As ever, Cocoon Recordings celebrate the turn of the year with another mouth-watering collection of electronic music. Dots And Pearls Volume 7 includes eight choice techno cuts of varying shapes and sizes, that somehow manage to acknowledge both past and future, while staying forever rooted in the ‘here and now’. The lush, beach bar vibes of ‘Halluzinelle’ get things rolling courtesy of DeFeKT x Extrawelt, and it’s not long before we’re lost in the subsonic undertow as the warm acidic vibes ebb and flow. Sudo’s ‘Daytona’ then compliments a dark, low-slung groove with a soaring, nostalgic melody that reaches skywards, melting hearts and minds in the process. ‘Solaris’ takes a more urgent turn as JA:CK utilizes growling synths, stuttering arpeggios and an elongated breakdown, slowly raising the stakes as the dance floor starts folding in on itself. Avision offers no respite on ‘Groove Theory’, maintaining the intensity while surfing the frequencies through a dense forest of loops with a pounding 909 for company. Zzino & Insider continue the 90s leaning retrospective with ‘Mind Crush’ and they’re certainly true to their word, juxtaposing razor-sharp acid arpeggios with seductive chords and analog washes in a cavernous, serotonin-soaked epiphany of sound. Monaco, Povoa then gets downright dirty on ‘Makeup Artist’, raising the tempo with freaking metallic riffs, twisted vocals and a plethora of disorientating filter action that’ll push even the most headstrong dancefloor to the brink of implosion. Defex, Tsodor reels it in just in time on the epic ‘Sieg der Liebe’, unleashing thick swathes of melancholy chords over a fat, rolling groove and the beats remain broken to the end, as Christopher Ledger closes things out with a classic slice of sci-fi electro. ‘X24’ is all stuttering edits, intricate sequences, squelching fx and metallic bleeps, adding yet another unexpected dimension to this dynamic compilation series.