After nine years of quality assured house music, FINA Records hits release number 30 with another of its forward looking offerings, this time from red hot young Frenchman Armless Kid. Well known on his native Paris circuit, Armless Kid is now breaking out on the wider international scene. He's released his bustling, heart felt house grooves on Rekids and the legendary Classic Music Company, is a Rinse FM regular and has an anything goes approach that has won him high profile fans like DJ Harvey and The Black Madonna. Opener Shadows is a superbly warm deep house cut with real drive in the silky smooth drums. It's perfect for cosy dance floors, while Lost Days picks up the pace with raw and hurried kick drums and dusty piano keys bringing real beauty to the groove. Brute Factor Disco pumps any party with its urgent drum programming, explosive sense of energy and dazzling disco chords and last of all, NaturaL FL Groove slips into a funky bass riff, with organic licks and authentic old school production values that make it a timeless classic in the making. More

It's number six for Tessellate and this time they're shining the spotlight on France's Xavier Dusclaux AKA Armless Kid. After a number impressive outings on the likes of Rekids, Let's Play House and Traxx Underground, Xavier turns to the London based label with three original tracks plus a remix of the A1.

The title track, Drop Down (Club Edit), eases in with broken beats and a gentle bassline before eventually building into a euphoric, 5am acid banger. Opal Sunn, who are regulars on Nick Höppner's Touch From A Distance, have dialled up the 303 from the orignal to give it a whole different energy. Flip the record over and we have two tracks aimed straight at the club. Category, which features MJOG (Daydream/Recordeep), combines shuffling percussion over wiggling basslines. The final track mixes shivvering pads, punchy organs and skippy drums over a wonky sub. It's called Les Bo Jours (Wonky Funky) More

The first EP from Sound Support on LPH, Méhari, will keep you warm and bouncy, wailing and flailing, all through the fall and winter. Sound Support is made up of Dam Swindle’s Lars Dales and Lorenz Rhode, known for his mastery of synths and talkbox videos. Big electro energy on this five-track EP. Funky, sassy synth melodies snaked around tight and punchy drums that instantly make you wiggle like a worm. It starts with the title track, a thumper with a herky-jerky swing, then slides into a slightly more melodious and noodly territory before completing with “Detox Your Feelings”, a high-speed Hi-NRG and Italo disco rocket ship off this planet into interstellar space. More

Like any good party, there's an after-party. What, you didn't think we'd keep it going? C'mon. We began this one with Jacques Renault's Sky Islands, a full-length album that sought to achieve euphoric disco delight within a wonky conceptual framework; it's his late-night live DJ sets in spirit, organized like a 70s or 80s vinyl megamix or public-access radio program, but comprised solely of a couple dozen originals he crafted in the studio, most of them being wrapped up during the summer and fall of last year. Of course, we realized delivering such an experience, where no “song” is more than about 90 seconds, would do nothing for the working DJ, unless the working DJ is looking to nod off for thirty or take an extended bathroom break. Thus, Coast to Coast, a 12-inch that collects seven of the songs from the LP—in full- length, special-disco-mix, club-ready form. This EP will be followed by more long-form cuts, as well as additional goodies. There will be an after-party for the after-party. More

Ray Mang has been a spiritual brother to and lodestar for LPH since it's founding, but it was only when we began releasing these Saidêra tracks, defined by their suspension between laid-back Balearic electronica and poppy sun-bleached samba, that we knew we'd finally be able to naturally bring him into the fold. Mr. Mang has kept the bright aesthetic and uninhibited ebullience of the original intact while simultaneously beefing up the presence of the rhythm section, revealing male-female vocal harmonies that were somewhat hidden before, and expanding upon the ornamentations that imparted to it a light-as-a-feather airiness and expansiveness. In classic disco 12-inch style, the record includes a main mix and three spin- offs, each exploring a different facet. The radio mix is shorter and tighter, the “sambadrone beats” puts the percussion at the fore, and the instrumental lets the bed Mang has made take center stage. More

Our second record from Sweden's Sune is a proper full-length. Ten tracks, forty- five minutes—classic LP! And it's arranged as such, too; it tells a story through tightly-arranged chapters. Early on in the journey, they're bouncy and whimsically animated, pillowy white clouds slowly drifting across an azure sky. As we get more invested, the tempo rises and the warm, squishy house beats feel as though they can't always quite keep up. A delight. To conclude the A-side, Sune brings a twinkly ballad, a late- night Joe Jackson piano serenade with instrumental hip-hop drums keeping everything in place. The other side only wants to party; it begins with a wiggly bass lick that's got a wicked charm to it, and continues to explore the unusual jazz-club-meets- sweaty-warehouse space that Sune's compositions are so often possessed with. The B concludes as the A did, with a lilting, hopeful, and heartfelt send-off. Everything is fine? Everything is fine. Everything is fine. More

For his third full-length album, Jacques Renault explores his craft through the format of the classic late-night radio megamix. It's a tour de force that finds him blending his quick-cutting DJ sensibilities with his crate-digging, drum-chopping disco-chemist bonafides into one wham-bam party of pastiche. This is Renault as we know him—but at hyperspeed, tearing through twenty- three tracks in under half an hour. And while it's a head rush of his trademark funky drums, sassy horns, playful synths, it's arranged as an album, with songwriting and structure at the fore. Imagine it as a flip on the script for Renault's most loved club 12-inches of the past, which luxuriate in long-form, stretched-out grooves that burn for hours, fills that ride for days. Instead of on pulling a thread for six, seven minutes, he romps around in a bouncy ball pit, plucking out whatever captures his imagination for a moment, then diving back in to discover another buried nugget. It's Jacques Renault as we've always known him, but this time through a suite of bite-size vignettes instead of slow-burn grooves. More

A big move in a new direction to start a big, new-direction year, 2021! The debut single from Saidera, a trio comprised of Alex Pasternak, formerly of Lemonade; Mike Cheever, a.k.a. Le Chev, previously of Avan Lava; and Brazilian samba school leader, Osvaldo "Vadinho" Luiz Freire de Araújo, on vocals and songwriting duties. The two tracks here meet somewhere in the middle of where the three members come from: they're laden with electronics and tuned for the club, but they're also distinctly Latin, crackling with joyful Carnaval energy, and everything's sung in Portuguese. Following this is a string of instrumentals and remixes, and, eventually, a second record we're keeping the lid on for now. More

Our first adventure with Makèz concludes with Levitation, the sequel to Elevation, their first EP for LPH, which we released on Valentine's Day this year. With this five-tracker, the slinky funk is back, but now it has an added layer of sensual, late-night, richly-detailed disco that slowly heats up over the course of the flight. The A side is a more contemplative affair, the soundtrack to dancing alone, under moonlight in a cobblestone courtyard or a jumbo disco ball in a freshly-mopped club; it prompts you to close your eyes and dive deep within. The other side is the community side, the overcapacity-party side, the collective-consciousness side, one big-room, sprawling anthem with razzle-dazzle diva vocals in the middle, one beachy, tropical affair that's an all-smiles comedown for the high. TRACK LISTING: A1. Blue Island, A2. Red Island, A3. Levitation, B1. Kimosabe - If We Were Children Again (Makèz Rework), B2. More Visions More

What was it Dorothy said? A few months back, we released Westcoast Goddess' LPH debut, The Inner Snoopy, a classic house EP reincarnated as one of those giant rainbow-colored lollipops. And that really wasn't enough, so now we have a second four-tracker from the guy, a continuation of the technicolor adventure through nightclubs in the Kingdom of Caring. Pop it on and feel the sugar rush, feel your pupils dilate, feel your heart race and swell with joy. TRACK LISTING: A1. Strawberry Infiniti, A2. Fruity Loop, B1. Like a Benediction, B2. Stay on My Mind
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Before this illness was but a blip on the radar, before this epidemic became pandemic, we were looking forward to sharing this LP, Pacific Coliseum's How's Life, with you because, simply, it is a joy, but now it's taken on new, prescient dimensionality, and we're looking forward to it even more. Before, it was a salve, a relief from the monotony of daily life and the troubles that burden us, but now it is an antidote to the physical isolation we're experiencing. It's an inward-looking album, one that's gentle and tender, but it's not quiet. It's full of life, color, spirit; its purpose is to take the emotion on the inside and connect it with the bright, miraculous world on the outside. Full of jazzy melodies and funky riffs and easy drums that land with a measured poof rather than a aggressive pop, it is, we are certain, what you need right now. Comes packaged in a full-color sleeve, designed by Drew Heffron and Nik Mercer, featuring a photo by Ruvan Wijesooriya.

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“I Do It,” the A1, is a 90s R&B jam—imagine Aaliyah—recontextualized into an acid-flecked big-room chugger. “Do It,” which follows, starts on the same foot, but strips the vox and charges straight into business, upping the BPM a smidge along the way. Then, “B3,” a nimble, electric ditty that fits its percussion squarely at the front and center of the mix, making it into a subversively deadly drum track. Rounding out the record is Baltra's version of “B3,” which takes the essence of the original and wraps it tight in atmospheric wigginess. It's a head-spinner and gives the EP a slightly psychedelic conclusion. A1. I Do It, A2. Do It (If U Love Me), B1. B3, B2. B3 (Baltra Remix)
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Imagine a Kerri Chandler track anthropomorphized, then jammed into a Japanese purikura photo booth for a series of bedazzled, glittered, and airbrushed headshots. Imagine that image set to music. What do you hear? Westcoast Goddess' The Inner Snoopy, a frenetic house workout that is puzzlingly contemporary, classic, and alien. The four-track EP kicks off with the title track, a cloud of cotton candy, supersaturated hot pink, threaded with twinkly bells and a bass shuffle that flips and flops around with cheerful abandon. “Limelight Golden Age” and “Murder at Passion Cove,” the two tunes that follow, assume a quietly sinister tone, introducing minor-key piano pounds and pinched synth riffs that stretch to the heavens to complicate the overwhelming joyousness of the instrumental palette and arrangement. A subtly ironic 12-inch that satirizes and lampoons the bubblegum, technicolor sounds from our hyperactive age while hearteningly finding beauty within it all. Bah—words, words, word! It's wildly fun party music imbued with idiosyncratic humor and life-affirming happiness. Play it loud, play if often.A1. The Inner Snoopy, A2. Limelight Golden Age, B1. Beach Noir (feat. Splitradix), B2. Murder at Passion Cove
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A spiritual successor to our last Sleazy McQueen 12-inch, Daikaya is a slab of buttery, slow-burn disco that coats the dance floor in molasses, making the party move with a certain sensuality.
The four-track vinyl EP includes three originals, all by Sleazy McQueen and Terry Grant, and one remix, courtesy of Versatile chief, Gilb’R, who turns the title track inside out and gives it a creeping, alien presence while not letting go of its starry-eyed, luscious warmth. For the digital edition, a second version, stripped down and dubby, is tacked on as a bonus.
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As we descend into winter and the end of 2019, an EP that, like the shorter, overcast days, is chilly and stark, yet accented with rays of sun that crack through the clouds, glints of starlight, full-moon rises. These five tracks—six for the digital version—come from Eluize, a Berlin-based Australian gifted at simmering minimal yet acerbic house potions over low heat, patiently coaxing them to a slow boil. Mischievous, creeping concoctions that approach and build sneakily, as layer upon layer is looped, expanded, condensed, dropped out, and slid back in. Each is a beautifully musical piece, too, with as much evolving melody as hypnotizing groove. An LPH soundtrack for nights that stretch on forever, lit only by blinking lights that break apart seas of heavy fog and slice between silhouetted bodies. More

Emil Sunesson, a producer from Malmö, makes his debut on LPH with a buoyant six-track album that's got the fluffy, airy body of cotton candy and the electric crackle of neon lights. Funky house and disco toe-tappers built around jazzy drums, jangly African guitars, goopy keyboard vamps. They zip along at a brisk pace yet feel cozy and warm, a morning jog through a forested park just before the leaves turn, the low golden rays of sun stretching your shadow out like chewing gum. Kind, loving music that's been thoughtfully layered up and arranged for your listening—and dancing—pleasure. More

The St. David Jam trilogy is complete! Once again, the Italian producer plunges into the depths of his music mine, chisels out a few rough gems, and polishes them off until the glinting diamonds beneath are exposed. As advertised, this EP is disco through and through. “Sexy Funk '98” is a slinky shuffler that gets the engine running and “I Got the Music” is a schmaltzy twirler that settles the party squarely under the mirror ball. The reverse is both more feisty and laid back. It starts with “Where U Move,” a lighter number with a hint of tropical rhythms and beachy sunniness. With “The Connection,” the 12-inch comes to a joyous conclusion; the sampled crowd cheers and jeers sound like a dance floor begging for an encore at the end of a long night. More

Last year, we released LPH cofounder Jacques Renault’s sophomore album, BK Club Beats, Breaks & Versions, a back-to-basics effort that found the producer eschewing big-budget studio sessions and once again using samples as the clay with which he sculpts his music. Considering the snappy, cut-up nature of the tracks, we thought it’d be fun to invite a few of our friends to take the parts and reshape them into versions of their own design. Here, we present you with the four we gathered. DJ Boring’s is a restive spellbinder stuck in a trancey lock groove; M.I.A.L.’s a molasses-thick slow-mo chugger oozing all over your eardrums; Spencer Parker’s a sunny disco strutter spinning across the dancefloor; and Tee Mango’s a wiggy soul inversion that suavely seduces.
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Late-summer joy from two long-time Glaswegian party-makers, James “Harri” Harrigan, a resident at the legendary Sub Club for over thirty years, once again crossing the aisle from DJ to producer after a ten-year hiatus, and Max Raskin, together known as Manakinz. The four tracks (five on the digital version) contained are saucy, sassy late-night bangers meant to keep you locked into a permanent groove hovering right around that 124-BPM sweet spot. Sharp, punchy house oiled with groovy disco grease. More

Our first long-player for 2019, Daze Island, by French producer Malouane, is a seasonally-appropriate departure for Let's Play House that's more summertime meditation than dance-floor ammo. Across these ten tracks, Malouane takes us on new age-indebted journeys down cobblestone paths banked with flowering cherry blossom, to clear-sky tropical beach sunsets, on hang glider flights across endless fields of golden wheat. As the LP progresses, the tempo picks up and the ambient washes and puffs of pads pull back to make way for dancier rhythms, but even in these moments, Daze Island is a tranquil affair, pressed first and foremost with a desire to independently explore the mysterious worlds within. More