Slok – Feel Alive

I'll be honest, I'm really not a fan of all those European, white-boy, synth pop-style vocals that are around at the moment… they remind me of the 80s, and I never liked them the first time around. Vocals like that have ruined many a perfectly good record for me in recent years.

Props must go to Italian techno producer and Electronic Petz label owner Slok then, cos this very now-sounding club throbber, which sits right on the house/techno cusp, sports just such a vocal, in this case supplied by My Favourite Robot. And I like it all the same. No mean feat!

I particularly like it when it comes in Subb-An Remix form, with plenty of added acid squelch… and I like it best of all on the digital-only Slok's Original Dub Mix, which drops the vocal almost entirely and allows the music to work its magic unhindered. Big, brooding and atmospheric but still with plenty of dancefloor oomph, this is big room house/techno 2012-style at its best. Drop the lights and turn it up.

Out: This week

About: This comes on Alex Flatner's Circle Music, who are based in Mannheim, Germany and who can be found here, here and here (website, Facebook, Soundcloud)

Alex Jones - City Farm EP

Co-owner of the Hypercolour label, Alex Jones is described on the hype sheet as a producer of "sharp, modern house and techno with distinctly trippy edge".

Yep, that'd about cover it.

Need to go do some other stuff for a bit right now, so not gonna go into every track, but suffice to say that if you like your electronic music forward-thinking, soul-infused and musical in an unpredictable, slightly experimental kinda way, then the four cuts here from Jones, who's worked with the likes of Glimpse, Jamie Jones, Mark Henning and Subb-An, should suit you to a T.

Out: Now

About: This comes on the fledgling Vitalik label, which is a) run by Mark Henning, a) based in London/Ibiza and c) nothing to do with French techno bloke Vitalic. Here's their website, and also, if you follow 'em on Soundcloud, not only do you get updates on all Vitalik releases, you can also download the Vitabits series of DJ tools.

Subb-An - What I Do EP

More deep, tracky shizzle here, as well, with three tracks from this rising Brummie star.

Deep, techy house is the order of the day once more. The title cut features a disembodied D-Train vocal snip echoing over crisp midtempo beats and a nagging b-line, No More features similarly fucked-with female vocal snippets from LOIs and a similarly chuggy backbeat, while My Slang is just the tiniest bit more upbeat and funky… but that's in comparative terms, y'unnerstan.

Essentially, this is pared-down deep house/tech house bizniss, made for druggy 5am dancefloors or drifting off into outer space from the comfort of your sofa. Which is to say, TIWWD likes it a lot…

Out: This week

About: This is on Culprit, who are based in LA. Found a website for 'em but it doesn't look like it gets updated much, cos the discography only goes up to CP006 and this is CP011… so here, also, is label boss Droog's MySpace