Audiopile Review: The newest venture for Mood Hut is a bit of a cross country affair, teaming local legend Michael Red with the Mexican-born, Montreal-based producer Ultima Esuna. While Red’s wide-ranging palette, hitting almost everything between ambient and dubstep, is a familiar presence in the shop and throughout the Vancouver dance and experimental scene, Ultima Esuna is a new name to us. And after listening back to some of her digital-only singles and recent Bandcamp EP on DJ Python’s Worldwide Unlimited, it’s clear that her complex latinate rhythms are the driving force behind this collaboration. Kicking off Water Seeds is the densely packed “Lemuria”, the sweaty and bucking percussion are subdued by a melodic synth line that wouldn’t sound out of place on Casino Vs Japan’s Go Hawaii. The buoyant “Atlantis” completes the A-Side, a sub-heavy ambient-house number fitted with the subtly tweaked sounds of the rainforest and chopped up vocals that give this an almost 3D feeling. “Mantarraya” is all crystalline synths and syrupy reggaeton riddems, and “Eros” takes it all home with an array of stuttering percussion and whirring electronics. The Mood Hut curation right now is absolutely on-point, with Water Seeds as the third entry, alongside very recent EPs from Cousin and Knopha, into an unspoken trilogy of expertly executed sound design-y dance music that keeps the attentive home listener in mind. Top marks all around. RIYL DJ Python and Ramzi.

Oro Azul is a new collaborative project from Michael Red and Ultima Esuna.

Water Seeds takes us through 4 shades of an aquatic garden. Dembow floats underneath the waves while woodblock melodies bubble up through the weeds. Sub bass shifts the tide. Some sounds are mosslike, a protective balm. Other tones come through as minerals and metals, shining in the refracted light from above.