The latest issue of “Internets most controversial underground e-zine” the Shadow Wolf Cyberzine issue#10 is out now on Nightwind Records. A 19 track ‘cover tape’ compilation with various artists. The term ‘cover tape’ stems from when magazines came with a cassette tape full of music or software on the cover back in the 1980s/1990s.
Sun Ra’s disciple and multiface artist Jamal Moss is back to Modern Obscure Music after his debut on the label with the “The Anticipatory Organization” under The Sun God alias back in 2018. J. Moss more known as Hieroglyphic Being is back to the Barcelona based record label with a new aka, Our Souls Are In The Hands Of The Translator. The new EP is composed by two 18 minutes long freejazz-psychedelic improvisations. A trip to the dark holes of the space eternity.
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)
Spanish label Drivecom presents the third and last episode of the Generative Operation series by Boris Divider. Completing the same style and vision, cinematic, technical and minimal concept trying to push forward a contemporary electro in our days. Evolving synth lines with a generative structure from new massive modular patches. Progressive minimalistic rhythms and sequenced tracks with different results as always elements can change every time they are played back again as a unique listening. A rare topic this time is that two 303 basslines have been addedd in the track GenOp10, they are interlaced with different step lenghts patterns as a tribute to put this classic synth from roland into a spacey environment and not always in the raver side of the music. The limited edition vinyl has been pressed in 180gr. keeping up theanalog character sound in this format, meanwhile the digital version will be a clearer and clinical one.
Always hot on the hard-as-steel plates and murky subterranean atmospheres, Public System turns in a haunted double package from the crypt. Spanning hi-octane indus bullets, half-baked mutant salvos and shadow-clad juicers from a host of reputed names and rabid underdogs, this new comp collates ruff’n’tuff joints from gritty techno don Container, genre-unbound explorer E-Saggila, Berlin’s electro arsonist Privacy, acid-spitting hydra DJ Loser x Penelopes Fiance, basement guerilla Yabboq Penuel alias Le Syndicat Electronique, neo-punk beat thrasher Crave, Yves Tumor collaborator and sine-wave crusher Anthem, expert circuit dissector Beau Wanzer, Liquid G as remixed by Mick Wills, Night Gaunt’s Lower Tar, occult machine funk preacher Maenad Veyl, DJ Chupacabras under new guise 110, soundwaves cross-pollinator DJ Richard, vibrant mood-scapist Gavilán Rayna Russom, as well as label boss Myn going ubiquitous with studio fellows Kluentah as Myntha, and NYC’s R Gamble under their Fade Accompli moniker. A much desirable feast of raw, unhinged, all-round spine-tingling jams for both inside and outside the club.
Four Flies presents the first Italian 7-inch release of “Non si deve profanare il sonno dei morti” (also known as “The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue” and “Let Sleeping Corpses Lie”), the soundtrack that gave Giuliano Sorgini eternal and worldwide fame as an occult composer \ occult-oriented composer, one who, being perfectly at ease with a certain type of Italian horror cult films, has gradually come to represent the essence, the quintessence of Italian scary music, horror soundtracks.
Shkema’s debut EP ‘Kronikos’ is a double release with four originals and four remixes. The author describes it as ‘world news show, where each song represents a different story’. Some of them he has experienced himself, some are hearsay from TV news programs, and some are actually imaginary. Stories are not really related – just like in the news. ‘Ispanija’ was created during a friend’s band rehearsal. Psychedelic vocals sounded interesting in Shkema’s headphones while he was watching soundless singers and the muted musicians. The true reason why this track is called ‘Ispanija’ is still unknown to this day. According to Shkema, ‘Ola’ is an allegory of Plato’s cave. It’s a story about prisoners, chained in the cave and the only moving thing they could see was a passing shadow – quite deep, uh? Justin Strauss and Max Pask recently have joined up to form new project Each Other. True dance floor legends delivered bass-busy remix of ‘Ispanija’. It could probably be best described as ‘juicy distorted badboy from New York you don’t want to mess with’. Moscow’s finest – Simple Symmetry – joined the pack and went back to the roots. Their remix for ‘Ola’ is future clubbing classic, four to the floor banger with a drop perfect for pogo.
Greek electronic music legend Lena Platonos returns to Dark Entries with Balancers, an LP of previously unreleased material recorded between 1982-1985. Athens-based Platonos has worked with the label previously to reissue her three solo LPs – Gallop, Sun Masks, and Lepidoptera – as well as to release three accompanying 12” EPs featuring modern remixes of her work. She is renowned for her forays into cutting-edge electronic experimentation as well as her striking, impressionistic poetry and lyrics, always recited in Greek. The twelve tracks on Balancers reveal a murkier side of Lena, one draped in tenebrous washes and oneiric utterances. Ragged analog rhythms feature on several tracks, even breaking into a brooding electro groove on “A Cat in the Corner”, but the predominant tone is sparse and somber. Mournful instrumental “Phaethon” swells to mythological proportions, while “In September” feels small enough to fit in your pocket. Lena’s poetry sits amidst lush pads and Radiophonic Workshop-esque squiggles, her voice setting an intimate tone in the shifting electronic sea. Inspiration is drawn from Greek mythology and architecture, and lyrics evoke a soft sorrow, an ambivalence towards love, life, and the passage of time. Although the material here spans 3 years and features a range of recording fidelities and synthesis techniques, the collection possesses the heft of a singular artist’s vision.
Marco Shuttle’s third album, Cobalt Desert Oasis, features a varied collection of music recorded across a two year period. Often traveling to remote destinations, Marco would come back to Berlin with field recordings, images, and other inspirations to process in his studio and turn into sound. The theme of the journey turns into a something more abstract than a travel diary, where environmental sounds blend in with modular synthesis, drum machines, effects and analog oscillators resulting in a cinematic listening experience where psychedelia, ritualism, and mysticism weave together in a sort of alien soundscape – that as the title of the album suggests, is reminiscent of a parallel utopian world. The album is rich in complex rhythmics, and more than in any of his previous work, has strong acoustic elements. Amongst other percussion instruments, Marco used the Tombak, a traditional Persian hand drum capable of reaching a very wide range of frequencies – from deep round subby toms, to high pitched sharp rimshots, throughout the record. Marco Shuttle is certainly not new to these sort of elements, but in Cobalt Desert Oasis he brings the environmental element of his sound into the forefront in a way that takes the listener into a hazy expanse where it is sometimes difficult to distinguish the machine elements from the natural – and where the music almost becomes a visual experience, which relates to Marco’s own photography used throughout the cover and insert images.
Squirrels On Film shares “Electric-Earthy-Esoteric” a haunted song cycle of kosmiche dark-wave/cold-rave sonic incantation from, Mexican born, Texas raised musician & DJ who currently resides in Vienna, Alyssa Auvinen Barrera aka LDY OSC. She uses synthesis, rhythm & voice to conjure layered compositions that draw from post-punk, techno, dub & underground synth-wave.
Pavel Fedoseev is KIKOK. As one of the few remaining members of the Komi tribe, he used the Komi words Ki (= arm) and Kok (= leg) as his brandname. Born in Kudymkar (capital of the Komi-Permyak nation) , now lives in Perm, no less than a 22-hour train journey east of Moscow, placing Fedoseev in what, he says, feels like cultural and social isolation. This 10 track album acts as a means to escape the monotonous cycle of his hometown. KIKOK works on this album with Loua (Luciana Russo) an electronic music producer based in Amsterdam. She’s taking care of vocals and voice snippets. The end result is a record that sounds both propulsive and hypnotic, an album that sounds like moving forward and in circles at the same time. Rich lashings of synthesisers pulse over beats that switch between techno thump and restrained ambience, with tracks seamlessly moving from dance floor stomp to woozy comedown let-up. Russian Rave Pop at it’s best. Perm is a disgusting city,” says KIKOK of his hometown. “It’s dirty, boring and rough. I’m afraid of walking outside; that’s why I sit at home and watch movies and make music.”
Outer-national dance discourses, that strive for no country and obey to no flag: when Düsseldorf based producer, Stefan Schwander creates music as Harmonious Thelonious, highly percussive rhythms, dissonances and melodic twists tango chatoyant virtuosic. All eight musical objects collected on “Instrumentals!” document a chapter in Harmonious Thelonious’s work, that left the noisy background drones behind in favor for a signature sound full of echoes of ancient rituals and ecstatic ceremonies. Eight growing outlaw music studies crammed with living, deeply haunting entities. They all came to life in different cities like Berlin, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, London or Paris, first published on labels like Asafa, Disk, The Trilogy Tapes, or Versatile. United under one roof, they unfold their magical groove symbolism, notable hypnotic harmony and agitating rhythm archetypes in a total overpowering coalition.
Over several landmark EP’s London Modular Alliance have established themselves as the premiere Electro act in modern electronica. Their distinctive blend of classic Electro and state-of-the-art modular synth techniques combine to create an innovative hybrid style all of their own. Applied Rhythmic Technology presents the long-awaited debut album from this unique talent. Presenting for the first time their vision of modern electronica over a double slice of vinyl, LMA stretch out to encompass not only their trademark bone-rattling dark electro rhythms but also haunting ambient interludes and sublime IDM.
Romanian two-piece Karpov not Kasparov have dropped their new EP ‘Memory’ on Disco Halal. A five-track release opens with the sunkissed, synth-driven vibes of ‘Except For Bears’, ensuring the EP commences with some cosmic disco energy. Next up is the hypnotic, computerised sounds of ‘Fool’s Mate’ and otherworldly synth oddity ‘Les Pions Sont l’Âme du Jeu’, before the title track and recent single ‘Memory’ sees the Bucharest duo delve into psychedelia-laced outsider pop territories. Things are then closed out with an instrumental of the same track.
Valeriu Borcoș and Eduard Gabia aka Karpov not Kasparov describe what they do as ‘a musical game of chess between synthesizer and drums’. The Romanian duo also incorporate an analogue visual artist and contemporary dancers into their live performances, resulting in a theatrical show and a kind of real-time soundtrack to the action around them.
The Hipodrome Of Music 