Jamie Jones – ‘Summertime remixes’

Jamie Jones – ‘Summertime remixes’
Crosstown Rebels
[September 2010]
House

It’s clear that Jamie Jones knows what he’s doing. After the stylish minimal anthem that was ‘Amazon’, instead of riding on the wave of hype which followed, he bided his time and re-unleashed himself on the world with his 80s electro influenced long player Don’t You Remember the Future last year. It was a fine effort which stood out from the crowd for all the right reasons, with libidinous tech-funk growler ‘Summertime’ being one of the highlights. Sadly though, none of these new remixes quite hit the same highs.

Stripping all idiosyncrasies from said tune first is Rob Mello. His unfortunately aptly named No Ears remix clatters along fairly uneventfully with a robotised, panning vocal lay crudely over the top. The engaging funk and restrained pace of the original are gone with the results unlikely to jump out of a DJ set any more than 1000 other tech house cuts.

Jones himself, in arms with new Hot Creations talent Rob James, offers the second re-rub and it’s rich with the sort of coy bounce, short shrift beats and endless-grooves-which-eventually-sneak-their-way-under-your-skin that you’d expect from the pair. However, it’s a bit coked-up; a bit tense; a bit too steely. As a result, it’s hard to love.

The best offering comes from SIS and is a much more languid, muted affair. It’s a bubbling, micro-evolving and dubby workout which twists and contorts the original vocal into a part of the track’s fabric, rather than its main focus. The results are nice, and as things get more dense and concentrated as the beats lollop onwards, it becomes harder and harder to ignore the rolling rhythm at the track’s core. Overall, though, there's nothing here to usurp the original.

Kristan J Caryl

1. Summertime (Rob Mello’s No Ears Mix)
2. Summertime (Jones & James Dub)
3. Summertime (SIS remix)