(February 2010) Despite beginning, and growing, across the UK and Europe in the 1980’s, New Wave is having its renaissance in America. Of course there have been pioneers of the sound based in the US, Experimental Products to name but one, but it is indisputable that the sound was forged by the post war generation of Europe. One label that has surfaced in recent times is Dark Entries, an imprint based in San Francisco.
Just before the start of the new decade Dark Entries brought out a 7″ by Adam Stroupe, aka Death Domain. The two tracker opens with “Ethidium Bromide,” an homage to a fluorescent mutagen. The track skids the divide between punk and new wave, but just leans towards the latter bordering into EBM. The lyrics have an infectious un-emotive quality that run into the B-Side, “Programme Cell Death.” It soon becomes clear that Death Domain is a microbiology and chemistry nut, utilising this cellular and molecular world to inspire his work. “Programme Cell Death” lowers the tempo a touch and settles into more of an EBM sound. The synthline is unnervingly catchy, with its simple snares punching through analogue reverberations to produce an amazingly addictive composition. The halted vocals mirror the sounds of The Normal or even a more minimalised Anne Clark.
Dark Entries are not just about the new generation, but look back to the dusty analogue annals to unearth some lost artists. In 1992 Christian Purwien and Andreas Sippel, aka Second Decay, decided to release a CD of their take on new wave. The CD only release, La Décadence Électronique, has finally returned some seventeen years since its digital inception onto vinyl. The tracks on the record are from the duo’s musings between 1988 and 1992. The LP stretches its limbs with the synthesizer medley of “Labortium I,” before the fast paced new wave pop piece of “A Kind of Dream” enters. “The Emerge” follows in a similar tempo, but has an element of lost love placed on top of the analogue chords. “Poisoned Water” is a tortured new wave work, writhing with physicality whilst its successor, “Chromatic” turns to a down-tempo work of cold isolated computer music. The tempo is raised for the upbeat “Grateful Vision” with its clever synthesizer movements before the cold calculated tones of “The Machine” makes their way in. Once more the beats rise with “Die Antwort,” the only track in German on the album. The track has a wonderful, almost crashing, synthline with the lyrics crippling the snares in their emotive pulses. “Enclose My Heart” is the unrequited new wave love track of the album. The synth composition is infectious and keeps running with tempered beats and an ache. “Interlace/Disconnect” is a slow lumbering work of arching analogue waves spinning across desolate vocals and a classic drum beat. John Foxx’s “Burning Car” follows, this time given a Second Decay twist. To those unfamiliar with the original it is of Foxx’s minimal synth sound, inter-spliced with the artist’s disillusion and uncertainty with Thatcherite Britain. The synthlines are brash and forward with some memorable movements. The vocals are lifeless and dispassionate, mirroring the alienation of, what Foxx saw as, an ultra-modernist world. The record ends as it began, with “Labortium II” and it’s instrumental synth curtain fall.
Dark Entries is starting out as a label. There are two LP’s and a 7″ on the books to date, and to date there seems to be some real quality coming from this West Coast imprint. Some labels spring up and don’t seem to have the background knowledge to actually pull the concept out of theory and into practice; this is not the case with Dark Entries. The label is exploring the past and present, allowing for a diverse stream of aging obscurities and new talent.
