Flex – Past Visions

Some smooth yet still floor-friendly deep house vibes here from Italian producer Flex, coming on the ever-checkable Trendy Mullet.

There are just the two mixes of Past Visions to choose from, but to be fair they are quite different. The Original mix ain't nothin' but a deep, pulsating groove, topped off with a simple piano hook and synth-strings. Flip it over, and you'll find the Nick Turner Remix, which is what happens when late-night deepness and vintage Windy City house collide.

Quality stuff from a quality label, with the Turner mix just edging it for me.

Out: This week

About: You can find Trendy Mullet on Soundcloud and Facebook… like just about everyone else at the moment their actual website seems to have fallen over. 2012, what the f*** is going on?!

GVK – C Love

A great man once asked – or it might just have been the bloke out of Sha Na Na in Grease – "how low can you go?" But that's not the question tonight. The question tonight is "how deep can you go?" And if GVK and assorted remixing chums were asked that questions, the answer would have to be, "Pretty fucking deep, actually".

C Love would come under the 'deep house' heading to start with anyway (just about): it's a midtempo groover with chopped-up female vocal snips and one of those squelchy, filtered synth stabs that always remind me of Akabu's Ride The Storm. But the remixes take us deeper still. First there's the Leif Remix, which mutes the synths somewhat and lets the warm bassline shine through, replaces the vocal with some mournful male wahs and woohs, and has a somewhat more laidback, horizontal vibe generally.

Even that's as nothing, however, compared to the DJ Da Remix… with production that truly warrants the term 'cavernous', this is as sparse and echo-y as the most demanding of deeper heads could possibly ask for. It's probably best suited to listening purposes, but there is a surprisingly insistent 4/4 which means, on the right floors – and you'd have to pick them carefully – this would absolutely slay 'em.

So while all the mixes are certainly playable, it's DJ Da's rub all the way for me: it's as beautiful and involving a piece of sonic meandering as you'll hear all week.

Out: This week

About: This comes on the always-checkable Trendy Mullet… that's about as much as I can tell you. I don't know who GVK is/are, cos no-one's told me… and I'm not sure what the Courtney Love connection is either, though I'm sure it all makes sense to someone. But anyway, you can find out more about Trendy Mullet (and maybe ask them yourself!) by hitting up their website, Facebook or Soundcloud pages.

4 Beat Club – Doppelganger

"Somewhere between deep, old-skool and jacking," is how the hype sheet describes this one. Which is fair enough… or you could just say "tuff house in the classic style" which would work equally well.

It's a four-track affair, with two mixes of the title track plus bonus cuts It's A Riot and Little Black Box. And, er… "tuff house in the classic NYC style" is pretty much how I'd describe Doppelganger, which also features some great trumpet action and (on the original, though not on the Craig Hamilton Remix) a female "all right" vocal sample you may remember from I Am Ready. The other two cuts are in a slightly friskier, more Chicago-y kinda vein: head for It's A Riot if you want retro thrills or Little Black Box if you just can't get enough of those trumpets.

Out: This week

About: This comes on Trendy Mullet, and is in fact no. 30 from the Dover stable. Find 'em on Facebook and Soundcloud, or at their own website.

Sarp Yilmaz – Ro Vibes EP

Some deep, techy, tracky shiznit here from Trendy Mullet, as supplied by Turkish producer and cat-lover (apparently) Sarp Yilmaz.

Got My Money is the standout for me, a slow, headnoddin' slab of soulfully-tinged, techy deepness… like listening to vintage deep Jersey garage on downers. Ro Shuffle works a similar sort of vibe, and is then given a beefed-up remix by James Johnston that's really your only hope here if it's dancefloor action you're seeking! And then finally Urban Vibe goes to the opposite extreme, being a downtempo/uneasy listening kinda thang.

A varied EP then, and one that won't have much appeal for a lot of floors… but if you like your sounds a little more challenging, this is well worth checking out.

Out: This week

About: Here come the usual links… Facebook, website, Soundcloud

Latecomer - The Magic Carpet (Fish Go Deep Remixes)

More top-quality deep house bizniss here, courtesy of Trendy Mullet who really aren't doing much wrong for me at the moment.

The original version of The Magic Carpet featured on Latecomer's Conditions EP at the end of 2010. Here, though, Ireland's leading purveyors of the deep, FGD, put their spin on the track. Twice, in fact, in the form of a deep and rumbling Remix laced with warm, sustained piano chords, and a largely piano-less Dub complete with some wibbly-wobbly added synth squeals and FX.

Dark, groovy fare perfectly suited for warm-up and afterhours play.

Out: This week

About: Here's where to find Trendy Mullet online

EZLV - Extended Weekend

Kent's Trendy Mullet Recordings come good here with some more top-quality deep house bizniss, this time courtesy of a pair of French Canadians called Ezekiel and Louis Vee. So you can see where they got the name from.

In total you get two mixes of Extended Weekend itself, plus bonus cut Soul Dwelling. In its Original form, Extended Weekend is a midpaced, warm-up/comedown, headnodding/sofa surfing kinda choon, with snatches of sampled speech plus an omnipresent 'dum dum dum' vocal, pads galore and of course, those all-important insistent kicks. Fellow French Canadian Maher Daniel then provides a remix which ups the dancefloor ante somewhat with rather more driving percussion, though it's still one strictly for the deeper floors.

Soul Dwelling, meanwhile, is a slightly more upbeat affair with about as much of a 'euphoric' vibe about it as deep house ever gets, a female voice intoning 'soca, soca' (I think) and a blissful piano lead. Balearic niceness abounds, in other words.

Out: This week

About: Can't believe this is Trendy Mullet's 24th release yet it's only recently they've really started to register on the TIWWD radar… which I guess goes to show just how hard it is to make an impression amidst the general bewildering profusion of indie start-up labels. Either that, or I'm just getting old and losing my touch, but that couldn't be it, surely? Ahem. Anyway, you can find them online here (website), here (Soundcloud) and indeed here (FB)

Kamo - Set The Routine

Manchester-based Aussie brothers Kamo featured on here precisely a month ago with the excellent Hulme EP on Losing Suki; now here they come again with another outstanding single, this time for Trendy Mullet.

As with the previous EP, there are hints of classic NY/NJ garage, of the deeper variety. The original of Set The Routine, for instance, is a twisted, jazzy affair that sounds like it could easily have come out on Kerri Chandler's Madhouse back in the day… great organ sounds, and is that a tiny vocal snip of Get Your Hands Off My Man I hear in there? Luke Solomon then supplies an even more twisted remix that sounds not 100 miles from his own work with the mighty Freaks, though TBH I'm still preferring the Original I think.

You also get two mixes of Shoot Your Shot. The original's a fat, laidback but nonetheless funky groover with a D-Train-esque kinda feel. This time though it's the remix, a slightly beefed-up and more Chicago-ish Manuel Sahagan rub that I'm feeling more.

Whichever mix you plump for though, if you like your house music on the more thoughtful and forward-leaning side, you won't go wrong here.

Out: This week

About: As stated this is brought to you by Kent-based label Trendy Mullet. Click the link for their website or check out Kamo's own blog.