Wonderful words by the ever erudite Adam Turner.

a.s.o. are singer/ songwriter Alia Seror-O’Neill and producer Lewie Day, residents of Berlin, whose debut self-titled album came out in June last year. It’s an album that effortlessly crosses from trip hop to dream pop to AOR, with nods to dub along the way. At the end of 2023 an E.P. followed, featuring five new mixes, pushing the music and vocals into new places.

The Lew E remix of Let Go is a strong opening punch. With a thumping four-four kick, hissing hi hats and synths firing off, it barrels along with the right amount of menace and moodiness to accompany the whoosh and whizz, the adrenaline and the pace. Alia’s voice is dropped in and out, and distorted. The track might be a bit too fast for Sean Johnston’s ALFOS but it operates in a similar sonic space. Imagine if the Hardway Bro. took his travelling disco consultancy to The Panorama Bar / Berghain. There’s also an extended mix of Let Go, the original album version stretched over nearly six minutes. Shuffling and sultry, it’s less frenetic than the remix but very neatly done.

Maara’s mix of My Baby’s Got It Out For Me follows, its chuggy trance rhythms hitting from the start, Seror-O’Neill’s voice now a spectral presence, chopped up and smothered in echo, while the track powers on, like a train speeding out of Hauptbahnhof and gliding through the Mittel Europa night. Eventually fading to just a snare and a wash of FX.

Things slow down, and cool down, with Cousin taking Falling Under in a dubbier direction, shuffling drums and sounds that shadow Mezzanine period Massive Attack. The vocals, once again, sent spinning into space, floating above the mix.

Purelink’s Say Less mix of Rain Down is breakbeat led, and bouncy, but laid back, and has the E.P. travelling toward more soulful, more Balearic sounds. A head-nodder for evening cocktails, with its coolly delivered refrain, ‘let the rain come down’, it’s a tempting hint of something beyond winter.

a.s.o. Remixed is out now, on Low Lying Records. 

You can find more proper, on point, prose from Adam Turner over at his own brilliant blog, The Bagging Area. Adam is also part of the admin team at the mighty Flightpath Estate.