The Bunker New York delivers a second collaborative Romans EP from Gunnar Haslam and acid obsessive Tin Man. They go in hard from the off, blending extended analogue bass, metronomic rhythms and wiggly acid lines on “Enoma”. There’s a classic bleep feel about the ghostly chords on “Coptos”, which seemingly float above a hard-as-nails techno groove. They seem to soften a little on “Delenium”, which pairs the uplifting, end-of-night ethos of progressive house with classic Detroit techno sounds.
Treacle thick tech treats from Black Merlin on super-limited vinyl. Worked on an all-analogue set up, both “Burn It” and “Experiments In The Dark” take us back to the early ’90s when Black Strobe were smashing down European boundaries and Beltram was doing the same in the US. “Burn It” is the real crunchy groove-heavy cut while “Experiments In The Dark” takes us even deeper inside our own minds with an orgy of modem banter.
Ambivalent adapts the raw hardware strategies of his LA-4A alias into peak-time analog techno. Truncate is on remix duty and delivers one of his power techno productions to top the release off.
Window 057′ is an arpeggiated tool made of a crazy synth sequence, shuffled hats and subtle kick drums in a constantly moving structure.’Window 092′ starts with a massive bass drum accompanied by synthetic bleeps and noises that soon are joined by repetitive sequences carrying the flow. Oscar Mulero’s remix for ‘Window 057’ is a cleaner approach to the original, less shuffled on the rhythms but with a lot more movement on the arpeggiated synth lines. The ‘Window 092’ remake slows down the pressure on behalf of a more liquid approach on the drums, and is more reverberated and deep. Oscar adds more percussive elements and puts the bleeps away using the main sequence as the centre of the arrangement.
New release on EarToGround label featuring two dark and solid dancefloor Techno from label boss Gareth Wild with remixes by UVB and Aiken.
Modularz returns with a new release. The return of the limited project – Dead Architect Series ” Portfolio Two focusing the entire release on Historic Architectural marvels and attempting to release tracks fueled by how they have influenced each of the producers and redistributing the energy through the language of techno.
The 2nd release on Aurora’s Mutual Dreaming label with a nice collection of dreamy Legowelt-esque tracks. ”The EP dives deeper into the unique sound world introduced by last year’s Passageway, its 5 tracks a deftly conjured ride through liquid emotive states. Shimmering waves of dark hypnotic energy rise and fall, evoking both synthetic plasmoid menace and soft sighing warmth, all brought to life by Halal’s nuanced and rapidly evolving sound design.”
Three more post-Chicago transcendental machine funk sessions by the Africans… You can’t stop the prophet.
Knekelhuis presents a cassette featuring a selection of six industrial/EBM tracks from Beau Wanzer, Parrish Smith, Maekkot, Sige Bythos and Volition Immanent. The tapes are housed in a black library case clear front black back.
Dark Entries returns to the New Jersey basement studio to unearth another compilation cassette recordings by Smersh titled Super Heavy Solid Waste. Smersh was the duo of Mike Mangino and Chris Shepard, who began making music together in the late 70s. They were uninterested in traditional notions of songwriting or live performance. Smershs sound is a lush hybrid of techno, industrial, dance, and experimental. Sometimes easy, sometime not. Most songs revolve around driving EBM style beats, intricate industrial noise manipulation and synth melodies. The Smersh sound has so many faces it doesn’t fall into any one category. For Super Heavy Solid Waste we have selected 8 songs, focusing on the harder, harsher, rhythmic side of Smersh’s vast discography.
Jealous God present Issue Number 7, the latest missive from Planete Rouge regular Alexey Volkov, and a record likely to cause bouts of overwhelming paranoia in listeners of a nervous disposition. There’s something undeniably uncomfortable about the horror-fixated electronics, dystopian textures and spine-chilling freestyle vocals of “A Snake Falling To Pieces”. The more upbeat and metallic “Never” is a little less bloodcurdling, with metallic hits clustered round a modular synthesizer groove. Perhaps the standout moment – though it’s an all-round excellent excursion – is flipside “Ruins”, which adeptly combines both approaches on an undulating, skin-crawling techno thruster.
Hard techno advocate J Tijn is next up to supply Bedouin with a heavy hitting package of industrially charged techno entitled MOR. Lead track “Kanon VIP” best typifies that approach, a dense bassline throbs away unpredictably like an agitated wasp as Kuye lays down the drum machine pain. The title cut seems inspired by the Rotterdam school of sewer techno whilst “Shy” is anything but with Kuye going full speed ahead on the dirty synths and raw beats.
This is the second release on Eye Teeth, the new techno sublabel of Interdimensional Transmissions, a remix EP with interpretations direct from the peers of Israel Vines. Features an incredible peak time remix of “WWKD” from Silent Servant. It is followed by another powerful and surprisingly straight techno take on “WWKD” by the often more experimental and industrial Talker. The B Side features a version of “Relapse” by Eye Teeth founder and curator BMG. This is his first published remix created entirely on his modular.
It was a remorseless hatred that enslaved a people many millennia ago in the captivity of those who worshiped the sun and the moon and the gods in the stars and of the earth and beneath the earth. In toil and despair the people were flogged and cursed by the searing whip, scorched by the flaming desert sun above and burned by the abrasive sand below their feet. In agony, they cried out for rescue from the malice-bred bondage of the kingdom. “How long?” While ridden with anguish, their captors became plagued with disease and death, and so the enslaved fled. Within a day, they reached the edge of a vast sea from which mountains grew blocking them in on both sides, and as they looked back in terror they witnessed their captor’s army quickly approaching. A watery death spread out before them while a spear-pierced death raced in from behind.
Yet their cries for help were not unheard… billowing clouds rolled in and a tower of fiery blaze appeared as manifestations of the theophanic Glory-Spirit protecting and separating the people from the approaching wrath. With no where to go, the great sea split apart, and before them a narrow path was unveiled through the voided waters for the people to pass through to their deliverance. The army rushed in after them only to be swallowed by the raging sea that had just brought life for those who had been enslaved, but now brought death to the death that had held them captive.
Life for the people of God is a pilgrim journey through an alien wilderness under the shadow of death. So it was in days long ago. So it is in ours.
Korridor returns to Northern Electronics with three cuts of ultra deep, twisted rhythms. Nothing for the motion sick.
The fifth installment of the Planet Rhythm Black series includes 3 buldging techno bits Giorgio Gigli and Ness. Leaning towards the more sinister side of techno this record contains everything from off beat rhythms to sinister early morning themes.
French men-of-mystery Polar Inertia describe themselves as a “blurry techno entity”. They’re at their shape-shifting best on Kinematic Optics, a double vinyl excursion that contains their first original material since 2012. They set their stall out with the foreboding, cinematic ambience of the title track (built, incidentally, around an extensive spoken word vocal), before delivering an epic chunk of rolling industrial techno (“Floating Away Fire”). There’s a mournful, melancholic feel to the deep techno throbber “Vertical Ice”, while “Hell Frozen Over” is fittingly dark and murky. The second 12″ contains a recording of previous live performance “Can We See Well Enough To Move On?” in its entirety, with droning textures and glacial electronics guaranteeing a spine-chilling mood.
