- The first release on a new label showcasing the Toronto scene.
- I support any producer who tries to clear the bad name a generation of mediocre records has given to tech house. Through DJ sets, productions and—perhaps most important of all these days—Twitter, Cindy Li has done more than most to shine new light on dance music's most maligned style. She's now added a label to that list. Parallel Minds, a collaboration with fellow Toronto artists Daniel 58 and Yohei S, features four tracks of what 20 years ago could've loosely been called tech house.
By the sounds of things, producers from Toronto spend plenty of time on Discogs. The Canadian set is the latest in a long line of scenes to resurrect vintage tech house—the Romanians did it more than ten years ago—so you might have a hard time distinguishing PM001 from many other releases pushing similarly old-school sounds. That said, there's plenty to like about Parallel Minds' first release. Best of all is the bleep melody on Ciel's "Hind Sight Is 360," which pans around the stereo field. Then there's the bassline on Daniel 58's "Space Bubble," so good that it could've been on a Grant Dell bomb. Ciel and her crew are devoted students of classic sounds, so, like scenes in Berlin and Bucharest, they might eventually put their own twist on established styles.
TracklistA1 Ciel - Hind Sight Is 360
A2 Yohei S - Eastern Rankin
B1 Radiant Aura Faculty - Mana Sadhana
B2 Daniel 58 - Space Bubble