Back in the mid-to-late-noughties, when I was in my ubercoolische minimal techno phase, I loved the sounds of the Tunisian–German Loco Dice. His output (often in collaboration with Martin Buttrich) was quite varied, and I loved pretty much all of it, from the stripped back tracks on M_nus like Seeing Through Shadows to the lusher stuff like the Harissa EP on Cadenza to his DJ mixes like the Green side of that Green & Blue double which combined impeccable grooves with a much-needed sense of fun (“trying to remember the names of the Isley brothers”, anyone?). The most obvious point of comparison for today’s purposes is his 2008 debut album on Desolat, 7 Dunham Place, which showcased his production skills across a broader canvas, and also his knack for bringing in some memorably off-the-wall collaborators (I’m looking at you, Pimp Jackson Is Talkin’ Now!!!).
As you might expect for 2025, this is a bunch less minimal than any of that. It is, though, reassuringly centred in techno. There’s a lot of deep bass, and almost every track has a vocal collaborator, often cut up and sliced about. Dice started out as a hip hop DJ, before the Berlin minimal scene got him, and it really shows here. I think that I detect elements of both ghetto house and Miami bass — although I am really bad at genres, so take that with a pinch of salt. What I do know is that this album is consistently rhythmically and structurally intricate, it is deeply funky, and it is liable to make me hand-dance while walking along the road with it in my headphones in a way which is probably exceedingly uncool and I just don’t care. This crams 14 tracks into a tight three quarters of an hour, bouncing along almost but not quite like a continuous mix. It builds very nicely, and by the time we get to tracks like Ice Cold Dealer it really captures the mood of the deliriously messy end of a long night’s dancing. And it reliably takes me to my happy place from start to finish.
I bought this on beatport.
dogrando writes about some records 