Terry Francis – Fabric 02

Compared to Fabric 1 (Craig Richards) this is livelier, trippier, more friendly. They're both great mixes but here the rhythms are faster, there are voices are drifting in and out of focus, you're floating through clouds of different colours. It's like being enveloped in a warm psychedelic hug.
Hits a peak during "D&D Gold" when the "Welcome" vocals come back in, then holds it steady for another 20 minutes before gently winding down on the last track.
You could have a good time with this one.

Did 'R Change U' ever get a release?

word word

It's a solid mix which has stood the test of time. It speaks volumes that people are still commenting on this almost two decades after it first appeared. Well worth picking up, or digging out if it's been a while!

Like I wrote at Fabric 01 ... theres some sense of incompleteness when listening to this without Fabric 01 prior. Terry Francis' approach is different and I guess we can call this mix much more emotional and maybe fun than the first one was. That acapella of Château Flight's "Welcome" popping up here and there through the mix made it memorable for me.
To call this timeless, however, is a bit odd.

Wow, not listened to this Fabric mix in a good few years, probably around 8 or so, but I now why i used to listen to this mix so much back in the day. This mix is so fucking solid. Perfect four-to-the-floor techno/house. Nice and deep but banging enough for any party and the right vibe. Great days. I shed a tear for The End and Fabric from back then.

I agree with the listed comments. This mix is deep, warm and pulls you in and hypnotises you. Most of the tracks on here are very subtle and first time round you would probably ignore them but when put together as a cohesive whole... It just works! Like most dance music, it only makes sense when played by a DJ who knows how to work the tracks and is testament to Terry Francis's ability as a club DJ. A deep, tech-house classic, sublime, bewitching, beautiful and timeless.

Right out of the gate you're met with this mesmerizing deep house track that's really beautiful. Usually CDs don't start off that strong, and when they do, I pay attention, because it has classic potential. I am not left disappointed, as Francis pieces together a superb mix in Fabric 02. If you are a listener of tribal, tech, or deep house, then you will love this mix.

would anybody reading this like to tell me the details of "Outa The Blue – R Change U"? Did it ever get a release?

Classic Terry Francis. A tasty tech-house set only really let down by the final track which despite winding the set down is un-necessary. Go out as you meant to go on I say! Many of the Fabric/FabricLive CDs are of the same style and I highly recommend them ...

Terry Francis belongs to that rarefied elite among underground dance music DJs who can craft utterly compelling mixes with what appears to be minimal effort. In the hands of this unacknowledged master, seemingly bland Tech House tracks take on a life of their own. How Francis managed to identify 15 fairly obscure, somewhat disparate pieces of underground music, and to string them together into a coherent-sounding whole, remains a wonder. That this happened so early on in the Fabric series has held the label and subsequent DJs in the series to exceptionally high standards that, for me, really haven't been equalled until "Fabric 28: Wiggle" (2006), the sequel to the present mix which Francis recently put together with fellow Tech House traveller Nathan Coles.

The sound is low-key and laid back, but somehow fully engaging at the same time: it lies somewhere in that glorious but seldom–reached intersection between Tech House, Deep House, and Minimal House. The rhythmic texture has a dampened, elastic quality to it that's almost rubbery, bordering at times on dub and techno dub, but without the self-consciousness of those genres. The arrangements tend towards the minimal, but the tracks never descend into the soporific contrivance that is the undoing of large swathes of Minimal House. And the hypnotic flow of this mix is about as silky-smooth as you will find in the marketplace today. In short, Francis has delivered an astonishingly subtle piece of music that is at once buoyant and restrained, a Holy Grail of sorts for underground dance music, and ideal for dancing on tiptoes if that's your pleasure.

This DJ mix has an utterly timeless quality to it even though it was released more than four years ago. Other DJs and producers in the Tech House space would do well to pay close attention to Francis' craft, in particular how a good ear and a delicate touch are all that's needed to make this genre work. Fabric 2 and Fabric 28 are both highly recommended, especially to those who have (or can induce) the capacity to groove while chilling at the same time.