Happy707 – Escupir Un Burgues [SBOX020]

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Happy707 have their vinyl debut, and it is well worth the wait. For years the Buenos Aires pair have been electrifying dancefloors far and wide, now their brand of electronics is set to infect even more speaker cones. With a unique style that meshes ebm, industrial, techno and wave, ‘Escupir Un Burgues’ is an addictive furore for the senses. From the energy packed “Cyber Chase”, the listener is pulled through the fog and the strobe of “El Extranjero” and into the headfirst thump of “Las Bolas.” Distant vocals and stuttering percussion are pivotal in the stripped bare title piece. Stammering synthlines and shattering snares rail and rage in the bold body music of “Magic Wave.” The curtain fall comes care of “Ultraman Theme.” Beats are emboldened, tempos race in this tongue in cheek slalom of laser beam melodies and videogames memories.

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Happy707 – Escupir Un Burgues [SBOX020]

Gifted & Blessed – Heard And Unheard LP [39156031]

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Gifted & Blessed returns with ‘Heard and Unheard’, an album that distills years of making music in a variety of styles and under different names into a singular statement. In addition to producing electronic music as Gifted & Blessed since the early 2000s, Gabriel Reyes-Whittaker has dabbled with many other aliases over the years: as Frankie Reyes, he explores his Puerto Rican heritage by playing Latin standards and originals on vintage keyboard instruments; as The Abstract Eye and The Reflektor, he creates dancefloor anthems with electronic hardware; and as GB and Julian Abelar, he’s released sample-based productions and techno adjacent dance music.

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Gifted & Blessed – Heard And Unheard LP [39156031]

Channel One – Technicolor [M003]

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Metroplex continues its run of reissues with two more seminal releases from the label’s golden back catalog. First off is Catalog number M003, aka late 80’s Metroplex electro staple Channel One, a Juan Atkins joint with Doug Craig (Carl Craig’s cousin) on vocals. Futuristic and playful techno from the late 80s which soundwise evolves from Cybotron and the obvious Kraftwerk influences. Juan Atkins said about the release in a 2005 interview that “it was more fun than politically driven, just about the colors and combination spread from colors”. An important release in the history of Techno from both a cultural and creative perspective. Channel One’s technicolor has been carefully remastered from the original tapes.

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Channel One – Technicolor [M003]

F.U.S.E. – Dimension Intrusion LP [WARPLP12R]

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‘Dimension Intrusion’ was the first full-length studio album by Richie Hawtin, who was 22 years old at the time and living in Windsor, Canada. It was first released in June 1993 under the F.U.S.E. name on Hawtin’s own Plus 8 Records imprint and again as the second release of Warp Records seminal ‘Artificial Intelligence’ series. The album compiled previously released F.U.S.E. EPs from Plus 8 complemented with new music specially recorded for this release. It would be a fundamental album for the young producer, who was experimenting with different themes and techniques to find his very own sound. Largely inspired by sci-fi movies he used a collection of synthesizers and drum machines, playing with their electronic yet warm sound effects and in turn discovering some of his favorite instruments.

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F.U.S.E. – Dimension Intrusion LP [WARPLP12R]

R​.​Gamble – Dream Sequence [KRI005]

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The fifth Kri release was produced by a New York based producer Richard Gamble. Dream Sequence EP explores the boundaries between mutated Wave, Minimal Synth, and EBM in search of a perfect loop and the most epic melody. A dim and moisty atmosphere is often cut by a ray of light but you can’t be sure if it’s just a flashing strobe. Three original tracks command absolute attention on the dancefloor or on the sofa and are accompanied by a Violet Poison remix.

R​.​Gamble – Dream Sequence [KRI005]

Love In Cage – Trans​-​Reality [SEA023]

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Third album from Rouen cold & arty band Love In Cage, between some cold synth electronic tracks, some post-punk anthems and a deep lynchian dark rock on the second half of the record. Perfect marriage of 80’s sound & contemporary music. A must have for wave & cold lovers.

Love In Cage – Trans​-​Reality [SEA023]

Facets – Breakable [OMDD053]

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Optimo Music presents the new EP from Facets. EBM has become a much abused term in recent times but here are some tracks exploring that EBM DNA where the creator 100% knows that history and what they are doing. Taking that knowledge and bringing that sound right up to date.

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Facets – Breakable [OMDD053]

VA – Next Wave Acid Punx DEUX [Eskimo]

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Next Wave Acid Punx DEUX is the second compilation for Eskimo Recordings compiled and curated by Berlin-based Musician and DJ Luca Venezia, aka Curses, to explore the darker side of club music. Spread across 3CDs and three 2LPs Next Wave Acid Punx DEUX features a mammoth 49 tracks that join the dots between early industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle, EBM legends like Nitzer Ebb and the post-punk experiments of people like Malcolm McLaren and Big Audio Dynamite with some of the most exciting artists around today, such as Boy Harsher, Nuovo Testamento and Years of Denial. Where the first Next Wave Acid Punx compilation was a personal journey for Luca, a lockdown inspired exploration of his record collection to find the thread that ran through the music that had soundtracked much of his life, DEUX is a celebration of that music let loose on the world, the thrill of music performed live, the smoke and strobe filled clubs you’ll hear it in and the artists you’ll find on those stages.

chapter 1 / chapter 2 / chapter 3 / CD

VA – Next Wave Acid Punx DEUX [Eskimo]

Model Alpha – Perceptions [OBL05]

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Jonathan Fitoussi & Julie Freyri are Model Alpha. 8 years on after their first album Dimensions, Perceptions is the duo’s second album and was entirely composed on analog synthesizers. Model Alpha is inspired by electronic artists such as Kraftwerk, Laurie Spiegel, Manuel Göttsching or early Detroit techno productions. An elegant blend of synthesizers and drum machines including remix by Chloé (Thévenin).

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Model Alpha – Perceptions [OBL05]

Poetical Licence – Footprints [LER1033]

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Poetical License was a brief project uniting Scottish born and Aotearoan (New Zealand) musician Mark Airlie and keyboardist and vocalist Keri Ansley after the duo met in New Plymouth. The solitary 7” came together in 1986, recorded at the infamous Auckland studio, The Lab. The A side’s fragile Footprints is as utterly charming as it is drenched in melancholia with a delicate glockenspiel lick and Ansley’s ethereal delivery of the vocals. On the B Side, Room 101 pivots to wonky rock and a more post-punk approach to composition. The two tracks shine brightly among an abundance of outsider gems made in Aotearoa during the 1980s

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Poetical Licence – Footprints [LER1033]

Anatolian Weapons – Teachings In Stone LP

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‘Teachings In Stone’ is a self released album by Greek producer Aggelos Baltas AKA Anatolian Weapons. It is available for download only on his bandcamp page. All tracks produced 2019 and remixed 2020.

Anatolian Weapons – Teachings In Stone LP

Moritz von Oswald – Silencio LP [TRESOR339LP]

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What are the differences and similarities between human and artificial sound, between oscillations generated by vocal cords and synthesizer voices, voltage amplified by speakers? On ‘Silencio’, his latest album for Tresor Records, Moritz von Oswald works with a 16-voice choir to explore this concept. Drawing from the ensemble works of long-standing inspirations Edgard Varèse, György Ligeti and Iannis Xenakis, von Oswald and Vocalconsort Berlin delve into the space between sounds, creating a deeply textured collection that shifts between light & ethereal and dark & dissonant. The vast dynamism of the human voice adds to the profound weight of electronics while offering up a rhythmic source and sonic noise palette unexplored in von Oswald’s repertoire. In Silencio, von Oswald dredges a dank murk, pulling clouds over a distant pulse. It hangs, ready to take on new forms.

vinyl / CD

Moritz von Oswald – Silencio LP [TRESOR339LP]

Actress – LXXXVIII LP [ZEN295]

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‘LXXXVIII’ is the ninth Actress album to be created by Actress (Darren Cunningham) and the very first presentation of Actress’ voyage into luxury sonics.
A lifetime in the making, ‘LXXXVIII’ is the culmination of 25 years’ honing mind-shorting, soul-igniting audio infusions for dance floors, rave dens, festivals, and concert halls. ‘LXXXVIII’ pays dividends to meditate on an instrumental facet of its creation: game theory. Indeed, deep strategic thinking – more readily associated with economics and chess than artistic practice – was fundamental to Actress’ process as ‘LXXXVIII’ was channelled into existence.

vinyl / CD

Actress – LXXXVIII LP [ZEN295]