Estroe releases I See You

Rotterdam resident Esther Roozendaal has been controlling turntables since the late 90s, appearing at the apexes of global techno and chilling in the t-shirt that comes after having pretty much been there and done that. Berghain, Watergate, Tresor, Cocoon, Sonar and an atlas-worth of others have all been bound by Estroe’s expertise in measured dancefloor detonations, operating an axis of deep yet defiant house and techno that has accumulated no lesser fans than John Digweed, Ellen Allien and Dave Clarke along the way.

Following eight years running the EevoNext imprint with Stefan Robbers, Rosedale Records aims to showcase hand-picked producers sharing sides with remixes by techno’s establishment and some of Estroe’s new discovered talents via her own producer advice company.

First up, ‘I See You’, which has all the welcome of a sniper looking at you through a set of crosshairs. A glowering riff wades into alien frequencies and floating signals caught in Estroe’s bass-mounted operation. For all it’s worth as a piece of razor sharp techno, it still shows plenty of energetic, accessible bounce in its hydraulics, and ability to bring tension to arenas twice over where the pressure of the kick drum undercuts shadowy, ambiguous shades.

Dragged along by an 8-bit-themed wash of addictively Sheffield-born bass, ‘I Wish’ is set in the long tradition of dance music where airy, twinkling keys are pitched against what is a savage bottom end. Dreamy clubbing in many ways because of its trance veneer, it shies away from an ambient tag by making you think you can sail away, before you realise you’re knee deep in beats that develop the bump of a cuddly monster. What’s more, it epitomises the new label’s ethos of supplying tracks that are “moody and deep, but always with an energetic edge.”