Steffi: Yours & Mine

Yours & Mine is a seductive and warm house record, teeming with both glassy, spotless textures and retro synthesizer squiggles. This Ostgut Ton debut is the first full-length album from Berlin’s Steffi Doms, and it fittingly speaks to her reputation as a prime performer and selector, as well as label head for Klakson and Dolly, rather than as a veteran producer. There isn’t a lot of artist production in Steffi’s discography; she’s better known for the loaded mixes like the one prepared for MNML SSGS last year, as well as for acclaimed live sets in her hometown. Yours & Mine builds on this characterization of her, as its nine pieces are rich with movement and provocative turns. The word “lull” doesn’t seem to enter her vocabulary. “Mine” is definitely weekend fare, its pulsing kick and classic drum machine beats sputter and click under a web of dramatic swells. Breathy gusts abound in the more subdued “Arms”, where the 808 taps are still intact against the worming keys and somewhat unsettling synth strings that swirl in the background. Alongside Steffi’s adept production, Brazilian singer Virginia Högl surprises those of us who have stern reservations about vocal house. Högl lends a sort of hushed soulfulness to a couple of tracks, offering love-affirming partial whispers, so pillow-soft, on “You Own My Mind” that her contributions are nothing less than perfectly complementary to the mood of the record.