Nail - Ode Rammel

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  • Nail is an alias of Neil Tolliday, a UK producer whose solo work mostly stopped around the turn of the millennium when he started making downtempo music in the duo Bent. Before that, he'd released a string of punchy house EPs as Nail, primarily for Classic and DIY, a label based in his hometown of Nottingham. His records became favorites among house DJs, and remained so more than a decade later, when one of his songs, "Til the Feeling's Gone," popped up on Zip's fabric 67 (and was, for many, a stand-out of the mix). All of this makes Nail a good fit for London label Fear Of Flying, who have a habit of bringing back underground house gems (they've also reissued Schatrax, an artist cut from the same cloth as Nail). Ode Rammel compiles four tracks from Nail's heyday. There are two peak time numbers ("Clear My Mind" and "Try") and two slightly more restrained selections ("Til The Feeling's Gone" and "Optimus"). It's all pretty simple: there's not much at play aside from crisp drums, propulsive rhythms and some basic deep house vocals. It's also basically flawless. The beats are on point, the compositions unfussy and effective. From a DJ perspective, every track is a get-out-of-jail free card—it's hard to imagine these songs ever not working. For stripped down, functional house, you won't do much better than this.
  • Tracklist
      A1 Clear My Mind A2 Try B1 Til The Feelings Gone B2 Optimus
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