A new addition to our ever-growing discoid dance club is Curses. The Italo American brings something a little darker to the party – four cuts of EBM influenced madness. Bone crunching snares and B-Movie samples sit atop shimmering synth licks that will be right at home on a wide variety of modern and retro dance-floors.
First opus of the new series is La Batterie, by the UK’s Richard Podolor and Sandy Nelson in 1983 in the hypnotic shimmering disco of ‘Let There Be Drums.’ The music of Polodor and Nelson is being given new life by Kalahari Oyster Cult. Alongside the entrancing original are two remixes. First up is Australia via Amsterdam’s very own Max Abysmal with his ‘Spooky Remix.’ Adopting and adapting the raw energy of the ’83 version, Abysmal layers ghostly notes and spectral snares into his mechanical remake. The flip takes on a different slant with ‘Shotgun’ taken from the EP of twenty fives years ago. A super slick work of understated funk shot through with bold keys and powerful chants to show another side of the UK pair. The fiercely talented Benedikt Frey closes, turning his daringly able hand to ‘Let There Be Drums.’ He keeps the vocal line, the rest of his rework is dipped in a thick heart of darkness threat. Pulsing thumps, menacing notes and danger lurk in this jungle of Frey’s own making.
For their sixth release London based record label and clubnight Snap, Crackle & Pop return with another slice of the post punk and kraut influenced electro/techno sounds that are coming to define the label. The latest release comes from Niv Ast and it serves as a follow up to his appearance on this summers Relish compilation. The EP leads with an ice cold slab of post punk swagger in the form of Quebec / Makolet which gets the remix treatment from previous collaborators Khidja, the Romanian duo strip the percussion back for the dancefloor and tease out the track’s darker side with more than a hint of acidic malevolence. For the B-Side Disco Monroe offers a nostalgic slice of pitched down French Electro undoubtedly influence by the Djs recent residencies in Paris. Optimo Music’s Mr TC rounds off the EP with his unmistakably left field vision to give the track a dark tropical re-imagining.
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.
Boston duo Dead Husband are responsible for the new and captivating release “Luxe Kondo”. Six varied and punchy tracks made up the long-awaited debut 12″ which as usual go hand in hand with a well prepared design and a white colored vinyl. Doubtless, this uplifting work is abounding with old and up-to-date influences and make clear that these tasteful guys share their love for Minimal wave, Electropop and Techno.
Afrobot cuts up four wavy 80’s tracks for darker times! A1 is a sleazy minimal wave banger of Ensemble Pittoresque, recorded in The Hague in ’84, now tripled in duration! After that we continue our trip from France to New York ending in the UK on the B-side. First track is a mix of a 7” b-side and a wrong speeder and a slowly pounding track with a twist is the one to finish with.
A new work produced by Zurich Dada, a duo from Porto, who play a kind of calm and melancholic Synth Pop. The release comes with two original tracks from them. On side A with ‘Peta Bytes’, which includes Antoni Maiovvi and Franck Kartell remixes, who are back on Aspecto Humano. On side B is included ‘Kites’ with a banger remix from the house by Anbau.
Well renowned bass player extraordinaire, Osynlige Mann from Gothenburg releases long awaited new solo material on Hoga Nord Rekords. This 7inch contains high voltage material; ‘Airports’ and ‘Exodus’ brings tense seventies synth and early eighties electro to the table. The A-side ‘Airports’ is a Kraftwerk inspired elegy over the lumpenproletariat of the machines – aeroplanes. ‘No sleep for the big machines, no rest for the sad machines’. The B-side, ‘Exodus’ carries more obvious characteristics from Osynlige Mann’s other electronic projects.
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.
The first release on The Golden Filter’s brand new label, 4GN3S (pronounced ‘Agnes’) is The Golden Filter “Talk Talk Talk”, along with three remixes.
“Romantic Fiction” the debut LP from Curses is an honest musical expression drawing influences from his youth growing up in NYC in the 80s. References to new wave, post-punk, synth music and early EBM are skillfully merged with the DIY approach of punk and rock n roll angst. Brandishing an immersive sonic palette, all instruments throughout the album were played and recorded by the artist.
Soft Vision returns to Acoustic Division with ZWEI, a 4 track 12” EP that breaches the flood walls between synth pop and techno. This Austin, TX duo proves not only make you cry or laugh, but possibly dance and lose any notion of self at all. The tobias. remix of the A1 Track ”Tractor Beam,” glides the original into a hallucinogenic territory. Melody and rhythm dissolve into each other as an ethereal voice guides you in from the fog.
Californian electronic pop duo Peaking Lights make a splash on Dekmantel with ‘Sea of Sand’, the band’s first release in 2018. It’s a kaleidoscopic melting-pot of dainty dub, experimental and leftfield beats, with wondrous sunny soundscapes that blend together the unconventional home-fashioned electronics, and windswept vocals that have defined Peaking Lights to date. ‘Sea of Sand’ is the band’s first record in three years not released on their own imprint. With six tracks, exceeding 30 minutes in total, the extended EP is a prelude to a forthcoming LP. With a DIY aesthetic and approach to analogue instrumentalism, Peaking Lights retro-digital sound is one that sits perfectly with Dekmantel.
1/2 GOTT is the new project of Sneaker from Dresden/Berlin and Scannoir from Zurich, who share their love for EBM and Synth Pop not only when DJing but also when producing. In several nights and with the help of a decent group of instruments, they have evoked a series of tracks that can certainly be subsumed as New Swiss wave. The first record is entitled 1/2 GOTT and will be followed by GOTT in the foreseeable future. The result is music that sounds as if the Iron Curtain had never fallen. Although Sneaker likes to step to the microphone, he leaves the vocals to Scannoir, who gives the perfect counterpart for the menacing beats with his deep laments. The tracks are little masterpieces in the matter of repetition with whipping drums and off-beat percussions. However, they cannot disguise their hymn-like gesture. This must be the sound of a sunrise over the industrial area.
Raw formed during the summer of 1990 in Athens, Greece when keyboardist Giannis Papaioannou and percussionist Makis Faros started composing music for imaginary waiting rooms. They combined the traditional cut-up technique of tape-loops, the industrial timbres of musique concrète with the harmonics of world music, all filtered through digital sampling and computer programming. Their first recordings generated an 8 track demo, which was freely distributed among friends and the local underground press. After 6 months of work and several sessions with guest musicians on acoustic and electric instruments, Raw self-released their first album ‘Land’ in December 1991 on Elfish Records. In 1992 they recruited the band’s sound engineer, Coti K., as a third member, both on stage and studio sessions. ‘City’ was their second album fully inspired by the mechanisms of their home town. Presenting a different electronic face of Raw, manipulating rhythms with analogue synthesizers and harsh sampling to evoke the atmosphere of Athens. ‘City’ was released on CD only by Elfish Records in 1994. ‘Fragments’ is a collection of 4 songs from ‘City’ presented on vinyl for the first time plus bonus track recorded during the “City’ sessions previously released on a compilation in 1992.
This is Amsterdam based Musique Exotique’s launch release. Dutch artists Machinegewehr and Ayden Vice team up to bring that timeless retro Italo vibe with Moroder inspired bass arpeggiation, mysterious vocals and epic pads. On the B side, San Francisco based Dutch artist, Yobkiss, offers up a masterful remix taking the track into darker electro territory. His offering includes beautifully haunting Japanese vocals by the producer’s long time collaborator Yuko Araki for exceptional exotiqueness.
Celebrate four years of VHS-inspired synth-driven greatness with Choice Cuts, a special-priced anniversary compilation culling highlights from Videogram’s vast discography between the years 2014 to 2018. Featuring songs from the official releases, as well as unreleased gems found in the vaults, the fourteen-track album gives you close to an hour’s worth of Videogram’s trademark genre sounds, with each track carefully selected, and lovingly remixed and remastered in HD for maximum audio punch.
Having previously released some rare solo material from Ende Shneafliet member Hanjo Erkamp AKA Dr. C. Stein, Artificial Dance is now serving up something special from the cult Dutch minimal wave band’s lesser-known side project, King Ende Shneafliet. The result is the first ever vinyl release of tracks from the outfit’s cult Dimension Mix series.
Emotional Rescue presents French 80s electronic band Takenoko and their unique and quirky euro synth-pop, here as collected works from 1982 to 1988. The compilation includes their 3 singles plus a number of unreleased songs heard for the first time. Formed in 1981 when Bruno Aujard, Jean Louis Simonet and Jean Michel Louisor met in Bordeaux, France, the trio took their admiration of post punk bands like Talking Heads and Gang Of Four and mixed it with the pioneering sound of Kraftwerk and the new wave of UK electronic bands and set about composing songs with the simple aim to make people dance. Encompassing their interest in Japanese culture, Takenoko, meaning young bamboo shoot – a metaphor for teenager in Japan – was born.
Emotional Rescue returns to the music of Takenoko, the Bordeaux based synth-pop project from 1982-1988, to follow their LP collection L’Amour Est Mon Arme (ERC062), with an EP of remixes from Dresden’s cult-like producer, Sneaker DJ.
The Hipodrome Of Music 