Waifs & Strays - Body Shiver

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  • You know a label's hit its stride when it becomes a talent magnet. To wit: Lee Foss and Jamie Jones no longer need to release their own jams on Hot Creations for it to prosper—their brand of warm, tech-y and sex-drenched deep house has taken on a life of its own. On Body Shiver, Waifs & Strays, a Bristol duo who saw chart success in the past year with tracks for Leftroom and Get Physical, offer a spot-on embodiment of the Hot Creations spirit. That's also to say that you can pretty much guess what you're gonna get before the needle drops. What's novel about "Body Shiver" is actually that it's fairly fast—it takes a characteristically funky wompwomp bass and cranks it up into a breezy, clipped pace. The fact that "Body Shiver" doesn't need much more than a good low-end recalls DJ legend Arthur Baker's remark about production—people dance to the bassline. The lyrics are nicely conflicted—while they're ostensibly about sexual attraction, there's something about their delivery (whispered and ghostly) which makes their description of a shivering body and a rising temperature somewhat unnerving. As the title suggests, "Eat into My Soul" doubles down on the sex-as-horror theme, and with its marble-mouthed goblin voices and crisp drums, continues the fashion of tech-y minimal house that's as scary as it is sexy. Hot Natured's own remix of "Body Shiver" regards the vocal as a curious plaything, time-stretching it and mangling it in a junglistic way. Foss and Jones jack up the tune's implicit housiness and throw some delirious, honking sounds in for good measure, making me feel a little bit like I'm at a dance party at Chuck E Cheese.
  • Tracklist
      A1 Body Shiver A2 Eats Into My Soul B Body Shiver (Hot Natured Remix)
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