The Guest List: Local Talk celebrate 13 years of dedication to house music

Delivering nostalgic, forward-thinking and timeless releases since 2010, Mad Mats and Tooli of Swedish label Local Talk have never steered far from their warm, fuzzy and deeper take on house music.

‘Local Talk – 13 Years Later’ recently arrived as a celebration of Mats and Tooli’s irrevocable commitment to letting artists shine through their own genuine light — label staples like Soul Renegades, Nico Lahs, Laroye, Alex Attias & Sohan Wilson bring out the Local Talk brand through jazzy and worldly characteristics. And the label is more than just a brand, it’s petri dish of soulful experimentation, most-often handled by line-minded producers hoping for unique yet intertwined outcomes of impeccable house grooves.

Mixmag Asia invites Mad Mats and Tooli to break down the 10 milestone tracks from the Local Talk catalogue that mark the label's history in chronological order.

One of our very first releases that released at the peak of the new revival of 90s house in the early 2010s. A really bumpy retro jam that I still think holds up.

One of the most recognised tunes on Local Talk. Funny enough this was not intended to be on the 12" at first, there was another track we wanted to release but it was not possible and then I got sent this...thankfully. It became an anthem, and we even re-released it on a separate 12" with an extended version.

After all the 90s tracks on the first releases we started to move into more soulful house and this is probably my fave one within the genre.

Deep and gritty with a badass bassline. So simple yet so good. HNNY is a genius!

This great tune lands somewhere between house and UK garage and got so much character in the main theme. Bumpy x 10 ☺

Martin Iveson aka Atjazz gave us a release that will work just as well on big sound systems as well in those dark house basements.

This actually started out as remix on a Sameed track (Can’t U) but it turned out to be so strong we decided to release it as a stand-alone single instead. I think we took the right decision ;)

When we approached our 100th release on the label a lot of people started asking if we would release anything with HNNY or Kyodai. They certainly did not expect this! It's a real trip and takes you on a real journey for sure.

If you took all the releases we've done and mixed them together then maybe it would sound something like this.

How do you follow up release No.100? With this release from DASCO of course! A fine example of DASCO’s creativity, a carefully crafted composition focused around a strong bassline, layers of percussions and melodies with instant hooks.

One of our more recent releases, "tasteful and melodic deep house productions coming out of Italy in the mid/ late 90’s". Personally, I think it's timeless, you listen to it and it reminds you of something you've heard before but also fresh and with a lot of soul. Craig Smith not only co-produced the track as part of Sound Signals, he also remixed it as 1/2 of Sound Signals.

Listen to and buy 'Local Talk 13 Years Later Part 1' here.

Arun Ramanathan is Mixmag Asia’s Director. Follow him on Instagram.