French house

Also called French touch or filter house: a style of house music that emerged in France in the mid-to-late 1990s, built on looped samples from disco, funk and soul records. Its defining technique is heavy filtering, in which producers sweep a filter over the loop to make the sound open up and close down, combined with sidechain compression that makes the music “pump” with the kick drum. It typically runs at around 120–126 BPM and is known for its warm, groovy, feel-good character. Daft Punk’s Homework (1997) and Stardust’s “Music Sounds Better with You” (1998) became its defining records. Cassius, Bob Sinclar, Modjo (“Lady,” 2000), Alan Braxe and labels such as Thomas Bangalter’s Roulé also shaped the sound. In the 2000s a harder, more distorted “French touch 2.0” followed on labels such as Ed Banger, led by Justice.