With a sequel to the classic icy disco compilation After Dark on the way, Chromatics have revealed "Cherry" – a frozen chamber of melancholy pop smeared with a danceable backbone and considerable melodrama. The Johnny Jewel-led group also dropped a video along with the track that was directed by Alberto Rossini, so check it out and go fall in love (or something).
It's tempting to describe Massimiliano Pagliara's remix of "Norman's Eyes" from the perspective of a grizzled, yet oddly charming bounty hunter pursued by secret police through the turrets of some fume-choked future city, but it's also tempting to just turn the blather boosters off, shut up and dance to the thing. Whichever you prefer, hunt down the original when it arrives through DFA-championed Mock & Toof's own Tiny Sticks label on October 25.
How's this for a line-up, London? Tomorrow night Italians Do It Better are taking over KOKO in Camden to parade their vogueing, sullen selves before you like odd animals retrieved from a distant, more glamorous past. Label boss Mike Simonetti will be first behind the decks and live sets will follow from Twisted Wires, Desire,Glass Candy and special guest Lindstrom. Johnny Jewel and Ida No are taking a break from recording their new album to play the show, so here's a reminder of what they're capable of: "Beatific" a lunging, lycra-clad eurodisco stomper with more kohl-eyed regret than Robert Smith alone in bed at night, while Desire's offering is similarly wired; elegant, corny and - yes - sexy all at the same time, with a string sample I just can't place. Any help would be greatly appreciated and full details for tomorrow evening's event lurk after the jump.
At this moment I want nothing more than to see a room full of people dancing to this song. I want to see them serious at the racing, arpeggiated Italo-tech bassline and - anticipating brutality - half-dreading the full drop. Then I want to see them laughing in hysterical relief and wagging their fingers at each other in time with the cheeky, squeaky 303 acid-house synth motif. Robotnick's a strange case - he first started making music 25 years ago and went seminal with the release of 1983's "Problèmes d'Amour", an Italo-disco track with an easy urbanity about it that appealed to the aspirant Europhile DJs who'd eventually turn Chicago and New York clublands into dance meccas. "Obsession For The Disco Freaks" comes from an Italo original who naturally understands the push and pull between cheesy self-parody and discotheque momentum that's necessary for dancefloor success. So succeed!
Eyes shut, mind levered ajar, Ramona's from LA and her music engulfs the imagination like daydream collateral; loneliness and boredom conspiring to turn underage bedrooms into observatories with telescopes aimed the way of young adulthood, learning the flail and seed of glittering beings, deep-house, disco chutzpah. Recently picked up by Mike Simonetti's esteemable Italians Do It Better record house, Nite Jewel fits well among more seasoned label-mates Chromatics and Invisible Conga People; hers an Italo-glide built from both - the former's low-slung glamour, the latter's Cluster love - but mostly from images formed the warmer side of late-night bedroom windows, kohl-eyes staring in wonder at the sparkling edges of big-city skylines far from the order of "Suburbia".
Sounds Like: John Maus, Geneva Jacuzzi, Debbie Deb