Midweek Mixes (16/02/23)
A run-down of some of the mixes and radio shows that have been soundtracking my existence – from the box-fresh to the tried-and-tested – all guaranteed to brighten up your week.
Luigi Di Venere - Pom Radio Ep. 7 (Harthouse Special)
Luigi Di Venere’s self-described variety show Pom Radio is back. 18 months after the last episode (a DECADA special I covered here), Luigi returns with a special on the venerable German label Harthouse, whose name he enunciates with all due respect in the intro. He gives a potted history of the label’s movements from Frankfurt to Berlin, through insolvency in 1997 and on to the world in a variety of guises. For my part, from the 12 (!) pages of releases listed under the parent label on Discogs I have precisely eight records, five of which are by Bill & Ben, which has to be said is not a very representative sample of the label’s overall sound.
You’ll get a much better picture from Luigi’s survey here. From the label’s first ever release ‘Barbarella’ co-produced by Sven Väth, one of Harthouse’s founders, through Luigi’s personal pick of the bunch, and finishing with a soothing track by the star-studded combo of Sven and Alter Ego, the show keeps things musically varied and informative on the voiceover, with space for a bit of trivia about Michael Jackson along the way. Long live Pom Radio!
Chima Isaaro - Nyce & Slo (Intimate Connection Mixx)
In case you didn’t have your fill of Valentine’s Day on Tuesday, here are two annual traditions that almost make the day worth celebrating.
First, Chima Isaaro’s Nyce & Slo series (previously covered here) returns for its annual outing with slow sex jams that often spill over into parody - but in a good way. Highlights of this year’s mix include Marsha Ambrosius’s self-descriptive “I wanna oh/oh/oh with you”, the swampy haze of instrumental tracks like OXP’s ‘Century’ and Sun Runners 女神の恋人達’s ‘Erotic Whispers’, and the climactic finish of Craig T. Cooper’s ‘Love Comes Easy’.
Jossy Mitsu - Valentine’s Garage Mix Vol. 9
Second, Jossy Mitsu returns with her annual hour of UKG V-Day power. From the sweet (‘And You’re Lovin’, ‘Back 2 Me’) to the sinful (‘Booty’, ‘Face Down’) Jossy keeps things mostly light and occasionally poppy with refixes of Destiny’s Child and Koffee, though at other times she gets moodier, like with ‘Jealous’ by Stones Taro. She finishes on a high, though, with RIP Productions’ ‘Pick Me Up’ followed by the huge ‘Paradise’ by James Lavonz.
Prosumer - Live From The Adriatic 2022
An excellent warm up for Prosumer & Gideön at The Pickle Factory this coming Friday, here’s two hours of the former doing his thing at Love International festival last year. Those of us who weren’t there will probably have seen the clips of him finishing his set with an ecstatic rework of ‘Borderline’, and it is indeed an almost spiritual moment even on the recording. But of course much of its power derives from the story he builds to get there, via another grand survey of the founding texts of House.
I’ve already covered my relationship to Prosumer’s work in detail here and here, so at the risk of repeating myself, I’d like to say something about how he’s always got a trick up his sleeve. When he plays something contemporary like ‘Hayday’ on Dungeon Meat he recontextualises it into the original house template by adding vocals from the intro to Daniel Wang’s ahead-of-its-time 1993 tune ‘Like Some Dream I Can’t Stop Dreaming’, itself a paean to 80s boogie and funk with lyrics sampled from Sleeque’s ‘One For The Money’.
The effect of this is, as always, kaleidoscopic. So when he drops the Deep Dub of Victor Simonelli’s 1992 hit ‘Do You Want Me’ shortly afterwards I find myself noticing suddenly how its carefree groove reminds me of Soul Capsule’s ‘Overcome’, released seven years later. This in turn leads me to a further reflection on the way Thomas Melchior and Baby Ford themselves deconstructed the house template for a new time and place. (For a new millennium, even, if we’re being dramatic about it.) And here I am, sitting at home more than a decade after I heard either record for the first time, being led by Prosumer down these new and endlessly diverting paths. It’s magic every time.