Sofia Kourtesis - Madres (2LP)

Sofia Kourtesis makes dance music that feels like holding sunlight in your hands, and Madres might be the purest distillation of that feeling yet. Arriving in late October 2023 through Ninja Tune, her debut album bottles Berlin club drive and Lima street colour, then shakes it into something generous and human. The title is not coy. Madres is dedicated to her mother, whose serious illness shaped the record’s making, and it includes a quiet thank you to Professor Peter Vajkoczy, the Berlin neurosurgeon who helped her family. That personal stake gives the album its pulse, a sense that every snare, whistle and chant is pushing towards care, towards life.

You can hear it straight away in the title track. Madres builds from a small vocal loop, almost like a secret shared at the back of a tram, then rises with bright synths and crisp percussion, the kind of house rhythm that would land just as well at 3am as it would on a slow morning with the windows open. Kourtesis has a knack for making big feelings sit inside small, tidy frames, and the album keeps delivering that trick. Si Te Portas Bonito feels like a celebration across three adjoining courtyards, a lattice of handclaps, cowbell and a humming bassline that never bullies the melody. The way she lets air in, leaving space for the room to breathe, is half the magic.

Estación Esperanza is the obvious draw for many, featuring Manu Chao, and it earns its place. His warm, familiar voice slides into her glistening framework without nostalgia getting in the way, more like a neighbour popping round for a chorus and a grin. The vocal line bounces off sharp hi hats and that bubbling low end Kourtesis favours, so it lands as a meeting of worlds rather than a bolt-on feature. This is a record full of crossings, between continents and between moods, and that track nails the point with a big heart and a light step.

Vajkoczy is the deeper cut that keeps pulling me back. Named for the doctor who treated her mother, it does not go for grand gestures. Instead it turns a few elements with patience, a careful arpeggio, a snare that tightens by degrees, field recordings tucked like photographs behind the glass. It sounds like gratitude turning into movement. The album closer, How Music Makes You Feel Better, wears its title like a diary entry. It starts spare, a soft shuffle and a comforting synth figure, then blooms into sparkling chords, as if she is showing her workings, the way rhythm and repetition can carry you through the long hours.

Kourtesis records and samples widely, often folding in the daily music of Lima, vendor calls, street brass, whistles, and you feel those textures flicker across Madres. They never read as gimmicks. She treats them as living instruments, giving the record the warmth of a lived-in place, the clatter of a market at lunch, then the hush that follows afternoon rain. Underneath, the drum programming is clean as a scalpel. Even the busiest passages keep their shape, which is why these tracks hit so well on a decent system. If you are the kind who hunts Sofia Kourtesis vinyl, this one rewards a quiet listen and a loud one.

As a debut album, it carries a lovely confidence. Kourtesis came through a run of well loved EPs, and here she resists the urge to stretch every idea to the horizon. Most pieces sit around that sweet spot where a dance track tells you enough and leaves you wanting one more turn. That restraint keeps Madres nimble, and it lets the emotion sit in the open without tipping into sentimentality. There are flashes of melancholy, but she always finds a bassline that smiles.

If you are crate digging in a Melbourne record store, or lining up a weekend order of vinyl records Australia wide, Madres belongs in the stack. The artwork looks ace on a shelf, and the Madres vinyl pressing has the sort of low end that gives your speakers a friendly workout without clouding the highs. For those who like to buy Sofia Kourtesis records online, it sits nicely with her earlier 12 inches, and if you are building a row of Sofia Kourtesis albums on vinyl, this will be the spine you reach for when friends come round.

In a year thick with worthy electronic long players, Madres stood out because it felt necessary. Not heavy, just honest. You can dance to it, you can cook to it, you can let it keep you company. That is a rare balance, and it is why this record will hang around long after the singles drift out of rotation.