Album Review: Various/Funk D'Void - Balance 022

On Balance 022, Funk D'Void dispenses with the formalities and drops you straight into the disco with his remix of Hawkinson's Introduction, its cutting bassline stabs and dreamy synth washes setting the scene for much of what follows. The Barcelona-based Scotsman has always blurred the lines between the more melodic realms of deep house and techno, and continues to do so here – particularly on a second disc that frequently (and effortlessly) shifts tempo and mood.

The first disc is significantly darker than its successor, the man born Lars Sandberg taking the scissors to some of his most trusted records while weaving a handful of new exclusives through. It feels like a set he's thrown down rather than pre-planned, with all the slight imperfections that brings with it – the momentum-sapping Lucky Punch from Peter Dildo in particular bogging things down just five tracks in. Yet it's almost as if Sandberg can visualise his dancefloor's attention drifting, responding to Dildo's plod with the cyberfunk bass riffs of Arkist's Effingham PL and building through a hypnotic techno-disco hybrid that peaks with the Psycatron remix of his own timeless megabomb Diabla.

Disc two, meanwhile, is a masterclass of programming that recalls the seamless genre-straddling of SOS on Balance 013. It's almost like Sandberg has soundtracked the daylight hours in just 80 minutes, the sun rising with the Balearic bliss of Kolombo's Waiting For, racing across the sky in time-lapse style to Joris Voorn's breakbeat-driven Re-2001, then setting in the west as the terrace house sounds of Soundstream, Phil Kieran and Sandberg's Francois Dubois alias close proceedings.

And the finale of Dennis Desantis' You Say sounds like a new beginning, leaving the listener wondering what might've went down on the dancefloor once darkness descended.