Geisha Twins - Love Situation

See this record? It's like a thousand records you've heard before, basically: file it under 'cheesy filter disco'. It's the kind of thing hairdressers and receptionists dance to at your local Oceana/Syndicate/Po Na Na/etc on a Saturday night. It's commercial, obvious and formalaic and it certainly isn't the kind of thing that gets covered on This Is Why We Dance. Usually.

But you know what? I don't actually mind it, despite all that. Or at least I don't mind a couple of the mixes (stand up, Joey Chicago and Agent Stereo).

So shoot me. Part of the reason for TIWWD's existence is to cover good dance music REGARDLESS of genre, and this is… well, not great admittedly, but it's the least-worst commercial and obvious Saturday night house record I've heard lately. And if it was by Daft Punk you'd call it 'unabashedly uplifting and joyously party-tastic', so get off your high horse.

Out: This week

About: This is on DJ EQ's US disco-house label Stardust Records. And supporting small independent dance labels is also one reason this blog exists, so here's their Soundcloud page (where you can HEAR THIS... if you're man enough to not fear the fromage!)

PS Tread carefully with those mixes, mind!

PPS Normal beard-stroking snobbery will be resumed shortly...

DJ Spen presents Assurance - And Be Glad In It

One for the traditionally-inclined here, as the former Basement Boy serves up a jaunty, rollicking little male/female gospel-inspired vocal number in a similar vein to Praise Cats' Shined On Me or, more recently, Chieko Kinbarra's Saved My Life.

Not got huge amounts to say about this one; as I said, it's very, very trad-sounding and as such won't be for everyone, but if trad is what you're looking for, then with Spen at the controls you know you won't be disappointed. Mix-wise, you get straight up Vocal, Dub and Instrumental mixes, plus a brace of DP1 B More Stomp mixes which strip down the vocal, add a JBs-ish breakbeat and might just take this cut to a wider audience than the soulful house mafia.

Out: This week

About: This is on Spiritual Sound, an offshoot of Spen's own Code Red Recordings.

Coeur D'Amour – Wild Lovin' EP

If I tell you that this is on Stardust Records, a new label set up by Philadelphia's DJ EQ, who not so long since had his own artist album out on Sean Biddle's Bid Muzik, then you should have some idea what to expect. Yep, this is 'back to the late-’90s' disco-house all the way…

That being the case, you could hardly call the Wild Lovin' EP the month's most groundbreaking release – in fact, let's be honest, it's 'archetypal', which is another way of saying 'formulaic', and it does have a slight whiff of cheese about it in parts.

BUT there's really rank, stinking cheese, and there's quite pleasant cheese. And if you cast your mind back to the late-90s, I think you'll find some of us were out in clubland having a blast while most of today's Shoreditch hipsters and too-cool-for school blognoscenti were still sitting around in their Postman Pat pyjamas playing on their GameBoys and listening to their Aqua CD. So fuck 'em. The five tracks here thankfully eschew the kind of electro snarls or horrible Dutch squeals that befoul much similar material these days, so they're all right in TIWWD's books… file this alongside the likes of Duck Sauce as 'good clean dancefloor fun'.

Out: This week

About: Stardust Records, as stated above, is a new label run by DJ EQ. Can't seem to find a website but here they are on Soundcloud