Search:emptiness

The EP FACE II is a continuation of the Faces EP series, of which the first EP was released in october 2022. The basis here is also a literary fixpoint with KAFKAS VER- WANDLUNG.

the examination of the urban modern man has its origin in the album JAHRE and is now explored in more detail here. What happens to us in a time of digital transparency as a glass human of the city and night.

It starts with THE VOID, which was originally intended as a poem about being lost. We go out into the night, some to search, some to forget and some to never come back as the same again. On our journey we often take substances that we expect to make this journey easier and faster. the escape from ourselves and from our relationships to the environment and humans can‘t just be skipped. a fast way is always a dangerous way and often leads to an even bigger EMPTINESS.

In THE GHOST something appears to us late at night, it is like a shadow of the previous hours, something that has followed us on the streets and accompanied us un- discovered until we reached our home. We wake up and at first it is unclear whether we are dreaming.

In half-sleep the dimensions blur together and the whole polyva- lence of the different existences gapes open. We blink into the DARKNESS and try to recognize something, the light remains far away and yet we hear this piercing sound, which in the end leaves us only with ourselves. we are the spirit of the night, trapped on an old tape in the chest of nothing.

The next section THE MOON shows us the light in the darkness. The shadows and ghosts give way for a moment and the light flows through our veins and molecules. The poem describes our unspoken longing to follow the light, in the light our fears disappear and everything blurs into an unknown familiarity. We stagger back and forget the encounters with our inner DAWN.

In the light the ghosts disappear like childhood memories left behind.
The last chapter is written by THE DAWN, a stanza from the poem of the same name as a spoken reconciliation with the world. In spite of everything, we seek harmony and connectedness. No one wants to become an exile, even if we can‘t always bring it about ourselves. We love LIFE and we hear and feel everything around us, if we let ourselves ...

ALL LOVE
AMAS_DHE / AMAS_PHI

Auf ‚Frozen‘ hielt der klassische Heavy Metal Einzug in den DeathMetal-Sound der französischen Institution. Die Gitarren sind vergleichsweise luftig abgemischt und drücken nicht so gnadenlos wie bei einer puren Death-MetalProduktion. Passend dazu verzichtet Frontmann Stéphane Buriez bei seinem Gesang auf tiefe Grunzer und klingt rauh und kontrolliert. Zu Recht wurde ‚Frozen‘ bei Erscheinen zu ihrem ersten Comeback im 21. Jahrhunder (2011) sehr positive aufgenommen und erfolgreich gefeiert.

Trout Mask Replica is a touchstone in the history of recorded music. The mix of dada absurdist blues and previously unexplored experimental avenues has long been praised as one of the greatest albums of all time. As so eloquently put by John Peel, "If there has been anything in the history of popular music which could be described as a work of art in a way that people who are involved in other areas of art would understand, then Trout Mask Replica is probably that work.” In full partnership with the Zappa Family Trust and to celebrate the relaunch of the seminal Bizarre label imprint, Third Man Records is proud to announce Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band's Trout Mask Replica. Out of print on vinyl for nearly ten years, this remaster was helmed by industry legend Bob Ludwig and cut by the estimable Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering. Utilizing crystalline-quality safety masters kept in the Zappa family vault for decades by the trustworthy Joe Travers, the audio here is positively glorious. Every last skronk breathes full life into the room. Every twisted guitar figure uncurls onto paths previously unpaved. Every last bark and howl shines resolute through the vast emptiness of your mind. Previous countless Trout Mask Replica repressings used scans of scans of scans of the cover image, but the original Cal Schenkel cover photo has been tracked down and reproduced here at its clearest — its resolution from the original release in 1969. If you’ve only ever seen a jpg online or fuzzy, smeared-looking CD issues from the 90’s, be prepared to be wowed by the fully engaging spectrum this iconic image casts. This 2xLP is pressed on heavyweight 180-gram black vinyl for that full-on frenetic feeling.

“All in the Golden Afternoon We Glide” (Realia006) is the forthcoming record from LATHE 00, the new moniker under which Umbria-based artist Leonardo Carloni has recently started to operate.

Preceded by several collaborative undertakings, LATHE 00’s debut solo album is akin to an experiment in autotheory, where art-making practice and theoretical inquiry are entwined to the point of being virtually inseparable. Through the combined use of autobiographical and philosophical elements, “All in the Golden Afternoon We Glide” meditates on individuality, technology, and new forms of (post-)human existence.

The record has been conceived as a three-act project, with each act comprising four compositions that correspond to as many recurring themes: birth, love, death, and emptiness. Produced over the course of two years, the album has a total of twelve tracks, the majority of which run for less than two and a half minutes. Upon closer inspection, these tracks feel less like standalone pieces of music and more like outtakes of a single but continuously mutating continuum.

LATHE 00’s first feature is a work of rare beauty. As a one-person debut project, its stylistic variety, compositional maturity, and technical rigor are outstanding. By combining a forward-looking production style with references as varied as ambient, hyper-pop, instrumental post-rock, world-beat, and modern classical and folk music, LATHE 00 develops a mode of expression that transgresses genres and is distinctively his own.

The result is a signature sound that feels equally primordial and hyper-contemporary, fleshly visceral and detached. The inclusion of the artist's own vocals in the music is a notable aspect of this style. Alongside sampled materials, his non-lexical vocalisations appear as both an affirmative and negative act, simultaneously gesturing towards bodiless dissolution and a desire to reclaim one’s all-too-embodied presence in this world.

Despite being a concept album grounded in a profound theoretical substrate, “All in the Golden Afternoon We Glide” surprisingly relies on wordless communication only. As such, in it, song titles become key vectors of information. Appealing primarily to the listener’s sense of sight, they are used in a way that seamlessly blends the aesthetics of the digital (“Loading of Image Aborted!”), nature (the title track), and ritual (Pouring Blood into the Lake).

The album will be released in digital format alongside a limited-edition printed publication conceptualised and designed by Lidia Ginga Cozzupoli and Bernardo Berga.

Cathalepsy ist ein Metal-Projekt aus Valparaiso, Chile, gegründet von Luigi Ansaldi, das 2006 sein Debütalbum "Fight in the sky" veröffentlichte, das in Ländern wie Brasilien und Japan großen Erfolg hatte. Leider war das Abenteuer nur von kurzer Dauer und die Band löste sich 2010 auf. Im Jahr 2019 beschloss Luigi, die Band wiederzubeleben, diesmal jedoch als Projekt, und begann, kraftvolle und energiegeladene Songs mit Texten mit starken Botschaften zu komponieren. Heavy Metal mit Herz und Wut, dies ist ein kraftvolles und wütendes Album, es ist für alle Metalheads, ohne Scheuklappen. Im Jahr 2019 schließt sich Fabián Valdés diesem Abenteuer an, ein prominenter chilenischer Gitarrist. Cathalepsy sind dabei, den Heavy Metal Fans die ganze Kraft ihrer Musik näher zu bringen! "Blood and Steel" ist der Inbegriff erstklassiger Metal-Musiker in nur einem Album mit Gästen, die von Sängern wie Tim "Ripper" Owens (KK Priest, ex-Judas Priest), Ralf Scheepers (Primal Fear), Harry Conklin (Jag Panzer, ex-Riot), Herbie Langhans (Avantasia, Firewind), Frank Beck (Gamma Ray), Giacomo Voli (Rhapsody of Fire), Ivan Giannini (Vision Divine), Thiago Bianchi (Shaman, Noturnall), David Readman (PinkCream 69, Voodoo Circle), Sologitarristen: Joel Hoekstra (Whitesnake), Roland Grapow (Masterplan, ex-Helloween), Ross The Boss (ex-Manowar), Glen Drover (ex-Megadeath, King Diamond, Testament), Pontus Norgren (Hammerfall), Thobbe Englund (ex-Sabaton), Jens Ludwig (Edguy), Danilo Bar (WhiteSkull), Sigurd Fylling (Legend Of Valley Doom), Keyboarder: Scott Warren (Dio, Heaven and Hell, Black Sabbath), Oliver Palotai (Kamelot). Das ist Heavy Fuckin Metal.

James Ellis Ford hat sich während seiner gesamten zwei Jahrzehnte währenden Karriere im Verborgenen gehalten. Der Komponist, Multiinstrumentalist, Produzent und Songwriter hat mit einigen der größten Namen der Musikbranche zusammengearbeitet, von den Arctic Monkeys über Depeche Mode, Foals, Gorillaz und Kylie Minogue bis zur Tourband von Simian Mobile Disco und The Last Shadow Puppets. In diesem Jahr steht er mit seinem ersten Soloalbum 'The Hum' im Mittelpunkt. Das Album ist eine ausufernde, genreübergreifende Ode an die Psychedelia, die sowohl zeitgenössisch als auch nostalgisch ist und komplett von James geschrieben, produziert und aufgeführt wurde. Auf der Bühne wird er von seiner vierköpfigen Band begleitet, um die Originalsongs neu zu interpretieren.

Voice Magnetic by Hainbach is the enigmatic Berlin based artist’s sonic diary of 2022. On his sixth release on Seil Records, Stefan Goetsch collages the sounds he made and the ones that surrounded him over the course of twelve months into a powerfully intimate ambient experience.

In his studio or on travels — Hainbach always is working on new material and allows the locations he records his tracks in to find their way into the music. Consequently, on many tracks you can can hear the outside bleeding in — seagulls and waves on "Izmir", the voices of his children while record the piano or the sirens of Neukölln’s police cars in background.

The connecting threads between these pieces are magnetic tape and the human voice — hiss and breath. The result are 15 immersive ambient pieces that make up Voice Magnetic. Often short like the moments that spark them. Fading and intricate, honest and pure.

Based out of Berlin, Germany, electro-acoustic music composer and performer Hainbach creates shifting audio landscapes, using esoteric synthesizers, nuclear test equipment, magnetic tape and a collection of idiophones. Hainbach has become known for his immersive live shows and an unique sound that is both abstract yet very much a corporal experience. Otherworldly and intimate, raw and heartfelt. On his wildly popular YouTube channel, Hainbach shares his love for experimental music techniques and his passion for forgotten machines with a wide audience. Inspiring over one hundred thousand each week to explore synthesis, electronics - and to leave beaten paths.

Îlot, an isolated element within a different whole. For his new album, Sheldon, emblematic rapper of the 75e Session collective, continues his work of introspection on organic compositions, filled with the multiple references that build the musical universe of the artist.

Produced by Epektase and mixed by Sheldon himself at Winslow Studio, the project leaves a lot of room for the guitar and the rapper's 60/70s rock influences such as Bowie and the Beatles. There are also influences from Soul, R&B, Lo-Fi and Jazz, pushing the meeting of rap with other musical genres even further.

A nod to Böcklin's painting Isle of the Dead, a work of multiple interpretations that obsessed the painter himself, the island echoes feelings of isolation and solitude, but also the need to escape and introspect. We thus find the themes that haunt Sheldon: his childhood and his relationship with others, his questions about his place as a human being, which he poses head-on or through lighter notes of humour, and his dismay at a world for which he "knows the problems, not the solutions". His texts, unique and personal, reveal his most intimate thoughts. Like a conversation, they resonate within each of us and create a strong bond, a deep sense of understanding, against the backdrop of all the sweetness and melancholy of the images he conjures up: "One more day on my islet, watching the sailboats go by."

The metaphor of the islet continues in the visual universe built around the album, where the central element is a monolith used to represent isolation and emptiness. Made up of four mirrored sides, this imposing artefact represents both the island and the subject of the album: the central element is not the main subject, Sheldon, but rather what he tells us about the world around him.

Das Ende der Zeit ist gekommen...
In Endzeit- Gewänder gekleidet, ist es für die Dämonin Lilith Fox, Mashl J. (alias der Messias) und seine drei Propheten Rayzon, Zach Volcanic und Smoky 616 endlich an der Zeit, sich ihrer Bestimmung zu stellen, die Welt zu erlösen und ihre Anhängerschaft zu vergrößern!
Alles, was nach der Apokalypse übriggeblieben ist, ist auf diesem Album vereint: Hass und Angst, aber auch Hoffnung, brutale und markerschütternde Drums und betörende Chöre, Geschichten über den Tod, aber auch Führung für die Verlorenen und Ungläubigen.
Die wahren zehn Gebote nehmen hier die Form von Songs an - hört genau hin und empfangt die Botschaft des Messias, die Visionen Liliths und die Mythen des Propheten.
Schließe dich dem Clan an.
Folge dem Messias.

In partnership with Ebb Software and Kepler Interactive, we’re happy to present the haunting soundtrack to Scorn on vinyl.

14 tracks mastered specially for vinyl will be pressed to heavyweight black discs, and housed in a deluxe gatefold sleeve. Artwork is by Ebb Software.

To complement the visceral, nightmarish Giger- and Beksiński-inspired art design, Scorn’s composers created an ambient soundtrack that blurs the line between sound design and music. Brian Williams, aka Lustmord, is often credited for creating the dark ambient genre, and has arranged two whole-side suites of his cues for Scorn. His pieces slowly unfurl in a broodily meditative way, emanating with emptiness and loss. AdisKutkut contributed under the alias Aethek, delivering oppressive, sci-fi-industrial tracks filled with deep synth pads, twisted harmonics, and metallic sounds triggering cavernous reverbs.

Dear Friends, it's 2023 and the future of Leftfield Bass, Trap, and Hybrid Grime is here... RATIONAL SOUL's debut EP, "SELF TITLED", is going to define a new era on the dance floor, reimagining 140 beats that typically are stereotyped into narrow catagories. "SELF TITLED" will become the worldwide definition of a style never heard before, sought after and inevitably copycatted by those inspired.

With no surprise, 2023 is set off to a paramount start for the German SATURATE! label, with an EP that “is the future of Leftfield Bass, Trap, and Hybrid Grime” and “it’s going to define a new era on the dance floor, reimagining 140 beats that typically are stereotyped into narrow categories.” The mastermind behind such a project, called SELF TITLED, is RATIONAL SOUL a Virginia-based, veteran electronic music producer. The EP is coming out in full on January 13, digitally and on vinyl, and it features six originals and four remixes. What sounds like a disorienting emptiness at the beginning, makes perfect sense when read as part of the overall narrative of the composition. “One moment you’re living happy-go-lucky, almost like it’s the script of a Disney movie, the next moment you’re questioning why you exist- how is it you’ve become a slave to the 9 to 5? Phone by your side as digital anti-anxiety medication, entertaining yourself with something nostalgic to remind yourself of better times…war against yourself, to reset your identity.” The fight against this subconscious condition was RATIONAL SOUL’s starting point while writing SELF TITLED. The artist’s attempt to light a lighter to ignite a spark in our consciousness and thus reveal the void in which we are immersed. “Wake up” he seems to want to tell us. Don’t be a pawn, be a player of your life. Let’s riot against this status quo and, quoting RATIONAL SOUL himself, “Let’s be gangsta and fuck shit up because we are mad at why our world is falling apart: twerk on a cop car with a fine cigar in your mouth type beat.” He then concludes by spilling one, big truth, “what better genre of music could describe these feelings than bass music?” How could we not agree?

1982, Brussels: The former au pair for Rick Wakeman of Yes and two of her teenage friends are at the doorstep of Les Disques Du Crepuscule, ready to cut an album with Gilles Martin. Living on busking wages and next door to Tuxedomoon, their work results in a contemporary bossanova record that would provide a missing link between Antonio Carlos Jobim and Kraftwerk. Camino Del Sol was issued and promptly forgotten, with Isabelle Antena moving toward jazz in Asia and the others returning to France. Twenty years later, it was findable only as a VG+ LP with a sticker price of $4.99. Intrigued by the striking cover's sunlit patio furniture emptiness basking in the south of France, we scooped up Camino Del Sol and grouped the extant Antena recordings from that exceptional period by session. 2LP reissue of the original five-song mini-LP adds the group's first 12" (a cover of Jobim's "Girl From Ipanema," naturally), the Seaside Weekend 12", compilation tracks, and two previously unissued cuts, recasting this short-lived combo's forward-thinking milemarker as a modern-day masterstroke.

With 'The Sentimental Swordsman' Farron slips into the role of his ambient moniker Quiem, telling the emotive story of a man who has lost everyone dear to him and seeking to find inward peace, appreciation, a feeling of security, and his capacity for love.

At the beginning of this narration, The Sentimental Swordsman wanders around with no orientation, feels empty and shows his vulnerable side in 'Strayed And Aimless'. A solitary life with a focus on himself and his modest requirements.

But just one mysterious encounter can change it all. 'You Looked So Pretty On My Balcony' describes the presentiment of lightness and a gentle breeze received through the presence of the new acquaintance.

The Sentimental Swordsman still feels insecure on his journey, but he is not alone anymore and he can somehow feel a warm and buoyant glow in his breast. 'Your Singular Courage' underlines the good intentions, harmony and trust slowly building up between them.

From now on, fights are taken side by side, individual crises are resolved with the mutual support of each other and risks are taken together. A new team has been formed that seems to be unbeatable. This intimate relationship is presented by the vibe of 'My Tiny Engine'.

They are lightheartedly taking steps into an auspicious future together and enjoying each others company. But the enemy doesn't sleep. It slowly grows. Evil bubbles up, it comes silently and attacks sneakily. 'On My Mother's Birthday' describes the wounds resulting from a craven ambush that leaves nothing but pain and pure emptiness. Snatched from this new life. Unwonted silence. Feelings of guilt. Fears of loss. A 'Trauma And Its Clutches'.

Stella Sommer, das ist diese Frau, die so zwingend nach Stella Sommer klingt Nach vier Alben mit ihrer Band Die Heiterkeit und zwei Soloplatten übertrumpft sie sich mit ihren 24 neuen Songs auf "Silence Wore a Silver Coat" nun selbst. Auch, was das schiere Volumen, die immer dichtere Stimmung ihres sehr eigenen Universums angeht, an dem sie mit diesem Doppelalbum mit vehementer Konsequenz weiterbaut. Wie bei ihren vorherigen Solowerken ist es auch auf ihrem neuen Album ihr glänzender, dunkel changierender Gesang, der vor wildwachsenden Klanglandschaften leuchtet und ihre stimmliche Ausnahmestellung in Deutschland bestätigt. Immer noch gilt: So hoffnungslos schöne und attitüdelos stolze Popmusik schreibt sonst niemand in diesem Land. Wir hören einmal mehr eine große Songschreiberin und Arrangeurin, die ihre Kunst mit leichter Hand beherrscht, und damit ein gänzlich unangestrengtes, kalkülfreies Meisterwerk schafft. Zum ersten Mal hat Sommer ihr Album mit der ihr eigenen beiläufigen Souveränität auch selbst aufgenommen und produziert, denn warum sollte man das nicht tun, wenn man es kann. "Northern Dancer" und "Was Passiert Ist", ihre beiden jüngsten Werke, solo und als Die Heiterkeit, waren in sich geschlossene, durchkomponierte Alben - dramaturgisch fein konstruiert folgten sie beim Hören wie ein kooperatives Wildpferd am hängenden Führstrick ihrer Erschafferin.

Italian, French-speaking and blessed with a Belgian accent Christophe Clébard brings a coherence that prevails both for his person and for his music: a wobbly mound, which sometimes resembles a series of explosions, sometimes a pile of layers cut by a flood of words from which parts can be distinguished. Relying on the amplified intonation of a saturated microphone, a pounding rhythm box and a synthesizer, his performances absorb the hearing to spit it out in a universe where nothing has any meaning, except "we're going to die". A punchline that he chants far from the cliché darkness of the dark wave, since for him death is jubilant and colorful, with the grim reaper as the owner of the nightclub. A nightclub well anchored in his head, without a future, with the upcoming emptiness and the hazy memory of his Christian upbringing.

All tracks composed and recorded by Christophe Clébard at les ateliers claus. The album was recorded during a residency at Les Ateliers Claus during the month of April 2021, mixed by Piccolo Bruno and Christophe Clebard, mastered by Elvin Vanzeebroeck at Rare Sound Studio. Photos and Cover projects by Jonas Meier.

Debut single for NEW label set up by Savage Pencil (Art), Al From Hell (Printer) and Agitated Records.. primarily to release tasty limited 7” records by awesome new musics.. first release is by Pensylvanian guitar manglers Laurel Canyon, evoking strains of the Stooges via a distinct Pacific Northwest pop filter.. Fluid, Tad, Screaming Trees, Mudhoney etc..are easy points of reference.. but these songs have fire and melody in equal measure and burn their own path, recorded earlier this year with Steve Albini. Punk rock band Laurel Canyon – Nicholas Gillespie, Serg Cereja, and Dylan Loccarini – formed in 2019 when Nick and Serg met through a mutual friend in their hometown of Allentown, Pennsylvania. After connecting over a shared interest in both Arthur Rimbaud and The Stooges, the two began to rehearse together in Serg’s garage. By October 2020, Serg and Nick began composing original songs together as Laurel Canyon. Following their first release, “Two Times Emptiness” b/w “Enemy Lines,” in May 2021, Nick and Serg traded in their characteristic jangle for fuzz pedals and established a relationship with veteran producer Bryce Goggin (Pavement, The Lemonheads) at Trout Recording in Brooklyn. They released their 5-track EP “Victim” digitally on January 14, 2022, rounding out the line-up with bassist Dylan Loccarini. The artist Savage Pencil, who has created artwork for Big Black and Sonic Youth, drew the EP cover. Singles “Daddy’s Honey” and “Eczema” created a buzz online and were featured in Spotify playlists “All New Rock” and “Smells Like Stream Spirit.” Their debut LP, recorded by Bryce Goggin and Steve Albini, will be released in early 2023. More news on that real soon!

In 2016 lutenist Sofie Vanden Eynde put her instrument aside for nine
months in order to recover from a severe burnout
Five years later, she felt the need to look back. Would it be possible, she
wondered, to use the intense, shared concentration between musician and
listener to convey sensations of over- stimulation, contrast, excess, stagnation,
emptiness, beauty and movement? Would it be possible to articulate the inner
reality of a burnout musically: to make a burnout audible, tangible,
understandable and, who knows, avoidable? The result is Vanishing Point /
Verdwijntijd, an autobiographical recital, a musical narrative, a journey:
somewhere between fragile comfort and cautious happiness. Writer Annemarie
Peeters drew on her interviews with Sofie to write a text that reflects the three
phases of a burnout. The run- up, the phase of total stagnation during, and the
cautious way out. Three colours, three seasons, three ways of being. Lurking
beneath Sofie's personal story are experiences that many will recognize: the
craving for efficiency, the sudden faltering, the unfamiliar and at the same time
disconcerting sense of emptiness, and the tentative search for a new balance.
But also the questions Sofie asked herself – about the connection between her
own little story and the big world that surrounds her – evoke wide recognition. Is
burnout a personal failure or a social symptom?
Sofie went in search of pieces from the solo lute repertoire that she intuitively
associated with the various phases of the text. This resulted in a recital with a
surprising palette of colours, styles and atmospheres. At times she chose the
rich, powerful sound of the theorbo. At others she chose the fragile, hushed
sound of the Renaissance lute. The Prelude by the French baroque composer
Robert de Visee combines phrases full of grandeur with breathing pauses filled
with intimate doubt. The music of John Dowland draws on the typically English
penchant for melancholy. In the fantasias and ricercars of Francesco da Milano, it
is not only the bright colours of the Italian Renaissance that resound, but also the
constant search for a new beginning. Luis de Narvaez's Cancion del emperador is
an arrangement for lute of the famous chanson Mille Regretz by Josquin Desprez,
a song that emanates serene regret for everything that is not. And in Robert de
Visee's Chaconne the same chord sequence revolves around its own axis. Hope,
tenderness, revolt and acceptance each step to the fore in turn.
At Sofie's request, Vladimir Gorlinsky created a new composition, one which
reflects the state of mind in the middle of a burnout. Vanishing Point balances on
the edge of total emptiness, a stagnation that at times is hard to bear. Vanishing
Point starts out from this stagnation to explore the different facets of burnout:
resistance and acceptance, fear and hope, stagnation and movement, absolute
solitude and the desire to interact again with the surrounding world. Vanishing
Point / Verdwijntijd can be listened to in different ways: not only as a lute recital,
but also as a radio play with voice, lute and soundscapes. Annemarie Peeters'
text was recorded by actress Katelijne Damen (NL) and voice artist Caroline
Daish (EN). Vladimir Gorlinsky created soundscapes based on the sounds of the
lute, which were magnified as if under a microscope. The soundscapes weave
themselves between the text and the lute music. Jo Thielemans created the
sound design and provided the live electronics.

LPC1 is on limited Ultra-Clear vinyl. A well is a stone-encircled place of depth, keeping an abundance of water for survival. “Well” is also a phrase for pause, for transition in language. Our tears can well up and bubble over. To define ourselves as “well” is the most basic term of goodness. What’s on the other side of the well? Inside the tunnel of change, or this life, we can either feel intimidated by the darkness of uncertainty, or excited by the possibility of nourishment. Songwriter, guitarist, and vocalist Jess Shoman wonders, “what the hell,” why don’t we go for the excess of love we deserve? Tenci’s album A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing becomes a gathering and collection of well-like vessels – cups, puddles, fists – to hold tight to this love and newfound joy. A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing is Tenci’s second album, coming after their 2020 debut My Heart Is An Open Field, which introduced Jess Shoman’s music explorations to the world. Shoman admits that their first album dealt with letting go of painful life experiences, resulting in emptiness. In this recent collection of wiser years and distance from that former grief, Tenci carries an opposite feeling, a celebration of self-rejuvenation. A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing shows Shoman steering their inventive music further and wilder, spilling over with 12 fable-like songs. In a combination of milk, coins, glass, water, and light, each song forms a spell to “fill my heart back up,” Shoman says, “by reframing complex feelings by turning my head sideways and seeing them in a different way.”

LPC1 is on limited Ultra-Clear vinyl. A well is a stone-encircled place of depth, keeping an abundance of water for survival. “Well” is also a phrase for pause, for transition in language. Our tears can well up and bubble over. To define ourselves as “well” is the most basic term of goodness. What’s on the other side of the well? Inside the tunnel of change, or this life, we can either feel intimidated by the darkness of uncertainty, or excited by the possibility of nourishment. Songwriter, guitarist, and vocalist Jess Shoman wonders, “what the hell,” why don’t we go for the excess of love we deserve? Tenci’s album A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing becomes a gathering and collection of well-like vessels – cups, puddles, fists – to hold tight to this love and newfound joy. A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing is Tenci’s second album, coming after their 2020 debut My Heart Is An Open Field, which introduced Jess Shoman’s music explorations to the world. Shoman admits that their first album dealt with letting go of painful life experiences, resulting in emptiness. In this recent collection of wiser years and distance from that former grief, Tenci carries an opposite feeling, a celebration of self-rejuvenation. A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing shows Shoman steering their inventive music further and wilder, spilling over with 12 fable-like songs. In a combination of milk, coins, glass, water, and light, each song forms a spell to “fill my heart back up,” Shoman says, “by reframing complex feelings by turning my head sideways and seeing them in a different way.”

OVERVIEW: Field Medic’s latest album doesn’t waste any time getting to what feels like a mission statement for the record with the first lines “I want to fall off the face of the earth and probably die” on opener “Always Emptiness.” The longtime songwriting project of Kevin Patrick Sullivan - Mr. Field himself, the bay-area native who finds himself living in LA these days - has always had moments of melodrama like this, but his latest album grow your hair long if you’re wanting to see something that you can change feels as emotionally charged and poetically devastating as anything he’s ever given us. Sullivan has been turning turmoil into beautiful music for almost 10 years as Field Medic. The project that had origins in busking San Francisco streets has blossomed into a full-time touring act with a few TikTok viral moments. 2018’s full-length Fade Into the Dawn and the pandemic-era mixtape/album hybrid Floral Prince both offered a glimpse into how Sullivan’s songwriting has evolved since his earliest songs

DNO hits double figures as Denver’s Trisicloplox & Sectra return with more industrial-strength electro-sludge.

Sectra sets the tone with ‘Mail Theft’, a hulking mass of sand-blasting static, insectoid jitter and low-end boom. It’s an intimidating, uneasy listen, like tuning through the haunting emptiness of post-apocalyptic broadcast frequencies, only to be interrupted by sudden bursts of unseen filth and gore.

Trisicloplox follows with a brace of tracks. ‘Bruised’ does exactly what it says on the tin, gargantuan kicks pummelling layer upon layer of dense sound into an impenetrable wall of noise. Ritualistic rhythms and gluttonous amounts of overdrive swarm over distant wails, sending everything into a spiral into despair.On ‘Megastructure’, doom metal meets hip-hop, as rough-hewn drums crunch above a bassline that takes its cues from the Super Hans School of Electronic Music: “The longer the note, the more dread.”

And finishing up the vinyl offerings is ‘Dead On Arrival’. Coming courtesy of Sectra, the most traditionally ‘club-focused’ effort of the lot sees a serrated breakbeat and venomous acid lick sparring over dissonant pads.

As always, digital listeners are offered a little bonus, this time the only full collab: ‘The Dead InTheir Shrouds’. Shunted along by a systematic kick, the track’s jackhammer subs become all-consuming, seemingly sucking all the air from the room and hurling it back out of the bassbins in a violent frenzy.

A bold release that’s not for the faint of heart, the ‘Dead Structure’ EP further cements Trisicloplox & Sectra as truly original talents and DNO as an outlet that can never be pigeonholed.

Rhythms of postmodern realism at the very bottom of the DNO.

Ekin Fil returns to the guitar on Dora Agora. Her earliest recordings, notably her debut on Root Strata, prominently featured guitar in this urgent expressions of a dreamy dreariness that immediately offered enthusiastic comparisons to Grouper. In her development as composer of ephemeral ghostliness for numerous albums as well as her scores to film soundtracks, that instrument has given way to keyboards, organs, synths, and various mood engineering devices, in her beautifully melancholy pursuits of an emotional emptiness through sound. Yet, the pandemic era gave Ekin pause to reflect on her creative process and she picked that instrument back up to create one of her greatest albums to date.

As direct and urgent as these songs can be, Ekin swaddles her acoustic guitar chords in soft-focus reverb and polyphonous shadow, colored with a judicious amount of shoegazing drone and somber atmosphere that speaks to her continued development as a composer. "Ghost Boy" in particular is a bittersweet, wistful tune whose arrangement harkens to Johnny Marr at his peak of effortless downer simplicity. "Farba" and "Yo Feelings" turn the emotional screws with soul-crush crescendos of vocal melodies that build upon Ekin's lonely guitar chords. Again, Grouper emerges as one of Ekin's closest neighbors, alongside Carla Dal Forno, Slowdive's Pygmallion, and Movietone.

"I really feel like I've gone back to a time when I was recording songs with a guitar and keyboard when I was very young. It's kind of like embracing Ekin from that period with my current ideas & mood. it's an homage, it's a wave, a hug from my present to my past…" (Ekin Fil, August 2022)

Blue Vinyl
If emptiness is heaviness is Godliness, Birds of Prey’s third full-length LP is an immaculate conception from on high. The record luxuriates in the spaces between. What’s left out says as much as what made it in. Deep, droning, and dub wise, “Vanishing Point” cascades in elegance. Its reference points call towards the sample manipulation of American tape music and the downward gaze of amniotic British bass music. It charts its own path nonetheless, building its own space for drifting off to. Unlike many peers operating in similar realms, Birds of Prey are a proper band, a foursome: Grant Aaron, Clay Wilson, Eric Holmes, and Camille Altay. Each are artists in their own right with a distinct practice. In Birds of Prey, their collaborations in studio take on a greater shape, whittled and edited into cosmic formlessness. Although borne of improvisation, you may never know that in the listening. “Vanishing Point” is a tight, coherent work, the sound of a cadre of talented musicians locked in flow. Rippling tones become glacial melodies. Cavernous drums emerge barely from the ether. Rhythms interlock, interpolate. Patterns repeat and dissolve whence they came. There is untold potency in simplicity, and Birds of Prey make it known.

Grey Marbled Vinyl

Clear water hits the surface of a grainy ball. The stream slowly dissolves and flows down the spherical structure until it finally drops on a candle. The flame extinguishes; fragile streaks of smoke ascend until they hit the rough surface of the colossal globe again.
The cover art to Marble Arch, the second long-player of Vienna- and Berlin-based artists Oberst & Buchner, depicts masterly the dramatic juxtapositions the musicians have always been reflecting in their musical outcome.
The massive density of a giant sound wall is contrasted by spacious openness. Fragile sonic details are sparkling out of colossal pitch-black clouds. The songs are filled with gentle warmth and cold roughness, bright digital clarity and deep analogue crackle, ranging in style from pulsating dark-disco over classic pop to experimental ambient.
The duo's two-week artist residency in a 250-year-old house, located in the mystic landscape of the Bavarian woods set this specific mood for the 10-track album which became a mixture of electronic synthesis, organic instrumentals and field recordings. Heavy-weight basslines in combination with bitter-sweet orchestral instrumentation and the minutiae of precise percussion recordings and drum programming are the characteristics that formed the sound of Marble Arch.
Oberst & Buchner's way to deal with tension is in how they compose their song structures as extreme arcs of suspense in a near classical manner. Their intense dynamic arrangements always alternate between rise and explosion or implosion and fall. This way the compositions pick up the motive of creation and destruction throughout the long-player in the same way as the cover-art.
Taken together, all these fragments form the duo`s signature cinematic articulation of dramatic slowed down club music and moments of surprise.

BIO
Oberst & Buchner are two friends and musicians living in Vienna and Berlin. They look back on a mutual musical journey that is as rich in variety as it is more then 15 years long. For one thing, countless high-energy DJ sets in clubs and at festivals all over Europe in recent years have earned them a reputation as a dynamic duo infernale. At the same time, their own productions draw from the full palette of moods and emotions.
Boiled down to the very essence, there's one common denominator running through the duo's musical works: colossally massive elements are masterfully set against a shimmering backdrop of incredibly detailed layers. Each so full of subtle suspense that they feel like the first raindrops before a monstrous thunderstorm. You can literally hear the calm before the storm in every break they build up, then feel the force of the wind in your face when it hits you.
Ranging from pulsating electronica over slow organic sounds derived from both nature and acoustic instruments to deep dance pop ballads, their songs are full of suspense and packed with drama. In their productions, the two friends conjure up soundscapes that are extremely dense and at the same time infinitely open and spacious. Within this framework, they play with stark contrasts of antithetic elements: repetition and improvisation, functionality and emotions, emptiness and overload, clarity and crackling.

Vessels promise an escape from responsibilities towards the landscape, they facilitate our avoidance of conscientiously feeling our attachment to the mainland. The visual nothingness of deep water and clean horizons fools the brain and delivers a treacherous feeling of independence.

We ignore the truths expressed by landscapes, so we mould them into urban projects for our strange desires. We clean up the irrationalities by which nature constructs itself. Then we look up to the skies, where the abstractions we have to draw in our minds should reside and inspire us.

We peer into the various shades of blue above the waters, the emptiness guarantees possibilities of our abstractions becoming realities. The apathetic stare into neat, straight horizons transforms our ancestral landscape into dirt and danger, when looking back to it.

To be on a ship under quarantine, is an upside down experience, for the promised escape has turned into a forced paralysis. The Lima flag (? - ? ?, in morse code), presented on the outer sleeve of this record, indirectly demands of all passengers to stay aboard and contemplate their escape from the land they now desire to return to.

These four piano pieces could be considered as a classical sonata (allegroadagio-scherzo-rondo). In a recital they are accompanied by four video pieces by artist Karl Van Welden. We picked the videos out of his extensive archive, choosing images intuitively while listening to the piano music. The theme of ships relating to quarantine thus came unannounced but of course, we were in the middle of the pandemic at the time.

Solastalgia was already waiting as a title for the new album before march 2020. I first came across the word in Underland, a book by Robert Macfarlane (2019). He defines the word as "The unhappiness of people whose landscapes are being transformed about them by forces beyond their control". These forces and this unhappiness are, I believe, what constitutes the modern human. Solastalgia, about the music We haven't found them yet, the words to talk to each other about the worrying signs of climate change. Feeling worried when walking on autumn leaves in the beginning of August should be completely normal. But how do we communicate about it? We don't want to be just the next hysterical doomer.

With this music I try to focus on the climate pain itself, gently inviting the listener to investigate their latent feelings of unease and growing concerns about the environment. As in real life, we circumvent the real issues because they are just too big, there are no words, no expressions yet.

This album tries, in four different attempts, to carve out a path towards communicating about a deeper pain that eventually will connect us all. My general method is to start with a comforting melody, full of fake nostalgia, which, after changing gear to autodestruct mode, morphs into a painful question mark.

The first part sets off with an idyllic melody, accompanied by repeated notes, as a far, muted echo of an alarm. The melody starts to explain itself painfully into a dissonant whirlwind in the high register, sounding not unlike Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit bravura. In the second piece a warm Beatles like melody (And I love her) gets confronted with the weird hippie mantra of a later Lennon song War is over, if you want it. Sentences get reduced to syllables and result in lonely notes that crash and shiver under the burden of too much meaning. Like Shostakovich's latest work, the Sonata for viola and piano.

The descending melody of Bach's Erbarme dich, Mein Gott is echoed in the upper and lower voicings of the third piece, juxtaposed to a typical, threatening Ennio Morricone Western dotted rhythm accompaniment. This rhythm eventually evolves into citing the 1972 Captain Beefheart early ecological warning song Blabber and Smoke (there's a big pane/pain in your window, it's gonna hang you all,... dangle you all). Towards the middle of the piece, the music explodes and the three layers get dispersed all over the keyboard in a virtuosic maelstrom towards another painful question mark. The bitter answer is going back to business with a barely noticeable citation of the first notes of the RZA's Liquid Swords album.

The final piece is some kind of mantra, the same 7/4 pulse all throughout the piece. The dampers of all A's and B's on the keyboard are released by the middle pedal, thus sustaining an ever present resonance. Melodic cells alternate in shifting quantifications with small, bell like percussive cluster playing. While composing this piece an image crept up: walking out of the church on Sunday morning, tolling bells enthusiastically moderating the churchgoers' small talk in the local dialect. Apparently I have tried to evoke this kind of conversation, but injecting it with fictitious alarming conversation topics, the contemporary.

Frederik Croene (August '22)

Shelter Press and INA grm are pleased and moved to present two previously unreleased recordings of Peter Rehberg, two live performances given at the GRM which, each in their own way, vividly illustrate the extent of his sonic palette.

On 22 July 2021, Peter Rehberg passed away, leaving a great emptiness in his wake. Many initiatives have already celebrated or will soon celebrate his memory and the titanic work he put at the service of so many artists - a whole musical community, in fact - through Editions Mego. INA grm, Shelter Press and Stephen O’Malley, who are continuing some of the collaborative Editions Mego sub-labels (Recollection GRM, Portraits GRM and Ideologic Organ), wanted to pay tribute more specifically to the musician Peter Rehberg, and to his immense talent.

Peter Rehberg, as an artist, has collaborated with the GRM on numerous occasions, both with Stephen O’Malley (as KTL) and solo. This release features two concerts given for the GRM, each time as part of the Présences électronique festival. The first concert, given on 15 March 2009 at the Maison de la Radio in Paris, marked the first collaboration between Peter Rehberg and the GRM and the beginning of a long and fruitful friendship. The second concert took place on 6 March 2016. Between these two concerts, 7 years have passed, 7 years in which the ties between Peter Rehberg and the GRM have been strengthened, 7 years in which Peter Rehberg’s music has flourished. What is striking in these two concerts is how Peter Rehberg’s unique musical sensitivity and ‘grammar’ can be heard beyond the instruments. For while the first concert is pure laptop music, the second is extended to the field of modular synthesis. However, in both concerts, the elements that are so personal to Peter Rehberg’s music are present and combine in a layering of sonic abrasions, raw sensations and a sensitivity that is as much about formal awareness as it is about the invocation of overwhelming emotions, even though a little hidden behind a radicality that is always a bit provocative. Peter Rehberg offers us a “portrait music”, a music that gives some clues about the personality of its author and whose absence continues to deepen an inconsolable sadness.

Live performances by Peter Rehberg at le Centquatre-Paris for INA grm’s Présences électronique festival, recorded on March 15, 2009, and March 6, 2016.

Mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi
Cut by Andreas Kauffelt at Schnittstelle, Berlin
Photo by Magdalena Blaszczuk
Sleeve design by Stephen O’Malley

Cleveland, Ohio's Axioma create their most stunning release to date on
Clear with Black and White splattered vinyl entitled "Sepsis"!Seven tracks
of unbridled devastation intertwined with blackened post metal precision

Die aus erfahrenen Musikern bestehende junge Band REXUL, stammt aus NRW/Deutschland und präsentiert uns hier nun ihr Debüt Album "Erebus... Virtuosus... Alpha...". Ein wahrer musikalischer Hassbrocken, satanisch, fies und brutal gibt es hier 13 Tracks (inkl. Intros/Outros) in die Gehörgänge geballert. Purer, klassisch amerikanisch geprägter, wuchtiger Death Metal für Fans von BRUTALITY, MORBID ANGEL oder DEICIDE. Definitiv ein Death Metal Highlight !!!

"Erebus... Virtuosus... Alpha..." wurde durch B. Oprea aufgenommen, gemixt und Gernhart Studio Troisdorf gemastert. Das Cover Artwork stammt von S. Milizia.

"Wer auf MORBID ANGEL, DEICIDE, MONSTROSITY oder auch NOCTURNUS steil geht und dabei seine Lauscher auf Anspruch und Qualität eingestellt hat, sollte hier zuschlagen" - Rock Hard Magazin
"Rexul vermengen auf ihrem sehr geilen und packenden Debüt "Erebus... Virtuosus... Alpha..." gekonnt verschiedene Merkmale des US-Death Metals der frühen 90er zu einem spannenden, feurigen und virtuosen Glutofen des Todes voller Killerriffs und Brutalität! Old Skull-Sickos müssen hier unbedingt reinhören!" - Hotel 666
"REXUL legen ihr erstes Album vor und huldigen dem Ami Death Metal der frühen 90er Jahre." - Twilight Magazin
"Die Burschen sind vom amerikanischen Death Metal beeinflusst und bieten sehr gute Kost für Fans von Morbid Angel, Deicide, Immolation und Brutality an." - Time For Metal
"...eine gelungene Mischung aus Melodie und eingängigem Todesblei, ohne dabei das Ziel aus den Augen zu verlieren- eine eingängige Scheibe zu präsentieren, die sich ohne Probleme schnell ins Hirn frisst." - Raben Report
"Rexul plays old-school death metal with a stronger link to genre veterans like Morbid Angel and Deceide. With this Floridian death metal inspiration in mind, Rexul combines harsh riffs, deep growls and an atmospheric vibe in a stunning way." Markus' Heavy Music Blog
"Recommended! Category: Kickass Death Metal" Voices From The Darkside

Chris Imler likes to play drums standing up. He‘s the dandy with the killer offbeat, or, as one major German newspaper once put it, the "Grand Seigneur of the Berlin Underground". He has been making his mark on countless Berlin musical affairs since long before the fall of the Wall, with The Golden Showers, Peaches, Oum Shatt, Driver &Driver, Die Türen, Jens Friebe, to name but a few. He has also been perfoming across Europe as a solo artist for the past decade.

In "Operation Schönheit" (German for "Operation Beauty"), he has recorded his most, well, beautiful album to date. But Benedikt Frey's warm production subverts its own beauty with a multitude of clanking and ingling synth sounds, making the work very much about the cosmetic surgery it performs on itself. It's all in the tradition of the more experimental and electronic side of post-punk in which Imler and his unique groove are rooted. It doesn't take insider knowledge of Berlin's post-punk underground to realise that that Imler groove consists of rhythm that sings, vocals that dance and a look that fits, as illustrated by "Disappoint Me", his latest video: https://youtu.be/YeVJ75ljjB8

Elsewhere - such as in "Movies" - the rhythm sings, less electronically reduced, into the acoustics of an old, high-ceilinged Berlin apartment; metal clatters, a zither trembles and Imler plays with the metronome. Sometimes he moves ahead of time, sometimes trails behind it. He always manages to be in his very own groove, which carries everything along. And this is precisely the essence of the Imler rhythm, which lends itself to being applied to the very rhythm of life: Stretch and compress your time and loop it according to your own groove! Optimise nothing but feel everything! And dance to it! Even when contemplating everyday information overload, as Imler's high-speed mumbling suggests in the hectic yet smooth opening track "Temperature".

But being the ultimate night owl he is, Imler manages to make even the odd bout of paranoia seem like a good thing: like some kind of krauty, groovy B-horror-soundtrack-inflected high-pressure environment, "Whip Me" is a cross between Conrad Schnitzler and Bauhaus. In the title track, whose lyrics were written together with Jens Friebe, he intones: "You want to be something greater / You break your leg / When it heals again / You break it again" and sounds like the most gleeful fatalist you can imagine. Because in his city, one can still lose oneself better than anywhere else - a night easily becomes a whole universe that can be traversed, marvelled at and played with, and one might find one's old self again only when hearing "church bells" and "small birds singing". At least that's how Imler illustrates it in "Emptiness full of stars", and it seems likely that those "stars" are the human companions of the Berlin night in question.

And so once again Imler becomes Berlin's most important cultural ambassador: that scene of the eternally, and somehow successfully, failing creatures of the night, once the envy of the international postmodern bohème, has, despite many claims to the contrary, not been completely "optimised away", and its attitude to life is perfectly summed up in Imler's groove. And, of course, his look. "Schau Hin" (German for "Look!"), he sings in the track of the same name, masterfully dubbed out with the help of Melbourne's Leo James.

Quite right! Look - and listen.

Yours, Johannes von Weizsäcker (The Chap)

Grey Vinyl

Polymorphism Records continue their intercultural and cross-genre work with their third release E Source. Female vocals return to the label with four original tracks by Russian artist Sestrica, who brings in her characteristic emotional narrative. A remix by Konx Om Pax and
a rework by Antwood make up the crew boarding on a galactic grey/silver vinyl.

PM003 takes off with electro-to-techno beats fuelled by a mild, wrapping acid melody in Today We Meet, where the uplifting countdown to launch can be felt. Sentimental Value gets
us deeper into the spatial trip. Darker samples and a heavier bassline give extra gravity to the anthem of the journey across sonic galaxies. Floating to slow, surrounding sounds and loops we land on a calmer planet called Intention. Its tidal sensation is created by an
orchestral combination of meditative vocals and other layers of composition. New Era enters an orbit of elegant syncopation within a rotating reverb stardust. Ancestral beeps subtly acknowledge legacy to be taken forward to the next odyssey.

Musician and graphical artist Konx Om Pax from Glasgow beautifully introduces nostalgia to New Era with playful breaks and scratches, getting us back to our roots in this excursion visiting alien territoires. Sestrica’s vocals from her original track are drawn into the remix as
echoing words rendering a mysterious aura, travelling through a deep trance of diverse yet harmonic rhythms and effects. A journey within a journey.

Canadian producer Antwood’s rework of side A jumps into an epic vortex of more experimental, unexpected sounds. The album-closer builds up towards absolute chaos, to then create a vacuum to emptiness. A supermassive (tribute to black holes intended) drop
leads to the last minutes of the EP: up tempo cyber-influenced sounds that bring us to a bright futuristic landscape ironically far from a dystopian prophecy.

Purely coincidental fact: the last track of PM002’s originals being Crisis Apparition and its homologue in PM003 New Era, hope seems to be peeking through current times to send an accidental message with this first series of the label.

Mind the overuse of Space metaphors; in this year 2021 where humans are going farther and further in exploring new places out there, it is a tribute and celebration to discover new musical journeys like this out here, on Earth.

Environmental sustainability and social justice are core values of Polymorphism Records. Following their strong interest in contributing to a good cause, shown from the early days, all Bandcamp digital sales are donated to projects such as Team Trees or The Ocean Cleanup.meet f B3 E Source side A (Antwood rework)

Emerging from the ashes of the band Church Of
Void, there is a new force rising up to pursue a
path in the name of doom. Fimir are set to release
their blistering debut album, ‘Tomb Of God’.
 Fimir were founded in 2019 by former Church Of
Void members G. Funeral, Magus Corvus, H.
Warlock, A.D. and Septic Apes’ drummer H.
Wizzard. From a mere spark in the dark and a
distant echo of forgotten riffs haunting in emptiness
from a collapsed doomstar of their former band,
Fimir got rid of their ghosts and started to work on
their first album right away, until the world went into
lockdown.
 The five-piece collective, hailing from the frozen
wastelands of Finland, used their time and
creativity wisely, and managed to put the final
touches on their upcoming debut, featuring six
heavy cosmic tracks unleashing an enthralling
blend of razor sharp riffage, haunting occult vibes,
ambient atmospheres and classic doom metal.
 For fans of Black Sabbath, Tiamat, Type O
Negative, Pentagram, Church Of Void, Reverend
Bizarre, Candlemass.
 LP on cyan coloured vinyl.

Empty surrounds all of me. It’s a poignant line from the third album by Blackwater Holylight that encapsulates the search for self when suddenly everything has changed. There’s a theme of processing vast personal trauma throughout Silence/Motion that eloquently — both lyrically and musically — and simultaneously embodies the crushing emptiness, sorrow, strength and rebuilding of recovering from personal devastation.

“There was so much grief both in the world and interpersonally during the process of creating Silence/Motion,” says vocalist/bassist Allison “Sunny” Faris. “The four of us gave one another more space to be ourselves, to experiment with each other’s ideas and to be gentle with one another more than we ever have before. So, we knew this tenderness would manifest in extremely honest arrangements, and I think that you can hear that throughout the record.”

Curiously, considering the dark times in which it was created, this is the band’s most melodic and catchy music so far. Blackwater Holylight, as the name suggests, is all about contrasts: It’s a fluid convergence of sound that’s heavy, psychedelic, melodic, terrifying and beautiful all at once. And, Silence/Motion finds the band honing those contrasts, letting ideas and moods fully develop from song to song, rather than filling every song with a full range of their capabilities. It allows the band to go fully prog-rock here, and simply stay hushed and intimate there. There’s a new confidence to the band in how seamlessly they wield their stylistic amalgam.

“Writing this album was extraordinarily difficult emotionally, however it did come to fruition fairly quickly,” Faris says. “In the past, the theme of vulnerability has always been a big player and it definitely showed up full force while writing this album.”

Blackwater Holylight recorded the album as a four piece: Faris on vocals and guitar (on “Silence/Motion”, “MDIII”, “Around You” and “Every Corner”) and bass for the remainder, Sarah McKenna on synths, Mikayla Mayhew on guitar (and bass when Faris plays guitar) and drummer Eliese Dorsay. New second guitarist Erika Osterhout will perform the songs with them live. For Silence/Motion the band chose to work with a producer for the first time, bringing in A.L.N. (of Mizmor, Hell) to produce, along with recording engineer Dylan White — who also helmed their previous album Veils of Winter (2019) — at Odessa Recording Studio in Portland, OR. Guest vocals on album opener “Delusional” are by Bryan Funck (Thou.) Mike Paparo (Inter Arma) and A.LN. (Mizmor, Hell) lend guest vocals to album closer “Every Corner.”

Silence/Motion opens softly with interwoven folky single note guitars over an ominous sounding drone for the first minute, akin to moments from Pink Floyd’s Echoes. Suddenly an irresistibly head-nodding, groovy droptuned riff kicks in with the drums and it’s a full on blackened rocker with soaring synths and Funck’s witchy whispers over the top. “Who The Hell,” the track quoted above, takes proceedings into a Krautrock direction, centered around McKenna’s arpeggiated synth loop and Dorsay’s tom-tom triplets, while 16-note guitar strums add tension as Faris wearily sings, “So tell me who the hell would want to live this way — so afraid/ To feel this void, to dwell in it… I can’t describe this pain I wear/ It suffocates and you left it here.” It’s an incredibly powerful 6 minutes. The title track delivers the 1-2-3 punch of the album’s brilliant opening trilogy. It starts with lightly plucked acoustic guitar, plaintive piano chords and Faris’ voice gliding so softly it sounds more like a Mellotron. The song builds slowly toward crescendo, led by a swinging tom pattern, that abruptly switches back to a heavier version of the opening melody.“Silence/Motion” is about digesting and healing from sexual assault. As Faris explains, “It is an ode to the juxtaposition of feeling paralyzingly blank and and like your entire life is moving through you simultaneously.” Elsewhere, Black Metal guitars collide with dreamlike melodies. “Around You” brandishes a hopeful, hummable synth melody and shimmering shoegaze guitars like throwing down a gauntlet. In the end, it becomes undeniably clear just how completely into their own Blackwater Holylight has come.

“The analogy is that with our first record (Blackwater Holylight, 2018) we were getting into to the car and buckling up,” Faris says. “The second (Veils of Winter, 2019) we were turning the car on, and with this third we have kicked into drive toward our destination. Our destination is a bit mysterious and has the ability to change from day to day, but we’re on our way.”

Empty surrounds all of me. It’s a poignant line from the third album by Blackwater Holylight that encapsulates the search for self when suddenly everything has changed. There’s a theme of processing vast personal trauma throughout Silence/Motion that eloquently — both lyrically and musically — and simultaneously embodies the crushing emptiness, sorrow, strength and rebuilding of recovering from personal devastation.

“There was so much grief both in the world and interpersonally during the process of creating Silence/Motion,” says vocalist/bassist Allison “Sunny” Faris. “The four of us gave one another more space to be ourselves, to experiment with each other’s ideas and to be gentle with one another more than we ever have before. So, we knew this tenderness would manifest in extremely honest arrangements, and I think that you can hear that throughout the record.”

Curiously, considering the dark times in which it was created, this is the band’s most melodic and catchy music so far. Blackwater Holylight, as the name suggests, is all about contrasts: It’s a fluid convergence of sound that’s heavy, psychedelic, melodic, terrifying and beautiful all at once. And, Silence/Motion finds the band honing those contrasts, letting ideas and moods fully develop from song to song, rather than filling every song with a full range of their capabilities. It allows the band to go fully prog-rock here, and simply stay hushed and intimate there. There’s a new confidence to the band in how seamlessly they wield their stylistic amalgam.

“Writing this album was extraordinarily difficult emotionally, however it did come to fruition fairly quickly,” Faris says. “In the past, the theme of vulnerability has always been a big player and it definitely showed up full force while writing this album.”

Blackwater Holylight recorded the album as a four piece: Faris on vocals and guitar (on “Silence/Motion”, “MDIII”, “Around You” and “Every Corner”) and bass for the remainder, Sarah McKenna on synths, Mikayla Mayhew on guitar (and bass when Faris plays guitar) and drummer Eliese Dorsay. New second guitarist Erika Osterhout will perform the songs with them live. For Silence/Motion the band chose to work with a producer for the first time, bringing in A.L.N. (of Mizmor, Hell) to produce, along with recording engineer Dylan White — who also helmed their previous album Veils of Winter (2019) — at Odessa Recording Studio in Portland, OR. Guest vocals on album opener “Delusional” are by Bryan Funck (Thou.) Mike Paparo (Inter Arma) and A.LN. (Mizmor, Hell) lend guest vocals to album closer “Every Corner.”

Silence/Motion opens softly with interwoven folky single note guitars over an ominous sounding drone for the first minute, akin to moments from Pink Floyd’s Echoes. Suddenly an irresistibly head-nodding, groovy droptuned riff kicks in with the drums and it’s a full on blackened rocker with soaring synths and Funck’s witchy whispers over the top. “Who The Hell,” the track quoted above, takes proceedings into a Krautrock direction, centered around McKenna’s arpeggiated synth loop and Dorsay’s tom-tom triplets, while 16-note guitar strums add tension as Faris wearily sings, “So tell me who the hell would want to live this way — so afraid/ To feel this void, to dwell in it… I can’t describe this pain I wear/ It suffocates and you left it here.” It’s an incredibly powerful 6 minutes. The title track delivers the 1-2-3 punch of the album’s brilliant opening trilogy. It starts with lightly plucked acoustic guitar, plaintive piano chords and Faris’ voice gliding so softly it sounds more like a Mellotron. The song builds slowly toward crescendo, led by a swinging tom pattern, that abruptly switches back to a heavier version of the opening melody.“Silence/Motion” is about digesting and healing from sexual assault. As Faris explains, “It is an ode to the juxtaposition of feeling paralyzingly blank and and like your entire life is moving through you simultaneously.” Elsewhere, Black Metal guitars collide with dreamlike melodies. “Around You” brandishes a hopeful, hummable synth melody and shimmering shoegaze guitars like throwing down a gauntlet. In the end, it becomes undeniably clear just how completely into their own Blackwater Holylight has come.

“The analogy is that with our first record (Blackwater Holylight, 2018) we were getting into to the car and buckling up,” Faris says. “The second (Veils of Winter, 2019) we were turning the car on, and with this third we have kicked into drive toward our destination. Our destination is a bit mysterious and has the ability to change from day to day, but we’re on our way.”

International power duo Dasom Baek (traditional Korean flutes) and Violeta García (cello) present their debut album. is the sound of two leading composers and improvisers pushing their instruments to the technical and creative limit, then beyond into places unnavigated, futuristic and often haunting.

Dasom and Violeta tussle with playful and at times brutal mastery between passages of sparse melody, acrobatic percussion and harmonic drift, while interjecting voices fracture and reassemble into intimate, improbable forms. It is hard to imagine an album more abundant in ideas and motifs, all atomised as soon as they are brought to life. The effect is a tapestry of rugged spirits - moving, and at times just plain beautiful.

Recommended for fans of Okkyung Lee, John Butcher, Messiaen, or Ernst Reijseger.

Dasom Baek is a composer, improviser and performer of traditional Korean instruments, mainly Daegeum, Sogeum. Dasom pursues ground-breaking and modern music rooted in traditional Korean instrumental performance. She is a Certified Master of Important Intangible Cultural Asset, no.45. She has achieved Bachelor's and Master's degrees from the Korea National University of Arts, and is currently undertaking a PhD course at Seoul National University. She has also represented Korea at the International Flute Festival. In 2019 she was selected as a fellow for the OMI Music residency in New York, collaborating with various genres of musicians from different countries. In 2020, she released her debut album, titled . In 2021 she was selected as a showcase artist at SXSW Festival.

Violeta García is a cellist, improviser and composer born in 1990 in San Nicolás de los Arroyos, Buenos Aires, Argentina. She studied at the Conservatory Astor Piazolla, and holds a degree in Composition from the Conservatory Manuel de Falla, with Ricardo Capellano. She also has a degree in Musical Arts, specialising in violoncello, from the Universidad Nacional of Arts (U.N.A).

EYA's sister label Lonewolf celebrates 2 years of activity with a 3x 12"!The VA explores a wide range of electronic music styles...from ambient to techno,breaks,electro,acid and more! 'The Wolfpack'will be a must in every record bag and vinyl collection!Music by Innershades,Es-Q,Matthew Dexter,Dom,Zolaa,Intareality,Tadan,Paradise City Breakers,NND,Cool and Frank,Patient Better Drivers.

Fractal City, the latest Cubenx album is a collection of terrestrial jams and arachnean ambient ballads that are particularly apt for urban listening. If its predecessors cracked the musical codes in force and shone by the versatility of their references, this new opus offers its listener an intense and symbolic sound environment.


The raw material of Fractal City was first conceived as a series of sound patches, designed to run in parallel with Canadian digital artist Maotik's installation. Broadcasted in real-time by generative patches reacting to various external and non-human data, those musical excerpts have been rendered in hundreds of nuances and extended over infinite durations. This unusual approach confers to the recording of the finished album's outstanding immersive strength.

Recorded live on a single track over a short period of a few weeks, the nine compositions of Fractal City capture the obsessions of its author for postmodern urban landscapes, and the revelation of new perspectives on the city of Paris.

The opening piece `Ssarg´ seems to hide the figure of the Mexican ambient producer Jorge Reyes. Cubenx built a cocoon of energetic layers, a new home of the mystical kind harmoniously integrated in a flourishing rainforest ecosystem.

`Transect ´refers to the urban development model of the same name, which is based on a division of the city into autonomous "fractal" zones. It also echoes the concept of "metro polarities" which considers the city as a mosaic of social groups. "By cycling in the evening with a friend, we could get away from the city centre to the suburbs of Paris. The contrasts are striking. You move from chic districts to bedroom communities, from industrial zones to improvised caravan camps. But there is a kind of energy in this heterogeneity that pushes you to always pedal further."

A few miles away, it would look like Art and urbanism have tried to level the cultural and social discrepancies of the outskirts of Paris. "Architectural sites like the Arcades of Bofill are splendid. There are completely extravagant projects, which seem to emerge from nowhere."
These buildings with ambitious aesthetics off the beaten tourist track, deteriorate over time and often remain far from the expectations of the local population. A feeling of nostalgic beauty is particularly perceptible on the slowest and most introspective ballads of the album as 'Urban Decay', 'Hagel' or 'Axe Majeur'. The producer leaves nonetheless no room for melancholic emptiness. "Every time, I have the impression that urban culture is taking its rights back and that young people appropriate the places in one way or another."

Just like `Transect', ` Quantified' and `Fractal City' present themselves as mirrors of a daily urban life in constant motion. All three are empowered by an overheated factory, which dispatches hypnotic beats and burst of analogue compressors with a clinical precision and direct them straight away to the reptilian areas of their listener's brains.

The sequencing leaves however space and time to take breath and makes way for aerial sonic excursions of spiritual and enlightened nature. On `Human Dilemma', Cubenx shows some concerns to opening the Pandora's box of transhumanist theories. While a long cosmic wave gives the listener a feeling of perfect fullness, a dizzying guitar distortion cast doubts on long term outlooks. `Smash Other' on the other way alternates gentle dissonances over an ocean of white noise and concludes the album on ethereal note.

With ´Fractal City", Cubenx eludes his irreconcilable love for shoegaze pop song and techno to concentrate exclusively on the production of mutant experimental materials. The result is an uncanny musical object, rich in image and sensation. Cubenx give us a guiding framework, enthralling enough to engage the listener to a tour of town. But he leaves it to the sole listeners to design their own projection of the city.

The seminal debut album from US Blackened Metal stars WORM SHEPHERD - with additional song 'Chasm Dweller'. One of the most seminal young talents on the emerging extreme metal scene, vocalist Devin Duarte and his band WORM SHEPHERD are re-writing the book on Blackened Death Metal.

The seminal debut album from US Blackened Metal stars WORM SHEPHERD - with additional song 'Chasm Dweller'. One of the most seminal young talents on the emerging extreme metal scene, vocalist Devin Duarte and his band WORM SHEPHERD are re-writing the book on Blackened Death Metal.

The Ember, The Ash is 鬼 from Unreqvited’s post blackened death metal project that explores the heavier, darker, deeper and weirder sides of the DSBM genre. "Throughout all of Unreqvited’s manifestations, 鬼’s roots in post-hardcore ring out in the form of bright, building riff-walls that welcome the dawn of a new day. More of a DSBM artist through his general emotional intensity that escapes the prison of despair, Unreqvited becomes a candle in the depths of darkness. Surely, there needs to be a place to store overwrought feelings in order to arrive at a place of hope, and that’s where The Ember, The Ash comes in. 鬼 has added the new band to his list of rock and metal ventures, and it is arguably the gloomiest yet. While his songwriting still very much mimics the building of a staircase, it is one that aims steadily downward to the pits instead of upwards to the heavens." - INVISIBLE ORANGES