Heels & Souls

Heels & Souls, London based not-for-profit party, reissue label and the DJ duo of Ben Croft and Patrick Forrester.

Starting life as a nomadic fundraising party in 2015, the pair moved between some of London’s most interesting, lesser-known dance spots before finally making The Pickle Factory their de-facto home in 2017. Since then, they’ve hosted the likes of Pender Street Steppers, Peach, Tornado Wallace, D.K, Mad Miran, Lauren Hansom, Jan Schulte, Bianca Lexis, DJ Slyngshot, Mark Grusane and Club Fitness at the party, which is distinguished by it’s devoted, warm crowd and the DIY cloud lighting fixtures that hang from the clubs infamous wooden beams. To date, they have raised over £50,000 for a variety of charitable causes.

Their prominence as a DJ duo has risen in tandem with the profile of their parties. Unconstrained by genre their impassioned sets navigate anything from lovers rock, UK street soul and dancehall to slinky 90s house, tech house and progressive, with a soulful thread connecting the dots. Alongside club gigs and festival appearances across Europe, highly tipped podcasts for the likes of Planet Triiip, Alter Disco and Stamp The Wax, and live streams for Mixmag Lab and Vinyl Factory have bolstered their reputation as ones to watch. Previous residents on Worldwide FM, the duo now hold a monthly residency on Rinse FM.

Born out of the pandemic, Heels & Souls Recordings was launched in 2020, a reissue label reviving Ben and Pat’s most keenly prized and sought after tunes. The imprint has gathered an impressive momentum, garnering features and reviews on Resident Advisor, Bandcamp and Test Pressing, with Gilles Peterson naming their reissue of Special Touch’s UK street soul grail ‘Garden Of Life’ one of his top reissues of 2020. Expect the label to reflect their broad tastes, with Canadian downtempo, UK Balearic and German new beat already released and UK bhangra, South African house and much more all forthcoming.

Best friends, you’ll often see the pair joking and beaming from behind the decks. It’s a refreshingly approachable and unpretentious attitude that, along with their deep-digging and smooth blends, is fast tuning people into the world of Heels & Souls.