Various - BITten FLAC

Sublime from start to finish fusing layers of the TB 303 over lush synth pads. Its ethereal mind melting stuff. No review needed. Smitten set the bar so high here its never been surpassed by any.

There is no doubt about it, this is the quintissential London acid techno sound overview, and arguably better than the Liberator DJs "It's Not Intelligent...And It's Not From Detroit...But It's F**king 'Avin It" double disc compilation, which often pops up as the most striking example of this particular breed of crazy acid, funky and hard techno, with tongue in cheek attitude.
There are no less than five stone cold classic tracks here, and I really do mean classic as in earning a five out of a five vote! Lochi's Serious Tangent and London Acid City, DDR & The Geezer's Mad Cows On Acid, Dynamo City's Shape Shift and Geezer's Prozac rank not only among the finest tunes those respective artists have recorded, but are high up there with vintage London acid techno gems from its absolute finest hour, years before most of these artists slightly deteriorated, in a way that most of them toned down the Rolands and pursued a more straight up, hard techno sound.
But not here. "BITten", if nothing else, offers a ride through some of the finest and earliest releases of seminal labels like Smitten, Routemaster and Stay Up Forever, and as already mentioned, half of these tunes became anthems of an entire party generation, with Mad Cows On Acid and London Acid City being both particularly memorable and impressive; the first with its neck snapping pace and ridiculous acid sequence, while the latter is London's aquat scene anthem, with its timeless vocal "London acid city! London acid city! Our time is now!" Both are calling cards at many acid parties, and serve as immaculate examples of what the London sound is all about.
My favorite here, however, is Dynamo City's Shape Shift. Starting out as pretty thumping and minimal techno track with scarse acid, around the 04:50 mark, the world stops spinning around its axis and what is quite probably my personal favorite acid lead of all times gets dropped. Love it, I have listened to that point over a thousand times in my life and I'm still not bored.
Other notable moments are contributions by Ballistic and Geezer. Both artists deliver pretty hard and pumping material, with ecstatic and sharp acid melodies killing it during the tracks climax. Actually, there is so little here which is not memorable.
303 lovers of any orientation should get this no matter the cost. Naturally, fans of the early acid techno of London should not be without this one either, and the same goes for lovers of vintage techno, which can still rock a party, any given place and any given time.
I will repeat once again: this release has five undeniable classics, and if you catch me in an exceptionally great mood, I'd let a few of the other numbers here earn that one last star. Together with the aforementioned compilation by the Liberator DJs, this marks the pinnacle of London's acid techno scene. The attitude and the "reclaim the streets" aesthetic has never again been encapsulated as successfully as on this particular compilation. Some tracks here are really remarkable, an astonishing combination of hard techno and intelligent modulation of acid synths. Unlike many of the later releases these artists recorded, tracks here are not only of the highest quality and made with passion, but the music is so much fun to listen or dance to, and that is something you sure don't get a whole lot of these days!