The new limited 12", released as a teaser for the forthcoming second single "Diamond In The Dark“ from Damian Lazarus for Get Physical, consists of brand new club edits of two strange and enchanting stand-out tracks from his debut album, Smoke The Monster Out. As boss of the Crosstown Rebels label and a DJ of worldwide renown, Damian has long been at the cutting edge of electronic music, pushing and promoting twisted, ultra-modern house and techno at every turn. For his first artist album, Lazarus sought to combine this underground sensibility with classic songwriting, psychedelic flourishes, rich instrumental textures and vocals which veer from the highly personal and heart-rending to the mischievous and role-playing. The darkly humorous ‘Memory Box’ falls into the latter category, Lazarus’s lyrics ruing the frazzled synapses and disrupted thought processes of nightlife too intensely lived: “I don’t like this game / Trying to remember your name..” For this single release the track has been re-tooled expertly by Lazarus, alongside studio engineer Kenneth James Gisbon, aka Appendics Shuffle, and brings to the edit all his deep experience of what makes dancefloors tick. His vocals ride a minimal but rolling, bassy house rhythm that’s draped in hypnotic synths and the odd clipped klaxon blast, blaring like the ghost of nights gone by.
A true legend of dance music provides the remix on the flip - none other than Sasha. The original rave king takes on Lazarus’s original ‘Spinnin’’, looping and chopping the vocals - provided by Lazarus and angelic Swedish twins Taxi Taxi - into so much trippy shrapnel, re-building the track around the anthemic refrain, “We can make it happen…” . With its stripped-back rhythm and buzzing, burring bassline, this track has real momentum to it and its rich, gloriously disorienting arrangement is testament to why Sasha has remained at the top of his game for twenty years.
These are two tracks which locate the strong current of dancefloor DNA in Damian Lazarus’s Smoke The Monster Out, deadly effective club anthems imbued with real musicality, and real personality.
