Deep house soldiers

And next, three releases from three well-known, well-respected names in deep house.

First up, Pete Dafeet gives us the Family Affair EP, a four-track/five-mix offering. Expect the usual high-quality deep house in various shades, with the dubby, slightly techy Lungs the standout for me. It's actually the Fred Everything remix of Lungs, to precise; elsewhere, Demarkus Lewis remixes Love Undercover while Giom has a go at Beneath The Fold, making this something of a 'family affair' indeed.

Out: This week

About: This comes of course on Lost My Dog, what with Pete co-owning the label and that… 

Next up we have another from the same stable, as Dale Howard takes us off on a deep, garage-y tip with the Inner City EP. All four tracks are very playable, but the jazzy overtones of C'mon and the Tuff Jam-ish bump of C'mon stand out for me. Niceness!

Out: This week

About: Here's another Lost My Dog link, for their Soundcloud page.

Our third and final deep house hero for this little mini-roundup is Matthieu Duchesne, who this week is doing the honours for Savoir Faire. Actually I say 'final' but there's a couple of other very familiar names involved as well. The original of Kind Of Funk is a heads-down, rolling deep house groover, but you also get remixes from Martijn and Dave James, the former taking us just a wee bit deeper, the latter doing his usual uber-deep and dubbed out thang… and as usual stealing the show for me! But again, a strong offering all round.

Out: This week

About: Here's where to find Savoir Faire Musique online, as if you didn't know already.

Various – Remixes Vol 3

On now to a brace of EPs featuring a Who's Who line-up of TIWWD 'usual suspects'.

First up is this one, the third in Something Different's series of Remixes EPs (I'm told there'll be four in total). Aartekt, Dudley Strangeways, J-Kar, Left-Minded and Matthieu Duchesne are the artists getting the remix treatment, while Bubba, Stanny Abram, Ashley Casselle & Justin Steel, Dale Howard and Dilby are those dishing it out. Given that pretty much all of the original tracks featured on this blog first time around, and given that pretty much all the remixers are TIWWD regulars as well, this EP shouldn't take much explaining – it's packed with exactly the kind of deep/tech goodness you'd expect.

But special mention must be made of  Casselle & Steel's rub of J-Kar's Baby Dreaming – always something of a TIWWD fave to start with, their deep, squelchy refix of this garage-leaning groover is the reason you need to go out and get this EP.

Out: This week

About: Find Something Different on Soundcloud and Facebook.

Jonny Bee – Loveless

I was just saying yesterday how Savoir Faire Musique is one of TIWWD's favourite labels right now… then I start ploughing through this week's reviews pile and find this! This is a dead cert for the proper heads…

Very deep house with a strong element of soul, is the general order of the day here: it's a mellow, male-crooned journey into deep space and no mistake, guv'nor. You could say 'deep garage' as well, maybe… you could easily imagine this having come out on Strobe back in the day.

Mixes come from Matthieu Duchesne and Tony S, who emphasise the organic and electronic elements respectively, but this is one time when it's not gonna matter too much which mix you pick. Where and when you play this, that's where you need to be selective… not everyone likes to go quite this deep!

But in the right time and place, with the right people, than any one of these three mixes is going to slay 'em.

Out: This week

About: As I seem to recall saying, ooh, only yesterday, you can find Savoir Faire Musisque here and here and here (Facebook, Soundcloud, blog)

Matthieu Duchesne – Afternoon In The Garden EP

So this was gonna go into the So many tunes round-up… only on playing it again I realised a) it was too wonderfully varied in style to sum up quickly and b) it was too just plain wonderful to not get a full review in its own right.

Afternoon In The Garden in its original form is a tough, heads-down chugger for deep house dancefloors, preferably circa 3-4am. When the hecticness has worn off but you're feeling good and you're feeling like you could go all night… those are the moments this is for. The Alvaro Hylander Remix then heads off on a very different tip… it's a late-night deep smooth groove worthy of Harley & Muscle themselves.

Flip it over and you'll find Deep In The Night. In its original form, this is another deep n' jackin' dancefloor workout that drops down to some seriously heavy-duty, er, droppery in the middle (hear it and you'll see what I mean). Perfectly suited to today's techy floors, it'll also delight those who remember the glory days of NYC dark garage circa 1995… it's big, it's sparse as you like and it's freakin' gosh-darned storming, frankly.

AND THEN, as if that wasn't enough, there's a remix from Robots Need Oil that takes us into heavy dubbed-out territory, with reggae stabs a-gogo and rasta vox. And that's also pretty awesome.

It's a personal pet hate of mine – as a hard-working sub by day – that words like 'stunning' and 'breathtaking' get so over-used these days that they've ended up meaningless. It's doubly a bummer right now, cos it leaves me struggling for words to describe this EP. So I'll just say that I've tipped Matthieu Duchesne on this blog before – he always does great stuff. But this… this is as good as house music gets in 2012. Go seek.

Out: This week

About: This comes on Jesus Pablo and Di Riviera's Something Different label…find 'em on Facebook and Soundcloud

Matthieu Duchesne - Caliente/Deep Soul

Not one but two singles from rising French producer Matthieu Duchesne this week, with Caliente coming on Endemic Digital and Deep Soul on Savoir Faire Musique.

Turning our attention to Caliente first, then, in its original form this is a driving, uptempo, Spanish guitar-flecked houser that's got 'Beefa written all over it. Which is fine, and the slightly deeper remixes from Pao C and Terry Brookshire are even better… but the stone-cold killer for me is the uber-deep Dave James Dub. But then Dave James can pretty much do no wrong for TIWWD at the moment!

Moving on to Deep Soul, here we have another somewhat Balearic-tinged original, albeit this time it's a deeper, more shuffly affair, built for sun-up/sundown play. The remixes this time come on more like alternative versions rather than doing anything radically different, if you see what I mean, but if pushed I'd go for the Nick Devon Remix, which brings the track's dreamy, soulful side to the fore.

Overall though, with high quality production throughout and a range of mixes to choose from, taken together these two releases definitely mark out Duchesne as a name to keep an eye on.

Out: This week

About: To find out more you can find Savoir Faire Musique at their own blog, or hit up the Endemic Digital website

Mr Leman – Love That Deep

Not sure what they're putting in the water in Copenhagen – nor whether a certain famous statue is responsible – but it's got to be said: there's a hell of a lot of good house music coming outta Denmark right now.

This latest example comes from Mr Leman, and would demand to be loved for the lyric alone: "Don't you like this deep house? Don't you feel it in your soul?/Is it the thing that keeps you going on and on?/Cos I can tell you, it's my only drug/The feeling that it gives, I would describe as love". But there's more to love here than just the heart-on-sleeve lyric, from the fact said lyric is mostly delivered via that most wonderful of studio toys, the vocoder, to the crisp, unhurried beats and the warm synth sounds that warp away unassumingly in the background.

Remixes come from three very respectable names – Dudley Strangeways, Matthieu Duchesne (about whom more tomorrow) and Onur Ozman. Duchesne serves up a slightly deeper pass with less of the vocal, Strangeways delivers a much deeper Dub with NONE of the vocal, and Ozman keeps it nice and deep but gives it a little more of a fried-head twist. This mix also has a male rather than a female voice delivering the vocal.

You can't go wrong, really, whichever rub you choose.

Out: This week

About: Mr Leman is Danish, but this is number five from Jesus Pablo and Di Riviera's UK-based Something Different label. Making it five winners on the bounce by my reckoning…