Mix / Looking For The Balearic Beat / September 2017

Paraphrasing the Soul Sonic Force and sorting through today`s releases for tunes that could have graced Alfie & Leo`s Amnesia dance floor.

It began in Africa. So I flipped that brilliant Bro. Valentino 12 on Analog Africa. Ah Wo sets Revolutionary rhetoric to Calypso flavours. Bosq does a dynamite Afrobeat extension of Orchestre Poly Rythmo De Cotonou`s Djanfa Magni. Robert Oh`s souped-up Samba is a secret weapon from Kann`s DJ For Drinks. Lenge Leve Villformorke extend a South African ode to a shapely woman. From the Caribbean, Soul Jazz dig in the Channel One archives. Coming up with a Do-wop and Jazz-influenced `70s Dub-plate by Alton Ellis and Cedric Im Brooks. The `80s get plundered by Dark Entries and Cultures Of Soul. DE please with a reissue of Krootchey`s Qu’Est-Ce Qu’Il A. The Parisian DJ probably most famous singing Love International`s Cosmic Classic, Dance On The Groove. Qu’Est-Ce Qu’Il A making my Wants Lists after Antinote`s Zaltan put it on his Quartier Choc mixtape. I`ve gone for the English version because it reminds me of the Balearic of B-Side`s What I Like. Cultures Of Soul get Running Back`s Gerd Jansen on board for a masterful megamix of Junior Byron`s Trying To Hold On. A Proto-House Dub-pounding of clipped guitars and Larry Levan-like drums. Moving on a decade or so Ari Goldman`s World Series reissue the Modern Soul of One Man`s Quest. Then it`s off to Brazil. Where Love Vinyl`s Zaf edits Ed Motta`s 1988 run at the sun. And Far Out repress a timeless Jazz-Dancer from Antonio Adolfo.

Back in the 21st Century, Kenneth Bager`s Copenema project transports his hometown of Copenhagen to a beach. Just South of Rio. Its first fruits are a musical Indian Summer. Think Cantoma covering The Doobies` Long Train Running. With a full orchestra and Elkin & Nelson joining in. Coral Heads finds L.A.`s Pharoahs doing Len Leise doing Wally Badarou. Tropical chimes dancing with Fairlight sighs and Hawaiian steel slide. Wally Badarou puts out his first piece of vinyl since 1989`s Words Of A Mountain. Music that combines both the Compass Point Funk of his seminal Echoes LP and the Jazz he produced as a member of Level 42. Switzerland`s Phantom Island release Kay Zee`s Electro Rock & Roll. Fuga Ronto taking the Alan Vega-isms of Barny for a slow skank. They also reinvent fellow countrymen Hove`s Romance as a deep `90s New York House groove. Synthesised flutes and a big old bass-line. Joe Morris serves up a similarly serene take on House for Pleasure Unit. Perhaps more inspired by those Italians. Full of strings and the flutes swapped for brass.