Suche:distort

Black Truffle is delighted to offer up a rare serving of unheard works by legendary Swiss artist Anton Bruhin. Active as a visual artist, poet, and musician since the 1960s, Bruhin has created important work in forms as varied as concrete poetry and landscape painting, imbuing everything he does with wit, humility, and absurdist humour. A recognised master of the jew’s harp (or Trümpi, as this ancient folk instrument is known in Swiss German), Bruhin’s sound work also encompasses tape collage, sound poetry, and manipulated bird song. On Speech Poems/Fruity Music we are treated to 26 short pieces made between 2006 and 2008 using the audio software Fruity Loops. These pieces carry on Bruhin’s long-running project of exploring the creative use and misuse of cheap, accessible technologies. In many of his analogue works, Bruhin explored the possibilities of simple cassette equipment. He invented DIY approaches to layering sounds by using multiple tape machines, experimented with distortion and tape speed, or, in his classic Inout (1981) created a maniacally single-minded audio monument to the pause button. Like the computer pixel drawings the artist produced around the same time as these recordings, Speech Poems/Fruity Music extends this approach to consumer software, presenting two parallel sequences of works that make use of Fruity Loops’ inbuilt synthetic instruments and its speech synthesis function. The instrumental works play like a twisted take on the aesthetics of 1980s video game soundtracks, using synthetic accordion and harpsichord sounds to realise jaunty little ditties that exploit their machine-realisation by making use of improbable pitch-bends and humanly impossible tempos and articulations. Between these samples of Fruity Music, we are treated to the Speech Poems, a series of recitations by a lone computer-generated voice. Many of them are in fact songs, as the synthetic voice crudely and hilariously changes pitch as it moves through its fragmented syllables and odes to cream in coffee. Carrying on Bruhin’s interest in the creative misuse of technology, many of the Speech Poems attempt to force Fruity Loops’ voice synthesis, designed only to speak English, to speak German. By entering phonetic text into the program, Bruhin gets it to produce a passable German alphabet and a series of approximations to a proper pronunciation of his name. Hilarious while strangely austere, entertaining but bizarre, Speech Poems/Fruity Music is classic Anton Bruhin, arriving in a beautiful mosaic cover by the artist, with the text of the ‘abc für anglophone’ on the back cover.

Distorted classical choral recordings, synths, processed guitar… The exquisitely complex human-machine interface experiments conducted by Stefano Pilia are kept in a delicate balance by John Duncan‘s lyrics and the soulful quality of his vocals, for an album of electroacoustic songs that are a unique blend for both artists. Seeds and memories from the past are re-actualized in the present through a machine electroacoustic compositional process creating a dark, gloomy and terrifying image of the future. Duncan’s lyrics offer a counterpointing liberation to the machine processes in action here, poetically revealing the dark and intimate struggle between the human soul and its rapport with the machine.

These recordings are a point of departure for Matilde Piazzi‘s inspired liner notes and photos, that take this release to another level entirely, becoming a metaphor for contemporary efforts to reach the limits of knowledge and discovery, their heroic nature and their inevitable failure.
Both artists worked on their respective sections in isolation, Pilia in an industrial area of central Bologna, Duncan in the wilderness several kilometers south of the urban sprawl. Together, their recordings developed an almost magnetic attraction that seemed to meld effortlessly.


The experience of listening quickly takes on a cinematic quality, exquisitely moving from an oceanic uplifting (Try Again) to the depths of apocalyptic, unsettling vocals (Fare Forward), constantly maintaining a lush, richly complex tapestry. The linear understanding of time is suddenly gone, dominated by a crushing machine-defined present, with Duncan’s lyrics and vocals becoming a shamanic portal to a possible future.
‘Try Again’ is released on digital/LP and was written, recorded and mixed by Stefano Pilia and John Duncan. Mastered by Ivan Pjevcevic. LP edition comes with insert, lyrics obi and text/photography by Matilde Piazzi.

Two bodies dancing hot in the New York City winter before being pushed inside for the rest of 2020. Two hearts that, in the span of 6 months, faced the loss of both of their mothers, the matriarchs that bore them to this planet full of wonder. They held on tight to the beauty of living, together. With this shared language and the confines of quarantine they lost and loved even harder. Battling packed boxes and lost jobs, the two celebrated their tragic journey with broad shoulders forcing power chords and the harmonized chants of utter release. They huddled together for the future while leaking their hearts into pop melodies that collide effortlessly with both a shared melancholy and simultaneous hope. MAN ON MAN (also M.O.M.) is a new gay lover band made up of Joey Holman (HOLMAN) and Roddy Bottum (Faith No More, Imperial Teen, CRICKETS, Nastie Band). Their upcoming self-titled record, MAN ON MAN, is infused with indie-rock distortion and soaked in gay pop confidence while still maintaining the dry acerbic sense of humor they both share. M.O.M.'s music videos take their magical collaboration to another level with otherworldly cinematographic dimension, and of course, the subversive playfulness of two gay lovers unmistakably flirting with their audience and each other. Upon the release of their debut single, “Daddy”, their video (chock full of the pair dancing seductively in their white briefs) was removed from YouTube for violating their “sex and nudity policy.” At this moment, the band solidified their political visibility as queer artists who are not ok with being silenced or removed from history because of their age or size. Bottum told Rolling Stone, “There’s enough representation in the gay community of young, hairless pretty men." Roddy and Joey’s love for each other and their own bodies, histories, and truths are what make this project so tender and lovable. MAN ON MAN’s music transcends both genre or decade, creating a timeless appeal for so many kinds of listening. The varied influences and textures of the record are a meditation on the myriad of emotions of lockdown, as well as this particular moment in their own lives, collectively and independently. The shoegaze whirlpools of “Stohner” transition into the square wave synths of “1983” with ease, while tracks like “It’s So Fun (To Be Gay)” open us up to a new type of queer anthem for the 2020s.

After the exceptional first volume of ‘Rakka’, Vladislav Delay is taken by the wanderlust again for a ravishing 2nd album of elemental electronics inspired by the Finnish wilderness. RIYL Shackleton, Rian Treanor...
Where 2020’s ‘Rakka’ represented some of Sasu Ripatti aka Vladislav Delay’s most intensely noisy textures and rhythmic complexity, as inspired by walks in his native Finnish wilderness, his follow-up further draws on and refines that experience in a beautifully brutalist bouquet of brambling distortion and tempestuous pulses that speak to the chaotic power of nature’s ecological interdependence. In the process ‘Rakka II’ fulminates Delay’s reactive sound even closer to the styles of Shapednoise, but still distinguished by his signature,
freehanded style of percussive tumult that reaches beyond techno and club music into an ecstatic, holistic hybrid of power ambient, black metal, avant-dub, free jazz, and extreme dance musicks.
While still breathlessly busy and densely overgrown, ‘Rakka II’ is intended as the romantic answer to the more hostile first volume. Its seven parts balance a sense of febrile passion with hyper-disciplined logic in more explicitly emotive, optimistic gestures that emerge from its atonal murk and convulsive structures.
Boundaries of discord and harmony are smudged almost into the red, but rendered with the spatial definition that become a hallmark of Delay’s best work for over 20 years, but never heard quite so wild and lushly semi-conscious as on cuts such as the soaring and collapsing ‘Raato’, or the craggy might of ‘Raaha’, and the heart-in-mouth headiness of ‘Rapaa.

In many ways, DJ Black Low's debut album, Uwami, shows the signs of an artist's first offering in any musical genre. Showcasing fluency in a broad range of styles and stuffing a number of ideas to the record's brim is the 20 year-old producer's attempt to both introduce himself to a wide listenership and stamp a recognizable sound in their minds. In other ways, somewhat out of the young South African producer's control, Uwami goes against the grain. The album comes at a time when South African electronic music is being fundamentally disrupted. Amapiano, the electronic music movement which first gained popularity with a small, core group of followers, now dominates the mainstream. Well-known and pervasive, amapiano borrows from a diverse palette of musical styles which are popular in South Africa's largely Black townshipsjazz, kwaito, dibacardi, deep and afro house among them. Instead of pandering to the seemingly insatiable local appetite and growing global penchant for amapiano though, on Uwami DJ Black Low seeks out the limits of the sound du jour and tries to stretch them. On his solo productions, he uses the samples and compositional norms that make amapiano hits the bedrock on which to experiment and improvise. With collaborators, DJ Black Low improvises within the boundaries of listener-friendly grooves. The sound he creates has foundations of what could easily have progressed into captivating amapiano songs on their own. But he uses improvised but structured electronic percussion and distortion sounds to drive the tracks in a particular direction. What remains is something like a deconstructed amapiano. For a young producer living in the townships of the greater Pitori area of South Africa's Gauteng province, there were few avenues available for Radebe to pursue a career in music. His trajectory shows the vulnerability of this pursuit. "I had started producing in 2013 and it so happened that I lost my equipment in 2014. I couldn't afford to buy equipment. In 2017, a friend of mine who had been making music found a job and decided to quit music. He gave me his equipment and I was able to start producing again. That's when I started getting back to it. I tried to pick up where I had left off, with hip hop and commercial house but I found that amapiano was the popular music. I liked it, so I started producing it."

Brooklyn based Starrk debuts with this 4-track EP of experimental & industrial techno records. Through dissonant synths, harsh distortions, and powerful kicks, "The Club Is Now An Empty Room" is a reflection of a 2020 that deprived us of the catharsis of a dancefloor. The release is influenced by artists such as Tommy Four Seven, Swarm Intelligence, Ansome, and L A V E N, and the sounds will be familiar to fans of these artists.

Starrk himself is a NY based producer who is affiliated with the local techno venue Basement, and organizes various parties and music-related events under the SYITS organization.

A side first tune brings at first a grindy noise tekno mental, quiet dark... Textures sounding a bit like live extracts.
Then comes a very structured tune, full of breakbeat jungly bridges leading to bangers parts.


The flip bring at first a pumping "classic" tribe tune. Old school tribe is it ?
the final track is Hardfloor solid kicker, a freekore tune with a wide open ambient/synth. A dynamite.

Numa Recordings is back again with a heavyweight release for all the grime heads out there: Badman Ting is a proper roadman anthem featuring Killa P, Irah, Long Range (aka Killa’s Army) and XL Mad (member of Numa Crew).

The original version sees the four MCs riding a heavy drill riddim with an unparalleled mix of dancehall and grime vocal styles. The riddim, produced by XL Mad himself, is minimal and impactful, combining spooky melodies with distorted 808 bass. All these elements make the whole thing.. a ‘Badman Ting!’

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is a psycho-phonic tale of the afterlife. Maybe one of the weirdest italian albums ever released.

'TRANSVITAEXPRESS is the sonorous realization of an idea that had been developing in me for some time and to which the encounter with the poet Barbarino gave the decisive push. I used the "tape-sound" technique, that is the organization and integration of sounds, noises, speech, song and rhythm, of which the resulting sound, being the result of electronic manipulation of the sound events themselves, is audible, therefore repeatable, only by means of magnetic tape. The sound material is, in part, reportage, so the work often takes on the character of a “disc-truth”, in part it is a faithful reconstruction of parapsychological events. We have defined this work "Psycho-phonic tale" in fact it is a sound experience, that is, a journey into the world of sounds of an "afterlife", rooted in us due to childhood, ancestral reminiscences, superstitions, legends, anxieties, utopias and above all fear. Fear of the mystery, fear of the unknown.

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is therefore the sound representation of these cultural and existential limits, and is therefore a critical, liberating, provocative work. I certainly do not expect, and perhaps I do not want someone after having listened to tell me that it is "beautiful".

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is the name of a train full of ... that travels in an afterlife so "beyond" that it coincides with the most central point of my ego. Perhaps the most logical "end-continuation" of life, the least imaginative, the least corrupt. The distortions, things that are too, or too little, defined, realistic situations, clichés, monotheisms and captions are embedded in the most traditional dream fabric, the most suitable in my opinion to promote approaches with the mysterious, with the esoteric, with the magical.'

M. GIOMBINI

Exclusively on vinyl - 14 defining tracks from the most glamorous indie rock & roll legends.

Kicking off with The Killers ‘Mr Brightside’ and Franz Ferdinand’s ’Take Me Out’ - both huge anthems from the post-punk revival of the early 2000’s - a genre that took inspiration from the distorted rock scene of the late ’60s alongside the guitar & synth driven new wave of the early ’80s and produced some of the most creative and bruised tracks of the past twenty years. Some acts found mainstream appeal and delivered huge radio and chart friendly pop - The Bravery, Razorlight and Kasabian (represented here with ‘Club Foot’ which sounds as fresh today as it did when it was released).



The scene gave rise to bands whose growing fanbases could easily identify with them, not only for the music, but also the look and attitude. From New York, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The Rapture are included here and from the West Coast, Dandy Warhols hit big with ‘Bohemian Like You’ and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club who scored a Top 5 album with their debut release. With particular emphasis on captivating live shows and an alignment to grittier rock aesthetics, The Vines, The Hives, The Libertines and The Fratellis all represented different elements of Indie Glam, while MGMT delivered one of the greatest debut albums of the period by melding Indie Pop with synth-driven psychedelia which included the incredible cut ‘Kids’, also featured here.



14 Essential Tracks on one vinyl album - ‘Glamorous Indie Rock And Roll’

Demon Records presents Distortion: The Best Of 1989-2019, the first career spanning
compilation of solo recordings by legendary American musician Bob Mould.
• Bob Mould’s career began in 1979 with the iconic underground punk group Hüsker Dü before forming
the beloved alternative rock band Sugar and releasing numerous critically acclaimed solo albums. At
the vanguard of his field for over four decades, Mould’s music has inspired generations of musicians.
• Compiled by Bob Mould himself, this new collection gathers together 24 essential recordings across
two LPs. Highlights include classic recordings such as ‘See A Little Light’, ‘If I Can’t Change Your Mind’,
‘A Good Idea’, and ‘The Descent.
• Mastered by Jeff Lipton and Maria Rice at Peerless Mastering and pressed on two 140g vinyl. Housed in
printed inner sleeves and a deluxe gatefold sleeve with artwork from illustrator Simon Marchner.

Demon Records presents Distortion: 2008-2019, the third in a series of four expansive vinyl box sets chronicling the solo career of legendary American musician Bob Mould.
Bob Mould’s career began in 1979 with the iconic underground punk group Hüsker Dü before forming the beloved alternative rock band Sugar and releasing numerous critically acclaimed solo albums. Volume three in this new series covers the period 2008-2019 and contains many of Bob Mould’s most celebrated recordings including Silver Age (2012), Patch The Sky (2016), and Sunshine Rock (2019).

Elusive UK producer Kilig brings a six-track EP spanning the British sound palette - forward, complex, with inflections of jungle and garage - to the new Shall Not Fade Classic Cuts imprint. Off the back of releases for Scuffed and Origins in 2020, kilig pairs their intimate knowledge of London's rave scene with more minimalist tinges for What My Mind Needs EP, a simmering club record soaked deep in ambience.

Taking sombre organic vocal samples and delicately placing them over a sharp two-step rhythm, opening track "Closer" is intangible, fantasy-like - the memory of music in your ears after you've left the club. There are echoes of Burial's seminal Untrue across the EP. Kilig aptly reflects the certain melancholy of British club music in the gritty "Overthinking" and mournful "Without You", an ensemble of distorted vocals and dramatic droning synth.

The rest of the record pushes into a more euphoric atmosphere - the title track is a soaring rave number while "Clocking In", a wild beast of a track, glitches and confuses. "I Wanted To Call & Tell You" swells in waves of breakbeat, bringing together the emotional core of the record, fading to gentle keys, the dream of raves to come in 2021.

Teenage Fanclub release a limited-edition double A side 7” ahead of their tenth studio album, Endless Arcade, released via their own label PeMa in the UK/Europe and Merge in the US.

The 7” vinyl features an edit of current single ‘Home’ (version only available on vinyl on this release) and previous single ‘Everything is Falling Apart’

Endless Arcade follows the band’s ninth album “Here”, released in 2016 to universal acclaim and notably their first Top 10 album since 1997; a mark of how much they’re treasured. The new record is quintessential TFC: melodies are equal parts heart-warming and heart-aching; guitars chime and distort; keyboard lines mesh and spiral; harmony-coated choruses burst out like sun on a stormy day.
Endless Arcade was virtually finished by the time lockdown was announced, bar the odd tinker under the engine hood. For the track ‘Home' It seems timely, given how everyone has had to stay home under lockdown, the track typifies TFC’s relaxed groove, culminating in Raymond’s peach of a guitar solo. Norman’s search for ‘home’ could be literal: after all, he’s been living in Canada for the last 10 years. But it’s also figurative.

In the 1990s, the band crafted a magnetically heavy yet harmony-rich sound on classic albums such as “Bandwagonesque” and “Grand Prix”. This century, albums such as “Shadows” and “Here” have documented a more relaxed, less ‘teenage’ Fanclub, reflecting the band’s stage in life and state of mind, which Endless Arcade slots perfectly alongside. The album walks a beautifully poised line between melancholic and uplifting, infused with simple truths. The importance of home, community and hope is entwined with more bittersweet, sometimes darker thoughts - insecurity, anxiety, loss.

Master craftsman James Welburn’s new LP, Sleeper in the Void, marks the 50th Miasmah release.The six years after his monumental debut have bred six tracks Welburn brings to fruition with the help of past co-conspirators from the Norwegian underground scene - Tomas Järmyr (Motorpsycho, Zu, Barchan), Hilde Marie Holsen (Hubro Records), and vocal artist Juliana Venter (W/V, Phil Winter).

On Sleeper in the Void, Welburn expands the domain of his sound, unveiling surprises until the very end of the album’s 36 minute playtime. While the character of the record is unmistakably his own, the tracks veer into many different territories, including a banging foray to the dancefloor.

The LP begins slowly with Raze, where Järmyr’s ritualistic cymbals introduce layers of Welburn’s signature sculpted bass drones and noise, building into a heart-wrenching epic of a track. This is perhaps the closest we ever get to Hold - Welburn’s previous LP. Falling from Time immediately surprises with it’s subdued mechanical techno beat, stark and cold as a glacier. Welburn’s texture-work is the star of the show, creating curious nooks and crannies of drone adorned with eerie melodies straight out of oblivion. This sense of wonder shines through to the album’s title track as well, where Welburn and Järmyr build another patient, echoing, and deeply cinematic piece, the drum patterns slowly shifting around a metallic hum that evokes the vision of church bells, ringing out under tonnes of seawater.

Sleeper in the Void feels like a story in two parts, rising lethargically, but with gargantuan power. The second begins with the momentous In and out of Blue, where Juliana Venter’s disembodied, spectral dirge takes center stage among the furious drums and bassy riffs, reaching a full crescendo with seconds to go. Parallel marks a release - Hilde Marie Holsen’s nostalgic soundscapes, pristine as glass, meeting the distant thunder of Welburn’s strings on the horizon. And finally, Fast Moon ends the record in a most surprising way - a tribal industrialized banger, complete with vile distorted beats and every other spice in demand on a blackened dancefloor.

Welburn’s Sleeper in the Void is a generous shapeshifter. Every inch of its soundwave breathes emotion and imagery - an invitation to take a dive and linger.

Under exhausted lights of civil discontent the count has just began. What you parodied, what you scrutinised rears its pure gaze when punctured beyond performance. We cried for justice but instead found order, and now we face the chain. PC World comes through with a haunting EP on She Lost Kontrol to distort the view and warp the vision of industrial addicts and mutant punks with their second release “Order”, a discursive counterattack on four distinct forms of command. The South London duo disfigures the unconscious reduction of pleasure and fetish, the connective tissue between privatisation and violence, the seduction of societal norms, and the neurotic tendencies of self-defeat. Like the surrender to a future shock, these four interwoven tracks are produced for the recognition of restraint and the demand for wanting more. B-side remixes of the title track “Order” come from Physical Wash (former member of High-Functioning Flesh) and Aktion Mutante (featuring members of Violent Poison and Unhuman), two additional perversions of protocol from synth-punk veterans on both sides of the Atlantic. So initiate these six cries of havoc in solidarity with this wasted world, a world of precarious necessity and incessant definition. A world whose shape and conscience will forever be satisfied by order.

Carl Craig has announced Detroit native and hotlytipped selector DJ Holographic is next in-line for his prestigious 'Detroit Love' mix compilation series dropping on Planet E Communications. Following in the footsteps of predecessors like Stacey Pullen and Wajeed, being invited to mix vol.05 of the series is testament to DJ Holographic being one of Detroit's most anticipated breakthrough DJ's. Born and raised in the Motor City's deep musical legacy, Ariel Corley aka DJ Holographic is an ambassador for Detroit through and through. Having cut her teeth as a DJ in the local scene over the past decade DJ Holographic is admired for her versatility, eclecticism, and impeccable taste. Ariel has firmly established herself as a staple of Detroit's modern underground scene, a core member of the city's LGBQT+ community and a devoted activist for local humanitarian causes - love for Detroit underpins every element of Ariel Corley's life. Released 16th April via Planet E and K7!, Detroit Love Vol. 05 is packed to the brim with exclusive tracks handpicked by DJ Holographic who takes the listener through a vibrant and flawlessly-mixed showcase of breakthrough artists, ones to watch, and longestablished artists Ariel has a personal affiliation to. The mix was curated by DJ Holographic at the artist creative hub below Submerge Records in Detroit - home to labels such as Underground Resistance, Transmat, Red Planet, and Distorted Soul.

Sun Milk was recorded in two months, a much quicker process than the three years spent on their previous release, Flowers. The band recorded the album at the Pharmacy, Vroom’s home studio in Toronto, located above an actual pharmacy. It was the first album to be recorded after Little Kid solidified their live lineup, with Boothby, Vroom, and Germain having played together for over two years. Every song except “Like a Movie” began as a full-band live take, with overdubs performed democratically, with both Boothby and Germain layering guitars. It was also the first record to feature Lunn’s vocals, who joined the band shortly after the album’s release.

The result is a deeply affecting document of personal crisis, mirroring the dramatic changes in Boothby’s life—a breakup, living alone for the first time, beginning a new career. The lyrics have less Christian content and more personal overtones than other Little Kid records. “It was a relief when these songs came out,” says Boothby, “processing recent changes in my life, trying to take ownership of my identity and choices.” This lends a confessional warmth to the songs, a feeling of reconnecting with an old friend, sharing stories. Highlights include the off-kilter opening track “The Fourth” and the lovely, meandering “Ugly Moon.” The centerpiece of the album is “Slow Death in a Warm Bed.” A meditation on why people stay in flawed relationships, the song builds in calming repetitions until the guitars explode in the last minute, climaxing in a full-fledged distorted freakout. It’s one of the most beautiful and harrowing songs in Little Kid’s catalog.

The drifting, gentle “Dim Light Coming Down” features some of Boothby’s best lyrics. The narrator describes a person seeing “the likeness” of their own dead father “floating high above the road,” a mystical encounter rendered in the most plainspoken of terms. But Boothby quickly undercuts the moment: “But you'd been drinking when you saw him/And your mind was moving slow/Like your ears were full of cotton/So what he said you'll never know.” It’s a thwarted encounter that becomes more powerful for that very fact. Just before the song reaches its slow-building climax, Boothby sings, “Coming down/There’s a bright light/A gentle sound/Opening wide.” The transcendence does finally arrive, but it’s in the coming down, the hangover, the regular life that comes after the big moment. There's little wonder why it's become a live staple for the band.

The record is a high point in a remarkably consistent career. Looking back at Sun Milk, Boothby believes it’s one of the strongest in Little Kid’s oeuvre. “It’s probably my favorite,” says Boothby. “In general, I love slow songs, and this album is full of them. I like the structure of seven long songs—can’t think of too many albums with only seven songs. It gives the album an interesting flow.”

Dark, psychosexual electronics lurk between the teeth of Ester Kärkkäinen, the Las Vegas based artist also known as Himukalt. For the past six years, she has tirelessly pursued an avenue of bleak industrial productions that parallel the extremist works of Genocide Organ and Atrax Morgue. She has built a considerable reputation for uncompromising, full-frontal noise, releasing albums on Total Black, Malignant Records, Found Remains, and Foul Prey, amongst others. Between My Teeth was originally a cassette which came out in 2018 as a tiny edition on the Greek imprint Several Minor Promises and sold out immediately upon release. Himukalt returns to The Helen Scarsdale Agency with the necessary reissue of Between My Teeth as a vinyl edition with expanded artwork.

The album is a maelstrom of ill-tempered noise and blackened frequencies, sutured to a foundation of primitive, raw rhythms. Kärkkäinen cuts up her own voice with the digital equivalent of a rusted razor blade through her proclamations of misery, rage, and desire. The albums' opening track "Cataclysm" a turgid industrial production with Kärkkäinen adopting two distinct voices that, while they remain mostly indecipherable in content, the context presumes an inevitable, catastrophic and emotionally violent collapse in the relationship between two people. A tense rhythm clicks below the full spectrum bursts of harsh noise on "She Went Mad" followed by the smoldering power electronic moves of "I No Longer Belong" and "Not Proper." And the death disco groove of "Mine" is far more hellish than danceable through its scalded distortion and Kärkkäinen's vocal mantras about bodily self-loathing.

Another bold, declarative album in the ever impressive Himukalt discography. Remastered by James Plotkin and features a 12 page booklet of Kärkkäinen's signature collaged xerography.

Swedish producer and electronic enthusiast Rivet (Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää, Malmö) joins the Editions Mego fold with a dynamic and diverse album that pivots between the punctuated pop of Ivan Pavlov's COH project, the chromatic slink of Chris and Cosey whilst also bearing a degree of fruit birthed from Hallbäck's home country Sweden in skewered pop such as The Knife.

This is electronic music born from the worship of machines and the spirit of punk, mood music brooding with sophistication and subversive twists all underscored with a deep industrial pulse. Are these songs? Are these lyrics? Words melt as beat perpetually takes us deeper into flight.

Interpretation is flung open as the audience are invited to gauge what on earth is going on here. Are Sooty Wing Flecks a minuscule species of half keyboard half vocoder chatter? Is Gleitende Liebe to be trusted or simply laying out a guide for disorientation? Pearling Woes is a queasy ballad sung by a robot on a very special comedown. Keloid knows exactly where the party can be now whereas Sodden Healer is an uber ride sans mask to destinations dark and unknown. Throughout this trip sharp snares punctuate ghost melodies as vocals rise and vaporise. Shadows hover the walls leaving holographic traces of the duality between fun and fear, the unexpected drifts diagonally across the audio plane teasing and taunting the listener in a unique blend of industrial, techno, pop and experimental forms.

On Feather and Wire album is a deep absorbing trip through multiple moods, genres and guises, as mysterious as it is engaging and one to ingest in a single sitting, lying back, sitting up, standing up and yes, even dancing. Let the angels and angles, the voices and distorted faces take shape before your mind. Who is Ordine Kadmia? What are they saying to me, here we go, on and on...

With it's haunted vocals, coded linguistics and dark sensual propulsive atmosphere On Feather and Wire is a sublime contemporary techno pop trip both psychedelic and subversive.

Written and produced by Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää

Post-production by Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää and Benny Liberg at Inkonst Studio Malmö
Mixed by Oscar Mulero at Dead Souls Studio Gijón
Mastered by Stephan Mathieu
Images by Dimitrios Bizios
Artwork by Nik Void