LATECRATES

Aalson returned to Purified Records with the four-track release 'Daylight', which landed on the label on November 29th, 2024.

At 123 BPM and in the key of 3A, the title track 'Daylight' sits in that warm, open window between the warm-up and the main event.

I think this is early set, the bit where people are still arriving and nobody's fully committed to the room yet. There’s a sense of gentle momentum here, built on soft-focus pads, a rolling groove, and just enough melodic detail to keep heads turning without forcing anyone’s hand.

The release comes with more to explore: 'Echoes of Dawn' follows a similar path, while 'Dreamland' and the 'Daylight' extended mix round out the package. Between them, they sketch a full arc from sunrise to the first proper stretch of the night.

Daylight's the one with an idea, that little pitched down thing that comes back in the last third; Echoes of Dawn just sits there being competent. This is not a complaint.

There's a fine line between 'track that fills the floor' and 'track that takes the floor somewhere else entirely'. This one's the second thing.

'Identify' has a headline, moody vocal that sits right on top of the beat. A proper midnight voice, the kind that turns the last hour of the room into something personal. But the real magician here is the drum work. It's tight, syncopated, constantly toying with the pocket. You feel it in the chest before you notice you're moving.

The production on this is seriously sharp. Crisp percussion, a bassline that doesn't need to shout to be felt, and that signature main stage sound that's got all the polish without losing its edge.

Released November 15, 2024 on Zerothree, this is the kind of record that doesn't need to overstay its welcome to make its point. It gets in, sets the mood, and leaves a mark.

PAWSA drops ‘COLLECT THE COMMAS’ via CircoLoco Records.

Taken from the new single, here is a groove-led house cut that leans into a sparse, low-slung arrangement. The track is built around a rolling bassline and crisp, punchy drums that lock into a hypnotic pocket.

The vocal is a chopped-up, stuttering element that weaves in and out of the mix. It's at least four different pitch versions of the same chop across the track, that's a deliberate choice not an accident. It’s a purposeful, head-down groove that maintains a sense of momentum from start to finish.

Fans of PAWSA’s deeper club material will find plenty to like here. It’s a functional, well-constructed record that does its job on the dancefloor without unnecessary fuss.

DJ Amadeus is back on Outer Space Oasis with the aptly named System Malfunction, and it's a clever little thing that sounds exactly like its title wants it to.

There's this tense opening where the whole production sounds like it's about to fall apart on purpose, wobbling and stuttering like a machine glitching out. And then, right when you think the wheels are coming off, it locks in. The groove snaps into place, the kick lands, and that sense of collapse flips into a steady, hypnotic drive. It's a smart trick, and it works.

The release lands as the fifth from Outer Space Oasis this run, and the label's small, focused instinct keeps paying off. It's not about being flashy. It's about releasing the right thing at the right moment, and this single has that feel. BPM is 124, key is 11A, so it's sitting right in that sweet spot for mixing.

If you want something that teases you into thinking it's broken, only to prove it's perfectly fine, this one's for you.

Yes, the title track is fine, and the edit is there as a radio courtesy, and 'Cable 23' sort of passes. But track two, 'Elevate', is the one that sticks.

The rest of the EP works from convention: the title cut's rolling groove, the edit's brevity. They're serviceable. 'Elevate' does something else.

The key is in the low end. The bassline doesn't just follow the kick or sit in a key that happens to fit, it arrives exactly on the chord change, which shifts the whole weight of the track. Most tracks of this kind place the bass under the beat, which is safe, but 'Elevate' lets the chord change pull the bass with it. That means the drop isn't a simple tension-release. The low end is actually in the key, so the release is a resolution of pitch, not just rhythm.

That detail matters. If the bass had come in a 16th earlier or later, you'd feel the drop as a percussive event instead of a harmonic one. The way it's written, the bass is doing two jobs at once: giving you the groove and resolving the chord. That's the trick.

There's a school of thought that track two is where the real thinking happens, and that's exactly what's going on here. The other tracks are good at what they do. 'Elevate' just happens to be the one that's doing something worth listening to more than once.

Carl Bee, the ‘Sinfonia EP’, on Diynamic Music.

The title track is the real keeper. It does the opening-up part with a filter sweep that goes on for a while, so the tension you feel is actually just a slow change in brightness over the same loop. No new element arrives until well into the track. It’s a small, honest piece of work for an artist who sits at four figures of fans, and not everything on this label is a big swing.

“Flava Selekta” is the thin one on this EP. It’s not bad, just not the reason you’d write about it. It moves through a false build that never really pays off in a new way, then settles into a loop that’s fine but does not add anything beyond what the title cut already showed.

“Mangatune” is a tool. It gets one line and that’s it. It passes as a functional DJ track, but there’s no need to give it a paragraph. The EP works as a whole if you take the title cut and use the others for mixing. That is the honest way to listen.

Cassian, ‘Dun Dun’, on Afterlife.

He’s not just some name riding the wave of a big label; his own number is real, 5,462 Deezer fans, a different situation from Adam Sellouk earlier this run. That’s the difference here; there’s substance behind the hype.

‘Dun Dun’ (the title track, the one you’re here for) starts with a tension-building intro that feels almost suspended in time. Then it drops. And the drop is where the magic lives: a vocal chop tucked underneath the main riff that does this brilliant trick, same mechanic as that red axes track that was doing the rounds in June, but with a different pitch each time it repeats. It keeps you hooked, keeps your ears working, keeps the floor guessing.

It’s a weapon for the main room, pure and simple. The kind of record that doesn’t just fill a floor, it clears the bar area.

The flip side, ‘Memento’, has its own character, though it doesn’t try to outshine the A-side. It’s flatter, doesn’t build the same way, and feels more like a piece there to complete the release rather than one that’ll be causing chaos at 3 a.m. Not a criticism, just a statement of what it is. ‘Dun Dun’ is the headline act here, and it earns that spot.