Sneaker Social Club 黑胶唱片和CD

Review: Despite his productions being of a consistently high quality, Al Tourettes blend of deft electro and dark UKF inflected bass still hasn't gained the same level of notoriety as that of his peers - which is criminal given how likely these tracks are to smash up the dance. Hopefully this release on Sneaker Social Club will go someway to rectifying that - "Habit 7" goes in hard with frantic snares, dubbed out chords and a gnawing bassline which tunnels deep into the mix, whilst "Inventing" is one for the Swamp81 heads - coming on like a jam between Boddika and Roska, filled with complex, clipped rhythms held together with elastic. Highly recommended.

Review: Sneaker Social Club is one of the UK underground's most low-key and underrated albs if you ask it. It has always and quietly gone about its most excellent business and by now has amassed a very decent back catalogue. Next up to add their spin on the continuum of UK sounds this label deals in is Patrick Brain. He opens on a dubstep tip with 'Flooring It' then explores hustling UK funky drum patterns on 'Cry-Baby' and eerie metropolitan broken beats on 'Nothing No1.' The flip side offers three more twitchy, futurist fusions of trap, bass and dubstep that will get you skanking in no time.

Review: Etch and Nico Lindsay make good musical bedfellows; the former's spacious left-footed soundscapes providing plenty of room for Nico's narrative, evolving lyrical style, they're kindred spirits linked by a glacial sense of adventure and refusal to compromise. Opener "Don't Wanna Know" kicks the doors down with force. Rough and switchy, there's a pulsing 2002 feel to both the step and flow while "Predator Vs Prey (Toxin)" takes us on a much swampier, weirded out trip that buns everything but survival. Finally, Tranq Sinatra joins the fray for an urgent finale where fast-tongue tales from Nico are backed from Tranq harmonies and another iced riddim from Etch. Cold.

Review: Sneaker Social regulars Alan Johnson return to the label with more unclassifiable gems. All flexing that bewitching, beaty brew of percussion, smoking 808s, shattered beats and crafty sampling, each cut hits with a direct physical groove. From the System-level dubsteppy title track to the more organic haze and swoons of the finale 'People Of The World', the UK duo have once again weaved a fine line between so many genres without committing to any. Tonnes of love..

Review: The ever-intriguing Luke Murray comes in hot n' heavy on his latest for Sneaker Social club - Liquid DnB-Like Ambient Grime 2. Although somewhat stylistically misleading: you won't hear any liquid d&b-like ambient grime on this record, the irreverent title does Murray's deeply informed UK soundsystem anachronism justice and flips the bird at genre pedants. Over four chronologically-referenced flips of one tune, he traverses dark, tunnelrunning two-step, lumbering dubstep annihilation, techno steppers a-la-Gast and lacerating future grime with great ease and NRG. Four system warheads to suit all tastes!

Review: After making a big impression with his first 12" on Senaker Social in 2019, Low End Activism is back with a superb full length. It finds him 'sum up the conflicting emotions attached to memories of home' as he explores his own sonic roots through the prism of future-rushing soundsystem sonics. The tracks are wrought with street level tensions and urban and suburban gimme, with darkness adn frustration. But there is also home and solidarity in these sounds which are sure to unite people of all backgrounds on the world's dance floors.

Review: Throwing Snow's latest effort heralds the start of the Sneaker Social Club imprint. Whispering to life on an ectoplasmic synth line, "Shadower" continues the producer's penchant for ghostly ambience, while the beats are positively direct and simple. The gently building melodies blossom into soaring chimes with the pastoral quality of early Four Tet. On the flip, "Sanctum" takes just as long to reveal its true colours, letting the melancholic vocal interplay ride out before an Irish-jig kind of cello signals the drop. Driven by a fulsome bass line and a lean 2-step shuffle, this could certainly get some rumps shaking in the right setting.

Review: Grime legends Trends, Boylan and Slimzee have made independent names for themselves over the years for their enduring contributions to the underground; the former two artists first cropped up on our radar after a string of horror-movie-themed grime bits which first proliferated virally on the internet. Slimzee, on the other hand, has been there from the beginning, co-founding the legendary Rinse FM pirate station among other things. We can't contain our excitement for this fresh, psychotic release for Etch's Sneaker Social Club; returning to the trio's penchant for oppressively trappy instrumentals, there are newer explorations in breakstep and garage, fleshing out the many teeth-gritted possibilities of the eight-bar rhythm. Haunting, atrophied sonic skeletons from a dream trio.