My 6 Gems:
Pete Bandit
Mr Finger
Praise to Vibes
Massive Larry Heard fan. His production technique is immaculate, I obsess with trying to understand his workflow on writing and producing. Me and my wife, we are really trying to get all the releases of the albums on vinyl, and I think we are pretty close right now - not a week passes by when we do not listen to one of them. We saw him live at Berghain once, very randomly on a wednesday evening, it might have been a CTM thing or another festival, it was absolutely amazing. And the new album is just out, really happy with that. Such an example of age is just a number, someone who keeps going because he lives it, his music is timeless.
Jungle Wonz
Time Marches On
Very cool stuff, classy and raw. Harry Dennis, after the work he did with The IT (with Larry Heard and Robert Owens), meets with Marshall Jefferson to do this project that became the “JungleWonz”, recording Times Marches On and Jungle. Much later in 2012, he released Deliverance. For me, when it comes to Dennis’s style, his poetic lyrics and timbre are just perfect. I'm a big fan of all his work and collabs, any work he did I’m instantly drawn towards. The whole album is great, next to the Marshall Jefferson produced tracks, there are also a lot of tracks produced by another huge inspiration of mine; Ron Trent.
Chez & Trent
Foot Therapy
Wanted to add some Chez & Trent, really could not make the call on what to add to this list. Was doubting to do “Don’t Try It”, "The Choice” or their “House of Love - Respect Vox Dub”, or maybe just the entire prescription catalog hahaha. These two are such an inspiration for me, what they brought with Prescription was really ahead of the time. I hope that writing this will inspire or remind someone to check that all out again. And also what Ron's doing now with the WARM stuff, is just mind blowing to me. Huge respect.
Kenlou
Mack Daddy Shoot
Masters at Work, they are such a big part of what shaped the Brooklyn/New York sound, and certainly who popularized it. For example Louie Vegas' work with later mega-star Marc Anthony on his first album - “When the Night is Over” is definitely recommended. I’ve been a student of their work for a long time, tracing old videos of them in the studio, figuring out how certain tracks were made via interviews, identifying samples via WhoSampled, reading record notes on collaborators etc. I play a lot of stuff from them in my DJ sets, old, new, all projects and alter-egos. But very drawn to the Kenlou stuff, as it's a bit rougher I guess, with these amazing endless grooves. Mack Daddy Shoot is such a great example of what you can do by lifting a few great elements from records, chop them, and with some additional drums build this amazing powerful groove.
Mike Delgado
What Would You Do
Major fan of Mike Delgado, I think I have bought his entire catalog over the years, twice. And honestly I feel he is really undervalued in “public opinion”, he is such a great producer. Musically mega solid on the chords and instrumentations, a master in taking a simple concept but making it very musically sound, grooves extremely tight, repetition without exhaustion. I went to Louie Vega’s Flashback Open Air at Dante Hifi in Miami in 2023, the highlight of that year's music week, especially for an European kid and never really felt that original block party energy, but yeah also saw Mike there and I really fan-boy'ed out and went to shake his hand. hahaha
Muscle Cars
Hello (Maurice Fulton Remix)
Two for the price of one! MuscleCars are at the moment in the house/soulfull house movement, injecting powerful new life into the sound with their impeccable productions and DJ-sets. I have had the pleasure to see them play a few times in Berlin (shoutout to Endless Groove!) It was awesome. Their debut album Sugar Honey Iced Tea is just incredibly good. And then Maurice Fulton takes this very ethereal sweet original and flips it into such a wonky banger like only he can do, with a groove & bass that pushes you aside , whips you up and drops you down again, to only start over again. Such a banger.
