Beats News

Waveshaper Media is thrilled to present Electron Music/Shore Leave, a new LP by former Pere Ubu synthesist and electronic music trailblazer, Allen Ravenstine. The LP is comprised of two EPs (1 per vinyl side), the first two parts in Raventine’s new Tyranny of Fiction series. Waveshaper Media first came into contact with Ravenstine when we interviewed him in 2012 for our modular synthesizer documentary I Dream Of Wires.

For those in the know, Allen Ravenstine has been one of the most creative synthesizer players of the past forty-plus years. Ravenstine started out in the mid-1970s experimenting in his Cleveland apartment with an analogue EML 200 synthesizer, eventually creating a piece in 1975 that became known as Terminal Drive. While he had no intention of releasing his compositions, word got out about the kind of sounds he was experimenting with, which led to an invitation to join pioneering “avant garage” group Pere Ubu for the recording of the group’s first 45, “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.” He soon joined Pere Ubu full-time, bringing to the band’s sound unpredictable textures, effects, bleeps, squalls, pulsating washes of sound—whatever he felt could enhance the soundscape of the band’s performances and recordings.

By the early 1990s, Ravenstine had grown sick of the road, band infighting and the music industry in general. Deciding a change was needed, he opted to forego music altogether, making his living as an airplane pilot. His music career remained in limbo until 2012, when an interview for the I Dream Of Wires documentary, alongside Robert Wheeler who had succeeded him as Pere Ubu’s synthesist, turned into a recording session for the duo, leading to a series of collaborative releases. As well as having his 1975 Terminal Drive recordings released to great acclaim in 2017, Ravenstine has been prolific in recent years, with Electron Music/Shore Leave now marking his 3rd solo full-length.

Electron Music/Shore Leave brings together ten of the prodigious composer’s most recent lyrical and abstract compositions collectively comprised of the sounds of analogue and digital synthesizers, traditional acoustic instruments and the sampled sounds of birds, dogs and other artifacts of nature. Working prodigiously on a daily basis, over the past two years Ravenstine has amassed a large number of atmospheric recordings that he has intuitively aggregated into groups of five pieces each. The first five recordings, subtitled Electron Music, are found on Side A of this LP while the second five, Shore Leave, comprise Side B.

Ravenstine played the majority of the sampled instruments on these recordings as well as piano, Moog theremin, a Roland Aerophone and a bevy of synthesizers including a Korg MS20, EML 200, and a Doepfer Dark Energy. Recording virtually over the internet due to the covid pandemic, collaborators from around the world contributed Ondes Martenot, prepared piano, transverse flute, trumpet, saxophone, double bass and percussion. The result is a heady, disparate brew of compositions that range from abstract to lyrical, in the process conjuring up a bricolage of ambient soundtracks, jazzy miniatures, space age exploration, world music, Erik Satie-like studies and the ghost of Harry Partch. As a collection Electron Music/Shore Leave is a stunningly mature work that provides new and surprising sonic rewards with each and every listen.

repress !

Now for something different! After a string of releases with dancefloor intent, Barcelona based MOM returns to its more experimental side with NO MORE WHITE PRESIDENTS. For this, Modern Obscure Music welcomes Black Meteoric Star (LCD Soundsystem/DFA) aka Gavin Rayna Russom to the label. NO MORE WHITE PRESIDENTS is an experimental film directed and soundtracked by Russom. This 12' contains 3 choice excerpts from NO MORE WHITE PRESIDENTS. The soundtrack was originally self-released by Gavin on cassette, but this is the first vinyl outing. The artwork on this release is by Marc Monguilod. At the start of 2017, Russom came out as a Trans-Woman and her transition is one of the themes explored in NO MORE WHITE PRESIDENTS, as well as broader topics such as capitalism and death. Gavin Rayna Russom has been releasing music since 1997 under her own name and a string of aliases. Gavin collaborated with Delia Gonzalez on the acclaimedDays Of Mars in 2005, where they explored keyboard hypnotics. Russom was the driving force behind The Crystal Ark with Viva Ruiz, and for the last few years has been an integral part of LCD Soundsystem. The music of NO MORE WHITE PRESIDENTS is dark and claustrophobic yet exciting. As far as the dancefloor goes, it is suitable only for the darkest of clubs. Stealth Technology features jarring oscillating synths, angular beats and waves of acid. Three Trains is a short track where tape hiss drifts over a tough rhythmic section and a dark bassline. Coffin Maker finishes the release with punishing beats, oscillating acidic synth lines and a growling bass. Not for the faint hearted!

To say we're simply just "excited" to get this phenomenal album by Double Geography out would be a monumental understatement - it has been on rotation here at INVINC HQ pretty much constantly for a couple of months now.

Double Geography is Duncan Thornley, one half of Weird Weather who have released on Emotional Response, Going Good and the Whip+Lash imprint, exploring sometimes hypnotic, sometimes abstract experimental tech-tronica.

Double Geography, however, takes us deep into the undergrowth, into the world of plants. With tracks named after a variety of flora the music could loosely be described as laidback ‘balearica'. However, where much of that genre (if it can even be called a genre) has spawned so much insipid, mediocre coffee table ‘lounge music', The Indoor Gardener has retained that crucial element of tripped out psychedelia that transports us just that little bit higher.

Technical wizardry is also very much apparent. Thornley's day job as an audio engineer shows. The unique character of the sounds we're hearing seem as rich and diverse as the natural world that inspired their creation.

So relax, take a deep breath and take a wander round this botanic paradise - a psychedelic Garden of Eden for the 21st century.

"The perfect record for taking a trip without actually going anywhere....another winner from the Invisible Inc camp....will bring a bit of light to the dark times ahead" Alexis Le Tan Full Circle / Bahnsteig 23 / Born Bad / Idle Press

"So amazing.....all tracks sound spectacular" Monika Seta Why People Dance / Dance In Chaos

In Search of Ancient Civilization is an contemporary electronic work at its finest, although the tools used to shape its sound are linked to a folk tradition. For that matter the album features musicians from within Vakula's creative circle. Tracks that needed specific vocals and also rare instruments such as harp, fujara, tambourine have been produced in collaboration with Olena Nevertii and Yaroslav. The artist has sampled himself while throat singing along with field recordings in natural surroundings.

There's a message behind the carefully made-by-hand fantasy aesthetics of the production and its unconventional voice. Vakula's fascination with the Ancient world moved him through the history of humanity, to the point where his findings were insightful enough to warn the listener: "It's time to wake up".

limited Obi strip/White vinyl edition

''Ruyzdael presents Writers on Wax Volume 1: The Sound of Graffiti, a compilation album with 8 exclusive, primarily electronic tracks by producers from four different countries who are more (in)famous as graffiti writers than as musicians.''Letters on a wall, letters on a train. When you take it back to that essence, it?s really not so strange that graffiti writers call themselves and each other writers. With just a few letters ? a word, a name ? they write their mythology for a general audience. No huge vocabulary needed, just imagination and a need for expression. It can come as no surprise that those qualities extend to other disciplines as well. Graffiti has long been associated with musical styles (hip-hop, punk) that contain an abundance of imagination and expression. Less well known is the fact that graffiti writers have embraced the DIY approach of electronic music. Writers on Wax Volume 1 is a group exposition of beats and basslines, imagination and expression. Sometimes using a lot of words, usually none or very few. The dance floor has its own myths.

Red Translucent Vinyl, Gatefold, Photo Book Cover

limited red vinyl/gatefold edition ''Ruyzdael presents Writers on Wax Volume 1: The Sound of Graffiti, a compilation album with 8 exclusive, primarily electronic tracks by producers from four different countries who are more (in)famous as graffiti writers than as musicians.''Letters on a wall, letters on a train. When you take it back to that essence, it?s really not so strange that graffiti writers call themselves and each other writers. With just a few letters ? a word, a name ? they write their mythology for a general audience. No huge vocabulary needed, just imagination and a need for expression. It can come as no surprise that those qualities extend to other disciplines as well. Graffiti has long been associated with musical styles (hip-hop, punk) that contain an abundance of imagination and expression. Less well known is the fact that graffiti writers have embraced the DIY approach of electronic music. Writers on Wax Volume 1 is a group exposition of beats and basslines, imagination and expression. Sometimes using a lot of words, usually none or very few. The dance floor has its own myths.

Craggy interdimensional pop hits by Yosa Peit on this transcending debut LP. Perfect time to invest. Brought to you by Tax Free and Termina

A year on from their self-titled debut, Bristol-based sound sculptors Dot Product are back with a follow-up that stays true to their experimental principles while offering up new textures and arrangements for their hard-won sonic content. It's been a busy year for Adam Winchester and Christopher Jarman, the pair behind the project. Following the release of Dot Product on Osiris Music in March 2016, they appeared at prestigious festivals such as Atonal and Simple Things. This spate of shows has fed back into 2080, a new body of work that feels distinct from its predecessor while retaining the unnerving, distorted finish that has come to define the Dot Product sound. It was largely created through studio-based improvisation as a natural response to the performance set up the duo had developed. Rhythm plays a significant role in the early strains of 2080, whether triggering static blasts or stirring up low frequency tones into a seductive waltz, but as the album progresses these rhythms give way to anchor-less drones, refined metallic shimmers and red-lining noise blasts. Even if such ingredients were present on the previous album, here they feel thrillingly out of reach. When occasional field recordings swoop into earshot as on Electric Flesh, it's hard to tell whether they might be a real-world mechanical manifestation or a visceral shard of sound design. Between the tonal lines lurks a narrative. Previously Dot Product concerned itself with a scientific approach, and such experimentation gave Winchester and Jarman the tools to define their venture. Now 2080 sees them applying these tools to a specific creative vision. That vision may be more implied than specified, but it's provided this intriguing pair with their next logical step on a journey into uncharted sonic waters.

Upstate New York artist Tor Lundvall's music often evokes a sense of soft-focus autumnal melancholia but nowhere is this atmosphere more explicit and evocative than his self-released 2006 holiday album, Yule, newly reissued by Dais Records. Inspired by childhood memories of “cold, dark evenings” waiting for his mother outside shops and supermarkets while seasonal songs drifted faintly on the frozen air, the collection feels appropriately hushed and hypnagogic, half-remembered melodies heard through falling snow.

Steady muted rhythmic pulses wind through wintry landscapes of icy synthetic textures, glass bells, and distant metallic echoes, occasionally framed by Lundvall'ssoft, dazed vocals, narrating scenes of “slushy, illuminated train stations” and “the lonely trees of January, still entangled with blue lights long after the season has ended.” It's a music of barren branches, crescent moons, and willowy figures shuffling and shivering on their way somewhere, viewed from a fogged window passing by, or high above.

As with Lundvall's signature oil paintings, Yule's sonic vignettes are works of observation, poetic glimpses rendered in gradients of color and quiet. He has referred to his music in the past as “ghost ambient” and, although his songwriting here skews more foreground than background, the phrase aptly captures the haunted, half-light quality of these fragile tracks. 10 miniatures of wreathed streets and silent woods, of twinkling store windows seen from a distance, the sensation of being outside of life looking in –the sentiments that seeded Lundvall's vision remain undimmed: “There was a special melancholic beauty about these moments that has never left me.”

Among the musicians whose work closely reflects the reduced forms in experimental music, perhaps the most interesting is Cristián Alvear, a Chilean guitarist performing formally radical post-Cagean music, as well as Laurent Peter aka d'incise, a composer, multi-instrumentalist and producer, one of the key figures of the eclectic scene in Geneva. The numerous projects in which they participate prove their strictly defined artistic vision and active involvement in networking the music community, so it’s appropriate to consider them as transitory elements between several scenes on different continents. They have collaborated, among others, with Ryoko Akama, Cyril Bondi, Michael Pisaro, Sarah Hennies, Seijiro Murayama, Taku Sugimoto, Lance Austin Olsen and The Pitch.

Bow Down Thine Ear, I Bring You Glad Tidings is a good example of the refinement of the style developed by Alvear and d’incise in recent years. One can observe here how their musical language and range of instrumental techniques in the use of guitar and idiophones got crystallised.

The classical form of a musical piece organized in time and characterized by a set of elements that create a coherent narrative is replaced here by the primacy of repetition, pitch, precise articulation and reverberation. Sounds seem to be clearly rooted in specific acoustic spaces, which allows the space itself to be treated as a real instrument that adds another layer of meaning. Repetitive sound sequences operate in a similar way to the metronome, determining an obsessive rhythmic pattern, a kind of matrix on which all the details are inscribed. The static structure of the pieces allows the music to function as a sound sculpture - breaking time constraints in favour of continuous duration and acting in a multi-perspective way. This material, does not promise any solution, but strictly accompanies the listener and tries to close itself in the continuous present.

At the same time Bow Down Thine Ear, I Bring You Glad Tidings is a clear dialogue with the work of Henry Purcell. The title of the album is a reference to the anthems written by the British composer (Z11, Z2) and the titles of the pieces refer to his sacred songs (Z192, Z342). Apart from a skillful attempt to decontextualize the lyrics (biblical or rooted in the tradition of baroque religious poetry), we can see here not so much an attempt to give the music a metaphysical character, but certainly Alvear and d’incise tend to replicate a similar mode of listening, as in the case of Purcell's compositions - meditative and at the same time oriented to all elements of the musical situation.

Molt assembles with DB1's opening redefinition of form & function in Late Night; a journey of spatial exploration and intricate drum work arranged for polyrhythmic bitempo hybrid territory, palpating into a spectrumrich environment topdressed with scything layers of percussion. Tone, DB1's beatless secondary o.ering introduces fluid, localised doses of low frequency synth work, developing into an exploration inside rich, vivid arrays of convoluted space. Vinyl copies of Initial Conditions include 10 infinite lockedgroove loops assembled by DB1 himself, covering 1 bar percussion arrangements as well as ambience and dronenoise terrain. These additions aim to channel functionality and provide creative tools for performance.

Flip over to uncover the masterful work of DYL in YDNTKNW:
A lesson in dynamics, donning swathes of industrial elasticity yet solidifying itself as a functional dancefloorworthy exercise. Rip roaring waveforms are barely suspended by the tension of cables buckling under pressure. Paragon delivers via Molt's first edition, Black Celebration (Stone Cold): a controlled descent into insanity in the form of textured sample destruction. Pitch bent, brash and broken; Paragon's drunken drum patterns dissolve into redux noise and drum confusion, conjuring a sleep paralysis inducing bed of imagery, advancing into a spiral of unconscious cacophony. The piece finalises as a crescendo of lockedloop noise.

Born and raised in South London, Hector Plimmer is a multi-faceted producer, composer and DJ whose sound is drenched in tribal rhythms and beautifully crafted bass. Influenced by beat-makers like Flying Lotus and Theo Parrish, but with the subtleties of the classic Metalheadz era drum and bass, his second album 'Next To Nothing' is released on 25th October 2019. The album features guests Ego Ella May, Emma-Jean Thackray, Andrew Ashong, Pie Eye Collective and Alexa Harley.

After featuring on Brownswood Bubblers 11, curated by Gilles Peterson, Hector proved his talent when he was selected as a winner of the PRS Steve Reid InNOVAtion award. At a performance at ‘Sounds Of The Universe’ Record store, Hector caught the attention of Albert's Favourites' label heads Adam Scrimshire & Dave Koor. A conversation was started which led to the transfer of almost a whole album's worth of material and resulted in his debut full length record ‘Sunshine’.

'Sunshine' was met with rapturous acclaim. The record went on to be awarded Gilles Peterson’s album of the week on his BBC 6 Music show and was championed by both Lauren Laverne and Tom Ravenscroft on the station as well as Jamie Cullum on BBC Radio 2. Its success on the airwaves transcended to streaming with the inclusion in the top 50 viral US chart on Spotify.

"This album has been a real labour of love. I spent the most part of a year trying to make music I thought would be fitting to follow my last album, whilst not actually knowing what that might sound like. 'Sunshine' had been received way more positively than I had anticipated and although praise is a lovely thing, it was the cause of much anxiety when the time came to start on this record. I put a lot of pressure on myself to produce music and kept going down routes that felt forced or just didn’t click for me, in hindsight I realise this was me making music not for myself, but for what I imagined other people might want to hear. In a way 'Next to Nothing' is my first real album, 'Sunshine' was more like a collection of four to five years worth of music compiled into the shape of one. This is my first dedicated attempt at creating a cohesive project, something that shows who I am right now and what got me here."
- Hector Plimmer

As a DJ Hector has a monthly slot on NTS radio. He has played alongside the likes of Gilles Peterson, Kutmah, Alexander Nut, MNDSGN, Onra, Dego, Kaidi, Max Graef & Glenn Astro; Hector finds himself in the good company of those talented selectors who play genres across the spectrum of Hip-hop, Beats, Funk, Soul, Disco, Afro-beat, House and Jazz.

+Digital Download

Last Rights is the seventh studio album by Canadian electro-industrial band Skinny Puppy originally released in March 1992. Last Rights was well received and named by Alternative Press as one of the best albums of the 1990s and was the band's first release to chart on the Billboard 200.

Last Rights saw the band experimenting with two opposite extremes: cacophonous heavy music and gloomy melodies, resulting in moments of industrial weight as well as moments of uncharacteristic softness. The album incorporates some of the band's most impenetrable walls of sound and an eleven-minute track composed almost entirely of manipulated and distorted samples. It spawned two singles, "Inquisition" and "Left Handshake" which was distributed under the title "Track 10.

2020 Reissue of "Anthropomorphic" - the third work of The Mount Fuji Doomjazz Corporation (the improvisation alter ego of The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble) from 2011. One session - almost 60 minutes.

PART I. "Anthropomorphic" means ascribing a human form to a non-human entity. In this case, this non-human entity is music. Being born is human. "Anthropomorphic" is born from the amniotic fluid of Eelco Bosman's guitar layers. Comforting, quiet. The innermost peace is the peace of the womb. Breathing is human. Hilary Jeffery's trombone starts to breathe. The first deep breath of many breaths. Infrequent breathing, irritated breathing, return to equilibrium. Endless organic cycles.

THE MOUNT FUJI DOOMJAZZ CORPORATION is a live improv jazz/drone/doom sideproject consisting of the THE KILIMANJARO DARKJAZZ ENSEMBLE members Gideon Kiers, Jason Köhnen, Charlotte Cegarra, Hilary Jeffery, Eelco Bosman, Nina Hitz, and Sarah Anderson and various interchanging guest musicians including Ron Goris. Following DOOMJAZZ FUTURE CORPSES! and SUCCUBUS, "Anthropomorphic" constitutes the third released session of TMFDC.

PART II. Growing is human. Nina Hitz' cello is growing on the mother soil of Jason Köhnen's guitar and Gideon Kiers' electronics. Strong body, solid body. Opening his eyes and capturing the light. Innocent receiving turns into the determined lookout of Sarah Anderson's violin. Clouded awareness, conflict, clear awareness. The dissonant revolt of the mind against the body.

Since the members of TMFDC live scattered among Rotterdam, Paris, Berlin, and London, they rarely tour. This in turn makes each of their single shows a special event, and if they do play a show, they don't mind longer trips. Consequently, it is not a surprise that "Anthropomorphic" has been performed and recorded in three parts in Utrecht / The Netherlands, Wroclaw / Poland, and Moscow / Russia.

PART III. Evolving is human. Hilary Jeffery's trombone returns from his trip. Jason Köhnen's bass, Eelco Bosman's guitar, and Ron Goris' drums lay the groundwork. Gideon Kiers' electronics reinforce the atmosphere tinted by Charlotte Cegarra's sparse vocals. Sarah Anderson's violin dares a rare melody. Free will is human. The instruments exchange their roles and dominate their players. Space. Dimension. Form. Function. The anthromorphism, the true and deep nature of improvisation, is complete.

Despite being recorded in three segments, "Anthropomorphic" is a coherent single entity and is based on a plan, like all the TMFDC improv sessions. Following this plan, TMFDC have created another mesmerizing, exalted, disturbing, and atmospheric piece of art. Always activating different talents of its many members, no album of TMFDC or their studio counterpart THE KILIMANJARO DARKJAZZ ENSEMBLE resembles the other, and "Anthropomorphic" makes no exception.

In a year which made impossible the now highly anticipated annual unveiling of new projects and collaborations that usually accompanies Berlin Atonal, the festival has compiled a major selection of new works by a range of artists from across the advanced musical landscape. Entitled More Light the compilation traverses the vast spectrum of musical
experience.
French producer Aho Ssan - who made his debut at Berlin Atonal’s 2019 edition - has smelted the vocals of Exzald S into a multi-layered track that gestures towards a future language for computer-produced music. New York’s Hiro Kone pairs with group A’s Tot Onyx to debut their collaboration with an outstanding showpiece of groaning power-surge electronics, while legendary futurist Gerald Donald XOR Gate alias.
Speculative widescreen-electronics protagonists Roly Porter and Paul Jebanasam unveil the first recorded track of their collaborative Altar project, conjuring up an entire ecology composed of both positively and negatively charged emotional-electronic particles. Enchanted Belgian magicians Pablo’s Eye offer a new track that grows out of the melancholic ambient-pop that the collective has been making since the 90s, while Nkisi hones in on a section of her premiere Atonal ’19 set ‘’Initiation” and reworks it into a brawling, bleak, hard-edged trampler.
These tracks sit beside a transformational collab between Abdullah Miniawy and Carl Gari, evocative synthesised works from Caterina Barbieri and Laurel Halo, unclassifiable post-ambient from exael and Kazakh-British violinist Galya Bisengalieva and much much more. The festival’s legendary revived imprint which has previously hosted contributions from Cabaret Voltaire, Psychic TV, Marshstepper and others now has a monumental new chapter.

Long ago, in the days before Rayna quit drinking, one of her favorite cocktails was something of her own invention called a “Saint Teresa”; iced chamomile tea and gin, usually Crystal Palace brand. To call it a cocktail is ridiculous, considering her technique was to mix it in an old orange juice bottle and carry that around all night. Something about the botanicals used in distilling the gin and mixing the chamomile leaves and flowers produced a mildly psychedelic effect before the inevitable blackout. The drink’s name came from the fascination-bordering-on-obsession Rayna developed for the story and writings of Saint Teresa of Ávila. She sought these out after being shown Bernini’s sculptural rendering of St Teresa’s experience of being penetrated by the Holy Spirit in an art history class in the early 90’s. She often spent most of that class sitting next to her girlfriend so they could fondle each other in the darkened lecture hall; the mix of religious ecstasy, sexuality and attention to detail in the sculpture lodged deeply in her consciousness. As a deeply spiritual and often extremely solitary and private person, her love of the story that animated Bernini’s hand has continued to grow throughout her life, especially after multiple visits in the late 90’s and early 2000’s to the chapel of Santa Maria de la Vittoria in Rome where the sculpture is currently kept. Transverberation sees her returning to that story as a sober woman in her mid 40’s, initiated into several spiritual traditions that specifically work with the energy of saints. The 9 works that comprise this release are also informed by her experiences of quarantine and social distancing. In an environment of enforced solitude and ramping collective horniness, the idea and practice of sexual intimacy with god became deep, complex and necessary.

HESITATION is the culmination of a slow-burning penpal friendship between Reckno founder Chris Catlin (aka Yaaard), and Kit Records honcho Richard Greenan (sometimes Devon Loch). Meeting in London in 2016, the pair recorded a woozy slab of improvs, using a battered organ, guitars, a saxophone and whatever else came to hand. These takes were then stitched together into a seven track LP over the following two years.

Veering from shoegaze to crystal clear electronics and fuzzed out jazz, the results pull two ways: slow and fast, meditative and exuberant. Here is a place where time bends and bubbles, drunk synthetic choirs follow an endless skywards pulse, and plaited melodies hover in warm air like motes of dust.

Recommended if you like the heart-on-sleeve whistle alongs of Tenniscoats, Zappa's foggier guitar serpents or the creeping black magic of early Sebadoh. HESITATION is a joint release between Kit Records, Reckno and videogamemusic.

100 limited copies
7inch
Produced by Art Crime
Mastered at Studio Martyrs
Digital mastering by Alexandr Pustynskiy @ajokki
Photo by Melchior Tersen
Design by Art Crime

IFP presents a long-awaited complete version of “Sara Dale's Sensual Massage” OST with 8 exclusive and unheard tracks.
Sara Dale's Sensual Massage was a delightful erotic video with a mystic soundtrack by Coil. Quite unusual for the band dreamy
ambient, almost spa-relaxed soft harmonies, bland tribal rhythms, chimes, and birdsong but still with dark mysterious and
inimitable Coil musick's charm. However, the second part of the album explores more rhythmic structures that remind 'Gay Man's
Guide...' soundtrack. Besides the OST recordings, the edition includes bonus tracks from the "Basilisk prod.'s" era: “Theme From
Blue”, and grandiose "The Hills Are Alive" so badly wanted on vinyl.
Artwork by Steven Stapleton. Mastering by Martin Bowes.

Die Orangen back on the adventurous Malka Tuti with their sophomore album ZWEI ORANGEN. It’s been two years since their debut album Zest animated the underground scene, merging obscure samples, field- recordings, krautrock motifs and a spattering of humour and self-perception into their newly forged genre: Krautback. The Australian duo - Kris Baha & Dreems - return with 2 more years of wisdom tucked under their hats to deliver a matured, developed sound. The industrial sonics & propen- sity for a dusty bush-beaten tone remain, however the sam- ples and ambience take a backseat, handing the map over to the guitar riffs, vocals and song writing to navigate the al- bums vast terrain. Collaborators Jono Ma (of Jagwar Ma), Alex Akers (of Forces) and Hayley Morgan expand the al- bum into a diverse journey across zones and styles, offering their own observation of the spacious musical world of Die Orangen. These 11 tracks will make you contemplate, they’ll will make you reminisce, they’ll give you friendly advice, they’ll ask you to dance, and they’ll question the direction of your compass... Fear not, however, this is music for everybody. As the Oranges say "Saft für alle”

After two years since her debut full-length release, Grand River presents her second album “Blink A Few Times To Clear Your Eyes” on Editions Mego. The 8 track LP shows an evolution towards a more experimental side of the Dutch-Italian composer which is here superbly combined with her ability of creating melodies previously heard on her 2xLP “Pineapple”, released on Spazio Disponibile in 2018.

“Blink A Few Times To Clear Your Eyes” expresses how acoustic instruments can be perfectly merged with electronic and analog synthesizers to become one new organic whole. The composer, whose birth-name is Aimée Portioli, brings the listener along on her personal explorational journey of expressions within a certain genre. The title of the album indicates the desire to explore what is new and see what is around us from different perspectives.

The album opens with the track “Side Lengths”, a complex and dreamy sequence made with one of her favorite synthesizers, the Yamaha DX-7. From there we are brought from extended panoramic sound design and cinematic ambiences, back and forth to synthetic melodies, field recordings, strings and for the first time ever, Aimée’s own modified voice in the closing track “All There Now”.

Recorded primarily at her home base in Berlin, Grand River’s music is pure, magnificent and elegant which documents a solemn atemporal story where her experiences are translated into another language.

Laurie Spiegel's second full-length album, Unseen Worlds, arrived just over ten years after her debut album. Having realized the pieces found on The Expanding Universe (1980) on an instrument no longer available to her, the GROOVE System at Bell Laboratories, Spiegel moved on to composing and developing for the Alles Machine, alphaSyntauri, McLeyvier and various other instruments before creating an instrument entirely her own. Spiegel created 'Music Mouse - An Intelligent Instrument' on a Macintosh 512k so that she could have an instrument that was not general purpose but a small, specialized, and well dened musical instrument for and by her that she did not have to compromise on or risk losing access to it. While it was a very personal instrument for Spiegel, demand among friends and colleagues nevertheless grew until 'Music Mouse - An Intelligent Instrument' became a commercial product for the Macintosh, Amiga, and Atari personal computers with a devoted popular following that continues to this day, despite the obsoletion of those platforms. At the time of her Unseen Worlds album's original release in 1991, the issuing record label turned out to be going out of business, dissolved and disappeared, sending the album immediately into obscurity. Outside of a private CD edition issued by Spiegel on her own Aesthetic Engineering label in 1994, this new edition represents the rst proper commercial release of Unseen Worlds.

'Unseen Worlds is not so much based on melody and rhythm as it is on textures, pulses, and sonic environments. Sometimes dark,
sometimes light, its drama pulls in the adventurous listener who wants to take a musical journey. Using computer software she wrote in order to implement a unique musical vision, Unseen Worlds blends the artistic and the technical, the cerebral and the sensual, and revives the virtually abandoned tradition of electronic music. Unseen Worlds is the work of a sonic explorer whose music can both challenge and caress. Those looking for other worlds of sound can put on headphones and nd them here.' - Craig Anderton

New Finnish imprint VIENO

The pioneering electronic composer Mort Garson (Mother Earth’s Plantasia) • takes on supernatural phenomena with lush synth grooves on The Unexplained, his only release under the name Ataraxia. Subtitled Electronic Musical Impressions of the Occult, the album explores tarot, astral projection, seances, and more with Garson’s signature Moog synthesizer serving as the listener’s tour guide to the paranormal. The exploratory, whimsical spirit of its creator is evident throughout the release, but it also takes its subject matter seriously, making it essential for anyone interested in musical conjurations of the occult. This remastered edition marks the first official reissue of the album since its initial 1975 release, and it includes all the original liner notes.

ABOUT MORT GARSON: Morton S. “Mort” Garson was a Canadian-born composer, arranger, songwriter, and pioneer of electronic music. He is best known for his albums in the 1960s and 1970s that were among the first to feature Moog synthesizers. His bestknown album is Mother Earth’s Plantasia, a 1976 Moog album designed to be played “for plants and the people who love them.”

Sacred Bones Records has undertaken the project of giving official, licensed reissues to key releases from Mort Garson’s catalog, with the intention of bringing these bold masterpieces to a 21st century audience.

Since 2018, three archival, private-press volumes of previously-unheard music from subterranean Swedish project Civilistjävel! have been released. Drawn from an extensive cache of material recorded in the late '90s and early 2000s using mostly Juno60 and KorgMS20, and startling in its accomplishment and emotional eloquence, Civilistjävel!'s M.O. ranges from intimate, melodic minimal synth nocturnes through to deep, droning, Chain Reaction-esque techno ice-scapes, all of it austere but full of nameless, 30-days-of-night yearning. 'Generalstrejk' represents the first "contemporary" offering from Civilistjävel! to appear on record: the 20-minute-long title track is a concussive, steamrolling epic derived from live performances given in London and Stockholm in 2019. The three tracks of unknown vintage on the B-side revisit the pure arctic dread of the archival work - all brittle, abstract dub phantasms and glowering industrial ambience. Edition of 250 copies, no re-press.

From the physical transformation of organic elements that melt generating new textures, Espleni is created. Fragmented into nine pieces, it starts with an inmersive melody starting a route without return where you can explore frozen territories of heavy structures.

This reflects the union between body and raw material, an interest
that was already glimpsed in its first release with Bestiarie (2015).
The distortion of organic sounds arrives to wide landscapes of noise, sometimes moderated and in others uncontrolled. Noises that are juxtaposed in a constant dialogue until its definitive bifurcation.

This project starts from the recording of everyday sounds that surround the author, using a Zoom H5 recorder, with which he later experiments, manipulating and gathering them until creating a musically harmonic composition.

The pioneering electronic composer Mort Garson (Mother Earth’s Plantasia) • takes on supernatural phenomena with lush synth grooves on The Unexplained, his only release under the name Ataraxia. Subtitled Electronic Musical Impressions of the Occult, the album explores tarot, astral projection, seances, and more with Garson’s signature Moog synthesizer serving as the listener’s tour guide to the paranormal. The exploratory, whimsical spirit of its creator is evident throughout the release, but it also takes its subject matter seriously, making it essential for anyone interested in musical conjurations of the occult. This remastered edition marks the first official reissue of the album since its initial 1975 release, and it includes all the original liner notes.

ABOUT MORT GARSON: Morton S. “Mort” Garson was a Canadian-born composer, arranger, songwriter, and pioneer of electronic music. He is best known for his albums in the 1960s and 1970s that were among the first to feature Moog synthesizers. His bestknown album is Mother Earth’s Plantasia, a 1976 Moog album designed to be played “for plants and the people who love them.”

Sacred Bones Records has undertaken the project of giving official, licensed reissues to key releases from Mort Garson’s catalog, with the intention of bringing these bold masterpieces to a 21st century audience.

Says the label: Ben loves Terre loves Robin is the second EP off Premature. Featuring works by Terre Thaemlitz (aka DJ Sprinkles), Scanner, and a first from London based producer Ben Galyas. The EP builds upon a private archival project involving Thaemlitz and Scanner, "Terre loves Robin" brings deep solo recitals to intercepted telephone conversations (think Leveson, just more intimate). Galyas' "Cloud Version" is heavy ambience, glitched piano and harpsichord. Limited to 500 copies.'

"Spoki (Ghosts) is the sound of an artist putting their private world to tape. Of exploring and pushing the limits of themselves and technology to realise the music in their head. Recorded in Riga between 1988-2011.
.
As Ingus Bauškenieks himself explains: My own world differs a little from my friends' tastes. And - as my father said - the collective art is not art at all.

The music of Ingus Bauškenieks is both deeply private and completely alien. Experimental yet happy to celebrate pop influences such as Engelbert Humperdinck, Simon & Garfunkel or Fleetwood Mac. It is shaped by the artist's engagement with technology and his strive to put to record his 'own world'.
As Ingus explains, it is the sound of him: doing what I like to do.'

Following on from one of the most sought after reissues of recent years 'MUSICA PARA EL FIN DE LOS CANTOS' on Berlin's Cocktail D'amore, Iury Lechs debut LP 'Otra Rumorosa Superficie' is made available for the very first time on vinyl launching the reissue division of London based Utopia Records set up in 2015 by Alexander Bradley.
This cassette only release from 1989 is a minimal masterpiece practically unheard until now. Arguably a more complete album than '...De Los Cantos', originally composed for two short films 'Final Sin Pausas' and 'Bocetos Para Un Sueno' as a full score, the arrangement is a beautiful listening experience spanning through ambient, meditational and cinematic minimalism of real depth, romanticism and sincerity.

Iury Lech is a Ukrainian born multidisciplinary artist, whose main focus now is as the curator of 'Madatac' a festival based in Madrid focused on new media art, video art and audio visual technologies which has featured the work of Brian Eno amongst many others.
During the late 1970s and 80s he rose as a pioneer within a moment focused on electronically generated audio and visual media. Drawing on the ground gained by Minimalist pioneers like Steve Reich, Terry Riley, and Philip Glass - built from repetitive rhythm and sheets of rippling resonance, drone, and ambience, Lech's work of the period is so striking and beautiful, that it seems shockingly unjust that it was overlooked until now.

The album comes in 180 gram vinyl edit form in deluxe sleeve.
Utopia Originals sets out to promote and reinvigorate music and artists in the most authentic way possible.
'OTRA RUMOROSA SUPERFICIE' has been remastered from original master tapes at Central Dubs, Bern Switzerland and the original artwork licensed through Argentine visual artist Pablo Siquier.

Vinyl version of Touch release TO94, incl. downloadcode. Vinyl is 180g. Limited edition of 500 copies only.

For the past decade or so, Polish musician Michal Jacaszek has been exploring a new, resolutely modern chapter in Eastern Europe's long, storied love affair with classical music. His creations are painstakingly crafted collages of electronic textures and baroque instrumentation, harpsichords being swarmed by woolly static one minute and pulled apart by billowing wind the next. A push-and-pull tension runs deep and constant throughout. Ambient music is rarely so sonically challenging. Jacaszek has recorded for Ghostly International, Miasmah, Gusstaff Records and Experimedia, as well as other labels. This is his first release for Touch.

Michal Jacaszek writes:

"When poets and writers declare their enchantment for the forms of nature, they often use musical terms as metaphors. Visual artists' creations often resemble graphic partitas, when recapturing the rhythms of landscapes. Confirming, in a way, these musical intuitions, composers write great music deeply inspired by birdsongs, wind rustlings, waves repetitions etc.

Making "Catalogue des Arbres", my ambition was to join this broad artistic movement devoted to natural phenomena and find my own way to describe trees: their forms, atmosphere and mystery. I have started with "open air" recordings, capturing mainly leaves' rustlings - from different distances, in different locations and weather conditions. This collection of nature recordings was transformed into a kind of "organic drone" and becomes a main background for instrumental and voice improvisations. My initial inspiration herewas Olivier Messiaen's bird songs transcriptions for piano - the composer's work title "Catalogue d'Oiseaux" I have paraphrased on my album. A piano, clarinets, violin and percussion parts, performed by the Kwartludium ensemble, were electronically processed, and afterwards all this electro-acoustic material was turned into a collection of eight soundscapes - forgotten songs performed secretly by my beloved trees."

Black Mass is an album of supernatural electronics from synth pioneer Mort Garson, the mastermind behind the cult classic Mother Earth’s Plantasia. Originally released in 1971, it’s his only release under the Lucifer moniker, and it taps into a profound darkness that may surprise fans of his sunnier work. These songs are Garson’s synthesizer interpretations of occult and esoteric phenomena ranging from the Satanic black mass, to exorcism, to witchcraft, and beyond, and they’ve inspired artists from Coil to Oneohtrix Point Never. This deluxe remastered edition presents the album in full with all original liner notes.

ABOUT MORT GARSON: Morton S. “Mort” Garson was a Canadian-born composer, arranger, songwriter, and pioneer of electronic music. He is best known for his albums in the 1960s and 1970s that were among the first to feature Moog synthesizers. His bestknown album is Mother Earth’s Plantasia, a 1976 Moog album designed to be played “for plants and the people who love them.” Sacred Bones Records has undertaken the project of giving official, licensed reissues to key releases from Mort Garson’s catalog, with the intention of bringing these bold masterpieces to a 21st century audience.

• Supernatural and occult-themed electronic music from composer Mort Garson (Mother Earth’s Plantasia)
• Served as inspiration to contemporary artists from Coil to Oneohtrix Point Never
• Remastered from the original master tapes

Black Mass is an album of supernatural electronics from synth pioneer Mort Garson, the mastermind behind the cult classic Mother Earth’s Plantasia. Originally released in 1971, it’s his only release under the Lucifer moniker, and it taps into a profound darkness that may surprise fans of his sunnier work. These songs are Garson’s synthesizer interpretations of occult and esoteric phenomena ranging from the Satanic black mass, to exorcism, to witchcraft, and beyond, and they’ve inspired artists from Coil to Oneohtrix Point Never. This deluxe remastered edition presents the album in full with all original liner notes.

ABOUT MORT GARSON: Morton S. “Mort” Garson was a Canadian-born composer, arranger, songwriter, and pioneer of electronic music. He is best known for his albums in the 1960s and 1970s that were among the first to feature Moog synthesizers. His bestknown album is Mother Earth’s Plantasia, a 1976 Moog album designed to be played “for plants and the people who love them.” Sacred Bones Records has undertaken the project of giving official, licensed reissues to key releases from Mort Garson’s catalog, with the intention of bringing these bold masterpieces to a 21st century audience.

• Supernatural and occult-themed electronic music from composer Mort Garson (Mother Earth’s Plantasia)
• Served as inspiration to contemporary artists from Coil to Oneohtrix Point Never
• Remastered from the original master tapes

After seven years, the second release of Max Loderbauer on Non Standard Productions arrives again in his style of post - german - electronic - avant garde. “Donnerwetter” is the perfect blue print of modern reduced electronic adventures. Carefully chosen out of a pool of recordings produced by Max in the last years, slightly edited and arranged into a full length album.

Mort Garson’s road to cool cultural caché and the sublimity of Plantasia meant a decades’ long journey through an underworld of sophisticated, international, string-laced dreck (i.e., your great-grandparents’ record collection) to arrive at Music from Patch Cord Productions, this set of queasy-listening you now hold.

Music from Patch Cord Productions shows that Garson’s knack was to exist in both worlds, super-commercial and waaay out. He cut delirious minute-long blasts for commercials (as to whether or not they were actually ever aired remains unknown) and spacecraft-hovering études. Were there really account managers out there in the early ’70s that gave the greenlight to these commercial compositions which seemed to anticipate everyone from John Carpenter to Suicide? What were these campaigns actually for, Soylent Green? Regardless, Mort’s jingle work laid the groundwork for the future. As Robert Moog himself noted: “The jingles were important because they domesticated the sound.” Via Garson’s wizardry, the synthesizer transcended novelty to ubiquity and dominance.

Other curios and questions abound. How did Garson’s arrangement work for Arthur Prysock’s satiny body worship album This Is My Beloved transmogrify into the body-snatcher pulses of “This is My Beloved”? Are the two pieces even related? What is the IATA code for the airport of “Realizations of an Aeropolis”? What denomination is the “Cathedral of Pleasure”? If “Son of Blob” sounds like a hallucinatory melted ice cream truck theme, what on earth does Blob’s father sound like? Every sound wrangled out of that Moog by Garson pushes things further and further out.

Of course, these are all questions that may never get answers, as Garson wasn’t the most organized modern day composer, busy as he was conjuring strange new realms with his circuit boards and synths. He worked and wrote right up until his death in 2008, his daughter and Sacred Bones still going through all of the material left behind. He wouldn’t live to see it, but his renaissance was just around the corner, the seeds that had been scattered in record bins around the world suddenly coming to bear fruit. Take a bite!