[Prime Numbers]

Releasing a gem of an album in Hazyville at the end of 2008 saw Actress (nee Darren Cunningham) passed over for the end of year accolades. But with several tracks from the album turning up on recent releases, the Werks Discs label manager is now receiving some overdue attention. His remix of Various Production’s “Lost” was a gobsmacking foray of compressed, blunted house music while the reappearance of album cut “Crushed” on a recent Prime Numbers sampler drew rave reviews from all who encountered it. Combining a touch of the new with further material lifted from Hazyville, “Ghosts Have A Heaven” will only further the reputation of the less than prolific producer.

The title track is a cool slice of meditative, hypnotic tech-house whose emergent pads slide effortlessly over a blurry background of rising and falling tones. The whole track is very befitting of its name; almost a whispered hush of late night Detroit house with more than an ethereal edge to it. Adding the title track from the Hazyville album shows Cunningham’s breadth of style with a robotic chunk of aquatic electro that recalls the great stalwarts of Motor City funk, Drexciya. It is however a more updated version of that sound and owes allegiance also to dubstep and UK garage. “Redit 124,” also a product of Hazyville, finds the producer in uncertain territory with something even more experimental that encapsulates Aphex Twin style breakbeat and muted, bass heavy tech-house. It may seem like a bit of a tease only having the occasional fresh track being offered up by Actress, but you can’t begrudge the man for wanting to spread the word of Hazyville further. And if the new tunes are all of this exacting, high quality then you can only hope that it’s not too long before we see another.