empreintes DIGITALes Music to write science fiction to. L’Envol is the first solo album release from American-born, Brussels-based composer Elizabeth Anderson. She is a prolific artist and teacher, and when I hear the opening of L’envol, I feel somewhat like I am at the beginning of a lecture on electronic music. The sounds are perhaps what you might have expected from the title of the record, (L’envol is […]
On-U Sound/Tectonic One of the genre’s key figures joins forces on Late Night Endless with a genuine wizard of the mixing desk to put the dub back into dubstep (something which it has probably needed for a long time
Sulatron The Night is a CD reissue of Sula Bassana‘s 2009 LP and finds him playing some of his finest space rock on what could be seen as almost a concept album, all wrapped around by Frank Lewecke’s luscious cosmic sleeve design. “In Space” opens the album and has more than a nod to ’50s sci-fi in its lush groove — the feel is more like The Tornados […]
Futurismo When I heard that I was to review this album, I had to re-visit some of my old Devo records, blow the dust off and give them a new, fresh listen. Some call them punks, post-punks, new wave or even artrock, but they certainly have their own signature no matter what. The recordings from the late ’70s especially have some of the same quirkiness and dark moods […]
Sacred Bones John Carpenter has had quite a career. After writing, directing and scoring some of the greatest horror films of the ’80s, he has since somewhat fallen off the metaphorical wagon, mustering a less than congenial reception to the majority of his output of the last two decades. The exception to this rule however, is his soundtrack work, from which a whole new generation of composers have […]
Hiatus The first in the Sound X Sound series of 7″ singles which will each explore just one instrument, Music for 8 Recorders finds Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard‘s compositions tackling the alto and soprano varieties on each side of the record. On the evidence of the first disc, the rest of the Sound X Sound series should be well worth following, not least to discover how much Løkkegaard can […]
London 30 January 2015 The day didn’t start well. A blocked drain, forgetting the keys to work and having to go back and fetch them and then a slip on rainy plastic, a mid-air semi-cartwheel (“semi-cartwheeled headfirst in the rain,” as Edward Ka-Spel would say) into the side of a skip and a resultant injury resembling nothing so much as the remnants of a failed scalping all combined […]
Suezan Studio The last thing I was expecting when listening to these recently-unearthed rarities was Gospel. But that’s what hits your ears first, hallelujahs, hand claps and all, roasted on some mad Blackpool-type organ and acoustic hints of blue grassy glinting holy — a bedazzle for the senses indeed. Thomas Dinger‘s only other released work, Für Mich, lightly dusted you with its composed turquoise, as its strange inclinations […]
Ici d’ailleurs/Mind Travels Important Aidan Baker has made an art of being really, really boring. Having released several thousand albums to date – with almost all of them revolving around a guitar and a couple of pedals – you’d be forgiven for thinking that ‘boring’ was in some way a pointed derision aimed squarely at the man’s omnipotence, his unwavering dedication to a singular minimalist aesthetic, but Baker […]
Staubgold Collected from two years’ worth of home two-track tape recordings made between 1982-1983 by Liquid Liquid‘s percussionist, Reel To Real gathers together Dennis Young‘s sketches of sometimes engagingly naïve acoustic songs alongside frenetic percussion workouts and occasional synth frenzies which prefigure the arrival of drum and bass in their clattery pace. The demo-like quality of most of the material makes for an occasionally intimate and sometimes plain […]
Beta-lactam Ring This has got to be Edward Ka-Spel‘s most introspective album to date; some would say business as usual, another party political broadcast from the inside of Edward’s head. Words held in tea-stained sepia and dust-choked webs, hints of jaded melody creeping out of the inky gloom, like threadbare playthings that have seen better days. Yep — definitely business as usual, and I wouldn’t want it any other […]
The Helen Scarsdale Agency Ever needed to block out the world beyond the ears with the application of sound, to soak and bleach away the intrusive noises of other human beings, their transport, the built environment, the elements themselves? Try Scarlet then, up loud and/or on headphones, and let Jim Haynes reorganise the sound world in rawer form. Tired of melody, bored to tears by tunes and than […]
The Helen Scarsdale Agency So Long is an often subtle work of suggestively imaginative electronics which offers to transport the listener to places where they are equally welcome to apply their own meaning as to take those proposed by both the music and its naming. Drifting along without a seeming care in the world, Stilluppsteypa‘s Sigtryggur Berg Sigmarsson seems unconcerned how long his journey will take, if a […]
London-based duo Kontakte‘s 2014 release These Machines brought a blissfully blistering end to their silence of two years between albums. Here, Ian Griffiths and Stuart Low give a detailed breakdown of how and why each of the album’s tracks came into being. * “Shut Your Eyes And You’ll Burst Into Flames” These Machines – Limited Edition CD by KONTAKTE Stuart: This track was birthed over a number of […]
King of Spades It seems like it’s been an æon since the last Chrome album. But with Feel It Like A Scientist, Helios Creed and band returns with some of his wildest proto-punk, space rock craziness in years. “Nephilims (Help Me)” jumps straight in there with a and is a great opener for the album. Zappa-esque nonsense-style jazzing introduces “Prophecy” and within a few moments we are already […]
Staubgold Not so much glitching as rippling on a bed of deftly, deliberately placed samples organised by Timo Reuber and Staubgold label head Markus Detmer, Transit is also blessed with the production skills of Joseph Suchy, ensuring that everything unfolds with a suitably spacious, widescreen feel. A constant sense of motion, of change and unfolding, of new vistas opening up as the album progresses, matches its title perfectly […]
Sulatron A beautiful-looking release from Sulatron Records, this cosmic slab has three massive planet-sized tracks on it. The album is a collaboration between Electric Moon members Sula Bassana and Komet Lulu and Zone Six members Modulfix and Rainer Neef. These improvisations from Krautzone are pure kosmische soundtracks to outer space travelling. “Liebe” starts off with some moody synth playing and a very laid-back vibe that lets you drift away […]
Consouling Sounds Two tracks; fifteen minutes of fearsome post-hardcore grunt, groan, riff and thrash from Eleanora splashes out of the speakers as if the very devil was grinding out the best tunes behind them, goading the band into producing yet more screamed crescendos. Tight as the screws which surely must be holding down the drummer’s kit in case it should get beaten off the stage, “Mammon” shifts gears […]