First off, this was released and copyrighted in 1993. Just so you know. Now to review. Honestly, I like it but it exemplifies a style that started to really annoy the hell out of me by 1995, the "DJ-friendly" style of music production. Where the tracks stay the same from start to finish. A hi-hat or snare or whatever else may come in and out from time to time but there's no major changes to indicate a "song" is happening, just a "track". Now again, I like the material on this EP, but as a "sit and listen" kind of record, it ain't happening. After a while you start to wonder if the tracks will ever end. I just happen to like what is happening when it is. But universally kick-ass techno this isn't. Just good DJ-friendly tools. The dual kicks on "The New Place" is what makes the whole damn thing worthwhile, and the pseudo-acid of "Mikado" is cool too, but the damn tracks just drag on too long. Reminder to producers - if you're going to make "traxx", please initiate some chord changes or some damn kind of changes to relegate repeated listening! Otherwise your "dope traxx" get to be just plain boring! Thankfully this EP displays some unique elements that lift it out of its own funk. If these tracks were more like so much other Harthouse material it would be a sure-fire winner, but as such, it's a better-than-average DJ tool.

While I agree with you on Trouble and Mikado, I have to take issue with your placement of New Place in the same category. It is one of the most constantly changing techno/trance (as there wasn't such a distinct line between the two back then) tracks I've heard in some 20+ years of listening to techno. The entire structure of the track is based around taking you to a new sonic location with each shift between sections. I know what you're talking about with the boredom I also grew with some of the Harthouse productions around this time, as well as other labels. It was around that time (the summers of 1996-97) that I decided I needed a change of environment and spent my time away from college in Ann Arbor with weekly trips into Detroit for true underground raves (prior to the R.A.V.E Act) and it really served to widen my horizons to an entirely new style, from hard to soulful techno, that was being played in the home of techno at the time. That said, New Place will always hold a special place in my heart because it is such a unique track. Rather than winding around slowly from one sound palette to another, it makes clear 90 degree turns and the changes are stark, to say the least.