(Renaissance/Stomp)

I was very keen to get my little paws on the latest compilation release from acclaimed label Renaissance. I discovered the label relatively late (‘03) and was blown away by their releases including Sander Klienenberg’s Everybody and Hernan Catteano’s Masters Series. On top of the quality artists featured, I fell in love with the production quality and ohhh so lovely packaging!

This time Renaissance launches a new series called Frontiers. They’ve come up with a cool idea of pulling DJ’s from opposite sides of the world and with distinctly different styles of House. Behrouz represents the States and this respected New York DJ brings us a deep and groovy mix. On the flip is Youself, than man who established Liverpool-based Circus brand as a leader in the UK house music scene.  Youself’s mix is more funky and jazzy, an up-tempo style not dissimilar to DJ Sneak. Frontiers is presented in the typical cool Renaissance cardboard double CD casing and has good cover artwork cleverly tying in with the national flags of each country.

I’ll start with my favorite of the two disks, Behrouz. This is one deep mother of a compilation! It’s difficult to explain, however if anyone is familiar with Alex Neri’s Yoshitoshi: In House We Trust 4 release (especially the 1st half), then this is the level of depth presented by Behrouz. The style is very hypnotic, rolling seamlessly from one track to the next. It’s a journey and for this reason, there are few tracks that really stand out from the rest. That said I do love the opening track, For the Time Being, featuring the floaty vocals of Norwegian Erland Oye. It’s a pleasant reminder of his ‘04 DJ Kicks release on K7 which I found diverse and pretty cool. There is also a lovely track called La Musica VS El Dinero which just bubbles along and my personal fav, Touch It by Jaimy. This is a big throbbing song with almost tribal-like beats. The 2nd half of Behrouz’s disk drops away a little and I can see how some may find it a little drab.

Yousef’s disk is a different beast. It’s a kinda jazzy and funky style with a lot less bottom end than the Behrouz CD. Songs such as Bounce 2 This by Switch and Find a Way (Sneak Remix) sum up the mix well, combining a bouncy (slightly off tempo) beats with jazzy horns, keys and occasionally some flute. It’s not a style that I really like, but for people that do, it’s a quality release. I think it’d go down a treat in some smoky jazz club drinking a few Margaritas!

It ultimately comes down to which style you like. I think many will prefer one disk over the other. For this little black duck, my taste definitely lies in the deeper Behrouz corner. I just can’t settle into a groove with the Yousef CD. Behrouz is the sort of CD I can see myself pulling out in 6 months time (shelf life) and loose hours cruising around town at night to. I’ll just have to remember to nail down any loose items so my subwoffer doesn’t cause too much damage! In summary, Renaissance Frontiers is a solid/ worthwhile, but not spectacular release.