German artist Ben Balance has been seeing some heavy returns from his investment in both his labels and studio time of late. From releasing underground gems on his own labels Yaji and Sukhumvit to his own works recently for Frame Music and LEMAIA Ben is growing to become a part of the exciting crop of new artists coming through the ranks.
His style is constantly crossing over between energy packed breaks, bass fueled house and punchy deep minimal techno. So, with Leon’s label looking to encompass this very ethos Ben’s 4 track ‘I Miss You’ EP occupies just the right sonic space.
Working through the release in reverse we head straight for track 4 ‘Hocus Focus’ and this is a mean slice of squelchy synth heavy tech house. Driving yet melodic the gnarled bassline trips along at a great pace, but it is when the vocal clips begin to appear that the track really levels up. Filtering in and out of view the accompanying waning synths that join around halfway through the track add a really sweet melodic aspect to things that pitch this track at secret weapon territory.
‘The Thompson Project’ at leads out the EP is a high-energy slab of upbeat tech house with a lusciously deep aspect to it. The dreamy synth work combined with the punchy drums and gated vocal snips are on point here. ‘Bbbreaks’ is a slice is new meets old, the gated vocals, old school synths and new dancefloor focused approach will no doubt lead to a wide cross section of DJ’s pulling this out their bag.
Rounding out this impressive purely original EP is ‘Let’s Have a Party’ and this banger does exactly what it says on the tin. Treading a line between nostalgic 80’s synth and modern positive and upbeat house music. This will also surely have cross over potential to other genres and playlists and this speaks volumes for both Leon’s and Marvin’s vision for the label and their own music.
FUTURA007 is now available on pre-order from Beatport.
More info on Ben Balance
Facebook | Resident Advisor | Soundcloud | Discogs
More info on LEON / FUTURA
Facebook | Resident Advisor | Soundcloud | Instagram | Discogs
