There is a kind of raw, rugged appeal to what Zoo Brazil does. Firm favorites of the noveau prog scene’s two pinup lads, Zabiela and Fanculli, and placed auspiciously in the ‘secret weapon’ pile of every electro house DJ from Panaroma Bar to Pacha, Swede John Andersson makes elastic techno with tough melodies and brittle percussion that ranges from the underplayed to the unhinged. The fact that Andersson has appeared on labels as diverse as Cuba, Systematic and Dessous gives you an idea of this guys talent for variation in a sound that, at least locally, suffers severely from tunnel vision, but I suspect 15 years mixing and producing in North West Europe’s fertile dance scene helps.

It’s Only A Mix Tape, the third in a series of which the title cheekily underplays the modern relevance of a DJ mix album, doesn’t do justice to Zoo Brazil’s versatility as a DJ but it sure does place him as a selector totally in control of his sound. The mix is a twisted ball tearer, the kind of intense music you hear pumping like pistons from the Function 1 system on La Terraza or clambering out of the sweaty speaker stacks and smearing the mirrors at the Laundry in Sydney. Good old fashioned electro house is Zoo Brazil’s slant, and for all intents and purposes he does it very well.

Not one to dwell on mood building, Andersson grabs you by the whiskers almost immediately. The only moment of calm and depth comes from one of Andersson’s more aquatic deep house workouts Brown that opens the mix sheepishly, but he slams into second gear with the grumbling Mucky Star by Get Physical starlet Elektrochemie soon enough. The intimidatingly prolific John Dahlback gets rapid eye movement with his flickering Stockholm techno cut Borderline and Frenchmen Sebastian Leger tweaks the filter relentlessly on the gristly Little Bug. From then on it is a tough exercise in squelched synthetics and precisive digi funk that encompasses Paul Deightons old school Dirty Harry and the littered static of Anderrson’s dry Bitch Boys. MANDY’s homage to Berlin dub techno rears itself in their murky remix of Rockers Hi If cut Push Push and it calms proceedings down a little which is welcome after Andersson’s electro onslaught.

Temperatures rise a little with Tim Deluxe’s progressive-esque rework of Gus Gus’s dancefloor wreaking ball Moss but when Gutterpunk’s bouncy, techno laden Up To 11 drops, shit boils well over. Andersson unleashes the trance hounds with the rather ordinary Over The Hill and postures minimal techno with closer Back To Back leaving you feeling like he should have stuck to the game he knows best; it’s a anticlimactic end to a storming mix.

Zoo Brazil takes the electro house mantle with aplomb here and in spite of Andersson’s rather narrow minded track selection (six of his own productions dominate the mix along with three of Dahlback’s) he weaves a broad sound. This tight, linear mix walks an assured line between the darkness of the Trentmoller/Radioslave camp and the bumpy tech of the Audiofly/Justin Martin without losing your interest and although it may dwindle down toward the end (particularly after the promising delirium of Gutterpunk) it is a fiery example of just what Zoo Brazil could do to a sweaty club.