- Effective house music blends personality with the established rules of the dance floor. It's a balance only the best producers have perfected, resulting in timeless tracks that appeal to hearts, minds and bodies. Peggy Gou has cracked the code on Once. Her first EP since 2016, this three-track 12-inch is a slick blend of form and function, oozing warmth while retaining the straightforward grooves of her earliest tracks.
Once is satisfyingly diverse: hand drums and lullaby melodies mix with cosmic synths and licks of acid. Feeling like a modern take on the obscure house and disco spun by DJs like Antal and Young Marco, "It Makes You Forget (Itgehane)" is the kind of tune that would light up an afternoon at Dekmantel festival. The melodic components—chord stabs, pads, a xylophone—are busy but the track never feels cluttered, bouncing along with bongos and the occasional cymbal crash as Gou sings—for the first time on a record—in Korean.
If that was the lazy afternoon jam, then "Hundres Times" is the peak-time bomb. The rhythm is strong and the mood is bright, buoyed by muted flecks of melody buried in the mix. Again, there are several melodic elements—whistles, panned riffs—at work, building in intensity as the groove hammers below. "Han Jan" is the surprise highlight. A slinky electro jam with a boogie-style bassline, it's deceptively crafty, with an arrangement that shifts every few bars. Gou's singing and upbeat spoken word is made even catchier by the fat low-end, which sputters between the sharp percussion. Like the rest of Once, it’s the sound of a golden ratio between body and soul.
TracklistA1 It Makes You Forget (Itgehane)
B1 Hundres Times
B2 Han Jan