tested 'Then After' EP by New York duo Wild Dark.
'...Stemming from a partnership with two decades of experience behind them, Wild Dark takes on contemporary song-writing and gives it a unique, thoughtful, modern-take using a wide spectrum of electronic music to tell a story. The duo, comprised of brothers Corey & Ryan Negrin, stray from cold digital samples in favour of a warmer approach to writing music. This allows them to merge house, techno and natural vocal work into a cohesive concept that uses soulful yet charming songwriting to nurture a sophisticated palate of contemporary work...'
Then After EP includes two tracks featuring Alex Who 'When we first met Alex there was chemistry off the bat. With inspiration of being young and free, the lyrics and vibe to "Why Not"came together with ease. As the production progressed, the darker tribal elements came to life.
We wanted this track to resonate with the free spirited. This track tends to be a favorite of night.
"Born By The River", A Happy Mistake. The vocals, the elements, the soul, all stemmed from animpromptu recording and this beauty was born. With a list of organic household recordings,accompanied by a warm low end, we aimed to create a track that defied all genres.
"Talky Talkie" is the most club oriented track of the EP, with a persistent groove and synth elements that work perfectly on the dancefloor.
"I'll Wait" brings our bohemian flavour to shine, a track that's comfortable being played anywherefrom Burning Man, lost in the desert to the deep warehouses of Brooklyn's underground.
The digital release will include a special remix by Superlounge, a German duo known for their smooth house vibes. This is a must have release, available first on the label's shop online;
t r u e C o l o r s
A Brooklyn / London based record label that channels artist's most honest version of their
creations and shares it with the world through vinyl and digital platforms.
Calendar Crowd was the duo of Alan Heaton and Terence tiernan who met in their hometown of Widnes, Cheshire as schoolboys and played together in various bands in the '70s. In the '80s they formed a 6-piece band called Room For Humans 0and recorded one single'Telephone Telephone / Girlfriend'. When the band split and Alan and Terence continued as Calendar Crowd in a more experimental direction. Their influences were wide reaching: Kraftwerk, Neu, Cabaret Voltaire, Eno, PIL, and Joy Division.In 1982 they released their debut single 'Perfect Hideaway/Perfect Hideaway Dub' on 7'. Guitarist David Knowles joined them as they toured the UK and recorded and released their follow up EP 'Listen in to the Heart' in 1985. A reviewer at the time called Calendar Crowd 'A Moody Merseyside trio with strong atmospheric tunes and haunting lyrics.' For this reissue we've compiled both singles on one EP featuring all four songs. Perfect Hideway is a evocative and dreamy, the music escorts you on a tour of icy landscapes, with Terrance's deep, rich vocals guiding the way accented by bright brass stabs. Meanwhile the Dub has stripped back the vocals, added delayed samples and heavy pounding drums. On the B-side 'Listen in to the Heart' and 'Questions Answers' are darker electronic rhythm tracks with layers of ethereal keyboards and guitar melodies. All songs have been remastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. The record is housed in an exact replica of the original Perfect Hideaway jacket featuring black and white October 1982 calendar with the tile hand written in red pen. Each copy includes a double-sided 8x11' insert with lyrics, notes and photos.
(en) Good things take time - ideally, including a great deal of oomph. At least when it concerns new tracks from within Monkey Maffia's inner circle. It has been four whole years since we received the momentary last piece of the 'Monkey Maffia Music Club', 12 inches full of funky nasty beasts dedicated to the best dancefloors of this world. In the meantime, a remix was released here and a track was presented there, but now we may once again enjoy a full load of Monkey Maffia. And on top of that the now 75th release of Freude am Tanzen!
Monkey Maffia is personally providing the soundtrack for this ceremonial occasion. His tracks continually supply tremendous amounts of oomph to parties as well as loads of gravity and funk. After all, as an experienced DJ he simply knows what an awesome night looks like - a straight bass drum fractured while simultaneously amplified with infinitely warm synths. On one track, bass and percussion are throwing all our worries overboard, on the next one pads and vocals are shimmering to the bet. Whatever may happen, it can be said with utmost certainty that it will never become boring on either secular flat earth.
A1 - Bad Or Good
A total brain and leg screw, that spins and spins and spins. Any DJ willing to test how much funk a dancefloor can bear up to the third decimal place, will be perfectly served with this track as proof.
A2 - Fake Heroes
Short reminder, but detailed clattering minimal with soul does still exist. At first, 'Fake Heroes' frostily shines through aerial heights; however, then submerges all the more into unforeseen depths.
B1 - MiniMi
Somehow jazzy, but was meant as house. Similarly hypnotic, equally free. Common thread is the bass drum, along which anything is possible. File under: secret weapon for truly late hours and DJs with guts.
B2 - Schörless
This is a track that sends Larry Heard on an Orient trip and thereby extends over a much longer period than its brief four-and-a-half-minute length. For all those who are still serious about 'deep' in house.
(de) Gut Ding will Weile haben - und reichlich Wumms am besten gleich noch mit dazu. Zumindest dann, wenn es sich mal wieder um neue Tracks aus dem engsten Kreis der Monkey Maffia handelt. Ganze vier Jahre ist es inzwischen her, dass uns von dort aus der vorerst letzte Teil des - Monkey Maffia Music Club' erreichte, eine 12-Inch voll funky-garstiger Biester für die besten Dancefloors dieser Welt. Zwischendurch erschien ein Remix hier und ein Track dort, doch nun gibt's endlich wieder Monkey Maffia satt. Und das nunmehr 75. Release auf Freude Am Tanzen gleich noch mit dazu!
Der Soundtrack zu diesem feierlichen Anlass kommt von Monkey Maffia höchstselbst. Stichwort Wumms: den bringen seine Tracks stets genauso mit zur Party wie massig Tiefe und Funk. Denn als routinierter DJ weiß der Mann einfach, was eine lange Nacht alles braucht - hier wird die gerade Bassdrum gebrochen, dort mit endlos warmen Synths unterfüttert. In einem Track klappern uns Bass und Percussion die Sorgen aus dem Leib, im nächsten flirren die Pads und Vocals sehnsüchtig um die Wette. Was auch immer passiert, langweilig wird's auf dieser wie jener weltlichen Erdscheibe mit Sicherheit nicht.
A1 - Bad Or Good
Totale Hirn- und Beinschraube, die dreht und dreht und dreht. Wer als DJ testen will, wieviel Funk bis auf die dritte Kommastelle genau so ein Dancefloor eigentlich aushält, ist mit diesem Track als Messgerät bestens bedient.
A2 - Fake Heroes
Kleiner Reminder, aber kleinteilig-klappernder Minimal mit Seele, das gibt's noch immer. - Fake Heroes' schimmert zunächst kalt durch die luftigen Höhen, taucht dann aber umso weiter vor in ungeahnte Tiefen.
B1 - MiniMi
Irgendwie Jazz, aber als House gedacht. Ähnlich hypnothisch, genauso frei. Als roter Faden dient die Bassdrum, entlang dieser geht aber eigentlich alles. File under: Secret Weapon für die ganz späten Stunden und DJs mit Mumm.
B2 - Schörless
Ein Track der Larry Heard auf Orient-Reise schickt und dabei viel weiter trägt als seine knapp viereinhalb Minuten Spielzeit. Für alle, die das - Deep' im House noch ernst meinen.
Dark Entries returns to the New Jersey basement studio of Smersh to unearth an 18-minute jam session from 1989, backed with two contemporary remixes. Smersh was the duo of Mike Mangino and Chris Shepard from Piscataway, NJ who began making music together in 1978. They were uninterested in traditional notions of songwriting or live performance. Between 1981 and 1993 they released over 40 cassette albums on their own Atlas King imprint. As these tapes traded their way across continents, Smersh developed a devoted following in places far beyond New Jersey, leading to releases on dozens of other labels from around the globe.
Sideways' was taken from a cassette titled '100', which refers to a 100-minute jam session the band recorded to tape on June 12, 1989 in Piscataway. The track was composed and performed by Mike, utilizing a Roland TB-303, TR-606, SH-09 and an ARP 2600. A frenetic hybrid of techno and acid with driving EBM style beats, Sideways' weaves intricate industrial noises with synth melodies that drift in and out of phase. On the flip are two fresh remixes by different aliases of prolific Ann Arbor producer Tadd Mullinix. As JTC, he expands the sound palette, adding organ stabs and lush pads, drawing on Detroit deep house and UK garage.The Charles Manier remix features chanted vocals on top of an array of pulsating synths, stark percussion, and post-punky guitar effects. Each song has been carefully remastered for vinyl by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. The record is sleeved in a replica of the '100' artwork, which designer Eloise Leigh modified using motifs and textures sourced from the original cassette. Also included is an oversized postcard with notes.
Restive Plaggona is the music project of the Corfu-based artist Dimitris Doukas -also producing under Matriarchy Roots, Leftina Osha and Plaggona-. After releasing a series of cassettes in different labels along 2016 and 2017 -including his own Several Minor Promises- 'Leaving The Body' arrives as an electronic composition of beats and synthesizer bodies disguised as a sense of provocation and mystery. Each of the seven pieces offers more than a smattering of interesting textures separated by spans of great decline, but a master class of permutations in-between accompanying sounds, stretching rhythms and viscera-and- violence noises. Driven by a deeply expressive narrative, Restive Plaggona makes a strong statement about
his post-industrial vision adding technoid inclinations in a delightful dystopian world.
When we started Ilian Tape 10 years ago in 2007, we were both basically kids at the ages of 23 (Dario) and 18 (Marco). There was no plan behind it, no concept, no promotion campaign or any budget, but just an early vision of where it could go. We wanted to build something that lasts. After a few years of playing at parties and producing music, it was the next logical step to start a label. You can clearly see us growing up through the label in terms of artwork, compiling the records and handling things. We made some mistakes along the way and there are surely things we could have done better, but looking back after 10 years now it all makes sense as it was a natural and human development with all its ups and downs.It was always a very personal project, never about making money, but about creating a platform for music we believe in and building relationships with artists in a transparent and fair way. We really appreciate that we were able to work with so many great artists, who shared the same vision and trusted in us, over all the years. A while ago we moved away from the ordinary release info write ups, because in general writing about music is tricky and who isn't tired of the typical, full of praise for every detail of a record, release textsBut this might be starting to get boring for you too, so just buy this lovely triple vinyl package including a poster and download code, light one up and turn up the volume!One last thing though - we want to deeply thank our parents for teaching us to live our dreams and find out who we really are, our friends for the vibes and honesty, all the artists releasing on the label, all the supporters & fans for buying vinyl and files, all the DJ's playing out the stuff, all the diggers selling the stuff overpriced on Discogs, all the dancers working out on the dancefloors & all the clubs doing label nights over all the years.
Based on the Irvine Welsh novel of the same name, the film version of 'Trainspotting' directed by Danny Boyle became a cult sensation. Focused on the heroin subculture of Edinburgh in the 1980s, the film is occupied with surrealism, black comedy and features a great soundtrack. This album includes tracks from Iggy Pop, New Order, Blur, Underworld and many more.
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the iconic drama, the original soundtrack is being reissued on CD and vinyl. Having been out of print for a long time, the 180g vinyl features replica original artwork that includes special silver spot finishes throughout - front, back, booklet and picture labels, as well as bright pantones. There will be a limited run on orange vinyl before moving to black once sold out.
Announcing the first release by Shift Imprint, "Hynek's Scale"!
What magic results if we merge the spirits of Detroit, Chicago, Amsterdam and Lisbon, all in the same record
Hynek's Scale is a smoking' Audiopath collaboration with ex Parliament/Funkadelic member Jerrald James AKA Jerry The Cat, who, besides being an amazing percussionist and great vocalist, is also a serious old school DJ and producer with collabs with names like Derrick May, Theo Parrish and Moodymann.
Together they carefully crafted the main theme "Hynek's Scale" with raging synths, thunderous kick drums, heavy baselines and last but not least, Jerry's sweet voice. This one is a house track you will remember for quite a while! Besides the original mix, there are two remixes, one from a guy that needs no introduction, Mr. K-Alexi Shelby from Chicago (Transmat/Trax/Djax-Up-Beats). K turned the whole main idea upside down and produced a real funky big beat slammer! We love it and we know that you will love it too, trust us! The second is a remix coming from Mechanique (Kaos Records/Affin), a talented Portuguese producer based in Amsterdam. He takes his mix to a very far, deep and beautiful place, a totally different atmosphere from the title track. Finishing the record, Audiopath delivers a banger that he's been anxious to release, "Good Foot", a heavy, heavy, heavy electrofunk track; watch out for this one, it can bite! In short, we sincerely advise you to immerse yourself in the beats and atmospheres explored by these guys, we're sure that theres a track here for each and everyone of you. The record is an immediate encounter with nothing but exquisite music!
Big support by Laurent Garnier!
Immersed in the early days of the 90s midwest rave scene, Bill Converse began DJing at a young age in Lansing, Michigan. Luminaries such as Claude Young, Traxx, and Twonz were key early influences. Since moving to Texas in 1998, he has experimented with analog techniques in varied studio bunkers. Early techno, noise, ambient, tape, and paranormal processing are all part of his uncanny sound palette. Warehouse Invocation' is Converse's debut 12 release, collecting material from a cassette release on Obsolete Future plus a new unreleased song. Three of the tracks, Warehouse Invocation', Senys Magick' and Consulted Acid', were recorded in Austin TX between 2012-2013 at home and direct to tape with no overdubs or multi-tracking. Riverbank' was also recorded at home in early 2014 in one take with a mic placed outside of the window to record the the sounds of the river late at night. Bill is informed by his surroundings, influenced by scenes of desolation in nature, the sea, the desert, and places of industry, like power stations, old factories, and warehouses. The songs on this EP length reveal a sublime influence from Detroit techno, early Chicago house, and Acid. The album was recorded and mixed by Bill at his home studio in Austin and mastered by Dave Alex. All songs were EQed for vinyl by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. A custom-made jacket designed by Eloise Leigh features a mystical collage by Josua Dorje Ngodup with acid yellow hues on a deep blue-purple background. Each copy includes a postcard with notes and a Buddhist mandala
Series-A was the duo of Sam Anderson aka DJ Maestro and Dave Webb aka Kid Fresh. Sam and Dave both grew up listening to the sounds of the Electrifying Mojo on WJLB in Detroit. They met in 1983 at a DJ gig that they were both hired to play. In 1986, they collaborated on the Nu-Sound II Crew project. After developing a friendship with Juan Atkins, they became hip to the emerging new club sounds that were to become electro and techno.Their subsequent project, Series-A, was named after different car model numbers, but also hints at the evolution of humankind into a new species.
In 1987, Series-A recorded the single Evolution 5 Technology' at Spectrum Sounds Studio in St. Clair Shores, Michigan. Their set up was a vocoder, E-mu Emulator III, Roland 909 drum machine, and an Otari 24-Track recorder. They landed a record deal with Satellite Records in Burbank, California, which had been founded by Pete Moore of The Miracles. After pressing 50 promotional copies, the label ran into financial problems, and the record never reached a full release. Taking cues Kraftwerk, Grand Master DST, Grandmaster Flash & Jam Master Jay, Series-A created dark electro beats in an era when sampling appeared to be the future of music. Lyrically the song addresses our species' entry into the technological age. For this EP reissue, the 7' Mix and Dub Mix are included on the A-side. On the flip is a new remix by prolific Ann Arbor producer JTC, an alias of Tadd Mullinix (aka Dabrye, SK-1, & Charles Manier). JTC speeds up and expands the song to seven minutes. Drawing on influences from Ron Hardy to Jeff Mills, he drives around suburban techno landscapes while simultaneously launching the listener into deep space.
All songs have been remastered for vinyl by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. The jacket is specially designed by Eloise Leigh and features a cyborg fossil motif with RGB color band and gradients. Each copy includes a post card with with notes.
After the sensation caused by his last release, Elchinsoul comes back strong with another battle cry into the darkness on Cellaa Music.
In his usual nonchalant style, you can expect deep driving arrangements. Through the precisely applied sub-basses and the unobtrusive synth pads, a first class sound-performance is guaranteed.
Made to fill dark basements, clubs and also festivals with sound.
The EP contains 4 tracks and includes a masterpiece of a remix by Sven Jaeger, and a special vinyl only track, which will not be availeable digitally. If you have listened to the full EP, there only will be 4 words to describe it: this is DOPE SHIT!
German Mark Jackus and Marcus Sur collaborated on this beautiful piece of music with singer/songwriter Golden Parazyth.
Noir Music is delighted to have signed the incredible 'In The Night' song which sits somewhere in between electronica and deephouse. This one works both as a club track and a treat for the ears when you just want some quality music in your life.
Timo Maas and Ed Ed deliver the more clubby vocal versions of the track and Tiger Stripes makes it a club-dub effort. All 3 remixes are a bit more edgy and functional for club plays.
Hit play and get sucked into the sweet melancholy of this track.
Disconcerting, questing brilliance from Rabih Beaini: two sick, nervy techno killers (including an Ethio homage), stalking the corrosive perimeters of noise; and deep, long excerpts from his engrossing soundtrack to Dreyer's Vampyr, with contributions from the Upperground crew, and Sun Ra in its marrow, alternately driving and motorik, off-the-wall, lost in space.
Another week and another debut for German label Cellaa Music as they welcome Giuseppe Cennamo to the family. Since his first productions dropped in 2009, the Italien born has gone on to grace labels including Desolat, Minisketch, Leftroom, Moniqué Speciale and of course his own imprint Carillon. Giuseppes's "Butterflies In Your Stomach" ep sees the label continue its stunning run of quality releases.
The Title Track "Butterflies In Your Stomachl" is an earthy house track with a beautifully soulful and mellow vibe.
"The Third Ear" features an irresistible tech house groove and the bassline drops on cue pulling the listener deep into it.
With "Ghostly Lovers" Giuseppe returns with a much deeper Tune and delve into darker territory.
Giuseppe Cennamo in der Familie willkommen heißen. Seit seiner ersten Produktion im Jahr 2009 hat der in Italien geborende auf Label wie Desolat, Minisketch, Leftroom, Moniqué Speciale und natürlich auch auf seinem eigenen Label Carillon releaset. Mit Giuseppe´s "Butterflies In Your Stomach" EP zeigt das Label weiterhin seine atemberaubende Sicht bei der Qualität ihrer Releases.
Der Titel Track "Butterflies In Your Stomach" ist ein sehr trockener House-Track mit einer wunderschön, gefühlvollen und sanften Atmosphäre.
"The Third Ear" bietet einen unwidersthelichen Tech-House Groove und die auf der 1 einsetzende Bassline zieht den Zuhörer tief in den Track hinein.
Mit "Ghostly Lovers" kehrt Giuseppe mit einem viel deeperen Tune zurück und taucht ein in dunkleres Territorium.
Detroit techno visionary Keith Tucker returns through his acclaimed alter ego Optic Nerve with AUGMENTATIONS EP, a forward-thinking exploration of minimalist machine funk, futuristic sound design, and deep electronic movement.
Crafted with precision and unmistakable Detroit character, AUGMENTATIONS merges hypnotic analog sequences, mechanical rhythm structures, atmospheric synth textures, and driving electronic beats into a powerful sonic statement rooted in the city’s enduring techno legacy. Sparse yet immersive, the EP balances raw underground energy with cinematic futurism — designed equally for dark warehouse floors and deep headphone listening.
Pressed as a Limited Collector’s Edition Clear Vinyl 12-inch, PBX-38 captures the sleek, transparent aesthetic of the music itself: pure signal, machine emotion, and uncompromising Detroit innovation.
A1 — Augmented 1 (Optic Nerve Original Mix)
A deep, stripped down Detroit techno workout driven by pulsing drum programming, evolving synth modulation, and hypnotic minimalist sequencing. Functional futurism engineered for late-night motion.
B1 — Augmented 2 (Infinite Worlds Mix)
Built around a rolling funky bass line and eerie flowing string textures, this expansive composition moves through layers of atmospheric electronics and mechanical groove architecture. The track creates an immersive sense of drifting through endless digital landscapes while maintaining a sharp rhythmic intensity designed for the underground dance floor.
B2 — Augmented 3 (Visual Shapes Mix)
Abstract melodic fragments, and precision electronic rhythms collide to form a futuristic minimalist soundscape filled with movement, tension, and cinematic pulsed chords.
American DJ, producer, and Ovum label boss Josh Wink remixes Chris Liebing's 'Eye C' via CLR on 25th September 2026, one of the standout tracks from Liebing's first fully solo-produced LP, 'Evolver', which landed in March. The album featured collaborations with the likes of Luke Slater, Charlotte de Witte, and Daniel Miller, with Josh Wink the latest to rework material from the project. The Philadelphian is an electronic music veteran who has shaped countless releases on his own Ovum, while also remixing the likes of Depeche Mode, Moby, and Radiohead.
Josh Wink showcases his production skills once again with a blistering take on Chris Liebing's 'Eye C', rewriting it with fizzing synth modulations and prickly acid lines. The track grows in intensity as rumbling drums march on, and the synths become ever wilder before pulling back into a deep, atmospheric groove, rebuilding beneath the menacing vocals and icy, incendiary hi-hats.
The original version of Chris Liebing's 'Eye C' is a deep, rolling techno masterclass with pulsing synths and deft percussion peeling away from the groove. It's linear and heady, perfect for the small hours, with unsettling vocal fragments refracted around the mix and subtle hypnotism floating overhead as the drums grow ever harder.
"Collect Records welcomes Byron the Aquarius to the family! Hailing from Alabama, Byron the Aquarius has established himself as one of the most respected names in contemporary underground house music. Classically trained as a pianist, his productions effortlessly blend deep house, jazz, soul and broken beat, earning support from artists such as Theo Parrish, Moodymann, Gilles Peterson and Floating Points, while releasing on labels including Sound Signature, Wild Oats, Shall Not Fade and Atjazz Record Company. Last Dance in Church features five original productions that perfectly capture Byron's unmistakable sound, warm, soulful and deeply musical. From stripped-back dancefloor grooves to rich harmonic compositions, the EP is a timeless journey through deep house, house and jazz-infused rhythms."
Trumpeter, rapper and sonic wanderer Pan Amsterdam has carved out one of the most distinctive voices operating at the intersection of jazz and hip-hop today.
Pan Amsterdam is a musical enigma wrapped in an enduring riddle. His creator is a jazz musician from Houston who’s found fame working with Detroit punk rock God, Iggy Pop, and British indie royalty, Metronomy, and now makes shapeshifting, adventurous hip hop out of the music’s spiritual home, New York.
He’s an irreverent character born out of frustration and named after a misunderstanding, yet one who’s on the verge of releasing his fifth album of truth-slaying, genre-crossing rhymes and beats. The result is a catalogue that feels both deeply rooted in Black American musical tradition and completely untethered by convention.
Pan Amsterdam returns with ‘Panarama’, his fourth full length album and a bold reassertion of his hip hop identity, released via Def Pressé. Created by Houston-born, New York-based musician and composer Leron Thomas, the record finds Pan Amsterdam embracing the harder edges of his sound while continuing to blur the lines between jazz improvisation, abstract rap, punk attitude, and experimental production
Written as a response to contemporary life and the endless cycle of information, conflict and distraction that defines modern culture, ‘Panarama’ unfolds as a stream of consciousness journey through hyper-normalised realities. Across sixteen tracks, Thomas navigates social commentary, personal reflection, absurdist humour, and cultural critique, delivering his observations with the same spontaneity and freedom that have become central to the Pan Amsterdam project
Lead single ‘Szechuan Beef’, produced by acclaimed collaborator 1FS, serves as one of the album’s defining statements. Built around Thomas’ signature free-flowing delivery, the track explores the overwhelming nature of contemporary life, where domestic conflict, social division, entertainment scandals and political discourse become flattened into a constant stream of content.
In Thomas’ own words: “My stream of consciousness style comes quite naturally to me due to the conditioning of scroll down culture where everything, no matter how minor or extreme, is hyper normalised.”
Elsewhere, the track ‘Vanilla Ice’ was written in response to widely publicised ICE killings and the speed at which tragedy is absorbed and forgotten within online culture. Thomas channels the anxiety and emotional disorientation of endlessly consuming information, allowing his thoughts to unfold in real time as social commentary collides with everyday digital noise. The result is both deeply personal and sharply observational, reflecting the fragmented reality of modern life. Other album highlights include the cinematic, Interpol-esque opener - ‘Old Friend’ complete with shimmering guitar lines and an far-reaching introspective, no-filter vocal as Thomas teams up with Nick Zinner (Yeah Yeah Yeahs) and Brad Truax (Interpol) across multiple tracks, often the production traverses left-field indie territory, but always maintaining Pan Amsterdam’s unique musical identity throughout. For the hip hop purists and beats lovers there are plenty of riches to discover from the clever nostalgic sample flips of ‘Cutlery’, the sleepy lofi of ‘Shuriken’ and the wonky LA beat scene / early Flying Lotus era beats of ‘Drunken Noodles’ - all boasting quick witted lyricism. ‘Deep Fried Shiney Things’ explores early electro and industrial sonics while album finisher is an upbeat new wave / indie band cut which sees Thomas take a break from rapping, but of course never letting up on the sharp observations nonetheless
While his previous record explored more alternative territory, ‘Panarama’ marks a deliberate return to rap, as Pan Amsterdam explains:
“I just wanted to do a rap album again.I enjoyed making my last album, but I felt like rapping again. I like to have the freedom to move in between musical worlds that suit the current state I’m in. Frequency accommodating frequency.”
This philosophy runs throughout the album. Tracks move effortlessly between jazz-inflected arrangements, experimental beats, punk energy and underground hip hop aesthetics, allowing ideas to evolve organically rather than conforming to traditional structures. Thomas describes himself as an improviser first and foremost: “I think like an improvisor. That’s how my albums pretty much move. It’s improvisation.”
Featuring additional contributions from Spice Programmers, AnOtter and Mr. Shn, ‘Panarama’ presents a wide-ranging cast of collaborators while remaining firmly rooted in Thomas’ singular creative vision. The record embraces contradiction, humour and unpredictability, capturing fleeting thoughts and observations with the same freedom and spontaneity that define jazz improvisation itself.
A musical enigma wrapped in an enduring riddle, Pan Amsterdam has built a reputation as one of contemporary music’s true outsiders. The project emerged from frustration, experimentation and artistic freedom, with Thomas drawing equally from his background as a jazz musician and his collaborations with artists including Iggy Pop and Metronomy. Operating from New York while carrying the spirit of Houston’s musical heritage, Pan Amsterdam has developed a distinctive voice that sits comfortably between avant-garde jazz, underground hip hop and experimental music.
Reuniting with Def Pressé for ‘Panarama’, Thomas explores what he describes as the more hardcore side of his artistic identity:
“They let me do anything and everything I wanna do so long as it’s on audio, and I need that freedom. What may verbally be perceived as vulgar to one group of people may be very thoughtful and a poignant description of the times that we’re presently in, so I’m glad that I’m part of a label home that understands that.”
Verdad Y Error (2026) resides in the tension between the thrashing of external noise and beating centred internal calm. Gibrana Cervantes is known for her work across experimental music and contemporary performance, a practice with focussed intensity and surging physicality, often pushing the limits of endurance, presence, and embodiment. A central axis of her performance practice is her ongoing collaboration with acclaimed choreographer Florentina Holzinger, including composing the music for SEA WORLD (2026), Florentina Holzinger’s critically acclaimed installation for the Austrian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Alongside this, she is a core member of the experimental ensemble Amor Muere (Mabe Fratti, Concepción Huerta, and Camille Mandoki). Cervantes maintains an active recording practice that directly informs her live output including her collaboration Memoria (2025), with Colombian Drone Mafia (Nyksan) for Ambie-Tón (Tratratrax),
Verdad y Error is a record of her artistic approach which expands her body and the violin’s horizon of possibility to near breaking point. Cervantes uses a register closely associated with Metal, yet buried deep in the alchemy of these pieces are motifs which hark back to her classical background. Across these pieces the violin is used as an instrument with a fragmented and shifting voice — blurred, repeated, and reshaped through distortion. “Many of these pieces come from images, memories, and sensations that have stayed with me for years. I'm interested in the blurring of what actually happened and what time transforms.” The recordings are built with layers of violin tones which oscillate between recognisable, processed, stretched and shifted, and lay embedded in a frequency stratum of volatile static and noise. “The violin on this album doesn't appear as a clean instrument. I process it, repeat it, distort it, and multiply it until it begins to feel more like memory than melody. Something blurry, shifting, difficult to grasp.” The origins of the album were born at a time when Cervantes was seeking inner calm amidst a relentless external noise, questioning the validity or possibility of memory and its radically changing perception in relation to experience. Subsequent reflection on this contemplative moment allowed her to develop a relational music which moves through memory, erosion, repetition, and emotional ambiguity. Creating a space that feels both intimate and unstable, mercurial with the patina of lived imperfection.
Akin to the unreliable narrator and linguistic instability, each piece functions as an emotional landscape suspended between clarity and confusion. An album which balances melody, brutality, fragility and noise
throughout its sprawling recordings and artwork, which operates as an analogue to the music. The visual world of the album developed in collaboration with Mauro Ventura was compiled across various media with a mix of handwritten texts, burned typography, metallic textures, and fragile physical materials. “I wanted the record to feel tactile and imperfect — something emotionally direct but physically worn.” says Cervantes. More than offering explanations, verdad y error exists as a conversation between memory and disappearance, noise and stillness, truth and error.
In the spring of 1971, somewhere between Brussels, Paris and a collective pop fever dream, Le Monde Fabuleux Des Yamasuki landed on vinyl. It sounded like nothing else then and it still does not today. More than half a century later, Sdban Records proudly presents a reissue of this singular cult album, available from April 3, 2026 on vinyl.
The album was produced by Jean Kluger and written both by Jean and Daniel Vangarde (aka Bangalter, later the father of Thomas Bangalter of Daft Punk), who were alreadywell ahead of their time, long before electronic music rewrote the rules of pop culture.
Released under the name Yamasuki, also referred to as The Yamasuki Singers, or The Yamasuki's, the project was never intended as a conventional band. It was a studio-born fantasy, a concept album disguised as a pop record. What began as a standalone single quickly expanded into a full-blown pan-cultural pop opera that ignored genres and common sense with joyful abandon.
Musically, the album sits at a delirious crossroads. Psychedelic pop collides with funk rhythms, samba and bubblegum melodies, full of chants and choruses in a phonetic pseudo-Japanese, written with the help of a dictionary. Kluger and Vangarde famously recruited a children's choir to perform the vocals, and for added spectacle, they brought in a Japanese judo grandmaster, whose ritualistic shouts and battle cries erupt throughout the record.
Several singles were released. One of them, Yamasuki, with accompanying dance move, appeared in the United Kingdom and France on John Peel's Dandelion label, a fitting home for a record that thrived on the margins of pop culture. Its B-side, Aieaoa, proved even more potent. In 1975, the song was reborn as A.I.E. (A Mwana) by Black Blood, an African group recording in Belgium, this time sung in Swahili. That melody would travel even further. Aie a Mwana became the debut single of English pop group Bananarama, and in 2010 it resurfaced once more as Helele, an official song of the FIFA World Cup, recorded by South African singer Velile Mchunu with Danish percussion duo Safri Duo. That version became the most widely known incarnation of the song. With Jean Kluger directly involved, it was less a cover than a continuation of the original idea.
The album's afterlife did not stop there. Over the years, Yamasuki has been quietly sampled, covered, and featured across media far beyond the realm of novelty pop. Kono Samourai was sampled in The Healer by Erykah Badu (2007), produced by Madlib, while Yama Yama has found its way into recent pop culture as well: appearing in the television series Fargo, on Angus Stone's project Dope Lemon, and on the 2008 Late Night Tales compilation curated by Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders. Proof, if any were needed, that this strange little record carries a deeper musical DNA than its playful exterior might suggest.
This new reissue of Le Monde Fabuleux Des Yamasuki proves the renewed interest and respect for this cult album, faithful to the original spirit while finally giving it back the physical presence it deserves. In an era obsessed with genres and algorithmic neatness, Yamasuki still laughs, dances and karate-kicks its way past definitions. It reminds us that pop music can be playful without being disposable, strange without being cynical and joyfulwithout explanation. The world of Yamasuki was always fabulous, we are just lucky it found its way back to us!
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Following his debut 12" on Futura Resistenza, Aukio Sound returns with a new release on Turbo Guidance Entertainment — a deep dub techno exploration rooted in heavy reggae influence, featuring the late Baba Ras. A solemn tribute to a singular voice. Like Rousseau's Tiger in a Tropical Storm, this record paints a dense, dreamlike fresco — where rhythm and texture grow wild beneath the surface. The record also includes a remix by Non Posso, a mysterious duo. Mastered by Carsten Dämbkes and pressed on 180g vinyl for the full listening experience.
Straight fire from the vaults! Three deep raw joints including the legendary floor anthems "Live at Palladium" and "Back to my Groove” by the legend Phil Weeks, back on wax with that gritty groove. OG vibes only — limited press, real heads know. Grab Rare Cuts before it’s gone!
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RE-issue of the first EP of SOUFFLE CARAMEL. 4 incredibly smooth house, deep house and jazzy house gems Full of trumpet, sax and piano. Initial release sold out in a week. Now finally available !
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Sublime frequencies from the golden era of ambient electronica.
Plumbing hidden depths beneath a deceptively tranquil surface, MLO's mid-90s masterpiece Io is an overlooked gem from a golden era for ambient electronic music. Originally released in 1994, Jon Tye and Pete Smith's collaborative album responded to the growing chill-out movement by leaning into classical and avant-garde influences from Satie, Debussy and Cage through to Soft Machine, Incredible String Band and Eno. Recorded across various studios stacked with classic and rare synths, Io was patiently composed into slowly unfolding suites punctuated with ripples of arrhythmic interference to arrive at a purist vision of true ambient.
The next instalment in Forever Records' ongoing reissue series shines a light back on this landmark piece of UK electronica with the first official reissue since its original edition on Rising High. As well as the original double LP pressing and a new CD digipak version, there will also be a uniquely numbered, limited edition housed in a gatefold sleeve that comes with a bonus 10" featuring two previously unreleased versions of the album's opening cut, 'Wimborne'.
Press response to Io:
"Not so much ambient, more environmental music, Io lets you bring as much (or as little) of your surroundings in as suits your mood. Every listen can be different. Interactive ambient at last.”
IO is pure ambience. Relying on motif as opposed to melody, MLO have produced a truly evocative album.
Peter McIntyre, Mixmag, UK 1994.
"MLO's influences range from the likes of Eric Satie and the intellectual salon music of his era to the more predictable reference point of dubby, modern techno, though they feel, perhaps rather contentiously, that "ambient music can exist in isolation from the rest of the dance music arena". Can it? Take a trip to Io, and find out."
Generator Magazine, UK 1994.
"If you like your ambient deep and moody with long chords that creep along at approximately the speed of drying paint then check out MLO’s Io."
Mixology, UK 1994.
"MLO set the controls for the heart of headspace for their first full album release. Io is top grade ambient brain… Ace album…"
Select, UK 1994.
2026 Repress
Originally released in South Africa in 1983, In The Music......The Village Never Ends is one of those holy-grail African records that barely needs any introduction. Featuring the enormous 'Nomalizo', it's a record that aficionados around the world have been waiting many years for. Now, Be With Records proudly presents the hugely anticipated vinyl reissue of this bonafied classic.
This release is officially licensed and has been lovingly mastered for vinyl by Simon Francis (Claremont 56 mastering engineer) It has been pressed on audiophile 180gram vinyl for the first time and features the original, rarely seen artwork.
South African singer Letta Mbulu possesses one of the most beautiful voices the world has ever known. Her immaculate voice emits a sweetness that radiates from deep within, brimming with a joy of life and inspiring a spirit of hope and happiness. On this album, her voice soars over a strident musical force that veers between disco, soul and pop music of the most incredible kind. The gleaming guitars recall disco's finest hours while the thump of the beats anticipate 80s British soul.
News of this limited reissue has already been causing a significant stir amongst those in the know so do not sleep on this - you have been warned!
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Born in São Paulo, Caetano Malta embodies the vibrant creative energy of one of Latin America's most dynamic cities. A singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, he has spent more than twenty years crafting a distinctive musical universe shaped by Brazil's rich and diverse traditions. Tropicalia, MPB, Afro-Brazilian rhythms, psychedelic folk, and contemporary pop blend seamlessly in his work with effortless elegance.
Over the years, he has become a highly sought-after collaborator. Since 2004, he has performed with numerous leading Brazilian artists, including Lucas Santtana, Bixiga 70, Karina Buhr, and many others. After two decades of international touring, he eventually settled in Paris, where he became the guitarist for Flavia Coelho, Luiza, Guts, among others. As a songwriter, he has also co-written with artists such as Lucas Santtana, Wado, MOMO, Rubinho Jacobina, and Arto Lindsay.
With Eterna Juventude, his long-awaited debut solo album, due for release in autumn 2026, Caetano Malta reaches a new artistic milestone. The record reveals a radiant songwriting style where harmonic sophistication, organic rhythms, and instantly memorable melodies come together naturally. Filled with joyful energy and deep tenderness, Eterna Juventude celebrates imagination, movement, and childhood's unique ability to reinvent the world. It is a remarkably accomplished debut, showcasing an artist whose singular voice and musical identity are already fully formed.
On Oath's latest, the imprint keeps the jazz-fuelled atmospheres going with 'Seven Dogs', an EP that serves up an astonishing excursion through deeply hypnotic melodies and idiosyncratic grooves, courtesy of an iconic link-up between Rteph88 aka Robin Taylor-Firth and Steve Cobby.
Taylor-Firth and Cobby are musicians whose careers are so richly storied, broad-ranging, and impactful that it's difficult to summarise their output and impact in so few words. Both Taylor-Firth and Cobby firmly established themselves in the 90s, being involved in some of the era's most prominent and celebrated groups and for releasing some truly era-defining records. As such, their discographies reach far and wide, from house and techno cuts through to downtempo, drum'n'bass and leftfield, there is little that is left uncovered, and this spirit remains with them both as they continue to explore the outer parameters of their sounds.
Taylor-Firth, a songwriter, arranger, and producer, is perhaps best known for his long association with Warp Records and its sublabel Nucleus, and for his work as a member of Nightmares on Wax, where his signature keyboard playing style became a staple of the group's legendary sound. Alongside this, he has hundreds of songwriting and arranging credits on a dizzying array of records, and was a member of house music group Anon and Pio Bo alongside Richard Barratt - to name but a few selected highlights of his extraordinary career. Cobby's career is distinguished by his multitude of releases under a variety of aliases, along with his helming of a number of imprints, including Pork Recordings and his most recent label Déclassé. Experimenting with a wide variety of genres and sounds, perhaps his best-known work was with the duo Fila Brazillia alongside Dave McSherry, who released a plethora of immersive and innovative records in the 90s and beyond.
'Seven Dogs' represents a shared passion, vision, and musicality, two languages borne of similar spaces but reaching through time, space, and existence in creating a richly veiled musical experience that draws from lifetimes spent within the nucleus of music's soul. The EP speaks of the present as such as the past and indeed future, hinting with motifs that feel right at home within sun-kissed skies and within the walls of the chill out rooms. 'Early Doors', the EP's opener, displays the core fundamentals of the unfolding experience, namely the intrinsic relationship between keys and drums and how they express tone and mood. The piano gently caresses, ethereally floating with space to grow, as the drums lightly swing into life, providing an engrossing and rhythmically diverse groove that nods as much as it dives. The title track lands next and leads with a more driving feel. Sonically, the track leads with an oozing bass sequence that worms through the mid range before retreating under an array of compelling piano chords. The drums once again provide a strong backbone, allowing the melodic elements up top to fully express themselves - in a myriad of ways, murmuring and clamouring all at once.
'Visiting Hobo' brings the groove down a few notches. Slightly sombre in its delivery, the piano and bass interchange above a sparse yet hard-hitting groove, with as much emphasis placed on the emptiness as on the melodically full sections. The piano has a certain tonality here, with the notes containing a large amount of textural reverb that helps the track feel alive, almost growing out of the speakers. Wrapping things up is 'Titled', which begins with the keys and an array of whimsical features. The drums allow themselves time to grow into being, but when they do, they simmer within an enriching melange. It's a fitting end to a record that abounds with sonic consideration, environmental and emotive feeling, where two technicians bring their best and serve up four tracks of such sublimeness and thoughtfulness. One to drift deep within, on those hot summer days….
The fifth album from Saint Abdullah & Eomac began as a poem and became a record that refuses to stay in one place. The title arrived in a cab in Paris. Mohammad Mehrabani read it aloud from a list of options. Ian McDonnell said: that's interesting, what does that mean? The answer, it turned out, was the album. Their fifth album When The Sandbox Has No Edge is rooted in hip hop, but its cast tells you how far it travels. Abbas Zahedi, Richie Culver, and Armand Hammer contribute vocals and poetry. Lester St. Louis brings cello. Che Chen of 75 Dollar Bill brings guitar. The producer and sound designer Seraphim contributed textures and sound designs throughout. Samples run deep, from records pulled from charity shops to market stalls on road trips across the UK. Raw fragments were shaped into fully formed compositions, structuring the chaos without flattening it. The sandbox, rendered without an edge.
The Civil Wars is the second and final album by americana/folk duo The Civil Wars (Joy Williams and John Paul White). Their songs can only be described as intimate and deeply personal. Although John and Joy's collaboration only lasted from 2009 to 2013, the duo was highly acclaimed, won 4 Grammy Awards, worked with Taylor Swift and toured with Adele.
Their swansong studio album features the Grammy Award Winning Song “From This Valley” plus the singles “The One That Got Away” & “Dust To Dust”. The album also includes a brilliant cover of the Smashing Pumpkins classic “Disarm”.
David Norland is an Emmy-nominated English composer, known for his scores for drama and documentary, alongside his experimental choral and electronic music. Bringing stories to life through sound, he received critical acclaim for his debut solo album ‘Glam Tear Stain’ (2019) and is set to release follow-up album ‘La Source’ in June 2026 via Denovali Records.
Relocated back to his London home after many years in Los Angeles, and free from years of drug and alcohol problems, recent commissions for two choral works allowed Norland to return to the innocent origin of his musical world, and his experience as a parent prompted a lot of outward reflection. What kind of world are we leaving to our children?
Inspired by his score to the forthcoming silent black and white film ‘Carousel’ (2026), Norland found other music emerging that refused to be ignored. The film’s director opened the door to an entirely free scoring process – no temp music, no expectation, no guidelines, just pure intuitive expression. ‘La Source’ draws on this experience, alongside his childhood as a touring chorister, the honkytonk upright piano in the north-east London bedroom of his early 20s, his early recording experiments with a TASCAM 4-track cassette recorder, and his intense preoccupation with bells, flutes, stone architecture, and mysticism.
From the haunting, choral beauty of ‘E-Car Soul’ to the breezy album title track, Norland blends minimalist classical structures with electronics. A unified tapestry of blended voices, harmonies and textures, ‘La Source’ is a deeply emotional and melancholic journey for Norland. “In the end, I’m looking to find meaning through the music, like when I was a kid singing in choirs. But I get the most sense of meaning through transcendent experiences, rather than anything intellectual or dogmatic. I have to feel it, not think it. I’m trying to make work that’s luminous, wondrous, shimmering and strange, so I can keep having those experiences,” says Norland.
On his inspiration for the album, Norland adds, “I love making patterns in things and finding patterns. That’s why minimalism was so enticing to me, the patterns are so explicit. I love word play and anagrams. The big sadness coming through as I was making the record is this clarity over the future of my kids. Everything else is a complete distraction. This incredible nurturing planet and its ecosystem are being rapidly destroyed, and the forces destroying it are relentless and punitive. And they seem to be fine with consigning our children to live in an ever-more-hostile wasteland. You can’t pretend that’s not coming, if you do I think you’re lying to yourself. And perhaps eventually it will be the fact that people love their kids that will stir wider fear and action. It’s hard to think of anything more connected to the idea of spirit.” The result is the reflective, ecstatic, mystical and sad world of ‘La Source.’
Norland’s screen work includes the award-winning documentary Anvil! The Story Of Anvil (2008), directed by Sacha Gervasi, and since 2010, he has composed much of the music for US broadcasting giant ABC’s primetime news documentaries. His work for ABC is broadcast in the US and around the world on a daily basis.
In 2012, he was the music supervisor for Hitchcock (2012) featuring Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren & Scarlett Johansson and in 2017, he teamed up once again with Gervasi for the score to November Criminals starring Chloe Moretz and Ansel Elgort. The following year, he composed the score for the Emmy-nominated HBO film My Dinner With Herve, starring Peter Dinklage and Jamie Dornan.
Norland will be performing the score of Carousel later this year, and the score itself will be a forthcoming release on Denovali. 2026 will also see the release of documentary All Permits Secured, a valentine to the history of EDM, featuring Norland’s score.
This album was born from a long-held, quiet ambition. I always wanted to navigate the entire journey of a record – from the first written note to the final mix. Winterglare is the result of finally stepping into that journey. Recorded in my home, the process was inextricably linked to the life happening just outside the door. Being surrounded by the daily routine and family created a unique tension; time felt precious, limited, and often fleeting. At first, finding mental stillness felt impossible. Yet as the winter deepened, a shift occurred. I found a place of unexpected calmness, where the music began to float, and the domestic noises around me became an accompaniment rather than an interruption. What began as an idea for a piano album expanded to include the Wurlitzer electric piano and the Gigster vibraphone. Some pieces evolved into experiments with percussion, accordion, and finally, the Roland tape echo and field recordings. Throughout this growth, the vision remained: to preserve a sense of space and time, allowing the true ambience of the moment to breathe. My hope is that these compositions find a place in your own quiet moments. I hope they offer your mind and soul the same sense of peace they eventually granted me during those cold months.— Volodja Brodsky
Silsila Dubs is a brand new label emanating from the backrooms and dancehalls of West London. Deeply inspired and rooted in the long standing traditions and dialogues of sound system culture, the label's output will echo the myriad musical foundations laid at various local historic venues including Southall Community Center and the Tudor Rose respectively.
Energized by the sounds of Jah Shaka, Aba-Shanti-I (Falasha Recordings), The Disciples, Manasseh, Conscious Sounds and more, the Silsila Dubs sonic aesthetic is that of classic 1990s sounds and recording techniques, lovingly channelled and dubbed via the cult Soundcraft Ghost Mixing Desk at Silsila HQ.
This debut release from the label has been written, produced and mixed by Govind Singh of the burgeoning Mya Hi-Fi crew who are closely related to Silsila and it's output. Across 2 mixes 'Perseverance' offers us a meditative and uplifting space in which to enrich our ears and our minds to carry on, no matter what life throws at us. Positive sounds for all to absorb.
You've never played a game like Blippo+ before, and you've never heard a video game soundtrack quite like Greatest Hits from Planet Blip.
Composed by Rob Kieswetter and Jona Bechtolt from the LA-based trio YACHT, the soundtrack collects 71 tracks from the cult classic video game Blippo+, reworked and sequenced into a continuous listen for this special release —a TV static-speckled gatefold double LP, out Oct. 16 via Hologram Opera, marking the soundtrack’s physical debut.
Taking the form of a cable TV simulator, Blippo+ captures the magical feeling of seizing a mysterious signal from outer space and discovering the television programming of an alien culture. Soundtracking the game’s pastiche of programs is Rob and Jona’s genre-spanning score—synth-heavy, eccentrically electronic, with a skewed sensibility that pays homage to cable access, library music, video art, and the late-night margins of the 80s and 90s underground.
TV obsessives will find plenty to love in Greatest Hits from Planet Blip: with surreal theme songs, jangly jingles, zippystings, catchy kitsch, period-accurate menu music and even pop hits from the alien airwaves, this propulsively playful soundtrack will have channel-flippers tingling with nostalgia.
“Planet Blip is an alien planet where art and music are the only currency and ‘consciousness particles’ form the basis of all media. To capture the spirit of this world, we drew inspiration
from all the music we felt best embodied this ethos and ran it through our own utopian blender,” say Bechtolt and Kieswetter.
Blippo+ is an award-winning, experimental, live-action video game created by YACHT and Telefantasy Studios, along with developers Noble Robot and Dustin Mierau, and published by Panic Games. It was released for Steam, Playdate and Nintendo Switch in 2025 to widespread
critical acclaim and has earned a devoted fandom. A Mac version followed earlier this year, and was nominated for an Apple Design Award.
"Simultaneously nostalgic and futuristic, otherworldly yet
welcoming, Blippo+ is an absolute artistic triumph.
" —Deven McClure, Screen Rant
"Blippo+’s presentation might ape old traditions, but the collective impact of its content is richer, deeper, and more entertaining than any mere remembrance.
" —Garrett Martin, Paste/Endless Mode
"In the increasingly reactionary and prescriptive landscape of video games, it is remarkable to encounter something so distinctive, so hopeful, so celebratory, so devoted to expanding the possibility space of art beyond a single medium." —Sam Bodrojan
For Louis Johnstone, making music has never been about waiting for the right equipment, the right environment or the right moment. Across more than a decade of work as both Wanda Group and A Large Sheet Of Muscle, the Huddersfield-based musician has built one of British experimental music's most singular bodies of work by embracing whatever happens to be within reach, allowing instinct, improvisation and circumstance to shape the outcome as much as conscious composition.
"'Chinese Benefits' was made over a year ago on an iPhone that had a broken microphone and was on its way out," he explains. "I have made many records after this with clearer sounds. Sharper ideas. That is never the point, though. You work with what you hold in your hands."
Recorded entirely on a failing iPhone 6 that stopped working shortly afterwards, 'Chinese Benefits' isn't a record about damaged technology. It is a record shaped by it. Rather than resisting the limitations of the device, Johnstone allows them to become part of the music itself, where distortion, interference and deteriorating fidelity are inseparable from the recording process.
Across twenty brief but disquieting pieces, corroded spoken word, environmental recordings, abrasive noise and fractured electronics continually emerge and dissolve. Voices drift in and out of range, reverberation stretches everyday sounds beyond recognition, and bursts of white noise interrupt moments of uneasy calm. There are echoes of radio transmissions, field recordings and musique concrète throughout, yet 'Chinese Benefits' never settles comfortably into any one tradition. Instead, it inhabits a space where accident and intention become almost impossible to separate.
That philosophy has long defined Johnstone's work. Through a vast catalogue of self-released recordings on his Umbro G imprint, alongside releases for labels including The Trilogy Tapes, he has consistently favoured immediacy over refinement, embracing imperfection not as an aesthetic but as a practical reality. His recordings are less concerned with perfection than with capturing the conditions in which they were made.
Looking back on 'Chinese Benefits', however, Johnstone's own assessment is characteristically understated.
"Listening back fully, it's quite a nice record actually. Fair enough, I make them and never really listen again TBH. Even better, it was the last Large Sheet Of Muscle record made on that phone with grit and damaged guts."
Like much of his work, 'Chinese Benefits' offers few fixed meanings. Its titles remain cryptic, its voices partially obscured and its structures deliberately unstable. What emerges instead is a deeply personal document of process over perfection, where the limitations of the tools become inseparable from the music they produce, and where the act of making something matters far more than the conditions in which it was made.
Amazing house anthems! The debut release, FD001 quickly gained international attention for its lowslung, dirty house groove, catching the attention of Claude VonStroke and the Dirtybird camp, with the track selected for Claude’s Live @ Movement mix. Since launching the label, Freak Division has continued to build momentum with a growing catalogue of original releases while also maintaining a strong presence on respected house labels worldwide. Drawing inspiration from their US house influencers, the duo’s recent productions have evolved to incorporate the warmth, swing and character of classic 90s house. The new direction has also seen the emergence of their latest moniker, House Monsters, showcasing a deeper connection to timeless house music while pushing their sound into new territory.
Charlotte de Witte now unleashes her slamming three-track EP ‘The Resistance’, featuring Theo Nasa and XSALT, out on KNTXT. It follows the astonishing summer tour of her new audiovisual show ‘The Resistance’, including a spectacular ‘XXL’ version at Belgium’s Rock Werchter in July, for a 40,000 audience watching from inside and outside the tent.
World #1 techno artist Charlotte de Witte’s new show continues a standout year of experimental ventures and celebrations, global pop-up shows, monster street parties, incredible new music (EPs and Deluxe LP)… and most recently ‘The Resistance’ AV show world premier at UNVRS Ibiza and the EU tour. The new ‘The Resistance’ EP is hard, fast, and uncompromising. It features Theo Nasa, whose raw, deep techno EP ‘Lifeline’ was released on her KNTXT label; vocal artist / longtime collaborator XSALT, (previously on ‘No Division’, ‘Overdrive’, ‘Roar’, ‘How You Move’); and Charlotte’s own vocals on a personal track ten years in the making.
‘The Resistance’ EP title track feat. Theo Nasa is urgent, demanding, unapologetic. Juddering main theme, rattling hyperspeed beat, spacey hoover swoops form a matrix for the deep, amused authoritative voice of Nasa – ‘we are unity, we are techno’. The brief ‘The Resistance (Intro Version)’ opens with futuristic FX and Nasa’s voice to the fore introducing the techno credo.
‘Never have I ever teased a track this much as I teased ‘The Resistance’. From the moment the track was being made in the studio, I knew this was going to be a special one. Theo Nasa captures the spirit of the underground and guides you through the essence of club culture like no one did before. An entire A/V show grew out of this feeling, this philosophy. It’s one of the biggest tracks I’ve ever made.’ Charlotte de Witte
‘See Through The Lies’ feat. XSALT: futuristic FX, fast stabby synth theme, and XSALT intoning ‘see through the lies. It’s time to take control’. A message of defiance. ‘XSALT delivers again on ‘See Through The Lies’, offering his own take on the EP's theme. Open your eyes. Break the illusion, see through the lies. Release the pressure. It’s time to take control!’ de Witte says.
‘Another Place’ has relentless pace, twanging pizzicato synth, and de Witte’s whispered phrases becoming full voice. ‘’Another Place’ has been in the making for over a decade. It saw the light of day in Brussels, where the lyrics took shape together with my friend One Track Brain. The track was forgotten and resurfaced years later, leading to an entirely new track created around that magical vocal from all those years ago. This is an EP very close to my heart.’
At the heart of ‘The Resistance’ EP and AV show is a message central to de Witte’s work: Protect Club Culture and the communities that sustain it. That’s why de Witte is donating all proceeds from The Resistance EP to The Nighttime Foundation, a global nonprofit dedicated to safeguarding and shaping the future of nightlife, empowering grassroots communities and promoting nightlife as a vital form of culture worldwide.
For over 25 years, David Madson (aka Odd Nosdam) has been stationed away from the light of the mainstream, diligently working the nightshift. Every so often, we awake to find another of his bleary and beautiful missives slung into the waking world – albums whose assemblages of sampled grooves, atmospheres and voices are unified by a hallucinatory sense of melody, like disparate visions strung together through ribbons of sleep-talk. From his earliest days as a member of the seminal group cLOUDDEAD, through his remixes for artists such as Boards of Canada and Black Moth Super Rainbow, Nosdam has been reporting back from his rounds upon the perimeters of culture and consciousness, forging a musical language all of his own.
On Patrol is the second Odd Nosdam LP to be released on The Notwist’s imprint Alien Transistor – following on from the 2019 album Mirrors – and continues a collaborative history that begun with a 2008 remix of The Notwist song, “Sleep”. It’s a love letter to the vinyl format, produced with the aim of optimizing for a single LP. This objective permeated every aspect of the album’s production, from the duration of each side through to the vinyl mastering (Jessica Thompson) and lacquer-cutting (Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin). As we've come to expect, the album is built almost entirely from found sounds, many of which were taken from obscure and second-hand vinyl gathered during Nosdam’s ceaseless crate-digging escapades. Other sources include field recordings made in 2022 at the Catalonia summer home of artist Salvador Dalí, which are baked into the swirling sci-fi glide of “Here to Know (Adéu Mix)”, and a sumptuous clunking bass line courtesy of Organi’s Mike Walti, which runs like an infinite highway through the fuzzy, sunbaked sprawl of “Deepsimple”.
Odd Nosdam’s work has always swept the entire atmospheric spectrum, from rhythmic vigour to levitational beauty. On Patrol is perhaps his finest assimilation of these extremes. “Sgt. Pepsi” is the perfect case in point: a formidable slow groove capsizes into vinyl crackle after a mere minute, before the song resurrects itself through sweeping strings and vocal harmonies, sliding against each other like the overlain romantic denouements to a dozen Hollywood films from the 1940s. Elsewhere, “Get You In (Belong Mix)” drapes shoegaze guitar over a trundling funk backbeat, straddling the physical world and the outer realms, while hushed voices point toward the song's implied themes of cultural cliques, critical consensus and the plight of the eternal outsider: “Sure, I can get you in... these people are my friends, I’m one of them - I belong.”
This is music that both endures and disappears. Odd Nosdam has always wielded a strange relationship with time, scrambling association with any specific era, weaving together numerous tempos simultaneously. There is no master clock. Each track could happily hold up as an infinite loop, yet Nosdam clearly favours the potency of the gone-too-soon, applying the fadeout just as hypnosis starts to crest. Indeed, the songs are both the product of meticulous long-term construction and spontaneity. While the foundations of On Patrol have come together over several years, the recording process involved channeling vibes through a vintage Roland Space Echo and bouncing song fragments back and forth from hard disk to cassette 8-track, gifting a phased permanence to creative decisions made on the fly – a hat-tip to the production processes of Nosdam's longtime hero, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry. Like a recurring dream, On Patrol appeals to both the plains of momentary ephemera and the long-established backchannels of the unconscious, equal parts revelation and deja vu.
The sun sat high above the desert outside Joshua Tree on October 17, 2024, baking the rocks and shrubbery outside the Farrington Observatory as a small group of invited guests ventured up a steep path towards the telescope. Kyle Simon, the artist and printmaker who founded the Observatory, was standing outside the print studio sat below the towering cylindrical building, greeting friends alongside his wife Sarah and lifelong friend Brian Weitz, the musician widely known as Geologist of Animal Collective. Simon and Weitz had spent the previous day testing and retesting a system that would transform the light of the oncoming full moon captured by the gigantic telescope into a signal that would modulate the control voltage of Weitz’s modular synthesizer. As the sun dipped below the horizon line, the audience gathered on a small wooden patio surrounded by speakers while Weitz readied himself behind the array of patches and knobs. Simon addressed the group, presenting the history of The Sirens, the sonic exploration of the night sky’s mystical and scientific significance about to unfold.
The music conjured under the Hunter’s Moon that night is now documented on this first official release of The Sirens, which was conceived by Simon and Weitz as a recurring performance piece and sound installation. Over a decade ago, Simon began immersing himself in literature on humanity’s sonic relationship to the celestial realm, including Homer’s Odyssey, Plato’s “Spindle of Necessity, ” Kepler’s Harmonices Mundi, and the field of astroseismology. He fitted homemade telescopes with photodiodes and optical sensors to make the images audible, finding latent patterns in the noisy sonic signals he began receiving from the stars. With Weitz, the process expanded as the signal was routed through an analog amplifier and set to modulate the pitch, filter, and other elements of his synthesizer. Together they developed a system of improvisation, with Simon adjusting the telescope to change the intensity of the light based on its relationship with the moon’s position (imagine a theremin player moving their hands in subtle, meaningful motion), and Weitz responding to that input in real time: bending it, amplifying it, or letting it stand on its own. The duo debuted the piece at the Integretron in Joshua Tree in 2018, providing a crucial proof of concept for the performance at Farrington featured here.
The first thing the listener hears on The Sirens is the opening of Farrington Observatory, the cranking of motor and metal. As the lens of the telescope is exposed to the evening air, a wavering drone emerges from the synthesizer, flickering at the margins, the tuning of the oscillators adjusting to the rapidly cooling desert air. The piece progresses and the drone becomes a luminous, spherical constant, bathing the listener in pure tone as Weitz draws out harmonically ambiguous melodies that spiral upwards. Electronics crackle and convulse, coalescing into dense dissonance before widening out into an open octave. Just as the moon orbits the Earth and the stars shift as the planet rotates, so each sonic element appears in flux, interrelationships slowly forming and falling away. Divided into two parts, The Sirens flows as a continuous conversation between the artists and the starlight completing its thousand-year journey across the galaxy.
The Sirens belongs primarily to a lineage beyond music: of sea captains navigating by looking skyward, of astrophysicists studying the formation of the Milky Way, of the modern myths of werewolves, of the stories embedded in constellations. As Simon writes in the album’s extensive liner notes, “These stories and explorations reveal a collective yearning to become conscious of our connection to the universe, our deep-seated desire to understand how we fit into it all.” This music underscores the history of the night sky as the place where poetry and science find common ground, where exploration hinges on the imagination. Driven by curiosity and ingenuity, Weitz and Simon look up and wonder.
Not only has the Montreal native cemented his place as one of the most talented producers in the dubstep scene, but his incredible work ethic, energy, and passion—matched by his undeniable talent—mean his ascension is quite simply inevitable.
DDD has been proud to play our part in his career journey, and things are taking another step forward with the phenomenal album Rites.
A tour de force of audio sorcery, savagery, and sacrilege, Rites subjects the listener to Wraz.’ trademark mix of filthy 140 dubstep, thumping trap flavours, and industrial grittiness.
This is expertly melded with stunning, captivating, suspense-filled interludes that provide counterpoints to the bass punishment in ways that are both tension-inducing, yet beautiful.
Featuring collaborations with label bossmen Truth and DDD favourite Hypho, Wraz.’ sonic understanding of his craft feels unparalleled throughout. Each track brings its own unique flavour, while sitting together as a body of work with remarkable cohesion.
Keep a lookout for this as the first DDD vinyl drop of 2026—alongside its full digital release—Rites marks a seismic moment for both Wraz. and the 140 scene.
Wraz. is putting the world to Rites, while we’re living in his universe.
Groovedeep, the international supergroup comprised of Toronto’s Ciel and DC stars James Bangura and Jackson Ryland aka JR2k, brings Fixed Rhythms a 12” of four racing, groovy, energetic, funky and lush techno cuts. This is the second vinyl outing by the group, the first one being the recent “Funk Solo” on Turbo Recordings featuring remixes by Batu, Shed, and Mark Broom.
“Speed Queen” opens up the EP with hypnotizing techno that eschews any four-on-the-floor demands. Up-tempo with a touch of house and handdrums and a tantalizing vocal clip. “Witness” has a similar structure…handdrums, non four-on-the-floor kick drum composition, rhythmic vocal chop-work, but whereas A1 is the leap into the deep, “Witness” has us diving down, exploring the eerier depths.
Whip to the B-side with “Flashback”, a slightly more east coast club track while also incorporating a bit more of a pummeling kick. The aforementioned Groovedeep sonic signatures are there, and…can’t get enough of the handdrums?!?! Well then just let that last “Witness (Bongo Heavy VIP)” track slide in, a slightly meaner (and of course bongo-ier) boom of a take on the A2.