TuneLab
SANDER KLEINENBERG in The Lab LA
Of course we’re here, chasing the ghost of a peak-time groove from a DJ who probably had a rider request for ‘energy’ spelled with three ‘e’s. Sander Kleinenberg’s The Lab LA session is that familiar itch: the need to dissect how a veteran stitches together a tech house narrative that feels both comfortingly classic and slyly current. The vibe is pure afterhours bunker, where the sweat on the walls has a harmonic minor sheen and every bassline feels like an inside joke. Technically, this is a masterclass in sustained, rolling pressure.
Locked at a steady 125 BPM, Kleinenberg uses the dominant 12A key as a home base, weaving in and out with harmonic cousins in 5A and 8B to create a seamless, driving arc. The energy profile is telling—a solid mid-range focus (0.51) over a punchy low-end (0.33), with just enough high-end sparkle (0.16) to keep the room on its toes rather than sending it into orbit. It’s mixing as hydraulic engineering, each transition a smooth piston firing. For crate diggers, the joy is in the selections that bridge eras.
Kyle Watson’s ‘The Afterhours’ is the perfect, moody opener, a contemporary tech-house tool with old-school tension. Odd Mob’s ‘Into You’ provides the unabashed, vocal-led sugar rush the set needs, while the double dose of Imany’s ‘Don’t Be So Shy’—first the Filatov & Karas bomb, then the Ruslan Nigmatullin twist—shows a DJ playing with different shades of a weapon. And the inclusion of Fade’s ‘All I Got (Chris Fortier 20yr Dub)’ is a deep, heads-down moment of respect for the progressive house bedrock. The journey is a sleek parabola: it begins in the shadowy corners with ‘The Afterhours’, builds to the euphoric, hands-in-air peak of the Roman Ramirez & Dmitriy Rs overhaul of Survivor’s ‘Eye of the Tiger’, and lands squarely back on the dancefloor with that same riotous closing track.