DJS: MOST CHARTED - TECHNO - MOST CHARTED IN APRIL 2014

Review: Dial regular Efdemin returns with a third album of a respected career, with the autumnal theme of Decay inspired by the German producer's three-month artist residency in Kyoto, Japan. Sollmann immersed himself in the local culture while in Kyoto, attending ceremonies with monks at temples and visiting local instrument makers. This results in a ten track set that canvasses the sort of poignant, introverted house music that's characterised much of Phillip Sollmann's work as Efdemin to date. There are however a few stylistic surprises along the way - the stripped back, jacking "Transducer" or the fusion of jazzy licks and noisy bursts of percussion that makes up the title track - but overall you'd be hard pushed to think of a better label to house Decay than Dial.

Review: When Broom met Hood! To celebrate M Plant's 20th anniversary, Robert Hood is planning a whole host of events and releases including a sequence of 12"s that see classics and rarities remixed and edited. Who better to inaugurate the series than Hood's UK contemporary Mark Broom? Here Broom digs deep into the M Plant archives, choosing to work with "Untitled 1" from Hood's Moveable Parts series and "One Touch" from the Minimal Nation album. Canvas Hood fans and the majority will probably nominate the first edition of the Moveable Parts series as one of their favourites, so it's little surprise that Broom elected to add his own signature dirty funk to the opening track for this 12". His edit of Minimal Nation opener "One Touch" proves to be just as effective, playing toyfully with the bassline whilst dicing the beats with undoubtedly dark results.

Review: Are you ready to P.A.R.T.Y.? Initially conceived as an outlet for Funkineven's own gritty club jammers, the Apron label has gradually teased out a curatorial side to the Eglo artist with like minded US producers Greg Beato and Delroy Edwards contributing to the imprint's peerless run. Seven Davis Jr is next up with the P.A.R.T.Y. EP which follows superb break out releases on IZWID and Must Have last year. There's a sobering story to how Los Angeles-based singer, songwriter and poet arrived here, overcoming drug addiction and depression, and introduced to the world by Kutmah through Brownswood's Worldwide Family Vol 2 compilation curated by the respected selector in 2012. Five tracks deep, the P.A.R.T.Y. EP is perhaps the musician's most confident collection so far, just try not to dance along to the confident gliding funk of opening track "Celebrations" whilst "Highways" is the sort of soulful disco Ron Hardy would spend hours playing with. What Seven Davis Jr does from here on will be fascinating to observe.

Review: It seems that we are currently in the midst of a production purple patch for Donato Dozzy and long may it continue! The recently formed label The Bunker NYC is the latest to act as conduit to the Italian's finely crafted techno in the form of some new material from Dozzy's Voices From The Lake partnership with Neel. The genesis for the Velo Di Maya EP dates back to Dozzy and Neel's night long curation for the Brooklyn club in the summer of 2012, playing two live sets consisting entirely of unreleased material. With plans afoot to expand The Bunker into a label, the possibility of scooping up some of this material was mooted to Voices From The Lake with us and you willing recipients of the results. If you fell in love with the 2012 LP from Voices From The Lake you will find the three tracks here just as captivating with a live edit of "Respiro" a current favourite at the Juno office.

Review: Veteran Italian producer Donato Dozzy and California's Tin Man are old pals, with the latter having first remixed the former way back in 2011. Here, the two join forces for a voyage into acid-flecked late night science for Absurd's ever excellent Acid Test series. "Test 7" sets the tone, delivering a hypnotic, heads-down journey into deep, stripped-back acid house. While it's the EP's most obviously floor-friendly moment, there's something far more thrilling about the bubbling, beatless electronics of "Test 2" and "Test 3". The latter, doused in minimal techno atmospherics, is intensely beautiful in its warm, melodic simplicity.

Review: Arguably the two biggest R's in techno at the moment remix [Phase], with Rodhad revealing a more emotive side to his techno, while Robert Hood delivers the goods like only he can. Rodhad's interpretation takes away some of the original low-end heard in "Perplexed", resulting in something that's groovy, but still tough, while noticeable increasing the blue-noted tones of the track. Robert Hood's love affair with "Dirto II" continues with the Detroit legend joining in on the cold temperaments for a clinical and percussively slicing remix. With rapid fire 12"s like this, it seems trying to match Token's dominance of club techno at the moment would be a futile act.

Review: There's a specific kink to the kind of dark and potent techno that Rodhad crafts. Back once again on Dystopian, the Red Rising EP offers up three examples of how to push things forward in the more serious corners of the techno menagerie. "Hell Diver" works around the cyclical motion of a few key ingredients to create a measured malice that will do nothing for your disposition, with slight touches of foreign sounds in those choice moments to make the ears dart around in paranoia. "Mines Of Mars" meanwhile lets a bleepy bassline head out in front with some playful fills creating a distinctive quality to the synth. "Rising" finishes proceedings off with a stout floor worker buttoned up so tight it might combust at any moment.

Review: Despite sounding like a journeyman midfielder from the lower leagues of British football, Steve Murphy is in fact the alias of Venetian Mattia Effe, a key cog in the sprawling Italian hardware enthusiast scene alongside the Early Sounds and Restoration crew. First surfacing under the Steve Murphy & Co. guise with a Chiwax release in 2011, Effe has gone on to record an LP with compatriots Die Roh and launch the Muscle Records imprint alongside Analogue Copper Lucretio, Chevel, and DJ Octopus. Now he's the latest addition to the distinctively named Lobster Theremin, with his Relax EP likely to do anything but that to you! If you've gripped some Murphy previously you'll know to expect some rough and ready house music and look out for the "Tentacles Loop" locked grooves from DJ Octopus that line both sides!

Review: Old flatmates Function and Ed Davenport (aka Inland) team up to deliver a two-track 12" of synthy techno that sounds like what Klaus Schultz and Kraftwerk might be making today if they were contemporary techno artists collaborating. You can really feel that Function is exploring his kosmische side of tonal and synth production on this release, while it's easy to assume that Inland, recently a proponent of dubby rhythm tracks, helps provide both pieces with a solid backbone, flecked with Function's trademark percussive sequences. Beginnings of a new project? We can only hope.

Review: REPRESS ALERT: Aubrey is a man on everyone's lips at the moment. After nearly 25 years of releasing music, the South Coast techno pioneer has just completed a busy 2013, including a remix for Juan Atkins' Metroplex Records and is pushing his own DOT Records to new heights. Here, Aubrey has followed up his earlier Ferox releases "Abstractions" and "Inner Feelings" with two super deep cuts on this techno jazz fuelled 4 -tracker. On remix duties are label boss Russ Gabriel and his RT-Transmissions partner - Germany's Hans Thalau.

Review: No matter how often you check in on the Relative label, you know you'll be rewarded with some quality DJ tools and this is certainly the case with their first release of the year. At the helm is John Swing, responsible for some of the Juno office's favourite Relative releases - "Rolling" from 2011 still blows minds - and this Dusty Dancing 12" pretty much lives up to it's name. Fragments of disco DNA are fed through Swing's hardware on opening track "Dirty Disco" with a central disco loop subjected to all manner of delay and EQ tweaking, whilst "Re Funked" applies a similar method to a low slung guitar riff. Interestingly, Swing changes tack on the flip, with "Madman Groove" a frantic exercise in percussion heavy cut up house whilst "Raw Twist" bangs hard!

Review: DVS1's Hush imprint has been so quiet since the US techno producer christened it with a 12" of his own tracks back in 2011 we thought it had shut up shop, much like his solo productions, which have taken a back seat to remixes in the same timeframe. Thankfully, Lost Myself sees the producer reinvigorate the label with two brand new productions, which show just how much his lean, minimal approach has been missed. "Lost Myself" is little more than a taut arpeggiated synth line, held together with the barest of rhythms and some impressive sound design, while "SOS" takes things into more heady territory, with a swirling mass of metallic tones and ambient textures surrounding his sharpened percussive tones.

Review: The ball of Ilian Tape keeps getting bigger and bigger and adding to it this time is new name Rupcy (our guess, a Marko Zenker alias). Chances are this record is already getting major play throughout Europe's clubs at the moment and it's likely that the A1, "Utow", is what's getting worn away most. This is because of the killer call and response combo between the bleeps and short air raid siren. With its Markus Suckut kick drum, "Can" is a dirty club track perfect for DJs looking to transition into something deeper while still wanting to remain hard-edged. On the B-side the title "Assemblage" has a slight Fachwerk ring to it, as does the crunchy hi-hats and other aggravated fizzes of the track which leads into an Aphex Twin-sounding ambient broken-beat session called "Bows".

Review: Having made his name with releases for Tresor and Deeply Rooted, French producer Marcelus has adopted the well worn role of label boss with the Singular Records operation, but you can't fault the music that's surfaced on the label thus far. Marcelus himself helms this fifth Singular transmission, with a four track grip that really demonstrates his variety and prowess for techno that is both razor-sharp and trippy. Lead track "Direct Drive" encapsulates this approach perfectly, as a dusty, booming groove jack hammers its route through a wall of abstract sound design that feels oddly liquid and rubbery at the same time. "Savage Pattern" leans more on the abstract side of things, with a minimalist, almost tribal backbone wedged deep into a production that feels almost ominously alive. "Oneness" could easily be mistaken for a Terrence Dixon track, whilst "Incantation" is the sort of techno you want to hear testing the intricacies and acoustics of a confined warehouse space installed with a Function One.

Review: With Bliq operating at a rate of roughly two 12"s per year, it's possible that this debut release from Deemonlover is the last vinyl transmission we'll see from the London-based label in 2014. If that's the case, there is plenty of mileage in the four tracks that make up the Manticore 12" and there's plenty of house and techno selectors out there that will be pulling for this record for some time yet. Fans of the Dial label will certainly find much to embrace in the buoyant yet melancholic opening track "Velcro" which engages subtle shifts in pitch. This atmospheric opener is something of a false dawn however, as Deemonlover duck between the abstract ghetto house of "J.a.a.p." and the dusty Naples style deepness of "Violet Kink" before closing on the crunching peak time techno of "Till Primals".

Review: Since 2012 Power Vacuum has made a name for itself by releasing unrelenting rave and acid fuelled techno. After a strong second year of releases that included contributions from Mark Broom and EDMX, as well as several releases from label founder Milo Smee, the first Power Vacuum release of 2014 introduces five new artists on a split release. Although the highlight for many will be a rare track from Objekt, the angular shock and awe techno of "Balloons", the rest of the contributions are equally great. Turbo's latest recruits Joe Farr and J.Tijn team up for the steamroller that is "Mustard Sucker" while Ukrainian hard techno producer Positive Merge delivers the relentless gabber-esque stomp of "Note", but perhaps the most eye-catching inclusion is the new An-i project from Lee Douglas that recently debuted on Minimal Wave's sister label Cititrax, with the ex-TBD man delivering the scrambled frequencies of "Convo". In a word: essential.

Review: The Trilogy Tapes continue their unassailable programme of releases with the Night Owl 12" from A Made Up Sound. The addition of Dave Huismans to the TTT discography is perhaps the most high profile release from Will Bankhead's label since the Kassem Mosse and Mix Mup mini LP, but makes perfect sense within the context of The Trilogy Tapes as a whole. The four tracks here hint A Made Up Sound was in a nocturnal mood similar to the sounds that punctuated last year's After Hours drop and feel unmistakably like the work of the man also known as 2562. Weighty yet intricately swung rhythms, a keen sense of space and expert sound design run through this record from start to finish, with the wavering "Kovaxxxt" and the Thin White Duke sampling madness of "Situation" ensuring the B Side will see plenty of wear and tear.

Review: The latest addition to world of anonymous, hand-stamped techno is Gauss, who presents what is a rather impressive slab of deep club tools. "Braunschweig" is the more straightforward of the two tracks, featuring a set of drums that march steadily onwards while a simmering bassline is pounded down with noisy snares. On the flip, "Interpolations" provides some more experimental sonics, as a broken rhythm and acidic bassline flutter around each other is suitably spacious surrounds. Highly recommended to those into Skudge's brand of loose limbed analogue techno, which is high praise from us.

Review: Since adopting the Tripeo alias back in late 2012, Dutch techno producer Darko Esser has been in inspired form with the project showcasing his more direct approach to the medium across a succession of 12" releases. First announced earlier this year, this debut Tripeo album Anipintiros allows Esser the chance to explore the project in more extensive fashion, and listening to the album demonstrates the Dutchman clearly enjoyed the process. Consisting of eight tracks of purist techno executed with both software and hardware, Anipintiros bristles with dancefloor intent at times sounding alien ("Anipintiros #3" & "Anipintiros #5"), others stripped back and hypnotic ("Anipintiros #4"). It's hard to pick out highlights, but the busted, bleep laden "Anipintiros #6" and the subsequent acid bathtub that is "#7" have been causing the Juno office turntable some damage!

Review: If there's someone you can count on for excellence in minimalism when it comes to techno, it's Mike Parker. This time it's Mote-Evolver he's doing the business for, turning out three po-faced slices of tough and stealthy tackle for the dance. "Spitting Electricity" uses neat and tidy polyrhythms to create a slip-sliding effect as the titular electricity undulates through a filter. "Polar Vortex" is more obtuse with its bubbling synth tone that comes straight out of the textbook of freaky sound effects in techno tracks. "Ice Fissure" too turns to canny sound design to make its point, not to mention audibly crafting the crack of the title over a slow marching kick.

Review: ** REPRESS ** Ever since JD Twitch rebooted Optimo Music, it's been the irregular transmissions from Glasgow act Golden Teacher that has hit the spot each and every time. The amalgamation of two diverse bands from the city -noise punk outfit Ultimate Thrush and analogue house duo Silk Cut, Golden Teacher first emerged on Optimo Music early last year with a pretty apt description of sounding like "Arthur Russell's Dinosaur L jamming with Bobby O, K Alexi Shelby, Liaisons Dangereuses and Imagination, with some voodoo drummers and Sly & Robbie". Steadily building up a reputation for some riotous live performances, Golden Teacher are a class above because they manage to distill this energy into their recorded output too. The Party People 12" features three such examples, with A Side cut "Love" the kind of production that sufferers of LCD Soundsystem withdrawal will embrace and cherish for years to come.

Review: Romanian producer Romansoff tends to pull no punches musically. Through his Raw Tools imprint, he's begun to make a name for himself as a purveyor of seriously heavyweight analogue house and techno. This fourth installment in the series continues where the first three left off. From the clattering acid madness of "Track 2" - all brain-melting 303 tweakery and industrial-strength 909 hits - and hissing, rave-era surge of "Track 3", to the blunt techno-funk of "Track 1" and stargazing Larry Heard-goes-acid goodness of "Track 4", Raw Tools 4 more than lives up to its name. Given the in-your-face nature of the series, there's a surprising amount of subtlety to behold, too.

Review: First emerging on his own self-titled label back in 2011, Abdulla Rashim has cultivated a brand of extended, atmospheric techno that explores African and Arab motifs under a cloak of intended anonymity. Respected hubs like Prologue, Semantica and Studio Barnhus have all issued work from Rashim in one form or another and he's also developed a fine curatorial streak as the head of the Northern Electronics label. It's through this outlet that the Swedish producer issues his debut album Unanimity, with the nine-tracks exactly the kind of immersive experience one would expect, poised somewhere between the psychedelia of Dozzy and the slightly foreboding sound design that punctuated Silent Servant's excellent 2012 LP.

Review: The same week as Answer Code Request's new 12" on Ostgut Ton gets a release, the regular Berghain DJ turns up on XDB's new one for Dolly, of course run by Panorama Bar regular Steffi. ACR owns the A1 with a remix to the EP's title track, with the German seemingly plucking out his favourite loop-section of the original and pumping it full of a solid sounding techno low-end like only the Germans know how. XDB's version is long-winding, groovy and noticeably lighter in comparison, while on the B-side Detroit techno and Chicago house influences are abound, most notably in "Tonik", while "Liberty" is a stomping and very funky house classic

Review: Gesloten Cirkel has become one of techno's true cult figures since his emergence back in 2009 with a self-titled 12" for Viewlexx offshoot Murder Capital, exploring the strange fringe between techno and electro with intermittent releases for David Vunk's Moustache Techno and Berceuse Heroique. Supposedly from Russia, there has nonetheless been much speculation as to the producer's true identity, though his musical roots seem very much planted in the sound of The Hague. His debut album Submit X is described quite aptly as "not for the faint-hearted", featuring a host of electro and techno cuts filled with classic breakbeats, tripped out vocal samples and caustic acid lines. However, it's also an album which looks to classic minimal wave sounds for inspiration - the lean rhythm and vocoder of "Stakan" and decayed 8-bit textures of "Chatters" provide some of the album's most memorable moments, proving Gesloten Cirkel is a producer with a few tricks up his sleeve. Undoubtedly one of the albums of the year.