Splattered vinyl with a silk screen printed cover and a huge poster inside. Lustpoderosa`s eclectic lifestyle continues with its very first various artist compilation. A clash of generations in sonic form, ranging from slow and heavy industrial beats to gloomy minimal wave. Four contemporary tracks and two reissues from 1984.
Rotterdam fuses with Berlin, as Das Ding lands on Mechatronica for the third record in the label’s White series, dedicated to limited vinyl-only pressings of EBM, wave, synth, electro, italo, industrial and experimental sounds. ‘Alien Insane’ opens the record with a relentlessly progressing piece of dark machine music, followed by the dazzling cosmic journey of ‘Idiomatic Transnominator’, both tracks vividly blending Das Ding’s signature sound with classic Dutch electro, synth and italo styles.
Stratis is an electronic duo from Cologne, Germany, formed by Antonios Stratis and Albert Klein in 1981. They took inspiration from the progressive electronic synthscapes of Tangerine Dream & Vangelis and the proto-techno of Chris & Cosey and Yello, as well as jazz and funk. The duo recorded 5 cassette-only albums between 1982 and 1986 – Exotic, New Face, Musica da Ballo, Film Musik, and Raging Beauty – which were released on their own label Creative Tapes (later called Temporary Music), and which were also licensed to Colin Potter’s Integrated Circuit Records (ICR) label. We are pleased to announce the first ever standalone vinyl reissue of their sophomore album “New Face’, which was recorded and released in 1983. It consists of eight future-fixated tracks that could have been composed for movies like Blade Runner or Tron. A wide range of minimal electronics are presented, from robotic synth pop to melancholic cold wave to Neue Deutsche Welle electro.
Victrola is the duo of Antonio ”Eze” Cuscinà and Carlo Smeriglio from Messina, Italy. The band formed in 1979 but shortly thereafter relocated to Florence take part in a rich musical scene alongside Neon, Pankow, Alexander Robotnick, and Diaframma. Beginning as a 4-piece (two guitarists, bassist, drummer) they slimmed down to a synthesizer and guitar-based duo by 1982. Their sole release was the now classic ”Maritime Tatami”/”A Game Of Despair” EP from 1983, which we reissued in 2012. ‘Born From The Water’ is a 12 song collection of unreleased demos recorded between 1983 and 1985. The band sent us over 100 cassettes, through which we dug to compile the first volume of their archival darkwave ballads. They used an array of Roland synthesizers (TR-606, TB-303, TR-909, Juno 6) plus a Korg Polysix, Yamaha DX7, Casio VL-Tone VL-1, DR-55 Dr. Rhythm, and Fender Stratocaster and Jazz Bass. Some of the songs would later appear on various compilations, but the versions presented here are unique. Victrola engulfs the listener with trance-inducing synth lines, oblique minor-key bass lines, angular guitar riffs, and melancholic vocals. The songs tell tales of youth, love, karma, and the decline of civilization in modern times.
Great compilation on Spanish wierdo label Burka For Everybody. The third volume of the series Material Eléctrico, a compilation of international mutant electronic underground. A tour around experimental electronics covering abstract rythms (Santiago, Black Zone Myth Chant), industrial EBM / new beat (Celldöd, Klack, Violet Poison, Bässt), minimal wave (Circa Tapes, Sam de la Rosa) and the great collaboration between Sam De La Rosa & Kyle Dixon.
Mannequin Records and Platform 23 come together to start a series of stand-alone reissues of the music of post-punk / industrialists Bourbonese Qualk, starting with their 1983 album Laughing Afternoon. Formed in Southport during the late-70s, the band came to prominence out of South London’s squat scene via their own Recloose Organisation. Early releases including the band’s first experiments put to tape and the now highly sought after Sudden Departure compilation featuring luminaries Colin Potter, Eg Oblique Graph (Bryan Jones) and Lol Coxhill, laid the foundations of their burgeoning sound. Recorded and produced at the Recloose Studios in Camberwell in 1983, Simon Crab, Julian Gilbert and Steven Tanza infused their music with politically charged atmospherics, instrumental exploration, heavily laden reverb and dub, all projected by drum machine rhythms to assemble a musical collage which encapsulated strands beyond contemporary music. Track titles decipher little, as with the music, a discourse not belonging to a set style or movement, but crossing boundaries of supposition, pushing distortion and outernational leanings towards something else, a primordial discant. While tape loops warp the ears and spoken vocals propel songs like Blood Orange Bargain Day and To Hell With The Consequences and contrasting guitar acoustics pierce the mood on Qualk Street and Spanner In The Works, the overall embrace is claustrophobic, embedding a foreboding for the times. This unique, indulgent, cross genre melting pot where pounding rhythms, wailing trumpets, mournful melodica and electronic pulses all spiral in a contagious dissonance that heralded Bourbonese Qualk to the wider world.
Die Form is a French post-industrial and electronic band formed in 1977 as the primary project of electronic musician and multimedia artist Philippe Fichot. He began by recording a number of experimental cassette releases in the late 1970s and formed the Bain Total label to release these early cassettes, as well as various side projects such as Krylon Hertz, Camera Obscura, Eva-Johanna Reichstag, Hurt and Fine Automatic. With ‘Some Experiences with Shock’, originally issued in 1984, Die Form return to sadistic pleasures. The album is a rare example of medical music, horribly sordid moreover, adding a more extreme dimension to their work. The first side, “Survival & Determination”, contains 7 tracks recorded in studio with analog equipment are the direct realization of previous works. In contrast the second side, “Lacerations & Immolation”, contains 5 songs improvised in the fever of paramedical oppression, with aggressive sonorities from new digital synthesizers. Devoted to the madness (the phantom of Antonin Artaud is not far) and handling the machines with instinct, Die Form advance on the way of industrial electronic creation, without concession.
Lunatic is back, after an almost three year hiatus, they arise and bring ua the five track debut EP of En Direct. A true beacon for those who know and care. Five tracks of inbetween stuff: dark, bright and sincere.
“This Modern Day” is a dry, somber, hopeless statement. Kinder aus Asbest releases is first EP on Lux Rec and delivers five ghostly tracks, the perfect description of his world. The title track is a revised version of old material, the remaining four are made specifically for this EP.
Mothball Record presents a lost album from legendary Italian wave band: Ruins. Hailing from Venice, Ruins are one of the pioneering artists of the Italian new wave scene beginning in the late seventies: an explosion of new and exciting art, music and film. The tracks on ‘New Record’ were taken from the self-distributed, tape only release from 1983 ‘Side Roads’. This album was timed directly before their most well-known releases in contemporary times, the ‘Fire / Crime’ 12′ and the eponymous 4 track EP on Black Square. Taken from the original master tapes and selected by Ruins themselves, the album should be listened as a whole to gain the full experience, but immediate ‘must-hear’ tracks are ‘I Don’t Know’, ‘I Love You’ and ‘Last Night DJ Killed My Wife’ featuring early use of Roland TB303. At times unsettling, beautiful, violent, harmonious, these songs will finally get the audience and exposure they deserve 35 years later.
TWINS (That Which Is Not Said) returns to Enfant Terrible. On the A-side you will find a synthpop / minimal elektro / cold wave tune with a metal beat reminiscent of John Foxx. The B-side features a harsh elektro piece. It is tense and uptight, could also have been fitting for a Gooiland Elektro release and should be a future dj favorite for sure.
Conceived by vocalist Gerrie Brand, the band Life In Sodom was starting out as performance art, and quickly became more as Gerrie surrounded himself with some of the best musicians from the club and art scene in South Florida, including Mystic Bill, who was playing the guitar with the band in the early stages. Originally self-released in 1991, the single ”The Stains” became an underground club hit and charted on many college radio stations, in both the extended and the original version. The single was distributed as a hard to get promo only release. The repress contains also the title-track of the single “Phantasmagoria” – another cult tune for early 90’s goth djs – originally released in 1992 and a friendly dancefloor cut of the title-track by Alessandro Adriani.
The Hipodrome Of Music 