Techno News

Veteran Swedish Techno artist Joel Mull revisits one of his earliest aliases as Damm for an album of after-hours inspired morning portraits on A Strangely Isolated Place. Simple observations can set many complex ideas in motion and it was the view from Joel's window that pushed him to create an album inspired by majestic cloud formations and Mother Nature's finest hour. 'Nautical dawn' occurs when the Sun is 12 degrees below the horizon, where the colors, clouds, sounds and atmosphere become an ever-changing spectacle. This phenomenon is reflected through the albums eleven shifting styles and moods; from field recordings and introspective synthesizer melodies, to more upbeat, glittering electronica and head-nod inducing ambient techno. Ten years in the making, the album's variety and depth developed alongside Joel's impromptu production sessions - be it at home in the early hours, or further window-watching on trains across Europe. What evolved as sketches in a variety of styles, soon started to form a narrative similar to his infamous DJ sets; moving seamlessly through chapters, feelings and colors, capturing Joel's passion for all aspects of electronic music. This is a soundtrack for friends watching the sun rise once more, first thing in the morning, or last thing at night.

The MINDFULNESS HIPERNORMALISATION album itself marks a new turn in Eduardo's work, breaking away from any musical style or stereotype and always trying to seeking freedom of expression,marked also by a strong connotation of voluntary ostracism.A new stage in which Eduardo uses this double vinyl like a tool to mark a distance with the current international scene and also support the Adam Curtis theories shown on his acclamed documentary "The HiperNormalisation" 2016 . The album show influences that goes from romantic ambient melodies to the most complex and experimental electronica,also including easy listening techno where it is difficult to differentiate the line between techno and ambient.

Francois Kervorkian,DJ and official engineer of albums belonging to Depeche Mode or Kraftwerk, gives support to this great work of Eduardo which will remain in the near future and without any doubt as a cult album.

Transcendental Movements Vol. 1 marks the beginning of a new full-length ambient series, curated by IDO founder Valentino Mora. Since the age of 14, Mora has been searching for alternative tools to relieve anxiety. In 2016, he discovered the music of Marow and Olaf Tonstein and found that through listening to this particular music he was able to access a new state of meditation. This began the journey of researching the technique he calls 'active mediation'. When he discovered that a lot of Marow and Olaf Tonstein's music from 2009 had never been released on vinyl, he knew he needed to release it one day. In their work, Mora identified a feeling pertinent to the concept of the label, one that exemplified the connection between minimal/ambient/glitch and IDO's ambient house sound. From there he reached out to other artists that he felt could relate to this idea, and asked them to contribute a track in response to the concept. The resulting compilation varies in tempo and technique, illustrating each artist's idiosyncrasies, yet as a whole it forms a cohesive and potent statement. Active meditation differs from regular stationary meditation through the focusing of one's attention on sound whilst in motion -- the form this motion takes is personal. The goal of active meditation is to transcend one's awareness of motion -- in fact, the awareness of being in a body -- and to become absorbed entirely in the sound. Mora found that this process has the potential to ease anxiety as all conscious thought is alleviated through concentrated focus on music. For the cover artwork, Mora selected a painting from visual artist Raphael Lecoquierre, in which the movement, airiness and minimalism elicits a profound sense of calm. Mora also invited writer and artist, Lou Drago, to interpret the concept in words. Their text, Suspending Reality, features on the inside of the gatefold cover.

Journey through the beauty and brutality of Mother Earth with "When The Ice will Break", a four-track techno EP from Italian producer, Mod21, breaking a year-long pause for On the 5th Day's label.

Please lend your ears to this new pastoral and nostalgic beauty from Swoop And Cross, aka London based Portuguese composer/musician, Ruben Vale. Like a soundtrack to a melancholic and romantic silent film from long past, the tracks on Stories Of Disintegration wind their way into your subconscious, softly easing you into a state of memory and longing. As though you are watching your life on rewind...and waiting to hear what happens in the music. The languid and dreamy piano motifs are counter balanced by more rhythmic electronic flourishes, and together they form this very contemplative set of sounds. Put this album on late at night with someone that you love!

"3x12" - Vinly Only.

The second instalment of minimood's multidisciplinary fusion series features Die Wilde Jagd with an extensive rework of the neo-romantic ’Morgenrot’ as well as a vast array of diverse remixes by Ancient Methods, CV313, Luigi Tozzi, Roman Flügel, Rude 66, Steve Bug, The KVB, Vactrol Park, and Variant. This gatefold 3x12" vinyl only release is visually enhanced with intricate hand-drawn artwork including inlay by Dusseldorf based artist Susanne Giring. Written and recorded by Sebastian Lee Philipp with his Uhrwald Orange studio collaborator Ralf Beck, ’Morgenrot’ originally appeared on Die Wilde Jagd's debut album in 2015.

For this release, Philipp and Beck re-visited the song: the ensuing ‘Fangschuss Version' enjoys an augmented arrangement, additional instrumentation and a haunting guest vocal by New- Zealand based singer Nina Siegler. In Philipp’s words, the 'Fangschuss Version' constitutes “a venture to capture the spirit that has been guiding this fusion release - a desire to explore the concepts of friendship, time, distance and memory. An attempt to unveil fragments of the unseen and to reveal the surge of a distant remembrance in an embracive listening experience." 'Morgenrot' subsequently gets a highly varied remix treatment by a range of carefully selected artists.

While Vactrol Park navigate the original audio material into beautiful ambient territory, Ancient Methods showcase an epic masterpiece of enchanting medieval-vibed techno. The KVB turn the track into a dreamy cold-wave trip and Rude 66 dives into a dark, primetime, anthemic dimension. For Roman Flügel, it’s a slow, organic, starry-eyed approach and Luigi Tozzi transforms 'Morgenrot' into hypnotic & loopy, minimal, deep techno. The rework by Steve Bug plays with the original's melody and a danceable kosmische-infused house cut emerges.

The final two remixes are both crafted by legendary Echospace Detroit mastermind Stephen Hitchell: absorbing deep trips into mesmerizing dubtechno by CV313 and into foggy lo-fi ambient by Variant.

* Mirae Arts (founded By Elbert Choi) Is A New Label Based In The Suburban Bowels Of El Cerrito, California, Usa. Elbert Choi, Originally From South Korea, Is Inspired By The Mountainous Landscapes Of Northern California And Is Focused Primarily On Releasing Music With Blissful & Natural Soundscapes.

* The Debut 12' Ep On Mirae Arts Is Called Prayers By The Lake, Produced By Seraphim Rytm. Seraphim Rytm, Based In Belgium, Is The Alias Of Damaskin, The Veteran Master Of Dark Hypnotic Techno Who Has Releases On Esteemed Labels Such As Unknown Precept, Noiztank, And 10 Label (japan). Damaskin Debuted As Seraphim Rytm With A Celestial Album Called Aeterna On Vancouver's Silent Season, Which Was Reviewed By Resident Advisor As Being 'deeper-than-deep Techno Shrouded In The Damp Atmospherics Of The Rainforest'. Prayers By The Lake Continues The Sonic Journey Into The Beautiful Complexities Of Nature And This Time Invoking Images Of An Isolated Lake Surrounded By Mountains In Seasonal Transition. The Ep Consists Of Three High-powered Ceremonious Tracks And Concludes With A Beautiful Ambient Closure.

* The Artwork Is By Landscape Photographer Cody Cobb Who Is Responsible For The Artwork On Haxan Cloak's Breakthrough Album, Excavation (tri Angle). Cody Has Also Worked For Labels Such As Permanent Vacation And 10 Label.

* 180g Vinyl Pressed At The Highly Reputable Gotta Groove Records, Cleveland, Ohio.

Mirae Arts is an independent vinyl label based in northern California with focus on experimental ambient and techno music. Inspired by travel and natural landscapes, Mirae Arts boasts a diverse catalogue of projects from artists such as Seraphim Rytm, Michiru Aoyama, and Katsunori Sawa.

Katsunori Sawa & Anthone (aka Martsman) are Bokeh, the dynamic duo behind some of the most notable releases on Berlin’s Weevil Neighbourhood. Bokeh blends together the distinctive styles of Katsunori Sawa & Anthone, who have releases on labels such as Opal Tapes, SNTS, Hidden Hawaii, and many more under their belts. This year, Bokeh has already released a 12” EP for UVB-76 and Mirae Arts is proud to announce the follow up debut LP release called Lenses Dances.

Lenses Dances comprises 8 tracks that reflect on the photograph effect called bokeh, where aperture settings of the respective camera lens create vivid patterns, almost like dancing dots. It is a dedication to the artists’ love for photography. The music is complemented by Paul Nicholson’s signature graphic designs.

Artwork design by Paul Nicholson, UK graphic designer who created the famous Aphex Twin logo and The Laughing Man logo for the cult-classic anime, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. Paul has since designed logos and artworks for numerous artists and organizations.

Mastering and lacquer completed by Kassian Troyer at the legendary Dubplates & Mastering.

The depths of ambiguity will at some point reveal the anonymity of this craze. Who is he? How did we get here and what does it take to "become"? We look up - we look down. This conundrum will guide us to the answer we are all waiting for. When we enter the land of Genam, we shall patiently wait for the Sun.

RICO PUESTEL debuts on his TIME IN THE SPECIAL PRACTICE OF RELATIVITY label with a mind-boggling journey of 41 minutes — split in two parts to fit on vinyl! HEPTAKAIDEKA is what it won't be and will be what it never was: Something from in-between worlds, a place beyond far beyond, where time dissolves into relativity...

Every modern electronic music presenter should be able to find joyful, elevated, convulsing or simply useful moments within the extent of this track that is designed to have its inherent connecting factors and starting points in place for every DJ set — letting it be just a few minutes, well-placed groove looping or bigger amounts of its entirety for diving into a long night, bringing it to an end or making it standing out in-between.

Starting off with a hazy half-grasp hint of what's to come, a mysteriously pervasive bionic loop emerges, slowly coalescing with a bone-dry groove on the rise. Taking up a first quadrant of the track, already gnawing into the long-term memory, it manages to gradually establish itself along the pathway while the "rhythmatics" endure some subtle layer-shifting with occult-like strings come sliding in from somewhere unknown like an admonitory subtext.

Being halfway through (and all the way in), everything smoothly crumbles down to its basic framework, still shaking off its own reminiscences while foregone vestiges almost perilously try to reassemble themselves. All of that leading to a clearly unforeseen yet fortunate drift into a 1980's-like synth peak time section after about 27 minutes being in that track, finally cherishing an evolving emotional felicity and the climax of its own being that tends to feel like an overarching salvation.

As everything being eventually finite, the track starts to bring to mind where it came from by assuredly falling back into a story told before with the well-established bionic loop that once used to run free, sounding somehow different and more tamed now. Ending with dignity, the consistently resurfaced admonitory strings lead the way to its conclusion and possibly new beginnings, solely leaving behind the heartbeat-like booming that carried it all, now fading away...

Coming into existence during a series of multiple productions of exuberant proportions with Rico making the studio his citadel-like stronghold, this is an extensive story of desires, instincts, pride, fall, mirth, solicitude, tension, détente and basically life itself while subtly yet versatilely entertaining on a dodgy yet accessible level throughout the wingspread of Techno, House, Minimal, Dub, Electronica and Ambient influences.

The CD version not only brings you the title track in the guise of its non-split completeness but eminently churns out the extra drumming dub treat DEKAEPTA for a pleasurable groove-delight as well as the trippy bonus beauty VOSEM' that transits as a precious component of infinity.

REPRESS: The world has found itself in a significant hurry. We have also found ourselves in the most distracted period of time in history; finding it tremendously difficult to remain in a moment of stillness, quietude, or allow time for self-reflection. Conversely, our vast universe continues its expansion into infinite development; a climate of deafening silence in a boundless four-dimensional continuum. It remains mesmerizing with a quiet allure that freely suspends in space-time; a true account of the beautiful unknown that sparks hope, reverence, and an awesome realization of impenetrable mystery.

"Stasis Sounds For Long-Distance Space Travel" is audibly rich in its delivery with an array of tranquil billows and patient tones. It is a journey and soundtrack that commences at Earth's thermosphere, gently moving towards the untraveled parts of space, lushly floating on forever.

These arrangements represent a group of celestial transmissions that are delicate in nature and intended for the listener to embrace moments of stillness, quietude and reflection, of which are on a trajectory of extinction at a place we call Earth.

MW007, 'Furi', is a collection of tracks from two Berlin-based friends / artists Exael and Arad Acid. The material highlights the commonalities between their individual and collaborative works, moving from boundless and chaotic energy to soft kinetic radiance over the course of seven tracks.

This 3-part compilation is a celebration of On The 5th Day - a project born out of love - honouring the music, moments and individuals that have helped to make it so special.

What follows is a journey through the spectrum of sound On The 5th Day so proudly represents and has become renowned for, the full compilation mirroring the vision for our events: to create unforgettable flow from beginning to end - a record for each part of the night.

Our love and gratitude goes to all those who have joined us along the way.

'Orchestral Studies Collectanea' consists of seven previously unreleased orchestral movements (Tracks 1-7) in addition to remastered variations of arrangements that originally appeared on, 'Orchestral Tape Studies' and 'Orchestral Tape Studies Tyresta Reworks'. Orchestral Studies Collectanea is a compilation arranged and produced by zake with additional production by close friend Tyresta. OSC is a group of richly layered movements of fragmented orchestral loops, paying homage to minimalist symphonic composers and orchestras. zake and Tyresta incorporate field recordings and faint drone billows to accompany these selected samples of orchestral loops. With an emphasis on tone and recurrent murmurs, these arrangements offer approximately 48 minutes of delicate repetition, reticent sound treatments, and subtle manipulations. OSC is intended for low-volume listening.

'Chronos' is the debut album of Berlin-based trio AUSKLANG. Presenting a perfect blend of ambient and post-rock music, Chronos traces all the veins of rock, from a grandiose ensemble sound of a cinematic soundtrack to the delicate natures of ambient soundscapes. Each song has its own pulse and signature, giving a new feeling each time.

Electronic centipede George Thompson aka Black Merlin debuts on DJ Nobu's Bitta label. The British producer delivers four expertly warped techno trips with his typical genre-bending approach. After his recent trip to Japan for Rural Festival 2019, Thompson was introduced to Nobu on the Iiyama train station for their ride back to Tokyo. Inspired by the festival itself and Nobu's approach to techno the two felt an immediate connection and stayed in touch for exchanging their ideas. A few months later Thompson sent his music, visualizing a bridge to connect his music closer to Japan and the inspiration he got from his Rural visit. Nobu: "I was immediately convinced it was a great match, and I could tell he had been following the previous Bitta releases and understood the label's aesthetics. To me, this EP demonstrates his new vision of dynamic techno thats so thrilling as if you were watching a movie, all illuminated in gorgeous pastel-coloured sound effects!"

Raw electro techno release from Rotterdam by Jeremiah R disguised in his Black Sky Soul alias. Very cool artwork by Madame Fourmilion!

Blocaus series is back with it's 8th release, "Gods & Robots" EP by rising French artist Ruhbarb for his debut EP on the label. Involved with labels such as Materia and Odd Oven, Ruhbarb's sound is a mixture between techno, dub and ambient, nurturing a tone that is driving, groovy and dark, but always loaded with great emotional depth. Part of a promising new generation of French producers and DJ's, Ruhbarb delivers 4 fantastic cuts in his own personal style including on the B side two killer remixes from Answer Code Request and Antigone.

Marco Shuttle is very much part of the Spazio Disponibile label family: he's put out his Systhema album and various EPs with Donato Dozzy and Neel in the last couple of years, and now the Eerie boss serves up more of his immersive techno excellence. He starts off in slow motion, with the roomy ambiance and slightly spooky dub of 'Ritmo Elegante.' Of course it's a track carefully filled with little sonic details that make it a very real place to be. 'Arpex' then switches things up with a super urgent, super supple acidic techno rhythm thats overlaid with a widescreen arp that sapiens space and time, and 'Stairway To The Milky Way' is a half time stepper though some trippy sci-fi jungle before 'Qatarsi' rides on a floating groove as sound effects pan all around you and traps you in a state of trance. These are expressive, hard to define and excellent electronics once again from Marco Shuttle.

Music ‡ Florian Kupfer
Artwork ‡ Conor Walker
Mastering ‡ Lawrence English at Negative Space

The Hivern split series was born as a platform for club-ready tracks that don't require a broader sonic context to express themselves. It's also as a way of generating an unplanned dialogue between artists in the label's orbit, connecting the dots amid them in spontaneous and almost unconscious ways. The third installment of the series brings together Beesmunt Soundsystem and Cooper Saver. Their two tracks share a similar approach, deconstructing ethereal sounds over dark rhythmic foundations to reach the same kind of narcotic transcendence. The visual concept of the series has been developed by London-based design studio DR.ME. Vinyl-only.

2x12"

Repress


2018 Konduku took everyone by surprise with his debut called Kiran. It doesn't happen all too often a new artist emerges with such a developed and distinctive sound, delivering an album as debut. Now, a year and three EPs later, Nous'klaer Audio is thrilled to present his followup: White Heron. His singular sound of odd-groove based techno has aged into a sound that's more mature yet still very playful. Konduku further refined his sound of snappy polyrhythmic blips by using a controlled sound palette focusing on the tensions in-between. Starting with the mesmerizing depth of Kenar to the stripped down halfstepper Hermitage, and from the synthetic beat patterns of Kobalt to the colorful dream fields of Belki - White Heron is an album designed to listen from start to finish, but more than anything else meant for the club

Signals is an absolutely beautiful new collaborative effort between the much beloved Finnish electronic artist Lau Nau, and the brilliant Swedish composer and pianist Matti Bye. These 8 gently melancholic and deeply sensitive tracks are a perfect antidote to the stressful times that we all find ourselves in. Let these soothing sounds from the light filled days and nights of the far north soften your cares during these all too dark days. As usual at the Time Released Sound label no effort or expense was spared here, and this lovely record comes with 180gm black vinyl in a super heavyweight, beautifully printed reverse board jacket.

Absorbingly intricate ambient electronics from Echium, a secluded Manchester producer returning for a 2nd release on sferic, the label home to Space Afrika, Perila, Jake Muir After inaugurating sferic with the ’Synthetic Space’ LP in 2017, Echium now leads the way with a
remarkably refined, even meticulous grasp of sound design steering away from purely “synthetic space” to imaginary spaces that smudge the listener’s perceptions of artificial and organic texture, tone and spatial dynamics. Like the best of its contemporary field, from Vladislav Delay to uon and Heith, the meticulous technical physics of ‘Disruptions of form’ provides the framework for a gently haunting spectra of metaphysical presence or spirited pathos to bleed through and reveal the sort of ghost in the machine that electronic music lovers prize. Collaged from banks of unfinished material, the results resemble a spongiform patchwork of shine-eye ambient-pop gestures and cosmic electro-acoustic parts that smudge and crystalize into a heavy-lidded, quietly beguiling narrative. The 9 tracks resemble an archipelago of interlinked microcosmos, each a variation of the last, following a deformed geologic chain reaction of events through its terraforming sonic sculptures that appear to describe subaquatic
organisms and their environment with close attention paid to both microscopic detail and plangent panoramics. As part of the next wave of artists innovating within dub techno and experimental ambient zones, Echium looks to loosen up its strictures while playing deep within its unfathomable dimensions, literally urging a dematerialisation of mindsets and musical structures with literal titles such as ‘Collapsed Senses’ and ‘Glacial Rust’ matched by meticulous sound design that surely connotes and evokes their meaning in the most elusively abstract, lushly sensorial terms.

Single-sided 12" with etched B-side.

Sissel Wincent and Anthony Linell (Abdulla Rashim, Ulwhednar) have their way with Pär Grindvik’s catalogue in the 3rd of five remix 12” for the boss of Stockholm Ltd and half of the Aasthma duo with Peder Mannerfelt.

Chasing up her 12”s for Peder Mannerfelt’s label and remixes of fever Ray and HTDW, Sissel Wincent is at her best in a convulsive rework of ‘Magnolia’ full of pointillist electro rhythm and subtly reverberating, doomy atmospheres with a poignant finale. The artist better known as Abdullah Rashim, Anthony Linell follows with a superb, subaquatic techno spin on ‘Ensemble’.

Jocelyn is next up on the ESHU label with three tracks of deep and smoky techno that mark his solo debut. He is one of the co-founders of the ESHU collective and has contributed collaborative tracks as ESHU, as well as working as J&L (aka Tom Liem and Jocelyn Abell) on Field Records, Deep Sound Channel and this label before now. Opener 'Other Heights' is eight minutes of deeply absorbing dub techno that is stripped back to only the most essential elements but still has a very real presence. A warped, soft edged acid line eventually takes the lead as calming pads stretch out to infinity. 'Maox' is more drum lead, with crisp electro stylings and more mind melting acid lines working you into a trance as the cosmic pads flash things out. Last of all, 'Utan' hits harder but is just as warm and cavernous, with call and response pads and bass leading you off on an intergalactic journey that is cerebral and cinematic. It rounds out a superb EP of immersive techno in fine style.

Metempsychosis Records invites you to 'Breaking The Silence', the sonic soundscapes of End Train along with remixes by Oscar Mulero and VSK.

The release will be available in a transparent marbled black 12" vinyl. The package includes a printed insert, narrating the story of the Aztec god of wind, who inspired the creation of the record.

Story
Relentless percussions, savage rhythms and mind-expanding glitches narrate the adventure of Quetzalcoatl, the Aztec feathered serpent deity of Wind and his mission to interrupt the silence on Earth with music. A long time ago music was yet a privilege of the Sun who was keeping all the musicians confined in its realm.
The evolving nature of the tracks symbolizes the journey of the Wind, who, helped by the waters, reaches the Sun s land. Disoriented and lost in the Sun s maze, he accepts the challenges that his adventure presents and endures a lengthy and demanding quest to find the music. The only way to get on the right path is by feeling the sound itself. By trusting it and following the air vibrations, he finally finds the courtyard where all the musicians are playing. Despite the Sun s crying and imploring the musicians not to go, Quetzalcoatl manages to bring them all down to Earth. With their arrival, the silence in the world is suddenly broken, while sounds and music sprout everywhere as animals and humans learn how to sing and play.

This story teaches us that through our perseverance and also by working with others - like the wind joins forces with the waters - we can change any condition and bring wonderful things even where they do not seem possible. It s up to each one of us to create the world we want. So abandon yourself and embrace the broken silence.

Four studio jams of futuristic and unpretentious contemporary dance music from N.F.O & Delta Rain Dance. Heavy on the low-end, easy on the wallet. Hypno vibes included. Knaller!

Consisting of Dennis White, Charlie May, and Dave Gardner, Quiet Places is a new project by the UK producers focusing on vivid and wide-screen journeys. Between the three, their production roots go deep into some of electronic music's most important outputs of the last few decades. Be it performing live as part of Sasha's recent Refracted shows, their own individual projects such as Spooky, Sentre and Cosmonauts or remixing the likes of M83, The XX, Thom Yorke, Little Dragon or Elizabeth Fraser, they are no strangers to electronica.

Heavy Psych Sounds is really proud to announce a brand new series of split albums that will be called DOOM SESSIONS. We are going to release a bunch of compilations with doom bands from Heavy Psych Sounds roster featuring some of the heaviest bands of the world doom scene. Each volume will host two bands. This record you are holding is VOL. 2 - a split album with our heavy doom bands 1782 and Acid Mammoth. 1782 is premiering three brand new tracks "Bloody Ritual", "Hey Satan" and "Witch Death Cult". Acid Mammoth is releaasing three new tracks too: "Black Wedding", "Sleepless Malice" and "Cosmic Pyres".

"Recorded early 2018, I feel strongly attached to these five jammed cuts. For some reasons, playing at both Brooklyn Mirage New York and Panorama Bar/Berghain Berlin was a direct consequence of these recordings. Emotions-wise, I owe these tracks a lot : Sarbacane d'Antan EP is about waving a happy goodbye to a bygone past period of my life." - Amandra

This first album proper from Polish composer/violinist Olga Wojciechowska was originally released on CD only by Time Released Sound, and has been out of print for some years. We are very pleased to be bringing you this long overdue vinyl re-press, in an edition of only 200 copies, each of which comes in a beautiful 24pt heavyweight jacket, with translucent 180gm disc.

Maps and Mazes is a stunning collection of 10 pieces that were originally written for various international theater and dance productions, and their overall feel reflects this performative nature. These electronically treated, modern-classical beauties are somewhat dark and moody at times, and with their elegiac violin and haunting horns are both elegant and absorbing, and the ultimately lingering effect is one of series of spine tingling, late night serenades.

Therapy With Colour is the Constellation debut by Montréal-based producer and sound artist T. Gowdy, who has released three prior albums of exquisitely textured, predominantly ambient electronic music (most recently Pachira Aquatica via Shimmering Moods Records in 2019). His sublime audio/visual performances have featured at MUTEK (Montréal and Barcelona) and Spektrum (Berlin), alongside his ongoing work as an in-demand producer/engineer with over fifty album credits to date, including Suuns (Secretly Canadian), Ensemble (Fat Cat) and Ada Lea (Saddle Creek) to name just a few. Therapy With Colour is Gowdy’s most sonically and conceptually acute solo work to date, inspired by experiments with the Nova Pro 100 Light and Sound Mind Machine (among the best-known home hypnosis ‘mind machine’ devices, first released in the late 1990s). For Gowdy, the ritualized therapeutic reprogramming of consciousness promised by this technology has two primary personal dimensions: “to explore psychological ‘debiasing’ and decorrelation of heteronormative narratives that exist within my familial, intimate and economic relationships; to let flow neutral communication with the self and others” and to circumvent the technical biases and temporal blockages endemic to digital audio workstations and the computer-based editing that governs production of most electronic music. The album’s five tracks are extracted from live, linear, real-time stereo recordings that have their origins in an audio/visual collaboration between Gowdy and light artist Laura Buckley (whose scanner artwork features on the album cover and packaging). The music on Therapy With Colour is indeed meditative, but in a resolutely contemporary and highly engaging way, eschewing gauzy New Age or environmental music tropes and instead conveying the rigour and empiricism of controlled experiments. Consistent with theories of ‘mind machine’ brainwave synchronization, these tracks involve oscillating, shimmering Minimalist pulse and techno-adjacent rhythm that reward active listening, while working coequally as dissociative concentration music. Each of the five songs has a distinct vibe but constitute a deeply satisfying and cohesive flow. From the day Gowdy dropped this record on us a few months ago, devoid of context or background notes, we’ve probably listened to it more than anything else – not realizing we’d been self-medicating. But we can see everything so much more clearly now.

Compilation album curated by Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith

The directive for the composers featured on Breathing Instruments was, in effect, to accentuate the ways in which instruments sound like they are breathing. Some have recreated the literal experience of feeling or hearing the human breath. Others take a more abstract approach, where “breathing” is more motif than object of emulation.

From hushed pulsations and distant vocals in Kathryn Shuman’s ‘Objects creating a womb-like environment to Julianna Barwick’s blissful ‘Newborn’ the tracks give sonic form to the experience of emerging from the womb.

There is also a striking concurrence of woodland sounds throughout this collection from the ghostly tones of Emily A Srague’s ‘Flew’ to Cool Maritime and Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith’s dew dripped ‘Daybreak’.

Meanwhile the undulating seascape of Geotic’s ‘Uncaught’ conjures moments of Evening Star by Fripp/ Eno, but supplants that album’s crystalline production with the warm crackle of vinyl.
If we learn anything from Breathing Instruments it is that we are inextricable from the natural world.

Sublime synth and guitar compositions from Echolog on this 7 track LP. I was first introduced to Otto's work via his Conversions tape on Constellation Tatsu, and on Conte he has created something really striking and unique. Each piece is filled with movement and melody beginning with the synth pulses of "Depart" and "Conte" to the slow motion ambient swells of "Reflection" and "Centre".

This music is a tribute to two major sources of inspiration: Dada and the German krautpioneers Cluster. Somewhere out in the periphery, we meet with a common idea that everything has a sound, and that all sounds can be music.
Dada and kraut were born at a time not unlike our own. Both "movements" were a grimace at the sight of everything absurdity. It was a time steeped in aggression, political bitterness and scandals. Against logic. Against reason.
In umf, the sounds float freely without rudder. Here are percussion from distant countries. 70s synths and a noisy mellotrone.