experimental
Undermedvetenheten – Undermedvetenheten [KR36]
UNDERMEDVETENHETEN is a simple, science fantasy game for 1-12 players, with a focus on atmosphere, storytelling and player cooperation – perfect for newcomers to live action role playing. It takes 2 minutes to set up, lasts around 30 minutes, and no two games are ever the same. Players take on the roles of humans aboard a vessel on an endless journey into the depths of space. They are not lost, but all hope is, as they hurtle stricken into the void. Your only access to the universe outside is through the ship’s altruistic artificial intelligence, Mima. As immersive chapter cards are revealed one by one, players must interact with Mima in order to shed light on the universe around them, indulge in fantasies of worlds past, or attempt to right the ship’s blighted trajectory. Can you make sense of the abyss? UNDERMEDVETENHETEN comes complete with a soundtrack composed by John B McKenna.
DYL+ DB1 – Ecou [RE25]
DYL+ DB1 successfully fuses experimental D&B, half-step and techno tropes. Here they re-establish their occasional studio partnership with a first collaborative full-length. It’s a pleasingly atmospheric and imaginative affair, with the pair offering up tracks that variously mix and match elements of unearthly ambient, off-kilter drum and bass, broken techno, murky post-dubstep rhythms, experimental electronica, the metallic clonk of industrial and the hazy hypnotism of dub techno. Musically it’s hard to pin down due to the wide variety of interestingly programmed rhythms, though the album’s uniformly paranoid sense of impending darkness, coupled with occasional glimpses of musical positivity, ensures a coherent aural vision.
Robert Bergman LIVE @ 2020 Intergalactic FM Streaming Festival
Regis – Hidden In This Is The Light That You Miss [DNLP028]
Regis lets his rhythmic noise opus out into the world, a bruising and hauntingly absorbing album – his first since 2001 – dispatched on his pivotal label; Downwards. On a masterful twenty-year followup to ‘Penetration’, Karl O’Connor yields a definitive solo LP that distills his passions for sonic brutalism and bastardised Chicago tracks with syncopated UK swagger and reverberating warehouse ballistics. Its lip-bitingly gripping effect is testament to a resounding reputation as one of Industrial music’s most influential producers, and sees the artist bring his own influences – from Test Department to Jeff Mills – into line with his potent palette of narcotised tones. Recorded in Berlin with Einstürzende Neubauten’s producer/engineer Boris Wilsdorf, the album’s supple, spartan, and rhythmic gymnastics notably benefit from acres of icy room to roll around and lash out. Snagged around muscular bassline revs, and caressed with keys and vocals by postpunk catalyst Annie Hogan (whose recent turn for Downwards was a total revelation), the 9 tracks portray Regis at his leanest and most mesmerising, which is all the more impressive coming from an artist who’s deliberately held his line through club music’s mutations for more than 30 years.
Orpheu The Wizard – Driver’s Eye
Bill Anagnos – The Sizzler [PHXS07]
PHXS07 comes from the Athenian experimentalist Bill Anagnos. It is the final outcome of several projects and performances held in 2019. Throughout long periods of almost complete isolation and loneliness and with a basic amount of audio equipment those 11 tracks are mainly fragments of manually managed and arranged in house performances using two analog synthesisers, a turntable, a loop station and a cheap sampler. Obvious is the influence of Kraut rock and retro wave due to the severe use of synthesisers and locked grooves.
Boris Divider – Generative Operations [DCOM016]
After a long break of around seven years, Drivecom the Spanish label based on advanced electro conducted by Boris Divider is back again to the scene delivering a minimal concept (as stated on its first roots) but with avantgarde elements to keep a vibe on the contemporary edge. This is the first episode of a new project under the name of “Generative Operations”. A project born from a new vision and workflow at the B. Divider’s studio. From the technical side, the use of massive modular synthesis and generative sequencing make the tracks to be different each time are being played, so here you have a unique recording of a certain moment as if it was and imprint of an instant. Also the minimalistic percussion tries to be slowly developed in an electro rhythm structure. In the other hand all the tracks have a cinematic vibe, it seems as they were composed thinking about to fit in any hi-tec sci-fi thriller movie. Granular sythesis pads, background noises, experimental compression routines help to fullfill the vision. At the moment of this info three volumes are being planned to be released in this year 2020.
VA – Cold Light, Low Tide [FREE DOWNLOAD]
Brokntoys presents “Cold Light, Low Tide” a free digital compilation of tracks from affiliated artists, featuring Black Propaganda, Obergman, K100 Signal, Trance Remix, Annechoic, Non Punire and XY0815.
CPR – Cyber Punk Romance [MKV1/369.004]
Weird shapes emerge from the darkness, illuminated only by muted street lamps and neon signs. The CPR album sifts through the shadows of night life decadence, influenced dimly lit romantic and mysteries that lurk on the streets in the early hours of the morning. CPR is a collaboration of a mysterious Berlin duo of lovers, Alexandra Ismalone and Tobias Lisius. Together they conjure a sound that paradoxically traverses darkness and brightness – diving into the depht of the unconsciousness leading to a hypnotic, transportive and psychedelic state done within a dark, intriguing and mysterious way.
Lorenzo Morresi – Objet Melodie [FBNM020]
‘Objet Melodie’ is a combination of real instruments, synthesizers, drum machines and samples, involving genres from different countries of the world. It’s like being on a surreal oasis, where music is eclectic but also meditative or just for a dance. Interconnecting with the whole planet, imagining or living in different countries and trying to relate with diverse cultures and experimentation. Lorenzo-Giulio Morresi combined real instruments like Roland TR-707, Roland JUNO-60, a Gibson Memphis guitar, marimbas and steel drums with percussions samples taken from his personal record collection. The other musicians involved are Stefano Ubaldini who plays the intro in ‘Rituel’ with an amazing hand-made guitar called ‘Slitar’, inspired from an Indian Sitar made with a broken metal window he picked up in a London backyard. Fabio Mina is playing flutes on several tracks, like the Hulusi from China and the Nose Flute from Hawaiian islands. Giuseppe Diamanti plays tenor sax outros. ‘Objet melodie’ is inspired by sounds, technologies and traditions from planet earth, with the hope of staying interconnected as much as we can.
Jaki Liebezeit & Burnt Friedman / Burnt Friedman & Joao Pais – Eurydike [NON50]
Joao Pais Filipe (drums) and Burnt Friedman (electronics) ultimately hypnotize their audience by activating cosmic mechanics. Both refer to it as ‘automatic music’, yet their focus is on playing and exploring rare rhythmic modes; in Friedman’s terms: ”We organize pressure mediation according to mother nature.” Friedman & Pais left behind the consensus–artificial–paradise of cultural musical idioms, developing an immersive, archaic next level–dance music, deeply rooted in natural laws of motion. Yet informed by the works of Jaki Liebezeit – one of the most influential drummers of all time – Friedman & Pais pursue a different path. On side two the listener is confronted with two more recent, unreleased ”Secret Rhythms”– contributions.
Project X – Project X [BLACKLP006]
A non-partisan group primarily operational in the late 20th Century. Their only confirmed action was creating and compiling previously unreleased music to highlight various events of the time. Although there continue to be persistent rumors of technological inventions and other creative diversions, no evidence exists to support these ideas. The plans outlined in the half completed and frankly garbled manifesto was to distribute the music and text to several sources simultaneously in the hope of sharing the stories of the various situations that best needed attention. Most contacted media outlets initially postponed the release saying the information could interfere with ongoing operations and that disclosure might have minor effects on their prime narrative. Whilst the music survives, the text has been scrambled beyond recognition. The names of the situations, locations and characters have been changed but the story remains the same.
Ratsnake – ПЛЕДЖЕ [FREE DOWNLOAD]
New Gesloten Cirkel release on his bandcamp via his Ratsnake alias. On ПЛЕДЖЕ, the enigmatic producer compiles six tracks fresh our the studio and a bonus live version. Oozing in raw synthesis, fiery acid lines and classic hardware drum sounds they both embody a sound that is the elixir of life for the true analog freaks. Released as a pay-what-you-want download through the Gesloten Cirkel Bandcamp.
Exhausted Modern – Failing State EP [OMO1]
The first release on the OMO Recordings is coming from the Czech master Exhausted Modern. “Power is not an institution, and not a structure; neither is it a certain strength we are endowed with; it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society.” M. Foucault.
Zandvoort & Uilenbal – Folk Triumfator [NW024] FREE DOWNLOAD
“Folk Triumfator”is the second album by Zandvoort & Uilenbal, a ‘paramusical academic’ project of medieval music expert Jimi Hellinga and electronic musician Danny Wolfers. As Zandvoort & Uilenbal they appropriate historical instruments such as a 19th century Victorian harmonium, a medieval hurdy gurdy, an electro acoustic thumb harp and an mid 20th century German Mixtur Trautonium. These are cross bred with the usual arsenal of contemporary electronic instruments and seasoned with some sinister poetry in their North Sea coast temple of sensory sonic delights. We can write how conceptual and arty this all is but let’s just say this is hardcore dark ambient with lots of medieval drone space jazz influences to trip your mind out into a region where time and your opinions cease to exist.
LVRIN – Sigil #1
Muslimgauze – Return Of Black September [ARCHIVEFIFTYONE]
The excellent Black September, a continuous, five-part, 68-minute epic, is as formidably competent as ever, although more for the brooding, surreal nature of its soundworld than for its grooves, which here sound almost subsidiary. The soul samples and restlessly evolving minor-chord kaleidoscopes that unfold throughout the work is prima facie evidence of a musician on a roll. Boldly named after one of the most notorious Palestinian terrorist organizations, the group which carried out the Israeli Olympic athlete massacre in 1972, September matches it’s dark black artwork and design with equally doom-laden music (mastered as one track, despite the five separate song titles listed on the back).
VA – Phormix – Mass Disorder [FREE DOWNLOAD]
Free download compilation from Athenian outfit Phormix; including tracks by Anatolian Weapons, Baz Reznik, Celldod, DJ Loser, Fragedis, Morah, Outermost, Penelope’s Fiance, Unhuman and many more.
Cio D’Or – Fluidum III [SEM120]
Cio D’Or returns to Semantica with a new brand conceptual mini-LP. Self-styled “sound architect” and “music creator” Cio D’Or has been strangely quiet since releasing a ‘special edition’ of her “All In All” album back in 2016. Comeback EP “Fluidum III” is a fine collection of alien electronic workouts that sound like they were created via modular synthesis. What we get is six tracks built around watery sounds, swelling electronic motifs, spaced-out noises and occasional quirky rhythms. While some of the tracks – particularly “Climate” and “Celestial II” – boast deep but weighty kick-drum tracks in the techno tradition, for the most part the tracks are sparse, alien and devoid of dancefloor intent. The results are consistently alluring, albeit in a strange and spaced-out way.
The Hipodrome Of Music 