- There has been much talk about the origin of the Slowhouse series of 12-inches, ever since the first one came to light at the tail end of last year. What seems to be established is that it comes from Zurich's Drumpoet Community collective, with Quarion and Agnes tipped to be the gentlemen responsible for the label's output so far. It's not surprising that they've decided to distance themselves from this particular project, as their heavy US deep house influence has sparked debate about whether it falls into the category of either homage or pastiche.
There's no argument as to how derivative the material is, but the sheer quality of all four tracks shines through as soon as the needle hits the groove. The infectiously skippy groover on the A1 is arguably the weakest cut on here, but its bumpin' bassline and simple stabs make it a highly functional cut that'll get people wiggling. Deeper fare can be found on the next two tracks, but the clean, booming drum tracks are pushed right to the front of the mix to make sure that you're not going to lose the floor by taking things down a notch. The A2 cut is especially worth checking out for the melodic triple whammy of synthetic strings, gentle pads and a lazy swinging bassline. Proceedings are rounded off by a funkier effort, again with heavy percussion and simple stabs, but this time enveloped in hiss and delayed FX.
As a package goes, it's the best thing that the Slowhouse guys have done so far, which is saying a lot due to the high benchmark that they've set themselves with the previous two releases. There might be a glut of producers flooding the market with this type of record, but not many of them do it with quite the panache of these mysterious men.
TracklistA1 Untitled
A2 Untitled
B1 Untitled
B2 Untitled