Manuel Tur

As a young twenty-something in Essen, Germany, Manuel Tur bucked the trend of hanging out behind the fahrradhalle, smoking Camels and drinking weiss beer, choosing instead to spend time honing his craft by immersing himself in the sounds of Ian Pooley, Masters At Work and Pépé Bradock.

 

It wasn’t long before his music started being released – Manuel’s debut EP on London’s Mada Music saw the day of light in 2002 when the young German had just turned 16, and more material was released soon through labels such as US imprints Agave and SoSound, as well as Sébastien Léger‘s own Bits Music.

 

 

But that wasn’t enough for Manuel so he hooked up with seminal UK house label Freerange Records. His track ‘Portamento‘ became a staple in Jimpster‘s DJ sets so he set about getting the young producer to record an EP for Freerange. This deep bomb and others like ‘Acorado‘ and ‘Deviate’ have made him hot property in the world of house music. With further big tracks for Drumpoet with Dplay and Josh Wink‘s Ovum label with Langenberg, it’s fair to say Manuel now is on top of his game.

 

He was nominated for ‘Best Deep House Artist’ and ‘Best Deep House Track’ at the 2009 Beatport Annual Awards. His remixes for Phonique, Nick Holder, Jazzanova and D’julz have been cropping up all over the sets of those favoring the deeper, underground house sound that Manuel & co. are excelling in.

 

2009 saw Freerange release the Manuel Tur debut LP entitled ‘0201‘, to widespread critical aclaim – DJ Mag crowned it Album of the Month, IDJ called it a ‘majestic debut’ and gave it 10/10, Germany’s De:Bug magazine named it contender for album of the year and the world’s DJ elite themselves voted ‘0201‘ second in GROOVE magazine’s album chart! The album may come as surprise to those more accustomed to his wobbly dancefloor beats, but it’s a very nice surprise indeed. Broken beats cosy up to filtered French disco, lush deep house flirts with soulful US sounds –

 

put it altogether and you have a beautifully constructed work of deeply atmospheric delights.

 

It was about the same time, when Manuel set up his own label Mild Pitch, alongside fellow Essen-based producers Dplay and Langenberg, the latter who Manuel engaged with in the project ‘Ribn‘, delivering striking remixes for world-renowned labels Poker Flat and Marc Romboy‘s Systematic imprint. Mild PItch quickly turned into one of the hottest new labels in house music around, with the label owners releasing some of their best original material and featuring stellar remixes by the likes of Steve Bug and Innervisions’ Marcus Worgull.

 

Fast forward 2011 and Manuel is set to release his second artist album for Freerange. The advance single ‘Most Of This Moment’ is already causing a stir on dancefloors worldwide and sees the talented young German straying way out of his comfort zone to deliver a perfectly executed vocal track with confidence and total abandon. The track comes with a pair of remixes by legendary Hambur

 

d-based producer Isolée (classic hit ‘Beau Mot Plage’) that was already released as anonymous limited white label vinyl in december and instantly made it into Phonica’ Top 100 Singles of the year.

 

Follow-up singles and the full album release are in preparation right now, so expect more great things to come from this bright young producer.