Although I wasn't a huge fan of Sascha Funke's debut album Bravo, I did highly enjoy the Boogybytes Vol. 1 mix that came out earlier this year on the Bpitch Control label. On that first go-around, Kiki took the controls and spit out a highly enjoyed batch of tunes that combined electro with sleek techno and even pulled off a couple slick dance mashups. Following quickly on the heels is this outting from Sascha Funke, and it's even better than the first entry in the series, flowing with a graceful arc that starts softly before dropping the hard beats home and finally cooling down again at the end.

The mix opens with the delicate ambient warblings and pitter-patter beats of "Jean" by Efdemin, and it eases things along nicely until the deliciously minimal tech of "Serenitti" by Trentmøller takes the mix up to the next level of smooth. From there, Funke locks into a wicked groove that doesn't let up at all, and he throws out tracks by big names (including an Isolee remix of Ricardo Villalobos and DJ Koze's side project International Pony) while gliding between genres with a deft touch.

Showing he's not only about including the bigger modern day names in electronic music, Funke even drops back to the early 90s for a cheesy rave-up track from Transformer 2 that has all the standard hallmarks of the era (including big pumping synths arpeggios, blasting whistles, and electronic cowbell). One of the best inclusions on the release is actually a track from Funke himself entitled "In Between Days" that cracks with more power than anything off his debut album and stands up alongside anything else on the release.

Even though the mix is fairly eclectic, it angles towards the side of deep and rich dance music and it actually seems to get even stronger during the second half, where he blows through rumblers from Louderbach, Voigt & Voigt, and an especially crunching beast from Sleeparchive that puts a real exclamation point on the mix. Finishing things out with a ray of sunshine, as the disc closes with a gorgeous cover of Jackson Browne's "These Days" by Phantom Ghost. Because of the eclectic taste and great flow, Boogybytes Vol. 2 is probably my favorite mix disc I've heard since Michael Mayer's entry to the Fabric Series.