Heavenly Remixes Vol. 1 & 2

Heavenly was all but founded on the art of the remix; the label’s sadly departed friend Andrew Weatherall remixed the first ever release, and the label has built up an immense catalogue in the intervening years that demonstrates all that is good about the art form and on Friday 10th December 2021 the label release Heavenly Remixes Vol 1 & 2, a brace of albums documenting this long history. A label forged in the white-hot heat of post-acid house Britain, these Heavenly remixes are perfectly weighted with respect and irreverence, the remixer in each case carefully chosen to add heft to the song - the tracks across the 2 albums are curated, remixed and delivered with love (and a teensy bit of impertinence) and are a glimpse into the catalogue of one the UK’s finest independent labels. There may well be no rhyme, nor reason, to how these compilations have been put together, beyond the fact that they are assembled with love, an innate understanding of the power of great pop music, and a skilled marriage of song and remixer. There is no sense of order to Volume 1. You’ll find a smattering of older tracks: album openers Saint Etienne are taken on a Poseidon Adventure with Underworld, who inject ‘Cool Kids of Death’ with typically manic energy. Elsewhere, ’90s Brum duo Mother add dancefloor pzazz to Espiritu’s innate glamour on an all-funked-up reworking of ‘Los Americanos’. There are several of Heavenly’s current darlings there too. Jagwar Ma’s Jono Ma takes the Kraftwerkian leitmotif on ‘Automatic’ and drives the Australian jazz-funkers Mildlife down an electro-convulsive psychedelic tunnel (thankfully no-one was harmed during the making of this remix). Though not purposely themed, beyond being judiciously chosen as the catalogue’s finest gems, there’s a tiny hint of psychedelia about Volume 2 that is hard to ignore. Producer-legend Lindstrøm conjures a majestic display of the Northern lights over the streets of Salford with this deeply wigged out electro-disco remix of Jetstream, the classic opener of Doves fourth album Kingdom of Rust. On the other side of the miasma is Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve’s redemptive re-interpretation of M. Craft’s ‘Chemical Trails’. Both albums will be available on vinyl, CD and DL. The LP editions are double LP's on black vinyl.