German producer and DJ, Butch is fast becoming not only one of the hottest names on the circuit right now, but also one of my personal favourites. Every one of his productions so far have been nothing short of excellent, all beautifully mastered and always brilliantly funky, and this is precisely what we get in every single track on his new album, Eyes Wide Open.

No Worries, the record that was charted by a staggering amount of top DJs and played in clubs by many more, although not included in Eyes Wide Open, was undeniably one of the hottest tunes of the summer and underpins perfectly what Butch is all about. If there's one thing Butch knows how to invest in his music it's rhythm. The guy has playful, ebbing, tribal rhythm flowing through the veins of all his productions. Tech house so often becomes the grey area of failed minimal and lets face it, is often pretty uninspiring. Only the major players consistently get it spot on. Blending house with techno to make music as groovy and alive as Butch does is no easy skill. What he's managed to create in Eyes... is a style of tech house which is house at heart, keeping the same four-to-the-floor structure, but with enough rave-worthy intensity so that it's not too deep and therefore assumes that classic techno ethic... it's pounding.

Butch's basslines are some of the most compelling, most groovy I've ever heard. Following the delicate string templates of For Her Smile (Epilogue), In God's Arms, is a lean, shuffling demonstration of house and techno in perfect harmony. Piano notes and percussive flavours decorate the floor-filling house beat. All of Butch's productions are all mildly progressive without becoming too aggressive. Joy (II) builds and builds at such an engaging, stimulating rate, but the gauzy vocal samples looped throughout the entire track keep it anchored to a field of house far more subtle and melodic, rather than frantic.

It's Butch's creative and often experimental influences that really lift Eyes Wide Open to level of supremacy. While he remains true to his own basic style throughout the entire album, keeping the same surging, pounding tech-house basslines and similar beat patterns, at not one point does the album ever become at all monotonous. Every track is dusted with something special, unusual and often slightly daring, a feature of Butch's producing abilities that truly defines him as one of Berlin's new breed of geniuses. His airy, psychedelic Kids is almost classic house, but the drums and percussion are this time stirred with infant-like vocal samples creating a delicious if not slightly aberrant groove, but that is not in any way a criticism. Soul Motion is the albums star though. This time Butch discards any sonic mischief and delivers something made for only the most powerful soundsystems. Again there are the twangs of guitar stings and various other shadowy samples, but this is by for the most aggressive of all, throbbing with heat, funk and swagger.

If Butch continues to keep producing such well thought and well conceived music then there is no limits to his potential. Granted, he's not a 'new comer' in any sense of the term, in fact he's been around for some time, but it now seems as if he's honed his creative skills into something more compact and just generally more pleasing than ever before. For this reason I will not be taking my eyes of his every movement from now on.

Butch - Soul Motion


Buy Eyes Wide Open by Butch on Beatport now here