In Search Of Sunrise 18 mixed by Markus Schulz, Matt Fax & Dennis Sheperd

Pre-order/bookmark here: https://blackhole.lnk.to/isos-18 

Few DJs who operate with more stylistic latitude than Markus Schulz (something that probably helped land him the ISOS role in the first place!). He brings all that formative open-till-close nous to bare on a mix that’s twenty tracks rich, an hour & fifteen deep and mind-expandingly wide. Overturing with his quintessentially sunrise-esque ‘When the Light Breaks in Sarmi’, he elevates straight into recent Emma Hewitt collab, ‘Into My Arms’. When it comes to renowned names, Markus pulls no punches, drawing on the latest from Above & Beyond & Mat Zo, Purple Haze, Jam & Spoon, Will Atkinson, Kyau & Albert, Grum and others to keep 2022’s ‘Search’ dialled in. Peppered throughout is plenty from Markus’s own Coldharbour cohort, too, with spear-sharp material from Daxson, NOMADSignal, Mike EFEX and others. Markus also has a direct production hand in no less than eight of the tracks in his fifth trip. Amongst them are ‘Equinox’ and ‘Atlas’: new collabs respectively with Ferry Corsten & Copini. There are also new custom-created Down the Rabbit Hole remixes of Probspot’s ‘Blueberry’ and Rapid Eye’s ‘Circa-Forever’. He also takes another walk to the Dakota dark-side with ‘Manray’, while (echoing ISOS 18’s rocky visual aesthetic) ‘From The Ridge’ plays out another consummate Schulz summer summerizer!

In finding his own sound and groove in amongst the myriad of electronic music producers, Matt Fax is a man who’s pulled off the hardest of latter-day tricks. Getting his ISOS call-up, he codes his set-time into the titles of its bookending tracks. Commencing with/at ‘4.38 AM’, he wastes no time in working his recent revision of Gouryella’s eponymous classic. New Fax-er ‘Compass’ is quickly followed by his purpose-created remix of Kamaya Painters’ ‘Summerbreeze’. Matt proceeds to sandwich a new ISOS-themed take on his own ‘Longing’ release between Solarstone’s languid ‘island’ and the beautiful ache of Eco’s ‘Let You Down’. Giving you what he knows you want, Matt then feeds some stonecold ISOS classics into his mix. Chaining The Thrillseekers remix of Chicane’s ‘Autumn Tactics’, with ‘Eugina’ from Salt Tank, Solarstone’s Seven Cities’ and BT’s ‘Mercury & Solace’, he signs the mix off with his own sun-up track, ‘5.49 AM’

Your final dawnseeker for 2022 is Dennis Sheperd and weighing in with six of his own, he’s been burning plenty of midnight studio oil too. Amongst them as are the JES-collab’ing ‘By My Side’; his x York x Iris meet-up ‘The Fall’ and – overturing the mix – his most recent single, ‘Intouchable’. In and around those, Dennis weaves instrumental treasure like Sunny Lax’s ‘Ayahuasca’ and ‘Signal’ from Kudus. There’s plenty of vocal manna too, not least, the Diana Miro-sung ‘Too Many Games’ from Tim van Werd and his own ‘Torture’, stunningly vocalled by Mira Feder. As the mix crosses its meridian, its tone develops even more stride, as ‘All We Ever Need’ from Paul Arcane, Dennis’s mix of Minus One’s ‘As Memories Fade’ and Florida Forgotten’s ‘Without You’ all apply further surge. Signing ‘ISOS18’ off in grand style, Dennis deploys George Jema’s ‘Meet Me At Sunset’, his own ‘Break The Ice’ and DJ T.H. & Deirdre McLaughlin’s ‘Over And Over Again’ to devasting and evocative effect.

With the series closing in on its landmark 20^th release, 2022’s ‘ISOS’ drops Sept 2. Kiss the summer off in the only sensible manner, hereabouts [https://blackhole.lnk.to/isos-18]!