Jellybean - Secrets & Lies

Funky US house that’s unfortunately all a bit too familiar in its angle of enrichment from JB Benitez. With Chicago’s Carla Prather as the soothing soul-house masseuse, the kind that actually betrays the stern lecture she’s giving, it would take a heart of stone to not tap a toe at least to Benitez’ latest beach party takeover, doing what he knows best and drenched in radiant opulence. But it’s simply too fluffy and set in formula – nonchalantly singular piano chords, bubbly percussion, bassline nip, etc – and the initial swooning turns into a chat-up line you’ve heard (and rejected) numerous times previously. Dub, acapella and bonus beats are available if you wanna search for Benitez’s Midas touch a bit further.
NYC’s Scott Wozniak keeps an eye on the night drawing in with a sub-house, Morse Code tapping – completely un-technical and yet still a funky pillar on the low – and icy electro cycles that makes Secrets & Lies something to hold dearer. Now well into the small hours, London’s Guy Robin is also one to put one over the original, although in fairness only by marginally darkening the template with the breathlessly pale chords and making the dancefloor strictly a candlelit rendezvous for two. If it takes on sedative-like abilities, it’s even tucked you into a silken nook with its unseen magic or made you nod off out of repetition. Secrets and Lies is probably too luxurious for its own good.