At the moment, I'm getting ready to move to a new apartment [thanks to my best friend shacking up at his girl's place and bestowing upon me his coveted abode]. Since I don't own any major furniture, the bulk of my work entails boxing up the ever-growing record collection, always a fun event. There's the all-important sorting, à la Rob Gordon in High Fidelity [a novel/film dear to my heart] - you need to make sure your categories are well thought out. For me that means there are separate boxes for 80s, Industrial Dance/EBM, 89'-'92, mid-90's Techno, Indie, "IDM", Italo, Ambient/Experimental, Depeche Mode, Kraftwerk, GTO/LFO/MBM, 7"s, and of course, many for mid-90's through present-day Electro. Not an easy task, mind you.

One part of this process involves revisiting old classics that you probably haven't heard in a number of years. The track I came across tonight came out in 1995 on a remix compilation for the Japanese group Soft Ballet. Done in a dance-y ambient-breakbeat-dub stylee by Global Communication [aka Reload, Jedi Knights, etc.], this was released at a time when "Intelligent" dance music was still dance-orientated, before the machines completely took over. This music is not computer algebra - this is E dance music to which one can chill. I urge you to turn off the lights, slip on the headphones, and don't be afraid to get your groove on to this one.

Soft Ballet - Ride (Global Communication Dub Mix)
[it starts out a bit quiet for the first 30 seconds or so]