While its exterior may shed elements of sun-soaked shoegaze balanced perfectly with lively electronics, Biodance is an abundant kaleidoscope of feel-good ear candy that will surely settle on many a top list for 2012.. n5MD continue their growth into powerful forays of emotion-filled audio extraction—but what’s astounding is when you can physically hear it buried [...]
Category: "Reviews"
Posthuman :: Nebula EP & Remixes (Acroplane)
Continuing a musical style inhabiting acidic sci-fi techno and dark-side Detroit leanings, Posthuman return with the five track Nebula EP on Acroplane plus a follow up remix selection from Datasette, Kirk Degiorgio, Nightwave and Boxcutter (under Planet Mu pseudonym The Host). With a discography going back to 2000, a rave CV that covers club nights [...]
Derek Piotr :: Airing (Bitsquare)
Carefully processed, minimal and manipulated layers of various instruments, beats, clicks, field recordings and his own vocals are lowered down from above and slotted together with the delicate precision but contradictory force of an industrial crane, placing steel girders into concrete foundations and often leaving you in the centre his own musical construction site. The [...]
Dub Mentor :: Versions (EnT-T)
Dub Mentor’s warm, peeled-down arrangements, comprised of loping drum loops, chocolatey bass and treated field recordings for texture, lend these tunes the intimacy of late-evening jazz. In its pursuit of optimal clarity of sound, Tel Aviv label EnT-T has been compared favourably with ECM. The Manfred Eicher of this operation is Lior Suliman and his [...]
Funckarma vs. Onionboy :: Rusty Kokon EP (Shipwrec)
Funckarma (the Funcken brothers) and Darko Esser’s Onionboy project combine to creatively sinter a four-track compilation and remix EP, (Rusty Kokon) on the Netherland’s Shipwrec label. Funckarma (the Funcken brothers) and Darko Esser’s Onionboy project combine to creatively sinter a four-track compilation and remix EP, (Rusty Kokon) on the Netherland’s Shipwrec label. Musically, each track [...]
Asonat :: Love In Times Of Repetition (n5MD)
A very picturesque musical journey through introverted winter-like soundscapes which deliberately bring to the fore a certain sense of mysteriousness and sentimental brilliance. [n5Mailorder] Love In Times Of Repetition is the first full-length release of a dream pop / electro ambient duo newly formed by two musicians from Island. This astonishing and deeply moving collection [...]
(val)Liam :: Dissolving Archetypes (Beats & Pieces)
Surpassing the limited confines of classification, Dissolving Archetypes bubbles in a mist of soothing percussive textures, tranquil atmospheric notes and wilting melodic layers. It’s inevitable that a series of adjectives will likely embed themselves in reviews of Dissolving Archetypes, (val)Liam’s third album released on Israel-based Beats & Pieces. Chill, downtempo, ambient, electronica and dub immediately [...]
Photophob :: Wasteland Vibes (Laridae)
Photophob has got a very deep, dark and densely textured sound going on with hints of apocalyptic dubstep, shoegaze and industrial influences. Thick rasping basses sear through oppressive textures like missiles across the sky of a city razed to the ground. Photophob has got a very German sound going on. He’s Austrian, but I don’t really [...]
Bob Chance & Suns of Arqa :: Double review (Emotional Rescue & Emotional Response)
This is but a small sample of a fledgling label. Bob Chance rings with intensity and grit, a precursor of a sound that would be taken up by EBM and New Beat. Suns of Arqa comes from a different tradition, that of disco, dub and spiraling sounds. Despite the grim economic forecasts there are some [...]
Zygote :: 00/10 (Architects + Heroes)
What’s been excavated on 00/10 are microscopic fractures of armchair electronics—sprinkles of chimes, pulses, acid, bass, clunks and textured synth noise falls from every edge. [Bandcamp] A collection of untitled tracks has been packaged up from Southern California’s busy Architects + Heroes‘ main detailer Stephen Ruiz (aka Zygote). After having combed through several hours of [...]
Chris Moss Acid :: Bay of Cadiz (030303)
It was never too clear what Bay of Cadiz was going to be about. There was a chance of 303 bedlam, a chance of house pastiche. Instead Moss Acid delivers a measured and modern sound using the vintage acid box. There’s a definite slice of AFX to the sound. It seems that wherever you turn [...]
Nimh :: This Crying Era (Synästhesie Schallplatten)
This Crying Era is a gorgeously cinematic and ominously bewitching album that will ravish fans of the most uncompromising facet of the dark ambient genre (masterful works from Lustmord, Raison d’être, Never Known…). Absolutely recommended for beginners in Nimh’s dark ambient and mystical droning minimalism. Nimh is an avant-garde deep ambient industrial electronic project formed [...]
Mirt :: Artificial Field Recordings (Cat Sun)
His sound has the aural texture of a daguerreotype, the mid-nineteenth century photographic process that makes every nuance, every pore so sharp and visible, though eerily, silvery. The trumpet he plays is a very wise choice as it adds some carnal juice. Wooden rhythms, fizzling wires, springs and flywheels and dub echoes bouncing off bare [...]
Axxess :: Novels for the Moon (Medical)
The album is pure synthesizer, from beginning to end. Mimran takes Barhardt’s machine and test drives it to the limit. Melodies are poured from one speaker to another, counter rhythms rushing forth and accelerating past tapered beats. Axxess traverses a gamut of sounds, cornering ambience whilst pursuing a new electronic destination. [Buy at Amazon] You’ve [...]
Seetyca :: Bleakscapes (Essentia Mundi)
The pieces Seetyca calls Bleakscapes are not grey and barren, they are near impenetrably inky black and evoke scary amounts of space far away from where we are. The only ripples in the fabric are radio signals heading even further off and some static circling the drain of a black hole. German dark ambient artist [...]
Claro Intelecto :: Reform Club (Delsin)
It becomes clear that the “reform” in Reform Club points not only toward tighter, slicker production but also to the combination of tech house and dub oriented beats that has evolved so much since his 2008 release Metanarrative. There are multi-insturmentalists in the more physical world of music but in the world of electronic music [...]
Stephen Hummel :: Meld (Self-Released)
With a handful of genres lapped over each other, Meld is an adventurous foray of raw electronics melded to lyrical lava flows that trickle into the subconscious with ease, simplicity and style. A well-oiled release that will surely agree with fans of Bitcrush, Tobias Lilja, Syntax and even mid-80s Depeche Mode for that matter. [Release [...]
Lone :: Garden Galaxy (R & S)
Lone acts as a guide through a futuristic, intergalactic rainforest full of Avatar-like creatures and massive landscapes. Even without the aid of song titles, the tracks lead the listener through a fantastical digital jungle of glowing waterfall drops, spliced African drums, flowing rivers of binary code, and massive caverns of glimmering stalactite tones. I’ve played [...]
wAgAwAgA :: Midnight Sampler (Record Label Records)
wAgAwAgA has an unusual take on music, with deep basses, really interesting beats and odd field recordings in abundance. He instantly stands out as having a unique style—not aggressive but not altogether passive. Innovative but not leaving the familiar completely in the shadows. I’ve been a fan of wAgAwAgA for a while now, ever since [...]
Demdike Stare :: Elemental (Modern Love)
Doubtless the duo would blanch if pigeonholed with labels like “dark,” “hauntological,” “drone” or “witch house” but there’s no denying their penchant for the arcane and unsettling, whether through bleak soundscapes Andy Votel’s supernatural and apothecary artwork or the archival, low budget exploitation movie images that accompany their live performances. What is it about Demdike [...]
Qebrus :: Exophobia (Bedroom Research)
As loyalists wait for Booth’n Brown to assimilate their frequency interrupts, now would be the time to digest Exophobia‘s gelatinous beat crunching rhythms as they consistently scrape against the grain. [Release page] On the outside Exophobia appears as foreign electronic mayhem—a deluge of sonic architecture gone awry. And with this hypothesis perhaps Qebrus’ intent was [...]
Jeff Pils :: Useless (Digital Gadget)
Useless dives headfirst into subtle fusions of electro, ambient and light melodies without being overtly in your face. Slithering around loosely crafted bells, pops, cracks, plunks and shades of emotion, each piece doesn’t rely solely on twisting itself around tangled data bursts. Jeff Pils’ self-released Useless sheds light on the uncompacted soil of electro, its [...]
Quanta :: Overflow EP (Enig’matik)
Smoldering bass, trudging beats, spaced lyrical blurbs and precision mastering of low-end frequencies are perhaps Quanta’s finest points. [Release page] Turning more towards dub than its darker step-brother, Quanta (aka 18-yr musical veteran Shane Harris) is the latest signing for Australia’s Enig’matik, an imprint that has steadily nurtured its bass in many a form and [...]
Celestino :: Protector’s Tea (Love All Day)
Six very ecumenical, very clear, consecrated spaces. Just about every belief system has very simply criteria for the creation of sacred space anywhere, anytime—by convening a quorum, smudging the air, or drawing a circle on the ground. The solo debut of Gabe Celestino, an American in Korea, is a meticulously crafted set of six ambient [...]
4Play :: The microsound of Line
The four latest updates come from an impressively august roster led by post-industrial pioneer, Asmus Tietchens, and Lord of lowercase, Steve Roden, with luminaries Stephan Mathieu (+ Caro Mikalef), and France Jobin in strong support. Over the last decade Line has become synonymous with leading edge inquiry at the interface between digital minimalism and microsound. [...]
Feedback :: Walk The Line (MRX)
Walk the Line sees Minimal Rome enter the club, chin up and shoulders back. The MRX label has sought out sounds for the 1210 zealots, and Feedback’s latest is just that. Clever and powerful, with some armchair appeal from Mr 66. The MRX wing of Minimal Rome has lay dormant since Solvent poured his squalid [...]