confused machines
Group Modular – The Tunnel / Lonely Pylon [GM0NE]
Group Modular breaks the 3-year silence and launches a new series of 7inch releases, powered by Confused Machines and Delights labels. The first 45 features two familiar tunes, previously available only on short-run (and immediately sold-out) lathe-cut releases.
Max Schreiber – Variations on Memory Vol. 2 [DM11]
Max Schreiber is the more introspective guise of Mule Driver, reserved for drifting into fragile and haunted sonic territories. Variations on Memory Vol.2 deepens Schreiber’s exploration of collective sound and personal distortion. This time, fragments of lullabies and children’s songs resurface along side memorial songs – distorted by time, memory, and a quiet sense of unease. Schreiber treats these melodies not as sacred relics, but as raw material: vulnerable to noise, decay, and reinterpretation. Recorded in intuitive, often single-take sessions, the album challenges the listener’s sense of nostalgia. Sentimentality collapses into abstraction, and familiar tunes unravel into drifting soundscapes – like half-remembered scenes from a film that never existed. Variations on Memory Vol. 2 is less about what these songs once meant, and more about what they might conceal.
Ishai Adar – Our Boys (Soundtrack from the HBO Original Series) [DM12]
Composer and sound artist Ishai Adar unveils the original score for HBO’s Our Boys, now available digitally for the first time. The 2019 series dramatizes the harrowing events surrounding the 2014 abduction and murder of Palestinian teenager Mohammed Abu Khdeir in Jerusalem, offering an unflinching exploration of state power, communal trauma, and fractured identities. Adar’s score avoids conventional narrative cues, instead constructing a sonic architecture of electroacoustic dissonance and textural abstraction. The compositions conjure an imagined ensemble—acoustic instruments processed and mutated into something part-organic, part-synthetic, edged with overtones of drone and analog decay. The resulting sound captures a persistent sense of unease and interior tension, echoing the bleak interrogation rooms and shadowed urban landscapes that define the series.
Machinete – Cost to Cost [CM25]
Comprised of raw recordings, spontaneously conducted between 2012 to 2020 in Venice and later in Milan, Machinete are Marco Segato (La Serpiente) and Pietro Giubilato (TLXCO) executing and modulating rough post-industrial beats into pummeling electro structures with a brute sense of nocturnal acid in the air which strives to bring power to its knees.
All revenues from this album will be donated to The Ghassan Abu Sittah Children’s Fund (gascf.org). The fund provides medical assistance to children in critical need and supports the medical sector in Gaza and Lebanon.
Mule Driver – Trilobite / …And I Was There Too [CM26]
The term “Ides of March” refers to March 15th since the troubled days of the Roman Empire. But this year, more than ever, one might think these times of Calamity start on March 3rd, the annual TB-303 day, due to the boiling and dark tracks cooked by Mule Driver for this glorious day. Once you hear their lethal drop of electro-acid you can kiss the Roman empire goodbye – Mule Driver delivers the Roland Empire!
Kosmologic Research Society – Inner | Outer [DM10]
The story of “Inner | Outer” begins in 2015, when two members of Berlin bass combo X.A.Cute and Jerusalem’s psych grooves expert, Markey Funk, set up a spontaneous jam session in the basement of an ex-spring factory building. The outcome of that meeting – now known as “Aquasonic Research Society” (Som Recordings, 2020) – was so inspiring for the three that they determined to record again the next time Markey is in Berlin. Eventually, two more sessions took place in consecutive years at Oberbaumstübchen, overlooking river Spree, U-Bahn tracks and Universal Music headquarters. The change of location also led them to depart from the bubbling aquatic motives towards darker mesmerizing soundscapes that explore themes and mysteries of deep outer space and the human body (sometimes described as “inner space”).
Mujahideen – Dead Language [CM-RE02 / NRR2]
As the world got even worse in the past ten years, Mujahideen’s songs from 2014 about greed, vengeance, culture slaves and the human factor are more relevant than ever in 2024, as it seems that the world is trapped in a vicious circle, which summons new dawn of Fascism. Therefore, Dead Language still sounds like a prophecy of wrath accompanied by a shivering crossover of post punk, dub and industrial, inspired by bands like Suicide, P.I.L, The Fall, Mark Stewart & The Maffia, Section 25, Psychic TV, The Young Gods and The Chameleons, which offers a captivating but desperate introspection into the abyss of humankind.
Mule Driver – Sequences to Activate Dormant Agents [CM24]
Confused Machines presents another 808 day release. 7 Electro cuts using Roland TR-808, Roland SH-09, Korg MS-20, Korg MS-2000, Verbos Electronics modules and a few FX processors.
VA – No More Bloodshed [CM23]
“These are challenging times in the middle east. As the situation in Gaza gets worst daily, we are committed to doing what we can to end this conflict, and provide aid to the residents of Gaza, as well as all Palestinians in the west bank.
All proceeds from Confused Machines’ digital sales will go directly to Physicians For Human Rights – Israel (PHRI) www.phr.org.il, which continues its medical work and humanitarian aid in the West Bank despite the difficult circumstances.
Since October 2023, PHRI has doubled its activity in the West Bank and is sending two weekly mobile clinic visits to help communities that are cut off from medical treatment due to the severe wave of settler and military violence, movement restrictions, and the financial crisis in the West Bank.
PHRI is currently unable to operate in Gaza due to restrictions by the Israeli authorities, and have been barred from delivering aid to the strip. PHRI is constantly working to resume these activities and will do so as soon as the circumstances allow.
We urge for an immediate ceasefire, the return of all hostages, and a peaceful future for all inhabitants of this troubled land.”
Mule Driver – Cue of Danger [CM22]
Mule Driver’s annual 303-day treat presents a dirty, hard-rocking EP. The A-side, ‘What We’ve Become’ features a gloomy and gritty electro-acid track, while “Cues of Danger” provides a classic, stripped-down acid techno experience. As in recent years the 303 day EP will be released as a limited edition transparent lathe cut 7″ shipping starts in may, pre order is already on. All music was made using TB 303 alongside other machines.
Taru – Ipnagogik [DM09]
Confused Machines unleashes it’s first release for 2024 and it’s a mesmerizing journey led by Ruggero Lambo aka Taru, utilizing minimal synths, squeezing beats into tiny fractures and exploring syncopations to a certain visionary degree where the tension between self-consciousness and unconsciousness arouse, a vague memory of a near future becomes present.
Max Schreiber – Discreet 808 Music [DM08]
Usually going under the moniker Mule Driver, Harel Schrieber has dedicated a great deal of his life’s work to studying and exploring the wonders of the Roland TR-808 drum machine, celebrating its’ rhythms to a large extent and since 2011 releasing exclusive material for the annual 808 day, which occurs every August 8th. For this years “808 birthday” Max Schreiber utilize and treat the 808 differently delivering two experimental and drone oriented works, creating an ambient soundscapes and atmosphere. Daniel Heidebrecht aka Swiss Arrow contributes a Masked-Cocoon dark ambient-drone remix for the B2 track which makes this release even more intriguing.
VA – For Huwara [CM21]
On 26 February, hundreds of Israeli settlers went on a violent late-night rampage in Huwara and other villages in the northern West Bank, leaving one local resident dead and 100 others injured and the town ablaze. This compilation of music was put together in order to raise funds that can hopefully give some aid to the residents of Huwara, all of the proceeds Confused Machines make from digital sales will go directly to Physicians For Human Rights – Israel (PHRI) www.phr.org.il An NGO that works in the occupied Palestinian territory, promoting Palestinians’ right to health and providing direct medical and humanitarian assistance. The compilation hosts a roster of both local and international artists spanning a wide spectrum of leftfield electronic music. Acid, Drone, Noise, Downtempo, Techno, SoundCollage and more. All of these tracks are new and have not been heard before, many of them have been created with Huwara and Palestine in mind.
Ian Martin – Grey Theatre [DM07]
Confused Machines welcomes one of the most eclectic artists around, Ian Martin. As an artist he is without genre or style, an open source of creativity. He is the host of SEER Radio on Intergalactic FM and also an amazing DJ, whether it’s experimental or dancefloor madness. Martin has released his music on acclaimed labels such as: Bunker Records , Pinkman, New York Haunted, Bio Rhythm to name a few. His 9 track “Grey Theatre” album for Confused Machines is a deep dive and playful exercise with his synthesizers. An emotional and mysterious listening experience. A portal to his soul. Melancholic at times, it flows like water and lurks from the shadows of reality.
VA – Disused Machines Vol. 2 [DM05]
Confused Machines presents the second instalment in the ongoing EnDM (electronic non-dance music) compilation series. On this collection of immersive recordings, created across multiple time zones and countries, by label members, friends and up-comers, we keep exploring the other side of Confused Machines. The side that is dedicated to different sonically aesthetics – from ambient passages to deep drone, manipulated radio transmissions, hypnotic soundscapes to obscured soundtracks, post-punk dub and kosmische. Tracks by Mise en Scene (chronica), Testkard 225 (Confused Machines), Rapha (Chateau Royal, Schrödinger’s Box), Max Schreiber (Confused Machines), Ian Martin (Bunker, Pinkman), Sacrestia Del Santissimo Sangue (charlios), Swiss arrow, OPTN (Confused Machines), Asaf Yahel, Nimrod Gershoni, Fabrikent (Confused Machines)
Mule Driver – Blood Flowers [CM017]
“Blood flowers” is a heavy duty 4 tracker for the freaks. Electro, dungeon techno, slinky acid and tribal excursion – properly damaged party starters for lowlight dreams and nightmares. Over the last 10 years, Mule Driver has been making special 808 day releases. This latest set is his most convincing effort to date, jumping from idea to idea but retaining a solid guideline of sci-fi weirdness and collapsing body movements.
Ian Richter – Bloody Marys With An Angry Goddess [CM016]
A short visit to the Indochinese Peninsula at the wrong time of the global pandemic breakout, led Ian Richter to over a year and a half of living in Vietnam, and to a deep love affair with the Vietnamese folk religion. Ian was intrigued to find a place drenched in culture and mysticism existing hand in hand with hyper capitalism (yet officially committed to socialism). Over the course of the last 18 month Ian recorded, mentally and physically, the sounds of his encounters and experiences. From daily life, through industrial and natural landscapes, to ancient and modern dance, forging foreign with familiar, mysticism with science, and claustrophobia with liberation.
The Hipodrome Of Music 