SMUGGLERS INN…002

Red Rackem, ex-Notts resident and now neu-Berliner, has a gift for discovering and championing new talent. Having establishing an outlet last year via his Smugglers Inn label, the second voyage has just set sail and features the off-kilter vibes of four more under-the-radar producers that hes been pushing out into the world.

Leading on the A is Reminiscin from Viennas Roman Rauch, a dirty-sexy cut that wouldve cut the mustard at a DiY party circa 95, which splices a jubilantly ecstatic vox with tough bassline action. Dragon, a mysterious Midlands instrumentalist who last surfaced on wax with an old co-production with Mark E, shows off a knack for playing realtime wonkiness with his Wackaday. Whoozy keys run a splashy gamut eventually misdirecting you, like a drunken boxer, into all sorts of jazz and soul inflected territory.

Flipping over, Estonian alt radio programmer and musician Akukajas Laks Remix comes across as a sonic Kinetoscope of a swampy Baltic pool. As various seem to fauna cry and call out, the whole track slows frame by frame into a swirling melancholia before spiralling back up in a crisp glimpse of sunshine. Bartellows Someday starts as a clattering, almost trap-esqe set of beats underpinning a hyperspeed yodel. It breaks and then the Mnchner goes ape, with a serious heads down dead-of-night basement bassline and wide, acidic pads hitting us like a boom whipping across the deck of a boat.

The EP presents exactly the kind of talent and vibes that is neglected by the increasingly sanitized and samey deep house, showing that the underground will always be able to come up with interesting music that doesnt rely on endlessly recycled basslines and chords stabs to give us the goods.

Smugglers Inn Voyage 2 is out on 27^th May

Joe Jones