(Hospital/Inertia)

A couple of months back High Contrast toured these shores, accompanied by the amount of hype that usually comes with highly rated UK DJs for sitting on a plane for 20 hours. I was never a huge fan, despite having a good deal of respect for the Welsh jewel in the Hospital crown. Anyway, to cut a long story short I spent the whole night at Suzie Qs buried in the side room letting it all out to some seriously heavy early 90’s jungle. And I didn’t regret it either. However, although jungle and the more militant hard-step styles of dnb may be perfectly suited to the dance-floor, many prefer the melodic (read; bordering on cheesy) soaring sounds of artists like LTJ Bukem. Fair enough, but Hospital show us yet again when it comes to the middle ground their roster has it locked down.

There’s no room for veterans such as London Elektricity on mix no 4, well executed by up and comer Cyantific, who drops a few of his own gems including the vocal-laden bass-bubbly Die 4 U and the jungle influenced Little Green Man. I haven’t heard snares used as an instrument capable of producing a melody for a bloody long time. But it’s perhaps the High Contrast tunes that stand out above the rest, starting off with the horns of the chilled-out Twilight’s Last Gleaming and the superbly well-constructed Racing Green, where a sliced up vocal is backed by orchestral strings. The horn-infused big-band feel is continued with Syncopix’s jazzy ode to the golden era of soul on General Hospital. This is then smoothly merged into Nu:Tone’s Three Bags Full, where a palpitating bass line is overshadowed by a repetitive and filtered vocal sample that sounds as if it at one time belonged to a choir.

There’s then a few techy tracks from Child Support (Strawberry Jam) and Cyantific again on Output. Two tunes from Logistics take us near the end, the first, Inside My Soul, a roller with the perfect bridge, reminiscent of classic Dom n Roland. This mix really does show the variety of talent the label is still pushing, and the only real criticism is the lack of truly groundbreaking rhythms. Not many in dnb seem too willing to mix up the standard drum beat, with the exception of those pushing the harder styles a la technical freaks etc. However, this is for all intensive purpose a quality snap-shot of a respected and enduring label and worth picking up if you didn’t snatch a free copy at the DJ Zinc gig…