Buscar:night

Originally released in 1986, Life Is Hard Then You Die was the debut
album from Liverpudlian indie-pop band It's Immaterial - Now reissued
and repackaged by Last Night From Glasgow, available October 2023
Simon Braithwaite of Smash Hits wrote that Life's Hard and Then You Die shows
that It's Immaterial "write jolly good pop songs - In fact everything else here is just
as inspired and original as their recent hit."
In a retrospective review, Michael Sutton of All Music wrote, "Musically, the LP is
all over the place - new wave country, blues, folk, and synth pop - Somehow the
smorgasbord of styles works, because the band members aren't being eclectic
just for the sake of it; they simply have a wide canvas, keeping the album fresh
from beginning to end."

A defining electroclash anthem returns to wax. Tiga & Zyntherius's cult classic Sunglasses at Night gets the deluxe vinyl treatment, featuring the iconic original 12" mix that set dancefloors ablaze in the early 2000s-plus a thunderous rework by techno titan Chris Liebing, who injects it with deep, industrial muscle for the modern floor.

Whether you're chasing nostalgia or sonic intensity, this is a must-have release for collectors, selectors, and nocturnal creatures alike.

Cut The With The Cake Knife was recorded by Rose McDowall in 1988/89 following the break up of her group Strawberry Switchblade. Produced with the aid of several musicians in several studios, the album features songs written for the fabled second Strawberry Switchblade album. More importantly perhaps it showcases the honest, direct and life-affirming songs of one of the greatest unsung songwriters of the modern pop era at a tumultuous time in her career.

Tibet opens the set and could be one of the best pop songs you've never heard. The innate sadness of the songs' content - the loss of a friendship, impending sorrow - is heightened to heart-melting level by McDowall's pop nous and melodic sensibility. Choruses and hooks are everywhere on Cake Knife, from the outsider take on stadium 80s pop in Wings Of Heaven to the spiraling, ecstatic So Vicious, a glorious anthem that highlights the human fragility in McDowall's vocal performance, an instrument that has never lost the naïve purity it first exemplified in Strawberry Switchblade's early 80s recordings. The centerpiece of the album, the title-track, is the greatest Switchblade pop chart hit that never was. Like the veiled melancholy of her former group's hits, Cut With The Cake Knife hints at a darkness beneath the gloss, a darkness that saw McDowall delve into more esoteric territory with her subsequent recordings and collaborations. Cut With The Cake Knife serves as the bridge between the pop music McDowall had been making with her friends Jill Bryson, Lawrence from Felt and Primal Scream to what became a more extreme, deep sound informed by neo-folk and post industrial music.

Rose McDowall's role in the canon has always been one of an outsider. Beginning in Glasgow's East End in the avant proto-noise group The Poems, achieving fame briefly in the 80s and then disappearing into counter-cultural folklore, the emphasis in the internet-age has been skewed towards her image and cultural significance. Unseen to many, her solo work, her groups Sorrow and Spell and her collaborations with a whole host of underground luminaries have still touched lives. As McDowall elucidates: 'They're real sad songs, about real life. I've had people come up to me to say I'd connected with them and helped them. I remember a gig in America when we made a whole room cry. It was bizarre. A couple at the front of the stage started crying and then these two boys beside and suddenly everyone was crying. And I thought, "that's power."

Night School's issue of Cut With The Cake Knife includes unpublished photographs, extensive sleeve notes from Rose McDowall and 2 bonus tracks culled from the bootleg 7' 'Don't Fear The Reaper.' First vinyl pressing is Clear w/ Black swirl; 500 only / has DL card and booklet, with a poster
CD has extensive booklet and is packaged in anO-Card.

South London’s Jerkcurb – aka Jacob Read – is back with news that his sophomore album ‘Night Fishing On A Calm Lake’ is to be released at the end of November following 2019’s ‘Air Con Eden’.

After that album’s successful release Read had planned to expand Jerkcurb into a full band setup when his father, a painter like himself and a creative inspiration, passed away. Instead of the envisioned plan of taking his project bigger Read returned to the family home and re-examined the material for the new album and instead the album became one of reflection, grief and redemption. It’s not much of a stretch to see clear musical inspirations for the record too – Prefab Sprout, Talk Talk and The Blue Nile, records where the moments of silence are stretched out.

Read produced and engineered the album himself, mostly at home with Lara Laeverenz and Gray Rimmer providing cocals. The album is mixed by Dilip Harris (King Krule, Mount Kimbie).

The enchanting cover artwork was painted at Read’s father’s studio in Camberwell, painted in oil with its dreamlike blur of blue and black . It hints at the early film noir and magical realist influences for the album.

The Natural Yogurt Band returns from the Derbyshire hills with another trippy record. We find again his signature sound
of raw neo-library and exotica grooves, with an electronic twist. Soulful string synths, modular chirps and crunchy electric
pianos will bring you in a colourful soundscape that only The Natural Yogurt Band can paint.

RAWAX welcomes Giovanni Vio to the artist family! We are very happy to present you this great talent on our main label's 35th edition with four brilliant deep and soulfull techno tracks .
Worth to check!

We are heading for a night to Itaewon from where French artist Booh has drawn his inspiration from this release. On the remix duties we have his friend Krijka who is currently resides in Seoul and who has done a stellar job while keeping the essence of the original. The name of the tracks on this 12” are named after the iconic clubs of Korean’s capital where the artist managed to spend good quality time and draw his inspiration from, a major city with its vibrant nightlife that is very close to the soul of the artist. Booh is on the roll recently with a string of releases on very well-known and respected labels of the underground with many more planned, so it's an honour to finally welcome him on Exarde. Enjoy this record and transport into the mind of this proficient artist that has opened a window into his world for us.

Western Australian label Hidden Liaison Recordings returns in 2025 for their second release. This EP kicks off with French producer Robotnik3000's deep, techy piano-laden jam. Local underground producers round out the rest of the EP, starting with sn33ze's blippy, dubby "Siofra River". On the B-side, things take a dark electro turn with Late Night Protocol's scifi-esque "Animus." Label-owner Ian Daniels closes the release with an ambient piece and the upbeat 2step "Soft Image." An amazing variety of electronic productions drawn from the Australian underground.

Sasha & Henry Saiz deliver evocative new single 'Love Is All You Need'

Henry Saiz and Sasha are two of electronic music’s most visionary figures, each renowned for blending emotional depth with cutting-edge production. Saiz is a DJ, producer, and live artist who crafts genre-defying soundscapes on his own Natura Sonoris as well as Sasha’s Last Night On Earth. His work resonates far beyond the dancefloor, much like that of Sasha, a pioneer with an enduring creative streak who continues to push boundaries, most recently through collaborations with forward-thinking producers like Artche, Jody Barr, and Joseph Ashworth. Together on this new single, the pair balance transportive grooves with meticulous synth work to perfection.

The wonderfully luminous 'Love Is All You Need' radiates breezy melodic charm while riding a light, uplifting rhythm that feels as airy and warm as the rush of a new romance. Shimmering, sun-kissed melodies evoke the glow of an outdoor Ibizan party with emotive female vocals drenched in reverb, adding a dreamy, blissful layer to round out this hazy and heartfelt electronic trip.

Ian Elms’s cult isolationist synth masterpiece Good Night returns via Dark Entries. Originally released in 1982, Good Night blends Berlin school minimalism and BBC Radiophonic weirdness with the aesthetics of then-nascent DIY punk electronics throughout its fifteen short tracks. According to Elms, these pieces were composed in two broad but interrelated modes: pieces with voice and synthesizer, which are obliquely narrative, and instrumental synthesizer pieces that aspire to capture fleeting emotions. Ian met with producer David Hoser at Octopus Studios and they began constructing pieces using a Polymoog Keyboard 280a, sampled drum tracks, and Elms’s synthesizer. On “The Street Enters the House”, live drums lurch along with skeletal motifs while Elms’s elliptical lyrics evoke domestic discontent. “A Light Moves Across Curtains” features metronomic pummeling and icy strings buttressing the scant cryptic lines from Elms. Instrumental gems like “Goodnight” and “Surrounded by Trees” are built around detuned riffs in round-like structure, both drifting and static like the motion of waves. With original pressings fetching three digits – if you can even find a copy – this reissue is essential listening for fans of John Bender, Transparent Illusion, and the early 80’s DIY cassette scene. Each copy of Good Night comes with a postcard featuring a photograph and notes by Elms. “This record is intended for anyone who by accident or design spends most of their time alone (whether in the body or in the mind).” – Ian Elms.

Originally a jewel from Sunnyview Records (born from the legendary TK Productions). Dolos’ Night So Right was a slick blend of electronic funk and soul with an unmistakable boogie-disco swagger. Hailed by fans as a “lush, echo-drenched boogie monster” with a “pre-house” edge, it was already dancefloor gold.

Now, Dr Packer breathes new life into the classic, delivering a silky, tension-charged rework steeped in his trademark disco-house finesse. A warm, rolling bassline locks the groove as percussion pulls back, letting Rhodes chords, filtered strings, and subtle guitar licks shine. The result? A masterclass in dancefloor tease and release, pure, modern-classic disco magic.

Visionary producer and one half of pioneering electronic duo The Chemical Brothers, Tom Rowlands returns to Phantasy with ‘We Are Nothing / All Night’, the first solo dancefloor material since his last appearance on Erol Alkan’s storied London label in 2013 with ‘Through Me / Nothing But Pleasure’.

Once again, Rowlands delivers a double A-side single in order to commit two progressive new productions to wax. Heavily road-tested across the world in Chemical Brothers DJ sets, the sprawling arrangement of ‘We Are Nothing’ trips through a decades-long obsession and subversion of house music and psychedelia alike. Imaginatively sampling Canadian outsider artist Bill Bissett, Rowlands uses the poet’s existential phrasing as the foundation for a rising slalom of acid catharsis, peppered with snatches of soul, analogue freakouts, and all-encompassing groove.

‘All Night’, meanwhile, finds a different, perhaps unexpected rhythm. Here, Rowlands’ unmatched studio instincts deviate in a different direction entirely, employing a searing tempo to embrace the analogue experimentation at the heart of his work, as well as an appreciation for electronic music’s willingness to barrel ever-forward; the result is a worthy head spinner from both label and artist alike.

Tom Rowlands will play a rare solo DJ set at Glastonbury's Stonebridge Bar on Friday 27th June, as part of Bugged Out's 30th Anniversary celebrations.

In 2025, Roger 23 makes his return to Night Defined Recordings. Following his 2022 album “Bounds of a Moral Principle and Established Standard Behavior”, the unmistakable Saarländer revisits his teenage memories of the Saarbrücken-Leicester connection through a collaboration with his UK kindred spirit, Tom Dicicco. In just two months, the duo has created a collection of ten tracks rich in sonic depth, embodying their dedication to and belief in the power of exploration.

In a world where it’s easy to point fingers or resist change, Tom Dicicco and Roger 23 choose a different path. They see creativity not just as self-expression but as a way to inspire future generations. Their mission is to challenge norms, trust the process, and create with purpose.

This album is more than just a musical project — it’s a statement that true innovation arises from freedom and risk-taking. The journey has taught them more than music production — it has reinforced the importance of conviction and trusting their vision. Their work serves as a reminder that leadership is about breaking new ground and inspiring others to do the same.

WE CANNOT COMPLAIN, IF WE DON’T DO IT BETTER

for UK: please contact Rubadub

Odessey One is probably one of the hottest, most appreciated and sought-after bands when it comes to caribbean funky Disco and Boogie music from Trinidad and Tobago.
These super talented musicians recorded a few incredibly good grooves in the Caribbean Sound Studio in the early 80s, which were long considered lost or very hard to find.
It was a bunch of friends around the composer, guitarist and singer Arnold Shuffler, like Nicholas Rostant, Carla Fauche and Colleen Grant, who came together in Port of Spain for a few jam sessions as a studioband.
Only a handful of vinyl copies were pressed from the tapes at KH studios pressing plant, which did not have much airplay at the time.
Sound Essence is more than happy about a renewed collaboration with mastermind Arnold Shuffler and to present this soulful island, disco, boogie synth funk to the music-lovers
community worldwide!

Today, Manchester’s Maruja announce their highly anticipated debut album ‘Pain to Power’, due for release by Music For Nations on 12th September and produced by Samuel W Jones, who the band worked with on their three EPs to date. The extraordinary eight track collection not only confirms the four piece as a creative force of nature but finds a deeply emotional and empathetic band concerned primarily with the power of community, both in the nuclear sense, as a tight knit creative unit, but also as a wider force for social and political change in the age of the individual.

Maruja believe passionately in the ability of art to empower, heal and unite and have created a body of work with ‘Pain to Power’ that they hope will offer both strength and an emotional release to anyone who is struggling with the impact of years of political turmoil and social isolation.

Spanish producer Larsson delivers a deep and hypnotic 4-tracker for Fuxbau Records, marking his vinyl debut on the label. Written in the rural village where Larsson grew up, the EP carries a sense of groundedness and clarity. Created in his parents' home, surrounded by nature and far from urban distraction, the tracks reflect a setting where ideas unfold organically. The result is a tightly cut selection of groovy, rolling techno - stripped back, hypnotic, and full of tension. That contrast between calm surroundings and high-impact club energy runs through all four tracks: stripped-back yet detailed, functional yet full of soul.

Max Essa is a firm part of the neo-Balearic mafia and shows off his trademark take on the summer-ready sound with this return to Is It Balearic? 'Camel Night-Rate (Clear To The Ocean)' kicks off with a great blend of chug, dubby low ends and shimmering synth work while 80s chords light it up with good vibes. A Be.Lanuit remix is more serene and stripped back for late night dreaming then 'Love's New Meridian' sinks into a melancholic and downbeat world of sunset charm with wispy pads. The Coyote Mellow remix reworks it as a gently breaking wave on a moon-lit beach. Classy tackle all round.

A multidisciplinary artist, and avant-garde icon in her own right, Little Annie leaves little room for an introduction that is worthy of her prolific career. She has remained relevant for over four decades through her innate spirit of experimentation and the multiplicity of her genre-bending collaborations with artists traversing the globe such as Adrian Sherwood, Swans, The Wolfgang Press, Kid Congo, Current 93—the list goes on!

For this release, Noir Age is proud to present a 7” single of new material from Little Annie in collaboration with South Florida-based producer and label owner Richard Vergez, recording here under the moniker of Night Foundation. Annie and Richard met back in 2016 after a gig at the ICA in Miami through their mutual friend: Drew McDowall of Coil.

Sharing a requited spirit for visual art and music, they became fast friends and began collaborating, conjuring what you hear on this release: Inertia.

Edition of 300 records, each housed in a silkscreened, custom black 7" envelope jacket with newsprint insert.

Reviewed in The Wire magazine:

"Night Foundation is one of the current electronic projects envisioned by Florida's Richard Vergez. In this instance, his work is smooth and bassoid enough to have a vague dancefloor-friendly feel without being overtly prancy. This notion is enhanced by the presence of a dub B side, so things are not as dark as with most of Verge's projects. But they're still not sunny. Of course, Little Annie's lyrics and casual vocals have more in common with urban menace than sunshine pop, so the pairing works quite well."

Vinyl Only!

The Swiss have long been renowned for their commitment to high-quality craftsmanship, and Dachshund is no exception. A fixture in the underground scene, he has built a solid reputation with standout releases on Poker Flat, 8bit, Audiojack's Gruuv, and Rebellion, among others. His meticulous approach to sound design speaks volumes about his artistry, and now, we are proud to welcome him to the Tenampa roster.
On remix duties, none other than Mihai Popoviciu, one of today's most respected and prolific producers who brings his signature touch to this release.
This exclusive vinyl-only release on Tenampa Recordings features four tracks, limited to just 300 copies, with artwork by Mexican artist Stitch. This record is a must-have for any collector.

Full-cover print illustration by the Mexican artist Manuel "El Stitch" Cetina!

Slowly yet firmly blooming into focus, An Unfinished Rose is the new album from Australian duo Troth.

This is their first since relocating to Hobart, Tasmania and their introduction to Night School Records. With a detailed web of past releases on labels A Colourful Storm, Mammas Mysteriska Jukebox, Knekelhuis and Bowman’s own Altered States Tapes imprint, An Unfinished Rose is the group’s most realised and composed work thus far. While still drawing on the improvisatory and DIY practices that informed Troth’s beginnings, it points to a new incarnation of the duo’s music; an intentional language emerging from the fog of obfuscation and mists of uncertainty.

Over these 9 meditations on change, acceptance, renewal and rebirth, An Unfinished Rose finds Amelia Besseny and Cooper Bowman peeling back some of the roughhewn architecture that defined their earlier releases to reveal a masterful - if auto-didactic - use of space and melody. Composition and improvisation compliment and feed each other throughout, with locked-loop earworms providing the springboard for lines of clarinet or synth melody, and the negative space between chord clusters giving ample room for Besseny’s most confident vocal performances to date. Shaving off a little of the defining dissonance and tape compression of old reveals Troth’s music in radiant daylight, humbly accepting of its place in the world while yearning for better, more sympathetic modes of living. Leaning more heavily on acoustic instrumentation and post-production processes than previously, the result is a transcendent body of work infused with an almost zen-like presence.

Troth’s music exists in the border between forming and becoming, its goal to project a kind of preternatural beauty, leaving interpretation open to the listener. Field recordings, happenstance and improvisation may provide seeds for the duo’s compositions, particularly on Side A, but there is a deft touch of songcraft on show. Loam Loom Leaf Litter opens An Unfinished Rose, directly referencing natural cycles of life, death and regeneration, before the blissed-out drum machine groove of Gold Plum continues a discussion concerning the totality of nature and one’s place in it. Besseny’s vocal, swelling like an ocean churn in duet with itself is adorned with synthesised harp and a revolving synth pattern, conjuring plumes of medieval smoke. Thistle’s rounded, bass-heavy drums, nodding to the vast echo of dub, is a relatively new terrain for Troth. It’s propulsive and thumping, pulsing with a meaning and symbolism consistent with Troth’s past work, referenced overtly in Bessey’s lyrics - “Say it too much and it loses its meaning…”. Similarly, the sprawling modern-classical suite, Tides Reflected In Her Eyes, is intentional in its lyrical themes while traversing new ground, revelling in layers of bowed cello and vocal intonations. Side B’s 4 tracks feel like Troth’s most thoroughly accessible and affecting music to date. Leaning into their own detoured version of Synth Pop, Cocoonist explores downtempoisms via a crunchy low frequency synth, and dream-like, fuzzy trip-hop modalities, not unlike Besseny and Bowman’s other group, Th Blisks. Following on, Myrtle Mystes is an open and searching DIY pop song, forged out of drum machine, bass guitar and cello. (An) Unfinished Rose’s title-track is a clear stand-out, built upon an evocative rhythm sample that appears to change emotional resonance with each undulating repetition. Its cascading waves of affect, interjected with a subtle breeze of synth, bowed instrumentation and soaring, densely-layered vocals.

An Unfinished Rose is enveloping, warm, forgiving. Difficult, yet retaining a unique beauty. Troth’s music aims to celebrate the duo;s shared experiences of being in the world, despite the complexity often surrounding us all. Theirs is a message of hope and perseverance, learning and patience.

The writer Max Sebald often pondered over the nature of human memory, specifically, how our thoughts and desires - and their results - overlap and mutate over time. In A Place in the Country, he writes of the significance of what see as “similarities, overlaps and coincidences”. Are they the “delusions” of the self and senses, or manifestations of “an order underlying the chaos of human relationships, ... which lies beyond our comprehension”?

Song of the Night Mists, the new album by post-classical composer Stefan Wesołowski, often feels it draws on Sebald’s premise.

On a simpler plane, the one where the market dictates the neatly ordered information we consume, Song of the Night Mists can be described thus: recorded in the main by Stefan Wesołowski in Gdańsk, both in his studio and in Saint Nicholas' Basilica, the album incorporates acoustic instruments - piano, violin, double bass - and classic synthesizers such as the Roland Jupiter-8, the Soviet Polivoks. A Roland Space Echo RE-150 tape delay was also pressed into service as an instrument. We also hear the basillica’s organ and field recordings from the Tatra Mountains. Other musicians were Maja Miro, who played the flute parts on ‘Glacial Troughs’ and brother Piotr Wesołowski, who played the organ on ‘Wilhelm Tombeau’. Sound engineer was Marcin Nenko, who was also on hand to record the basilica organ parts. The album was mixed in New York by Al Carlson (Oneohtrix Point Never, Jessica Pratt, Zola Jesus, Lady Gaga, and Liturgy) and Rafael Anton Irisarri handled the mastering.

Ostensibly, Song of the Night Mists is the last in a trilogy, following on from albums Liebestod (2013) and Rite of the End (2017). All three deal with existential matters such as love, death, decay and “an ultimate end”; apocalyptic and Promethean in spirit, and betraying very human conceits. The Sebaldian nature of the new record starts to make itself felt when Wesołowski talks of how he used sampling. One element is unexpected, that of sampling himself: “I go back to dozens of my own unused sketches and recordings, treating them as raw material to cut, slow down, reverse, and transform in every possible way.” Memory as sound, to be reemployed by the listener through their own imaginings.

Another set of samples made by Wesołowski plays another role. These are field recordings, originally created for an audio illustration of the formation of the Tatra Mountains, and used in a film by sound designer Michał Fojcik. Wesołowski: “You can hear cracking ice, streams, footsteps in the snow and the wind, and a real avalanche, recorded from the inside.” The “Tatra connection” on the album is also found in samples referencing composer Karol Szymanowski. The album’s title alludes to a poem about the mountains by Polish poet, Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer.

Wesołowski’s Tatra recordings are “about a world without humans - about the fact that the world existed, was beautiful, and had meaning long before people arrived, and for the vast majority of its history, it was a place without us.” Wesołowski, using one iteration of the natural world, plays out in sound Sebald’s idea of another order, underlying the chaos of human relationships lying beyond human comprehension.

These feelings play themselves out on the five album tracks. Sonorous and rich, they illustrate tectonic shifts we have no control over. Wesołowski hints that the overall sound is a “meditation on the metaphysics of the non-human set against the spirituality that human presence has brought into it.” In that light, the opening number, ‘Core’, with its slow build, and crackling and straining sound effects, create an effect of the earth groaning into life in a creation myth. Once the piano part raps out a simple melody and modulated tonguing trumpet samples add to the overall atmosphere, the listener can certainly find a cue in the “spiritual”, or “human” side of the story. Human versus nature: from the strains and harmonic muscle stretches of the second number, ‘Glacial Troughs’, through to the powerful and filmic ‘Stalagmite’ and heart-on-sleeve romance expressed in closer, ‘Wilhelm Tombeau’, we listeners are cast as Friedrich’s wanderer, looking out over a landscape that will appear only if we engage with it.

Formations of melody appear incrementally, almost appearing by chance - like hidden footings in the rock shelves to give us something to grasp onto. Rhythms are used sparsely: the prolonged percussive taps on ‘Glacial Troughs’ are an anomaly and maybe there to give pace to the album to come; essentially to keep the listener strapped in. Elsewhere, percussion is used as an aid to mood, the two thudding, timpani-style passages on ‘Peak’ there to offset the short, beautiful, kosmische passage that splits them.

Elements of the borderline religious spirit that drove German electronic music in the late 1960s and 1970s also find a place on Song of the Night Mists. The swells and recessions of the organ find their emotional climax on ‘Wilhelm Tombeau’, a track which summons up echoes of the “mountain magic” vistas created by Popol Vuh or Tangerine Dream, especially with the slightly atonal wobble of the Mellotron that counters it.

This is a dramatic album, but it does feel a strangely short, or curtailed listen on ending, evoking the feeling one gets when waking from a dream, and, for all its incipient grandeur, a track like ‘Stalagmite’, for instance, ends on a minor note. Wesołowski admits that Song of the Night Mists is born of the all too human process of temptation, doubt and recalibration - Sebaldian overlaps and coincidences forming something that must live another life, away from its creator. In Wesołowski’s words, the album is “a newborn foal must stand up and walk right after birth.” Now it is yours to ponder.

A1. Live in Holland (5:32)

A loose-limbed roller that feels like a half-remembered set from a sticky Rotterdam afterhours. Dubby chords smear across the beat like fog on the dancefloor, teasing tension without ever breaking stride. Full sleaze mode.

A2. Morning, Noon and Night (5:46)

Subtle and sensual with the swing only V.I.C.A.R.I can conjure — this one works in hypnotic repetition, layering hissy hats, muted stabs, and a gliding low-end that keeps you deep in the pocket. Time melts here.

B1. Partial Disk Recovery (5:48)

A gritty tech groove, sputtering like corrupted hardware—yet never missing a step. High-end percussion twitches and snaps while submerged bell tones bubble underneath. Peak-hour ammo for selectors who like it bent.

B2. Show Me That You Care (5:41)

A late-night house cut with a heavy emotional pull. Warm pads and delicate vocals ride a chugging rhythm that feels both intimate and urgent. A closing track with real staying power.

Visionary producer and one half of pioneering electronic duo The Chemical Brothers, Tom Rowlands returns to Phantasy with ‘We Are Nothing / All Night’, the first solo dancefloor material since his last appearance on Erol Alkan’s storied London label in 2013 with ‘Through Me / Nothing But Pleasure’.

Once again, Rowlands delivers a double A-side single in order to commit two progressive new productions to wax. Heavily road-tested across the world in Chemical Brothers DJ sets, the sprawling arrangement of ‘We Are Nothing’ trips through a decades-long obsession and subversion of house music and psychedelia alike. Imaginatively sampling Canadian outsider artist Bill Bissett, Rowlands uses the poet’s existential phrasing as the foundation for a rising slalom of acid catharsis, peppered with snatches of soul, analogue freakouts, and all-encompassing groove.

‘All Night’, meanwhile, finds a different, perhaps unexpected rhythm. Here, Rowlands’ unmatched studio instincts deviate in a different direction entirely, employing a searing tempo to embrace the analogue experimentation at the heart of his work, as well as an appreciation for electronic music’s willingness to barrel ever-forward; the result is a worthy head spinner from both label and artist alike.

Tom Rowlands will play a rare solo DJ set at Glastonbury's Stonebridge Bar on Friday 27th June, as part of Bugged Out's 30th Anniversary celebrations.

D.S.A. and Night School Records are once more teaming up to release a limited edition 7”: Certe Notti by Molly Nilsson. The
record contains the two new songs Un Po’ Più Vicino al Cielo and Il Peggior Bar di Caracas.
The songs were written and recorded in August 2024 in San Giorgio del Sannio, Benevento, during a month long artist
residency, made possible thanks to the kind invitation and hospitality of AUNA a.p.s.
A whole moon spent between local festivities, sagras and late nights in the best of worst bars, making new friends
forever and life-long memories (including an unforgettable Inti-Illimani concert), all infused with sweet drinks and ancient
lore of local witches.
The cover art depicts the view from the window on one of those nights, the rising moon, Liquore Strega yellow, and the
inlay hints at Nilsson's favourite crosswords magazine. With all these distractions it’s really a wonder any music was
made at all. But thanks in large part to endless espressi and ginseng, two new songs came to be. The first is Nilsson’s
first opus in the Italian language! The second, a hommage to her favourite joint and hang out, The Worst
Bar in Caracas.

Born and raised in Sicily but now based in Berlin, SLV is known for his innovative approach to techno and its various shades. He has released on revered labels like Soma and received support from key industry players who respect his ability to blend old-school vibes with modern production techniques. Away from the club, he also produces music for film soundtracks, adding a sense of cinematic edge to his techno cuts and is a master of both analog and digital technologies - a true audio engineer who crafts unique, compelling sounds. Having previously featured on the labels Federation of Rytm III compilation, he returns to SHDWs Mutual Rytm imprint with his Night Echoes EP to open up October.

Graustufen opens with punch drum programming and scintillating percussion that dances atop the groove as booming bass brings serious weight down low. The superb Grand Cayman is another potent techno weapon, this time with icy synth atmospheres and eerie moods pervading the tightly programmed drums and bass to deliver an unstoppable force. Voids brings urgent funk with its hunched-over, closely stacked kicks and suspensory pads, which never let up and keep you locked in the moment, while Elastik Pho echoes a classic Detroit sound with its soul-drenched beats and serene, uplifting, beautiful hi-tek style. Last but not least, That Night shows SLVs extraordinary range as it brings some soulful vocal loops and optimistic chords over thunderous drums, which are sure to power dance floors through to euphoria. The EP includes two digital bonus cuts: Basic Uno, which is a raw, percussive and heads-down banger, and Persistence Of Memory, which is stripped-back, glitchy and dubby techno for strobe-lit warehouses.

Coaxial System presents a powerful four-track techno EP loaded with immersive textures and driving atmospheres designed to ignite the dance floor. Also featuring a heavy-hitting remix by Squaric and a groovy reinterpretation by Stephen Disario.

Amazing Peak time to late night house gems.

Compiled by Philip King
“And then came the rise of synth pop : blokes with dodgy haircuts hunched over keyboard-operated
machines stuffed with wires and do-it-yourself tone oscillators making sounds like a brood of geese
passing gas in a wind tunnel. Whoopee! This is the way the ‘70s ended : not with a blood-curdling bang
bang but with a cheap, synthesized, emasculating whimper.”
NICK KENT, NME.

All The Young Droids: Junkshop Synth Pop 1978-1985 is a new compilation that charts the
underbelly of the epoch-defining sound of the synthesiser in 80s popular music. Compiled by Philip
King (previously seen compiling All The Young Droogs, Glitterbest and Boobs - The Junkshop
Glam Discotheque), the music here connects the dots between DIY synth enthusiasts grappling with
new, cheap synthesisers at the tail-end of punk and wannabe, jobbing songwriters enthral to the new
music pioneered by Gary Numan, Depeche Mode and Daniel Miller’s Mute Records. Featuring rare
tracks of auto-didactic progressive pop music, proto-techno punk, shoot-for-the-stars-land-in-the-gutter
chart flops and heralded, underground synth classics, School Daze paints a picture of beautiful failure.
Complete with extensive sleeve notes written by King and never before seen imagery, all 24 tracks
were remastered by RPM in-house engineer Simon Murphy, many from vinyl copies due to lost master
tapes. The story told on All The Young Droids is one of the dawning opportunity presented by both the
emergence to the market of cheaper analog synthesisers and the distribution networks plus indie labels
that exploded with the advent of punk music in 1976. While the music that sprouted out all over the
globe in the wake of these factors was decried as fake, plastic, a refutation of punk’s guitar-led
revolution, it’s telling that much of the music on All The Young Droids.. was created in bedrooms,
ramshackle studios and home-made set ups with often borrowed equipment. In the era of record labels
jumping to capitalise on the success of The Sex Pistols, The Clash (both on major labels, of course)
these artists struggled to stand out from a new gold-rush with next to no budget or PR team. With radio
and labels desperate for the new Yazoo, what resulted was a testament to necessity being the mother
of invention.

At the time, the synthesiser was the music of the future, a shiny new machine that could paint like an
orchestra with a single finger and a 4-track. In the hands of Manchester avant-pranksters Gerry & The
Holograms it’s a pulsing, sardonic weapon.. the only instrument on the Messthetics classic lampooning
of New Wave fashion. In Hamburg, a 16 year old Andreas Dorau used it to write and record (with his
female classmates on vocals) a global smash in Fred Vom Jupiter (later licensed to Mute Records).
The hard-to-find English version (Fred From Jupiter, natch) is included here. Many artists with alreadystoried careers caught the bug and recorded synthesiser-fuelled peons to space, computers, the future
and, of course, love-interests. Harry Kakoulli, late of Squeeze, recorded a solo album in 1979 that
included the incredible power-synth-pop smash-that-never-smashed I’m On A Rocket. Similarly, Ian
North of Neo and American Power Pop stalwarts Milk ’n’ Cookies bought a Korg MS20 and used a
tape machine to record We’re Not Lonely, an absolute lost-classic of minimal synth pop. We’re Not
Lonely also features on the Junkshop Synth Pop sampler 7” twinned with John Howard unreleased
track You Will See, released April 12th 2025.

There are plenty of compilation debuts in evidence. Sole Sister were a mysterious trio who were
featured on the Scaling Triangles compilation of female-fronted, queer-adjacent post-punk /
underground music that also featured The Petticoats. Selwin Image were from San Francisco and
featured members of the recently defunct power pop/punk group The Pushups. Their stupidly catchy
The Unknown fizzes with New Wave energy - think XTC to Sparks but remains unreleased until now.
Dream Unit’s A Drop In The Ocean is an early synth wave cut, positively teaming with Joy Division
instrumentation, previously only released on a long-forgotten and super rare, self-released EP.
Incandescent Luminaire’s Famous Names belies an archetypal struggle of a small-town trying to
make it in a cruel industry but is a thrilling New Romantic-Synth Wave cross over with a OMD
gloominess that’s a joy to hear. Feminist Minimal Wave track I Am A Time Bomb by performance artist
Peta Lilly and Michael Chance is a revelation destined for new found cult status. It was released on 7”
and lost until now.

The flipside to the subterranean, never-made-it synth pop mentioned above are the ambitious, even
fruity attempts at success that have a perennial elegance to their confidence. New Jersey-ite Billy
London (real name Ed Barth) tried to cash in on the synth boom with Woman, released by a major
label, a lurching new wave track built on the Louie Louie rhythm and a wonderfully camp Lou Reedstyle sleazy vocal before exploding in the synthesised chorus. The song bombed but with a chorus like
this, you have to wonder why? Ex-Glitter Band member John Springate’s My Life is truly epic, with
doomed chord progressions and massive sounding drums turning into at least 3 different songs in the
course of the track. Before you wonder what’s going on the song resolves with a glorious return to the
main refrain.

The dry-ice-dressed dance floor is well catered for too. Design’s Premonition and Vision’s Lucifer’s
Friend are stone-cold minimal synth bangers, well loved but given a new lease of life here. The
Warlord’s The Ultimate Warlord was released in 1978, a homespun proto Hi NRG banger that was
later re-recorded by The Immortals in Canada who had a club hit with it. One-man- band Disco
Volante’s No Motion was re-issued by Synth wave label Medical in 2012 but makes its first vinyl
compilation appearance here. Close your eyes and you can imagine what Lawrence of Felt would have
sounded like with some cheap Korgs a little earlier in his career. Gibraltar-based trio The Microbes
imagined a computer programming people to dance - how prescient - and ended up with a propulsive,
robo-funk track with splendid rubbery bass playing over a tectonic drum machine. Previously picked up
by Belgian label Stroom TV, Dee Jay Bert & Eagle’s heavily Euro-accented I Am Your Master
demands the listener to “come to paradise!” In a frankly terrifying manner.
All The Young Droids is the first compilation to peel away from the narrative that dour, Minimal Synth
and Cold Wave were the only musical children of the first rush of synth pop. Philip King and School
Daze Records describe a much more complicated world: along with the austere, Brutalist children of
Daniel Miller (who produced Alan Burnham’s Bowie-Low-influenced Science Fiction here) was a
plethora of desperate cash-ins, accidental mainstream hits, ambitious pop dramas and major label
punts that went nowhere. Crucially, the compilation blurs the line between junk and treasure. What if the
two things are interchangeable. What if it’s all science fiction?