TuneLab
DANCE SPIRIT and TARA BROOKS in The Lab LA
The back-to-back format in The Lab LA can sometimes descend into a polite tug-of-war, but the pairing of DANCE SPIRIT and TARA BROOKS feels like a unified front for deep, hypnotic house. This is music for the long haul, where the pleasure is in the subtle shift of a loop, not the obvious drop. Imagine a hazy room where the smoke machine has been working overtime, and the dancefloor is a slow, pulsing organism. Technically, the set is a marvel of consistency and depth. Averaging 122.5 BPM, it operates almost entirely within a lush, deep pocket.
The harmonic narrative is dominated by the key of 12A, creating a cohesive, dreamlike state. The energy profile is telling: an overwhelmingly dominant low-end (0.75 avg) provides a warm, sub-aquatic foundation, with mid-frequencies (0.20 avg) adding melodic color and almost no high-end aggression (0.02 avg). This is mixing as a form of gentle hypnosis. The tracklist is a treasure trove for deep house connoisseurs. Ora the Molecule's 'Silence' is a beautifully sparse, vocal-led opener.
Maae's 'Descartes' is a quintessential modern deep house cut, all muted chords and driving bass. Jonny Calypso's 'Teenager 2K15' offers a shot of raw, nostalgic energy, and the extended play of 'Acid X Tadao & Tadao - Amor' shows a commitment to letting tracks breathe and evolve. The journey starts in contemplative silence, builds through layers of deep, percussive texture, and ends with the warm, bassy thump of Andrew Fontana's 'Bear,' a perfectly understated conclusion.