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

Fat White Family / Bullet Of Dignity (Acid Arab Remix) / Domino

Following Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve’s brilliant go-go-not-go-go remix of Fat White Family’s Bullet Of Dignity, French / Algerian Parisians Acid Arab now take a stab. Chunky and chugging with a big buzzing Middle Eastern, snake charming synth, their version is tad moodier than the uber Balearic BTWS reimagining, but a dark, mid-tempo mover nonetheless. Both of these reworks will soon be available on a blink and you’ll miss it 12. 

Galliano / Circles Going Round The Sun / Brownswood Recordings

I’m a huge fan of Rob Gallagher’s poetry – his words wilfully kept simple, but dense with knowledge – both street and spiritual – and argot. I really dig what he’s been doing with ThE DiAboLIcaL LibERTieS, and love this new track from the reformed Galliano. Circles Going Round The Sun is a brilliant piece of rhythmic beat prose. A whirlwind of snatched memories and diary entries, it name checks brushes with legends like Andrew Weatherall, David Mancuso, Gil Scot-Heron and James Brown, and the rush of partying in Berlin just after the wall came down. A whistle stop travelogue of a musical life lived less ordinary, a search for new connections, new sensations, set to a great, shuffling jazz groove. With an electronic b-line that nods to Lonnie Liston Smith’s Expansions, the song promises big things for the forthcoming album, Halfway Somewhere.

House Of Spirits / Times Are Changing / Razor N Tape Reserve

Tom Noble’s House Of Spirits released their first single a decade ago. Keep Holding On was a gospel disco epic, accompanied by a dynamite, totally deranged, dub, produced in collaboration with Aaron Coyes of Peaking Lights. When I interviewed Tom at the time the plan was to put together both an LP and a full dubwise set. Unfortunately neither materialised. However, we now have a new tune, Times Are Changing. To be honest, everything Tom and his label Superior Elevation have done has been an underground dancefloor smash. The 12s and 7s snapped up and then sought after. This is certainly no different. With a boisterous bouncing b-line, spacey synth, and cool keyboard runs, the authentic late `70s / early `80s retro production echoes the kind of Brit and jazz funk championed by David Mancuso at The Loft. Potentially an anthem like, say, Hudson People’s Trip To Your Mind. The lyric not so much a song as a positive sing-along mantra. Harvey Sutherland’s remix is slightly slower, calmer, less frantic, slightly stretched out, smoother and squelchier.

The Human Aerial / Antenna / Bokeh Versions

JD “Hooly” Barnell is The Human Aerial, a member of the `80s / `90s post-punk band, Reducer, who, coincidently, have just had an album released by Downwards. Bristol’s Bokeh Versions previously reissued Reducer’s 1985 debut, Nada Neuvo, back in 2021, and now the label collaborates again on a rummage through Hooly’s vast tape archive. He’s been making and recording music for 46 years, so there’s an impossible amount of material to choose from, and this first shot consists of tracks dating from between 1984 and 1991.

A central part of Hooly’s sonic aesthetic is harvesting signals from mass multimedia, a “wealth” of information, something he describes as “a flood of human effluent” – hence The Human Aerial – and then cutting it up so that it has something meaningful to say. Again in his own words, “If it gets heard, great, but if not at least I’m screaming back at the fuckers.” Pieces like A Call To Arms, Direct Action, A Change Of Worlds – a mix of Muslimguaze, Nocturnal Emissions, and On-U Sound – will definitely appeal to fans of Autumns’ latest industrial dub set, Dyslexia Sound Source, while Spotless is a bit of a Balearic surprise. Bass heavy and smoothered with sound effects and sampled cinematic Sc-Fi, it builds its skank from a snippet of The Beloved.

Jezebell / Weekend Machines / Ran$om Note

Ran$om Note have recruited plugged-in party people Jezebell for an E.P. of slick, sleazy shenanigans. Each of the 3 originals cuts to the chase and heads straight for the heart of a dark, packed, heaving, strobe lit dancefloor. Autostrada is all racing Italo arpeggios a-go-go. Citric summons the sexy electro / freestyle of Miami’s Beat Club and Minneapolis’ Information Society, while Weekend Machines is a piece of prog-y trance. Pumping, throbbing, acidic and gurgling. Its bad ass punk funk b-line bending, pushing dancers into shapes, positions, that are deviant and definitely non-missionary. Fiercely 4 / 4-ed and industrial edged – a bit Portion Control, a bit Nocturnal Emissions – it’s a house harking after the sound of Ron Hardy’s Music Box, via Andrew Weatherall’s Sabresonic. Seoul’s Shubostar steps up for a remix which then transforms this track into epic stamping, stomping, stadium synth-pop.