Andy Lee – What About Us

If I had to describe the house sound of now (I'm not sure how that might come about, because in my actual real everyday life people are generally telling me to shut up about house music, not asking questions about it. But IF) then phrases like 'cavernous production', 'big synth riffs', 'chunky midtempo beats' and, perhaps most of all, 'heavily treated/downpitched white male vocals' would feature heavily.

That east London/Berlin deep/tech sound so beloved of skinny-jeaned hipsters, in other words. Music bought by kids who think house music began with Huxley, Solomun and Maya Jane. There's a LOT of it about, but to be honest it's a sound I can take or leave a lot of the time… so often, there's too much smart-arse studio trickery and not enough in the way of actual soul.

Well, THIS record is very much in the vein mentioned above, but the latter doesn't apply… this one's dripping with soul and I'm loving it. Which suggests, to me, that it must be really a very good record indeed. Ha!

Out: This week

About: This comes on Seamless Deep.

And by the way, just to clear: I wasn't dissing Huxley, Solomun or Maya Jane there! Fine producers all of them. It's their 1001 imitators I get a bit bored of sometimes…

Evren Ulusoy - Head Over Heels EP

Evren Ulusoy has featured on this blog numerous times before, but here he serves up a two-tracker for Seamless Deep that shows off his abilities perfectly.

On the A, you'll find Head Over Heels itself, which is as main room-friendly a houser as we've heard from Mr Ulusoy to date. That's not to say it's commercial cheese, you understand, just that its dreamy female vocals, driving beats and proggy synths could see it getting plays outside of the deep house cognoscenti. On the B, meanwhile, Cherry Picker is more the kind of thing we've come to expect from Evren: an unhurried and bass-y looping deep house groove that really doesn't 'do' much of anything at all… in a good, 'less is more' way, you understand!

No prizes for guessing it's the latter I'm personally feeling the most, but like I said, put the two together and you've got the perfect snapshot of this Turkish producer's many talents.

Out: Well, the mailout says 2 March, the hype sheet says 19 March. Go figure. But now-ish, anyway

About: This comes as I said on Seamless Deep

Nicc Johnson & Beatmaster G - Tell Me Something EP

A couple of weeks back I told you about the reorganisation over at Seamless Recordings, whereby the label's output is now split between the Seamless Soul, Seamless Deep and Seamless Traxx imprints. Then, we were discussing the first Seamless Soul release, from Hector Jennings; now here's the debut outing from Seamless Deep.

The EP comes with two mixes a-piece of Tell Me Something and What Ya Gonna Do. The former is about as party-hearty and 'Beefa-ish as deep house can get in its original form; better to these ears though is the pared-back refix from Aki Bergen, who strips the track down to its vocal and piano essentials, then underpins with an ominous, brooding bassline.

On the B, What Ya Gonna Do is a deeper house cut with one of those 'old jazzman talking' vocals, but again it's on the remix that it really comes to life, as Le Vinyl gives the track a skippier feel reminiscent of the kind of wonky, off-kilter garage-y bizniss the French have been turning out on the quiet since the FNAC days.

It's definitely the remixes that are doing it more for me here, but you really ought to check it for yourself…

Out: This week

About: Keep up with all things Seamless here