In the week that finally sees the release of his eagerly-awaited Back In The House compilation, flamboyant disco don Dimitri From Paris talks us through some of his favourite tracks included in the mix.
Poolside 'Do You Believe'
The best thing about Poolside – who hail from sunny California – is that they created a style of their own, ‘poolside music’, which really says it all and could be the modern day descendant of surf music. They have a whole album of beautiful music to get lazy to, yet with that sneaky undercurrent to make you get up and dance. Perfect music to make any day sunny and wet.
Miguel Campbell 'Kiss & Tell'
Miguel Campbell – also half of MAM – is one of my current favorite producers. He totally integrated the overly compressed and filtered ‘French touch’ sound, adding a remarkable twist to it. Slower, groovier, with much more subtle and elaborate movement. Bestest of all, he created quite the perfect electronic/organic house music hybrid. I find it extremely inspiring, and challenging to hear young producers fusing history with modernity in such a dancefloor effective way.
Dimitri From Paris & DJ Rocca 'Pretty Baby' (Original Full Length)
I've always been a fan of piano House, and loved how the Italians made it theirs in the mid 90s with Blackbox at the helm. In this track, from the second Erodiscotique EP with DJ Rocca, we collaborated with Italian vocal sensation Massimo Bastasi from Hard Ton. I recommend watching this video where our song is featured which is worth a million words
Faze Action 'I Wanna Dancer' (Old School House Mix)
It wouldn't be going on a stretch to call Faze Action my cousins in music. Like me, the two Lee brothers started producing in the early 90s, and they are with the Idjut Boys the godfathers of what is now called nu-Disco (which was called nu-House back then!) Unlike many others they stuck to their guns of blending elements of Disco, Boogie, classic House in an always contemporary way. On this particular track, they aptly remix a track of their own, in the House style of yesterday with the pumping sound that can rock the dancefloors of today.
Fury 'Pain'
Murk, the Miami duo behind Fury are yet another House music landmark. Like Frankie Knuckles & David Morales, Master At Work, Daft Punk, they had a unique sound, a sound that spawned countless imitations, and generated equal inspiration. The deep House of today, knowingly or not, owes a lot to their way of making intricately low key, yet pumping dancefolor material. Not only has their output stood the test of time, it is almost sounding better today than I remember it 15 years ago (yes, 15!)
Elz & Elise 'Soul Power' (MKTL Master Kev & Tony Loreto Club Mix)
While America invented most forms of modern dance music – Jazz, Disco, House – they always got somehow rehashed by Europe and sent back in poppier form, for best and worse. This is particularly true of House music, and there is much to debate about this. In the process many sub-genres exploded. While in some case the Europeans outdid the Americans, there is one genre they've always been unmatched at. Soulful vocal House is a true ‘regional’ style, proper to the New York/New Jersey area. Years after it was born, no one does this better than them Jersey guys, as you can hear on that song.
Dimitri From Paris & DJ Rocca feat. Tim Benton 'Domino Dancing' (DJ Rocca Club Remix)
House music might not have gone on to be the global phenomenon it is without the British exposing it out of its Chicago motherland in the late 80s. Many forms of American-born Dance music were extremely influential with British bands. Along with New Order, The Pet Shop Boys were to me the ones that contributed the most in making House music crossover to the masses via their pop songs. Domino Dancing is a cover of one of their song which wasn't House (Latin Hip-Hop, actually). I always adored it, and was missing a House version. In this cover version I did with DJ Rocca we tried to fill that void.
Marshall Jefferson feat. Curtis McClain 'The House Music Anthem' (Move Your Body) (Terry Hunter Lower Wacker House Mix)
A rare case of a song that proclaims itself an anthem, and actually becomes exactly that over the years. This is THE original and ultimate ‘piano House’ which Marshall Jefferson set the blueprint for in Chicago; The one that started it all, the one that still sounds fresh today. From the many great remixes available, I choose Chicago's own Terry Hunter's which kept the spirit of the original giving it just the right amount of nip/tuck.
Sébastien Tellier 'Cochon Ville' (Dimitri From Paris Erodiscomix)
Sebastien Tellier is one of the most interesting artists that was born out of the French touch. His unique output is always, cheeky and baroque, but always with a firm foot on the dancefloor. This particular track really reminded me of the original French spacey Disco from the likes of Ceronne or Arpadys. On this I remix I kept most of Sebastien's original, just switching to acoustic drum for a fuller Disco sensation.
Dan Hartman 'Relight My Fire' (Dimitri From Paris Remix)
I did this remix a few years back for the sole purpose of playing it out, and the reaction has been phenomenal, and completely global too. Many people mistakenly think this is 90s boy band Take That’s record, who only covered the song (backed then, with Joey Negro's production). Loleatta Holloway, for whom Dan Hartman wrote her biggest hit ‘Love Sensation’ makes a remarkable cameo here and I really wanted to push her upfront in my remix. It took years to finally get clearance for this, but here it finally is, as the last, unmixed track of CD2 of my Back In The House compilation.
