The Sessions Podcast

Alex Reece was/is a drum & bass producer from the UK who was involved in the scene (pretty much) from the beginning, releasing on a variety of labels, starting with Basement, before releasing a number of seminal singles for Goldie’s Metalheadz label, including the highly regarded “Pulp Fiction”; He also had music released on R&S, Moving Shadow, Precious Materials, and remixed a number of high profile artists including UFO, Nenah Cherry, and Tricky. Around this time, he signed a big deal with Island Records and released the album “So Far”, which spawned the hit singles “Feel The Sunshine” and “Candles”.

I always found his music pretty exceptional simply because he didn’t sound like anyone else at all; His melodies were always quite unusual; some people describe it as similar to jazz, but I don’t necessarily agree with that; there’s clearly a wide range of influences in his sound; it’s definately more influenced by early techno pioneers like Carl Craig and Juan Atkins, I think…..

Anyway, of late, he seems to have all but dissapeared from the scene, which is really sad, I think. So I was both delighted and frustrated to discover that there was a second album slated for Reece through Island records, which sadly was shelved.. However, in preparation for the release, a single, “Vicious Circle”, was released; Also, a pre-release CD album sampler, containing six tracks:

1. Vicious Circle (Edit)
2. Vicious Circle
3. Vicious Circle (underdog Remix)
4. Vicious Circle (Freq Nasty Remix)
5. Will You Give Me What I Need?
6. Sound Clash
Source: discogs

Luckily for us, someone who owns the CD has been kind enough to upload two of the tracks to youtube, and results don’t dissapoint.

“Will You Give Me What I Need?”, is a lush, emotional, synth-rich intelligent piece of music that really draws you in with it’s hypnotising melody and great vocal hook:

“Sound Clash” is a pretty daring, typical Alex Reece off-the-wall style roller with more lush synth melodies, similar perhaps to his singles released on his somewhat short-lived Al’s Records imprint; very nice too:

According to the guy who uploaded the videos, the 2nd album’s tracklisting looked like this:

1. Vicious Circles
2. Phantastik Voyage
3. Angels
4. Wheel
5. Will You Give Me What I Need
6. A Different World You Understand
7. Rollin 99
8. A Woman in Da Woman
9. Falling
10. Star
11. Tell Me
12. In Dis World

It can only be assumed that, at this point, the album isn’t likely to surface, which is a great shame; However, it’s great to see these tracks appear.

Links:
Alex Reece Wikipedia Entry
Alex Reece Discography
Alex Reece records for sale @ Discogs
Metalheadz
Alex Reece – “So Far” on Spotify
D-Zine’s Excellent “Alex Reece Tribute Mix – A Brief History”