2013 was a bit of a renaissance year for Giorgio Moroder, his production influence highlighted as a result of a massive hat tip courtesy of Daft Punk and some excellent coverage in the mainstream media.
Moroder is without doubt a musical genius - a multi-instrumentalist and visionary producer, much of his work of the late-70s and 80s is staggering. I Feel Love is frankly better than most artists achieve in a whole lifetime.
None of this gives us anything new to devour though - whilst Moroder still creates music it can be hit and miss... The Daft Punk collaboration is pretty great (even if you do hate the intro), but his remix of Haim's Forever is, frankly, dog shit (and it's his fault, not Haim's).
I'd argue we don't need anything else, anything new... Just stick I Feel Love on again and gurn your way through another 16-minutes of pleasure. Still, into this flabby modern wasteland come I-Robots' re-constructions of Utopia.
I-Robots' aim was simple - take the partially mixed track that appeared on Moroder's From Here To Eternity and create longer stand-alone versions. And that they do, successfully. All three versions are very true to the originals (re-edits more than remixes to be honest) - cleaned and extended but little else.
The 1977 Reconstruction extends the track from 3:23 to almost seven minutes. The 2014 Tape Reconstruction is created based on a dream of the remixer in which they found an old lost Moroder tape, using it to give the track a slightly fuller mix and a slight cassette fuzziness. Finally the 2014 Reconstruction is a cleaner version of the Tape Reconstruction, the tech-house beat giving it a more contemporary feel.
The three mixes are similar enough that this is really aimed at real Moroder fans and to be honest, the greatest appeal is likely to be in the availability of the track on a standalone 12-inch for the first time (without the 2014 Reconstruction). The 1977 Reconstruction does the job though, and I'd happily spin that all day every day provided it meant I never had to hear that dreadful Haim remix again. Shame on you Giorgio.
Utopia - Me Giorgio is released through Deeplay Digital and Opilec Music on 28 February.