a range of tastes, too. The three mixes from PrinsJan himself – Radio Edit, Extended and Dub – do the straight-up chuggin' tech-house thang, topped off with preacherman-style exhortations. Martin Fisher serves up a remix that takes the track into proggier territory, and then finally there's my personal favourite: a deeper rerub from Don Ruijrok that's mellower by far and adds some sumptuous, sultry piano chords and the tiniest, most restrained of female vocal snips.

Classy stuff all round… but then from 90watts it usually is.

Out: This week

About: You can find 90watts at their website, on Facebook and on Soundcloud

Marten Fisher – Wasted Screens

The first in a while from Amsterdam's 90Watts comes from Marten Fisher, best known (it says here) for his progressive house label Dub=records.

There's not a lot either progressive or dubby about this EP, though! Instead we're firmly in tech-house territory, with Wasted Screens itself coming on a bit like 2nd Toughest-era Underworld doing deep house. Sweet Sax isn't the soulful, musical joint you might expect but instead more of a 'driving through the Bladerunner set at night'-type moody chugger; Grazend Shaap is another slab of moody, cinematic deep techno, before the excellent Concrete Noise brings the EP to a close, a 4am deep house joint with a whispered vocal intoning “this is the sound of Amsterdam.”

Proper bizniss that'd be equally at home on the sofa or on the more discerning dancefloors.

Out: This week

About: You must know about 90Watts by now, I put 'em in the 'rising stars of deep/tech house' feature I did for iDJ and everything :-)

But just in case, here's their website...

Various - The Sound Of Amsterdam Vol 3

Okay, so what we're mostly going to be doing on This Is Why We Dance this week is playing a game of catch-up... something I intended to do over the weekend, but I accidentally bought a kayak instead (tell me that isn't my best excuse for non-blogging shoddiness yet). But now to business, and let's kick off with some rather splendid house comps that hit the racks last week. First up, this third in 90watts' The Sound Of Amsterdam series.

If you read this blog or iDJ regularly, you'll already know that 90watts is one of my favourite labels right now, so it should come as no surprise that I'm well into this. The 90watts sound is for me exactly where the most exciting house music is at in 2011: either rather techy, post-minimal deep house, or the deepest shades of tech house, depending how you look at it. Or, you could just call it quality jacking underground house music, and leave it at that.

Ten tracks, and ten artists that, apart from label boss Jens De Langer, you've probably never heard of… but then that's always the best way innit? There's not a dud among 'em, but I'd suggest Girl Talk by Ferreck Dawn and Grey Haze by Angelo D'Onorio are particularly worthy of your attention....

Out: Last week, but I was messing about on the river.

About: Already bigged up 90watts enough for one post I think so here's their website and let's leave it at that! You can find 'em on all the usual social networking sites from there anyway.