Beats News

Futuro Antico, released just on tape in 1980, this record contains the hypnotic session of Walter Maioli (Aktuala) and Riccardo Sinigaglia. Analog and warm sounds, a perfect mix of drone synth and ancient flutes (found in oriental countries) gives you the idea to fly on a spaceship towards some exotic sites. This records terribly remember the astonishing live Köln jam of Terry Riley and Don Cherry, the comparison fits!This reissue maintains the first tape artwork + info and photos in the innerfolder.

The Wastelands' is an album of material made around the same period as 'The Entire City' though never released commercially. The album expands on 'The Entire City's shadowy, futurescape, featuring foreboding, percussive songwriting, with euphoric choral swells. 'The Wastelands' also features the captivating photo collage artwork of British artist, Suzanne Moxhay.

In 2011 Gazelle Twin self-released 'The Entire City', a debut album that gathered rapid acclaim and sparked a decade of creativity during which its creator, Elizabeth Bernholz has built big upon her foundation of dark, cinematic energy. The album is now set to be reissued on deluxe coloured vinyl featuring the captivating photo collage artwork of British artist, Suzanne Moxhay, with newly designed artwork by Paul Agar & Gazelle Twin.

Five years after the release of "Je vous dis" in 2018, Geins't Naït and L.Petitgand's second album from the "Mind Travel" and "Make Dogs Sing" collection on the German label "Offen", the duo are now writing a new chapter in their story with this fascinating poetic tale. The same mysterious and heady atmosphere which characterises the two musicians is present in this new work but clearly they have never ceased refining and polishing their sounds to give their compositions even more power and depth. Geins't Naït and L.Petitgand here offer twelve new tracks with names as enigmatic as the title "Like this maybe or This" itself and the record's whole universe. In reality, these mysterious names lead us to let ourselves be taken to the deep meaning of their creation. The subject matter is certainly difficult to grasp and invites us on an inner journey while leading us to doubt and question ourselves incessantly. There is a perfect alchemy between these two artists though this was far from self-evident as they come from two very different schools. Thierry Merigout, who is now the only representative left from the late 80's experimental project Geins't Naït in Nancy, comes from the post-industrial scene. As for Laurent Petitgand, he is a pure melodist who is best known for his work as a composer of music for films and live shows and has collaborated with Wim Wenders and Paul Auster in particular. "Like this maybe or This" is a fully accomplished symbiosis between Geinst Nait's industrial and experimental tonalities and the celestial melodies of Laurent Petitgand. "Shape of the storie" starts the album with a bewildering atmosphere which mixes a sample of a guttural voice with cavernous resonances thus prefiguring the album's general atmosphere. However, while some tracks like "HAC" fuel our existential anguish, other tracks have a poetic and melancholic tonality which touches our deepest humanity. This is the case of "Dustil" whose subtle piano notes combined with the melancholy violin show us a sublimated world. This fascinating blend of violence and gentleness makes this record an atypical work which enables listeners to lose themselves in an emotional nebula where they can perceive the turbulence and also the intensity of our inner life.

The first vinyl release between Carl Abrahamsson & Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, ’Loyalty Does Not End With Death’ is the final part of a spoken word trilogy initiated in 1990 with the Psychick TV & White Stains side ’At Stockholm’, and proceeded by their ‘Wordship’ [2004] album as Thee Majesty & Cotton Ferox.

Electing to use their own names for this final part of a 30 year wide series, the duo intend ‘Loyalty Does Not End With Death’ to be received without the connotations of their other projects. It’s the sound of two cosmically-travelled minds crossing paths after a long time to chew over the bare essentials - love and magick - via vibrant poetry and beautifully charged forms of ambient music.

In nine parts they conjure a warmly meditative music, where Abrahamsson’s characteristic, playful tones, cut-up electronics and gentle rhythms comfortably lay the bed for Genesis, who inhabits and enlivens the pristine scenes like an observant dark interpreter, translating the incomprehensible and revealing the divine through their psychedelic prism.

The spellbinding results were recorded in New York and Stockholm 2017/18 and could feasibly have occurred at any point between 1990 and now. They are blessed with a pacing, intuition and timelessness that pays testament to an enduring creative friendship, taking the form of writing, interviews, photographs and films (‘Change Itself’ [2016]) for nearly 35 years.

The latest reissue from chOOn!! is Giedrius Kuprevičius' Erotidijos, the sixth release from the label that specialises in obscure, archival and forgotten releases.

Erotidijos translates from the Lithuanian to “Erotidies” - these were festivals held in honour of Eros, God of Love in Ancient Greece. They were organised every five years and were famous for their celebrations, decorations and luxury. Ritual games were played during the festivals, musicians and poets competed, worshipping Eros.

Erotidijos is a haunting yet hypnotic tableaux Kuprevičius originally created for a Stanislovas Rubinovas theatre play staged in 1994 in Kaunas, Lithuania. The Lithuanian composer was one of the founding members of the pioneering electronic pop outfit Argo and has written dozens of scores for stage and film over the past several decades, imbuing his soundwork with a multitude of artful moods and emotive depth.

The story of Erotidijos unfolds in both melancholic and serenely lush scenery, in turn mysterious and playful. Memories of places you’ve never been drift into frame, from bedroom womb into a foliage of phantasmal keys and gently psychotropic symphonies. A collection that glissandos between notes, place, and time.

Erotidijos is guided by an intuitive, improvisational dream logic that threads the line between waking and sleeping revelations. It offers a hazy, voyeuristic lens into another world with dusty ambience and eccentric keyboard effects, warm synth pads and shimmering vistas serving as soft accents to the angelic murmur of giggling voices.

As you listen, you are invited to apply your own interpretation of Erotidijos’ narrative of a new land, its climate, sounds, and geography. A contemplative, celestial electronic work in a gentle, often beautiful ambient style which breezily swings with exquisite analogue synth textures and infinity loops. Jazz spontaneity and organic pop impulses lift the meditative veil, ending with a climactic final scene: a sensuous reverie complete with shedding light and gently opening synapses.

Available for the first time on vinyl, including over thirty minutes of music not featured on the original cassette release and produced in cooperation with Giedrius Kuprevičius for chOOn!!.

Originally released in 1980 on Goldfinger label and realized to score various documentaries for Italian Rai TV, Sonor Music Editions is happy to release an highly sought-after Italian Library jewel with mental Disco-Funk cuts and sleazy groove dopeness. "LAVORO E TEMPO LIBERO" by the eclectic maestro Giuliano Sorgini is another stellar recording from the comprehensive Italian Library world, very different from his 70s masterpieces like Under Pompelmo or Zoo Folle but with a perfect early 80s sound and clear funky greatness mixed with some very beautiful chill jams. An insane set of Dark Funk bangers filled with drum breaks and beats / different refined moods with soothing airs and loungy suites / exquisite flute notes by Nino Rapicavoli / sharp guitars and sleazy basslines. Easily one of the top albums out of Library labels Usignolo/Goldifinger with renewed artwork and remastered sound for the joy of collectors, DJs and sample hunters.

A teal vinyl edition of the album. Reverse-board sleeve, with a matt-laminated insert, and white poly-lined inner sleeve - all housed in a protective PVC outer sleeve. First 50 with a signed + numbered card. All artwork by Timothy O'Donnell (formerly 23 envelope, 4AD).

"The Echoes on Departure" is is the seventh album from GNAC, a musical project composer Mark Tranmer started in 1990.

Tranmer says of The "Echoes on Departure": “I finished previous album “Afternoon Frost” in 2021 — and straight away I could hear the beginnings of the next album. It is different from the previous album; more electronic, but still with some of my favourite chord progressions — and a few new ones. I also felt strongly that this album it needed a voice on two tracks — and was delighted that Kathleen provided that voice - and took those tracks beyond my envision”. Kathleen Stosch of Constant Follower provides vocals for “Betweenness” — the evocative first single — and the closing album track, “Until The Heart Stops”: a piano-led baroque waltz miniature.

An album launch party takes place at the Glad Café, Glasgow, on Wednesday 22nd March, co-headlined by The Orchids.

The inclusion of early single “The Broken Fall” on Tim Burgess and
Bob Stanleyʼs 2019 “Tim Peaks” compilation inspired the relaunching of GNAC after a long hiatus; 2021 saw the release of the well-received album “Afternoon Frost” – with extensive airplay, including on KEXP and 6Music, and a Timʼs Twitter Listening Party. There were several GNAC concerts in Scotland last year — these continue further afield in 2023. Prior to GNACʼs return, Tranmer co-wrote and recorded an album with Italian pianist Alessandra Celletti in Rome. He was also half of the Montgolfier Brothers, alongside sorely missed songwriter, lyricist and vocalist Roger Quigley; the band released two albums on Alan McGeeʼs Poptones label.

“This is inescapably music. Chamber music, possibly...with enough post-rock plinks, plonks and percussion to reassure you itʼs not 1602.” —Kitty Empire, The Observer

This is the second release for the label curated by DJ Khalab, it is mixed by Cristiano Crisci (aka Clap! Clap!).

Limited Import

TRNT is the first attempt at reworking the Tarantella Tradition by Go Dugong.

Tarantella is a popular, magical dance and music from South Italy, that in ancient times was related to the ritual of exorcising hysterical people, mostly women, who were allegedly bitten by Tarantula spiders, scorpions, snakes. Delirious people, named ‘tarantolati’ after the poisonous spider, underwent therapeutic rites and dances, that drew them into a trance, healing status.

Tarantism related hysteria was actually due to the socio-cultural oppression of women in South Italy, where this diagnosis and its cure originated within a machismo dominated society. The bite of the Tarantula was indeed a scapegoat, used to justify what people did not want to understand at the time.

By working on this music, I happened to turn into a trance status, just like the ’’tarantolati” - Go Dugong

Go Dugong is the moniker of Giulio Fonseca, musician and producer born in Apulia, Italy.
Passionate lover of global sounds, in the last 7 years he has been crafting personal interpretations of rhythms, languages, instruments, field recordings and samples from all over the world. Half collector, half artisan, his sound collages are unique and cinematic in that they let the listener travel through sound. This long trip, started years ago, today has brought him back to his home land, to re-elaborate and synthesize memories, images and tales from his fellow countrymen and women.

Presenting the latest in sonic architecture for the hyper-realised, the self-aware non-entities and synths alike. Drum & Bass sonic weapons collide with vocal downtempo, and a handful of technoid and breaks cuts round out this ultra-dancefloor cache of sound programs. Gore Tech is Manchester UK's leading exponent of hard electronic music and Geist Fibre is easily his finest hour.With a series of advanced cyber-neuro Drum & Bass tracks comprising the majority of the album, Geist Fibre is aimed squarely at the DnB dancefloor, but the additional flavors at different tempos make it a complete album that can be enjoyed in its entirety. Geist Fibre is the electronic music soundtrack for the future-phobic - sonic messages from a world where science fiction has always proven too benevolent, and our developed technological reality stands at odds with human existence.

Last year Century Media Records welcomed the mysterious producer known as GosT, who embodies the character of Baalberith on his propulsive synthwave solo project that is channeling his fascination with the occult, John Carpenter and 80s slasher flicks.

As a teenager he played in metal bands, but eventually drifted toward electronic music which would later become the foundation of his powerful synthwave / retrowave sound. With its haunting atmospherics and aesthetics influenced by the blackest corners of the metal world his music quickly garnered GosT a loyal following within the rock and metal community worldwide. Apart from playing his own headlining tours in North America and Europe he used the interest from his growing fan base to hit the road with the likes of diverse acts such as Carpenter Brut, Pallbearer, Black Dahlia Murder, Power Trip, Khemmis, Havok or Skeletal Remains.

Right in time for the upcoming tour supporting Pertubator throughout the US Century Media Records will make the classic »Skull« available on vinyl including two new tracks, »She Lives in Red Light« and »The Call of the Faithful«. Coinciding with the first live performances as GosT and the introduction of Baalberith, »Skull« marked the true beginning of GosT in his current shape.

T. Gowdy has kept up a productive albeit mostly virtual pace since the release of Therapy With Colour (his third full-length album and first for Constellation) which dropped just as things were locking down back in spring 2020: performances at numerous festivals including MUTEK Montréal, Node Festival and NEW NOW; audiovisual pieces exhibited at various European galleries and events; a track and video for Constellation's Corona Borealis Longplay Singles Series; sound design for the documentary Atalaya by filmmaker Emma Roufs. Gowdy now returns with Miracles, his second full-length for Constellation, which draws on source materials originally performed in 2018 for an unreleased audio/visual project based around surveillance footage_a precursor to videocapped, monitor-based horizons that soon took on new meanings. Re-immersing himself in those recordings, Gowdy disassembles and deploys them as raw source material for new experiments with vactrols, noise gates and analog-to-digital triggering and aliasing, the original recordings juxtaposed anew amidst their successive textural and rhythmic treatments. Gowdy keeps this re-composition process stripped down, elemental and purposive, guided by an ascetic Aufhebung: synthesis as sublation_subjecting a temporal material/theme to analysis and transformation, reintegrating to form a whole that overcomes what it preserves without erasure, reshaping and intrinsically carrying its origins forward. Where Therapy With Colour was strictly and rigorously a set of stereo live performances, Miracles fuses iterative_though still spartan_layers of performance. "Therapy With Colour was about healing through self-hypnosis; Miracles is about forging a future with memory through subjection to trigger mechanisms" notes Gowdy. The result is a captivating collection of minimal IDM and oscillated electronics from the Montréal/Berlin producer, working primarily in a 120-140 BPM zone of tonal percussion and corrugated pulse. Gowdy's sensibility and sound palette gets deeper and dirtier, summoning new pathways of alluvial flicker and abraded euphoria. As the album progresses, low-pass gate vactrols coalesce into a clear and vital theme, conveying immanence through woody timbres at times reminiscent of the Shinrin-yoku aesthetic (Japanese `forest bathing'), though always with a grainy transcendence rather than invoking any clean pure sheen. Gowdy consistently heats and heightens the presence of each component in the mix, balancing different elements in democratic compression/distortion, attaining an unornamental and earnest form of mantric-industrial majesty. Miracles is live, corporeal, activated electronic music of the highest caliber, deployed with monastic and meditative focus.

Debut LP from Graham Reznick on Death Waltz Originals, his is a name you may not know but you have certainly seen and heard his work over the last ten years or so. Sound designer on House Of The Devil & Innkeepers as well as co-writer of the video game horror hit Until Dawn.

For his first solo LP he has used his home town of Los Angeles as his muse, lush electronic soundscapes buzz under neon soaked streets, providing a warm, hazy record that shimmers with positivity. The record is split between rousing electronic Bangers and more contemplative tracks and makes the perfect late night listen whether you are crying in the car or home on your sofa.

Green Ribbons is a project dedicated to the celebration of unaccompanied song. The current line-up features Debbie Armour(Burd Ellen), Frankie Armstrong, Alasdair Roberts and Benjamin “Jinnwoo” Webb (Jinnwoo, Bird in the Belly). Their debut release is an intimate collection of traditional and newly composed songs. Recorded live at Studio 95 in Brighton by engineer Tom Pryor, GREEN RIBBONS sees each artist featured solo, in duet and in full ensemble. Ben “Jinnwoo” Webb brought the project together in July of 2018:

"Very broadly speaking, unaccompanied singing seems to have gone out of fashion in more recent years – but it’s always something I have enjoyed performing and listening to when I’ve had the chance. I wanted to get a group together whose voices I feel really lend themselves to storytelling, and focus purely on the voice and the stories. We wanted to make something very rough around the edges and unpolished, a kind of documented swapping of songs..."

About the track that gives its name to the project and album, he says: "I found these words in the Bodleian Archive and set them to my own melody. Green Ribbons were used to label people as ‘insane’ in the 1800s. I enjoyed the historical reference to mental health, a subject which features in some of my own writing. I liked, too, the directness of the lyric."

"- log p" is the debut release by the Hamburg based improvising duo David Wallraf and Klaus Frieler. The group takes a contemporary approach to classical concepts of Minimalism and Kraut. Repetition and layering are some of the main characteristics in the creation of rhythmical complexity through drums, field recordings and electronics.

The Berlin-based duo hackedepicciotto have
returned with ‘The Silver Threshold’, their fourth full
length album. This cinematic and hypnotic release
combines swirling electronics, shimmering
autoharp and the beautiful vocal harmonies of
Danielle de Picciotto (co-founder of Berlin’s
legendary Love Parade, prolific solo artist and
illustrator) and Alexander Hacke (Einstürzende
Neubauten), blended with a plethora of
instruments from around the world.
 Danielle and Alex have contributed to a vast and
varied legacy of electronic music. Although ‘The
Silver Threshold’ is their first album in partnership
with Mute, they are not new to the label, with both
Danielle and Alex members of the last incarnation
of Crime and the City Solution and Alex a member
of Einstürzende Neubauten whilst also contributing
to releases by Phew and Miranda Sex Garden.
 CD in gatefold card pack with silver finish and
artwork by Danielle de Picciotto and photo by Sven
Marquardt. Includes booklet.
 LP in gatefold sleeve with silver finish and artwork
by Danielle de Picciotto and photo by Sven
Marquardt. Includes digital download code

Haii Usagi is a two piece electronic/exerimental band from Columbia, MO

Members consist of Pete Hansen (Drums and Keyboards) and Eric Burch (Keyboards,
Synths, and Programming).

"Electro-thrash, calling up the ghost of Brainiac, sans vocals and guitar. Haii Usagi brings
the bleeps and blips that drives and veers as opposed to superficially just addressing
your need to dance the night away". - Beer and Pavement
"Haii Usagi approaches it with an emphasis on songcraft, focusing on the hook rather
than the tracks being simply a groove you can dance to. They also manage to hint at a
number of styles from rock to ambient while staying true to their electronic vision. I
know some of the more punk than thou types may find problems with Haii Usagi's
sound, but for those willing to open their minds you'll find a group who manages to make
their own vision of what the genre should be and proves that not all electronic dance
music has to sound generic". - TTWN

Haiku Salut, the acclaimed electronica trio from the Derbyshire Dales release their fifth album, ‘The Hill, The Light, The Ghost’ on Secret Name records on August 27th. Note the LP follows in November.

A beautiful study of ghosts and memory, the gestation of the record began when Haiku Salut’s Sophie Barkerwood was given a Tascam field recorder. “I carried it around with me in case anything interesting happened. I guess I wanted to capture little pieces of the world in the same way we all take photographs,” explains Sophie. “It wasn’t immediately apparent that we would begin to use these sounds as the architecture for an album but as our writing process evolved the textures of these memories became a bank of inspiration.”

“We then began actively searching for ghosts in the world and framing the songs around their qualities,” Sophie continues. “Gathering recordings, removing them from their context and building worlds around them. Capturing and preserving personal experiences, and evoking vivid spaces. You could say the record is a miniature exploration of sound in relation to memory. Each piece is intimately connected to a place in time.”

Musically, the album marries the expansive vision of their third album, ‘There Is No Elsewhere’, which celebrated identity and community, with the darker, more contemplative feel of their fourth album, the trio’s original soundtrack for Buster Keaton’s ‘The General’. Building on the lessons learned working on ‘The General’, ‘The Hill, The Light, The Ghost’ is a cohesive suite, nine songs that combine to tell a larger story – that of experience and memory, of precious moments and echoes of past lives.

Mikko Singh has been living different musical lives from the start. With »Cloud Formations«, his third album under the Haleiwa moniker, Singh eschews the guitar-dominated sound of his first two LPs for lush but grainy texturality. Inspired by bands and songwriters like Animal Collective, Real Estate and the late Jay Reatard, »Cloud Formations« is a hopeful record whose experimental approach to rock music calls to mind the experimental pop of Morr Music label mates like Sequoyah Tiger or even Stereolab’s motorik-driven post-rock. It’s a fusion of fuzzed-out sounds, washed-out sentiments and far-out songwriting - perhaps the only shoegaze record you can actually take along to the beach.

Ever since he first picked up the classical guitar at age nine, Singh has pursued many different ambitions. Having moved on from skate punk and hardcore bands to instrumental indie rock, Singh even released an album of subtle piano compositions on the 1631 label alongside artists like Dustin O’Halloran and Hauschka. As an album dedicated to new beginnings, »Cloud Formations« proves to be the perfect synthesis for all of these ambitions. But it also ventures beyond that, making a side of the Stockholm native’s musical vision heard that his previous records only hinted at.

After the release 2015’s »Palm Trees of the Subarctic«, Singh began experimenting with his collection of vintage and analogue synthesizers, exploring different ways of using the guitar and putting an emphasis on his bass playing when composing. This proved to be a liberating change in perspective. While some of the songs on »Cloud Formations« were initially conceived in 2015, he recorded and produced the album between 2017 and 2018 in what he calls a »long and continuous process«, a fruitful time in which he reinvented himself.

Apart from some drum recordings (provided by his long-time friend Johan Nordlund of the Swedish hardcore band This Gift Is A Curse), Singh maintained full creative control of the album, tweaking the nine songs in his own Stockholm studio until every note and every tiny grain of sound was exactly where he wanted it to be. Over the course of two years, he was paying more attention than before to the subtleties of sound design and their emotive qualities. »I have experimented with different recording techniques,« he explains. »Some of the instruments were recorded with bad quality lo-fi microphones in order to get a better and more interesting soundscape.«

The result is a dense, at times psychedelic and intimate album, abundant with passion and optimism, despite its name, which may at first indicate the opposite. »The state of the world is pretty cloudy at the moment, metaphorically speaking,« Singh says. »But I wanted the album to express some kind of hope beyond that rather apocalyptic title.« This approach becomes tangible from the very first seconds of the anthemic opener »HKI -97«, a joyful marriage of jubilant synthesizer melodies, warm bass tones and Nordlund’s high-precision drumming, topped off by Singh’s freely floating vocal melodies. It’s the perfect opener for an album that is a celebration of new beginnings in every possible sense.

Between the fuzzy ambience of »Ka’a’awa Surfin’«, the title track’s hypnagogic mid-tempo grooves, to the relentless drive of »Swell« or »Crossroads«, and the eerie final track »Cold Concrete«, this album is to be understood as a celebration of different musical lives becoming one. It’s the sound of Mikko Singh opening an entirely new chapter in his career.

Hampus Lindwall’s Brace for Impact might just be the first album of post-internet pipe organ music. It’s an album of five new contemporary classical compositions, all performed by the composer himself on the 78-stop grand organ at St. Antonius church in Düsseldorf, Germany. Featuring the electric guitar of SUNN O)’s Stephen O’Malley on the title track. A highly visceral forty-five minutes of music with undeniable elemental power.
As 2024 came to a close, in New York and Paris chords rang out from thirty-two-foot pipes for the first time in half a decade. Following twin fires in 2019, the grand organs at the cathedrals of St John the Divine and Notre-Dame, amongst the largest instruments in their respective countries, had finally been restored. The news was justly celebrated in the international press, but the incidents were far from isolated. In England, the city of Norwich hailed the return of its cathedral’s five manual organ in 2023 and just two years earlier York Minster heralded a “once-in-a-century” refurbishment of its own 5,000-plus pipe instrument. Meanwhile, further organ restoration projects are ongoing at churches in Liverpool, Bradford, Bristol, Winchester, and Washington DC. Significant as they are to their respective communities, they’re also emblematic of a wider rebirth for one of humanity’s oldest musical instruments.
The organ is having a moment. Over the last few years, albums by the likes of Kali Malone, Ellen Arkbro, Anna von Hausswolff, FUJI|||||||||||TA, and Áine O’Dwyer, as well as projects in the visual arts by Sollmann Sprenger, Cory Arcangel, Massimo Bartolini and many other talented artists, have given a new prominence to the old ecclesiastical stalwart. The pipe organ bears historical traces which stretch back to the third century BC. But that doesn’t mean it can’t speak to a contemporary moment haunted by algorithms and networked culture. Hampus Lindwall’s Brace for Impact is an album of organ music for today.

In 2018, artists Haroon Mirza and Jack Jelfs spent two months in residency at CERN, the European Centre for Nuclear Research, and home of the Large Hadron Collider. From this collaboration the artists created the fictional reality of 'The Wave Epoch', a sprawling multimedia artwork drawing influence from science, mysticism and the nature of belief. ‘The Wave Epoch’ project spans live performance, film, art installations and their critically acclaimed 2020 album of the same title.

'one1one' is the latest transmission from this same universe, a magical incantation spoken by Jessica Barter, with words filtered through Google Translate to produce what the artists describe as “algorithmic mysticism”. This release presents remixes by Fracture and Jack Jelfs, alongside the original album track by Mirza and Jelfs, here on vinyl for the first time.

Experimental drum n' bass artist Fracture has transformed Mirza and Jelfs’ raw materials into a heavy 160 BPM workout that harkens back to the Blue Note-era Metalheadz sound of the mid-nineties, a crunching minimalist construction of metallic breaks and analogue sub bass. Accompanying his track is an AR (augmented reality) work by Scott Utting and Mirza.

Reissue of Harry Pussy's Ride A Dove, originally released on Siltbreeze in 1996.

"By 1996, with one LP, a handful of 7"s, and a couple dozen gigs under their collective belts, Harry Pussy had thoroughly scrambled the mid-90s scuzz-rock ecosystem. Their acclaimed first LP, described by David Keenan as 'a black hole that devoured genre and flattened any attempt to classify it,' fused Japanese noise, '80s hardcore and post-Ayler jazz into a dense, white-hot ball of punk anger and insanity. The band's newly expanded trio lineup of Bill Orcutt, Adris Hoyos and Mark Feehan toured with Dead C, Sebadoh, and Sonic Youth. Thurston played their video on MTV's 120 Minutes. Nirvana gave them shout outs. Everyone expected the sophomore Harry Pussy LP would be more of the same, a logical next step, a synapse-melting punk orgasm that would shatter the coke-bottle spectacles of noise stoners, record store clerks, and college radio DJs across the USA.

Instead, we got Ride A Dove: a 30-minute, tempo-less, musique concrète collage of feedback, whiny Sonic Youth fans, overdriven room tone, hijacked jungle beats, unhinged screaming, and the near-constant squall of the self-oscillating low-pass filter on Orcutt's Korg MS-20. Recorded on Sony Walkman and Tascam Portastudio, mixed through a RAT distortion pedal, then chopped and scrambled with SoundEdit 16, it took to new heights the Siltbreeze tradition of terrorizing mastering engineers by burying everything with shitty post-production (cf. Jim Shepard's Radio Shack reverb on his Picking Through the Wreckage With a Stick LP). Thanks to the single unbanded groove on each side (and similarly unindexed CD), the relationship of Ride A Dove's 'songs' to its listed song titles - which allude to Michael Jackson, the Bee Gees, and most of all, Black Flag, whose 'Rise Above' is echoed by the malaprop of the album title - was decidedly obscure. One might be forgiven for characterizing this career anti-move as a simple challenge, an 'ok, sell THIS' to an unsuspecting distributor - Matador Records, who surely had no idea what they were getting into when they scooped up Siltbreeze for a manufacturing and distribution deal - or to fans naively anticipating simple catharsis. Rather, Ride A Dove is an intensely personal document of a disintegrating marriage and band; a snapshot of an era when noise groups were unexpectedly emerging from complete darkness into mere shadow; a diary of questionable decisions regarding marital fidelity and drug consumption. It's a raw, vulnerable record that is more Rumours (1977) than Metal Machine Music (1975).

In the aftermath of Ride A Dove, and the near-apocalyptic Harry Pussy/Shadow Ring/Charalambides tour that followed it, life went on. Bill and Adris split up, guitarist Mark Feehan decamped, and Harry Pussy soldiered on for a few more records, including the sleeper double LP Let's Build a Pussy (EMEGO 146LP), which perhaps stands closer to Ride A Dove's high-register wail and conceptual monomania than any other of the band's recordings. As for Ride A Dove itself, the intervening decades has made it almost fashionable, yet harshly adorned in a raggedness that's as cozy as a fiberglass sweater." - Tom Carter

Adris Hoyos - drums; Bill Orcutt - guitar; Mark Feehan - guitar.

Since his 2012 debut as Heathered Pearls, Jakub Alexander has constructed art — music, objects, installations, performances — as a way of re-imagining fragments of his past and mapping ideas for his future. The Polish-born, Michigan-raised, New York-based artist and producer sees imagery and narrative framework as fluid components to his craft. Alexander’s first album, Loyal, mimicked the hypnotic motions of ocean waves at night, offering melodic, loop-based ambient music as a tribute to the tasteful influence of his mother and aunt. The second Heathered Pearls album, Body Complex, found inspiration from comfort, imperfection, and visions of interior architecture, transforming Loyal’s soft textures into driving 4/4 figures, glacial tone drifts, and starry synth plateaus. His 2017 EP, Detroit, MI 1997 - 2001, reflected on a formative era through ephem- eral dance music. The third Heathered Pearls full-length,


Cast, returns to moodier loop formats joined by the distinctly new presence of the spo- ken word. The move mirrors the multitudes of its namesake: collaborators comprise a cast, healing in the bind of a cast, complex emotions and the shadows they cast. Alexander started work on Cast when living in Berlin and in Queens.

“I hit a wall listening to these tracks when they were instrumental.” This is where he diverged from previous modes, deciding to integrate speech. With a healthy distaste for aspects of performance art, he invited strictly non-scripted recordings, a series of anti-performances. This new format adds a surprising human element to music that has previously operated as sea-shapes or infrastructure. These flashes of language, Alexander’s close friends speaking about things, narratively and cerebrally, casually and profoundly, turn the distinctive Heathered Pearls sound into some- thing surprisingly gritty, tangible, and in certain sweeps, cinematic. It is as if the world outside of these compositions bleeds into the music, casting their verbal being from just off the surface, like the album’s cover artwork where the light hits the plexi object but misses the wall.

Alexander sees his covers as naturally unfinished workstations; the gauzed and patinaed copper on Cast continues in this philosophy. This is all to say Cast deals with absence as much a presence. Among the guest storytellers is Alexander’s friend and tourmate Nick Murphy (formerly Chet Faker), who unwinds a series of tender observations on “Basic Needs.” The swirling synthesizer immerses a series of empathies; feeling like an egg yolk, a window’s view, his love for the color yellow, and wanting yellow to love him back.

Henry Green returns with his first original music in 18 months with his pumping new track Realign, the first track from his second album titled Half Light. The 23 year old from Bristol has crafted his own brand of chill/electronic music that has captured attention from far and wide, from the likes of Mixmag and Electronic Sound
magazines to blogs such as DIY, The Line of Best FIt and Nylon. His music is adored by the likes of Kygo, who remixed him several years ago, and Jenna Dewan, who has performed dance routines to his music. Henry has also remixed contemporaries such as TENDER and Mogli. Half Light is released on 12 June 2020 and features the likes of Andreya Triana and Ghostly Kisses.
"Electronic-meets-R&B, operating in the same soothing, alluring terrain as, say, Rhye" Consequence of Sound
“One listen of Henry Green and you're immediately sunken in.”

DUMMY

“A true genius”

Hillydilly

The multi-instrumentalist duo that comprises Hermitude - Luke Dubber
(aka Luke Dubs) and Angus Stuart (aka El Gusto) - were in Japan when
Covid became a stark reality
Just making it back to Australia before the borders closed, they quietly slipped up
to Angus' place just outside of the Blue Mountain town of Blackheath as the rest
of the world went into meltdown.
The two holed up together in Angus' childhood home with a pared- back music
setup and began a process that was all about taking back control over how and
why they make music as Hermitude. As Luke says, "they say the artist is your
inner child, so it was like the children were out at play. There were no rules or
expectations; we just threw stuff at the wall. It was really fun, which is why we
started making music in the first place." A year and a half later, Mirror Mountain
was finished.
The album acts as a reawakening, a place to draw strength as time goes by..

Hooverphonic’s fifth studio album No More Sweet Music is their most controversial album, as it marks their departure from their original, signature sound. The radio-friendly pop songs still consists of elements from their trip-hop music. No More Sweet Music contains two versions of each song, one from the original recording and one remixed by Alex Callier. The remixes are effective and focused on the electronic music, with its trip hop character.

No More Sweet Music is available as a limited edition of 1000 individually numbered copies on transparent blue coloured vinyl.

Guideposts adorn the path of every journey, no matter the distance. Given Icelandic extended daylight, journeymen couldn’t rely on the stars, so they followed the Varda. Translated to “cairn” in English, these tiny rock towers heralded the way as the next cairn would always be visible from its predecessor. Icelandic duo Hugar—Bergur Þórisson and Pétur Jónsson—envisioned such a trek on their second full-length album, they appropriately titled Varda. A tectonic shift between classical orchestration, alternative ambience, and post-rock spirit, the 14 tracks string together an epic expedition awash in stark piano chords, gusts of lyrical brass, high-powered strings, off-kilter guitar, and brushstrokes of electronic swells. “Similar to those piles of rocks, the songs are like small cairns on the album,” explains Bergur. “It’s not about the destination though, but rather this never-ending journey, which the whole record represents. Thematically, it’s like the story of an intense road trip or rally car racing,” Bergur goes on: “It’s beautiful, nice, and energetic, but there are all kinds of obstacles and difficulties.”

Icelandic natives Hugar have forged a musical lane all their own with a genre-defying sound. Combining a shared passion for music and an impressive resume working alongside fellow Icelandic luminaries Björk, Sigur Rós, Ólafur Arnalds and Johann Johannson, the longtime friends and natives of Seltjarnarnes began writing music together in 2013. Through a series of impromptu sessions, Bergur and Pétur recorded and released their independent self-titled debut Hugar the following year, making it available for free on their website. The sweepingly multi-layered and ethereally ambient album quickly amassed an organic following of listeners and has since racked up over 45 million streams worldwide on Spotify alone.

Varda is available as a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies on black & transparent swirled vinyl.

Brown vinyl LP. For the first time ever released on vinyl, this brilliant 2012 LP features an all-star cast of musicians and actors lead by Tim Robbins, Dr. John, Bill Frisell, Ralph Steadman, Annie Ross, John Joyce III and Will Forte.

Hunter S. Thompson's classic Gonzo reportage on the 1970 Kentucky Derby is summoned brilliantly to life through spoken word and musical composition. Conceived by executive producer Michael Minzer for his Paris Records label, the project was produced by Hal Willner, who brought Bill Frisell in as composer/arranger/conductor. Bill then assembled a stellar group of musicians including Curtis Fowlkes (trombone), Ron Miles (trumpet), Eyvind Kang (viola), Doug Weiselman (woodwinds), Jenny Scheinman (violin), Hank Roberts (cello) and Kenny Wolleson (drums, percussion).

Ralph Steadman does double duty portraying himself in the narration and contributing original artwork for the project. In 2021, Kramer re-Mastered the original audio for this historic re-release on limited-edition 'Horse-Shit Brown' vinyl for his Shimmy-Disc label.

Huntly are one of Australia’s most evocative and dynamic electronic acts, writing music affectionately referred to as doof you can cry to.

Low Grade Buzz is their incredible debut album - available on 12” sea – blue heavyweight vinyl. Package comes with a printed inner card sleeve and mp3

download card.

It seems now that Ian Daniel Kehoe has been hiding in plain sight
A classic songwriter pulling from a seemingly endless supply of hooks, dancing
through his debut video in silver face paint and an assortment of wide shouldered
sports jackets, Kehoe appears somewhat like an apparition, an emissary from a
better world. Yes Very, Kehoe’s latest under his own name, is an entirely self
assured record, confident, immaculate pop songs, drenched in analog synth and
punchily articulate in their pursuit of love, beauty and rhythm. Recorded and
performed entirely by Kehoe himself.

After a series of explosive singles on Distinctive, iLL Audio a.k.a Rob Blake is finally ready to reveal his debut album to the world, titled 'Know No Boundaries'. 2012 was definitely a brilliant year for this young producer with single collaborations with Roots Manuva, Skin and most recently Alex Vargas showcasing his vast pool of influences within his unique framework of propulsive bass music.

'Know No Boundaries' fuses elements of Drum and Bass, Dubstep, Breaks and Reggae with the cathartic power of rock music, accompanied by moody orchestral motifs and tribal sensibilities. Blake's keen ear for live-sounding beat programming, huge guitar riffs and high-energy synth work bring all these facets together to create an album that is truly vast, cinematic and powerful.

The opener 'Nibiru' is a lesson is tension development. Brooding strings and splashes of percussion lead bold tribal rhythms into the darkest recesses of orchestral bass culture. Cuts like the dubbed-out 'Divide and Rule ft. Akala and Dan Bowskill' arrive like shards of sunlight amongst an otherwise dark and emotive pallet. The title track 'Know No Boundaries' is fierce , focused and technical dubstep, whereas 'Remedy' is a 3-part exercise in cross-genre pollination. There's half-time beats at the beginning, leading into Muse-esque arpeggios, a rock fuelled D'n'B mid section and back to half time. It's busy, exciting and spilling with energy and ideas.

With all the collaborations on board too, including the huge 'Never Be the Same Again ft. Skin' and 'Chase ft Roots Manuva', 'Know No Boundaries' is a diverse piece of work that mirrors our desire of multiple styles and musical tribes, our thirst for more, be that a good or bad thing. It's an ode to technology, the power of contemporary music and above all the evolution of the hardcore continuum and dance music as a whole.

1. Nibiru
2. Let It Roll
3. Divide and Rule
4. One Man War
5. Riddle Riddim
6. Number 13
7. Know No Boundaries
8. Remedy
9. Chase
10. Stand Up (D&B Edit)
11. Never Be The Same
12. 404

"Face The Fear" ist das zweite Album von In Strict Confidence und erschien im Original 1998 auf dem damaligen Kult-Electro-Label "Zoth Ommog", auf dem auch Bands wie Front 242, Frontline Assembly und viele andere in den 90ern ihre Heimat hatten. Nach dem Debüt-Album "Cryogenix" 2 Jahre zuvor, konnte auch "Face the fear" überzeugen. Beinhaltete es doch Hits wie "Industrial Love", "Alles in mir" oder "Hidden thoughts", die auch heute noch in Clubs laufen und auf Konzerten die Fans begeistern.
Nun, 27 Jahre nach Erstveröffentlichung, kommt das Album erstmals auf Vinyl. Dazu noch in transparent-weissem marmorierten 2-LP Gatefold Design und mit unveröffentlichtem Bonusmaterial.

Giving title to two separate collections in as many years, 1984’s Dekadance was originally released as a cassette compilation only in Australia. The seminal compendium of extended & re-mixed tracks from ‘The Swing‘ album is set to see its first ever official vinyl release to celebrate the album’s 35th Anniversary. (180 gram vinyl) Dekadance features six extended & re-mixed versions of songs from “THE SWING” album. These six songs are “ORIGINAL SIN”, “I SEND A MESSAGE” & “BURN FOR YOU” – all Nick Launay re-mixed versions & all released as twelve inch singles previously. “DANCING ON THE JETTY”, which is the re-mixed version released as the albums fourth single. Then there’s two rare extended/re-mixed versions of “LOVE IS (WHAT I SAY)” & “MELTING IN THE SUN”. As a bonus to all this, there is a seventh song included on the LP. The cover of the Nancy Sinatra / Lee Hazlewood duet “JACKSON” – performed by the band together with QED’s Jenny Morris duetting with Michael Hutchence on vocals. All of these lovely goodies are cut to a heavyweight 180-gram vinyl LP, featuring artwork replicated from the ultra-rare 12″ Dekadance promo gifted to Australian Radio stations in 1984.

The self-made creator and front person of iamamiwhoami embarks on an extensive tour visiting the US and Canada, collaborates with Zola Jesus and Röyksopp on new self produced album.

In 2018, audiovisual pioneer and subcultural phenomenon ionnalee delivered her first solo-album and feature film 'EVERYONE AFRAID TO BE FORGOTTEN', after enchanting an international audience with her award winning, modern folklore tales through the mixed media project and Youtube mystery iamamiwhoami for almost a decade. All through her own force and own label.

The Swedish singer, songwriter, producer, and director’s acclaimed ‘debut’ as ionnalee, was subsequently followed by a world-tour; funded alongside her fans through Kickstarter in just 5 days. The hugely successful tour sold-out dates across Europe, US, and Latin-America — Brazil being one of the places where ionnalee finally got to face her audience live for the first time in her career.

"As the tour finally happened, the audience response knocked me off my feet. It became a real game-changer for me. After my last album was made, there was no plan to go back into the studio. I was exhausted and have struggled with health and motivation to even continue working as an artist. But in between touring I found myself alone in my studio at every given chance, so inspired from that whole synergy I experienced with the audience on stage, that this natural flow happened, and I wanted to give back to them.’

The result is a new full-length album, ‘REMEMBER THE FUTURE’ — released May 31 on her label To whom it may concern."It’s a hopeful visionary album of daring to dream, and shooting for the stars, despite the paradoxical underlying chafing knowledge that we are destroying our planet",says ionnalee.

"To me, the album has a kinetic energy. I felt much more confident and free when producing it, both as an artist, person and a producer.” ‘REMEMBER THE FUTURE’ is just as her debut solo album produced by ionnalee and also features contributions from her long time collaborators Claes Björklund (iamamiwhoami), Röyksopp, Zola Jesus and Jennie Abrahamsson and the album is mixed by Johannes Berglund (Fever Ray).

On “Siu Hinama” vocalist Stine Grøn’s primordial chanting is carried forth by the atmospheric synthesizers of Adi Zukanović and compelling drumming of UK-based Seb Rochford (Polar Bear, Patti Smith, Brian Eno). It's a track that reaches for the stars above our heads and the earth beneath our feet, drawing from both Zukanovic’s Bosnian and Grøn’s Danish heritage, and combining a multitude of musical traditions, states of mind, and spiritual dimensions.

The track is evocative and energetic, sung in its own language, as Stine elaborates: “"Siu Hinama" occurred through vocalistic sound meditations. The song never felt right with lyrics and therefore we decided to just let the words or word-sounds be as they were.”

Adi was born in Sarajevo in Bosnia but fled to Denmark with his family as a four-year-old when the war broke out. At his refugee centre, Adi found a small keyboard in the playroom – a discovery that went on to open a whole new world of calm and escape for him. Years later, Adi is one of Denmark’s most sought after pianists and keyboardists, arranging for some of the country’s most celebrated Danish symphony orchestras. Stine was brought up in Denmark and when she took up singing as a child it soon became her creative universe. Her singing has evolved over the years into seemingly effortless, powerful and ethereal expressions. Eventually their musical paths brought them to each other and together they formed IRAH, named for a higher being Stine encountered during meditation, which came to be a mantra for her. 

Drone Records is proud to present two new tracks on vinyl by the master of surrealistic, enigmatic sound (and visual) worlds, whose collages and titles often reveal a cryptic and thought-provoking nature. As soon as the music starts you might get the impression that micro- and macroscopic dimensions intermingle and oscillate, these multi-layered drone expansions and deep humming drones evoke a strange organic feeling, ominous half-concrete acoustic shadows seem to live inside this, ghosty saw-blades conquer the sonic space, there are rolling mechanic eruptions, and you could be stuck in huge spinning machines, it's music that consists of complex noises and drones that seem to be in a circling state of an endless metamorphosis...

irr.app.(ext.) has been the project of sound, performance and visual artist M. S. Waldron for more than 20 years. He currently resides in Hillsboro, Oregon (USA), just slightly to the left of the picturesque midriff of the Pacific Northwest. Known for recurring collaborations with Nurse With Wound and through a phantastic trilogy of albums with reference to the radical psychoanalytic and founder of body psychotherapy Wilhelm Reich, the creations are much grounded in non-orthodox surrealism and collage and fall somewhere between beauty and absurdity, between amorph drone ambience transcensions and bewildering and attacking noises, often with deep philosophical and psychological implications involved.