Walt J - Reborn

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  • When thinking about house and techno, we tend to compartmentalize: House gets the smooth, warm and deep stuff, and techno gets everything hard and dark. Perhaps now more than ever, dance music acolytes these days understand the intrinsic power of both impulses. Could there be a better moment for them to join hands? Belgium's Curle Recordings found precedent for such line-blurring in Walt J's Fingers Inc.-sampling "Reborn," which first appeared on Detroit's Dow Records in 1997 and is now back on a highly limited, clear-vinyl run. On the one hand, Walter Jones composed a fiercely punchy and wildly percussive five-and-a-half minutes of techno that would have no problem keeping pace with anything Jeff Mills could throw at the floor. But laid-back synth pads, floating in halftime over all this breakneck banging, and an indelibly funky low-end lend the track a vibe more curiously chilled-out than its constituent parts might suggest. DJ Qu, whose deep house seems to grow more sinister with every release, has undeniably had a hand in making the time ripe for such a (re)marriage. His Journey Towards Birth remix of "Reborn" both updates Walt J's production technique and refines its moody complexity, helping to make this package one of the most widely relevant—and wholly enjoyable—releases around at the moment.
  • Tracklist
      A Reborn 1 B1 Reborn 1 (DJ Qu's Journey Towards Birth Remix) B2 Reborn 2
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