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Nick Lapien and Robin Koek's latest collaborative album, Days Bygone, helps launch Delsin's Interstellar Series as they continue to explore beyond the dancefloor trappings of conventional techno to create a body of work steeped in mystery. Although not totally devoid of percussion, Artefakt shift their focus away from dominant drums and lean on the keys and pads to map out the landscape each track traverses. Sometimes furtive and suggestive, elsewhere pearlescent and diffused across great expanses, it's these striking, sublime formations which define the atmosphere Lapien and Koek have created - a textured, dynamic exercise in techno as internalized listening music.

Be With is delighted to present Jorge López Ruiz’s El Grito (Suite Para Orquesta De Jazz), eternal Argentinian magic released on CBS in 1967 that must be one of the most sought-after South American jazz LPs.

Living in Buenos Aires in the 60s, driven by creative impulse and rage Jorge López Ruiz used music as his platform to protest the Argentine military dictatorship: “I could never stand dictatorships, to be told how you have to think, what you have to do. Nor did I endure discrimination”.

A young López Ruiz had appeared on a television panel alongside writer, politician and philosopher Arturo Jauretche, criticising the Onganía dictatorship. Jauretche told López Ruiz “Now say it with music”. This was the deep inhale that lead to El Grito, literally “The Scream”. As López Ruiz later explained “Jauretche urged me that my protests should not remain in words and acquire the consistency of a work… but it was not so much what he told me but how he told me, what prompted me to make the work take shape, first in a live concert and then in a recording”.

As the police and military began resorting to kidnapping, torture and summary executions to quiet dissent, with depressing inevitability the artist community and their work were a particular target of the increasingly brutal regime. El Grito was banned not long after it was released and the majority of original copies were unceremoniously destroyed.

The work of a genius artist living under an opressive dictatorship, erased by the government of the time, this is buried treasure in every sense and it’s been a rare record for over 50 years. But it isn’t just being hard to find that has pushed up the prices of those few original copies that survived, this is a foundational record in the development of jazz in South America.

El Grito (Suite Para Orquesta De Jazz) is a showcase for Jorge López Ruiz’s skills as a composer and arranger as he leads a virtuoso orchestra of the likes of Mario Cosentino (alto sax), Baby López Furst (piano), Pichi Mazzei (drums), Gustavo Bergalli (trumpet), Oscar López Ruiz (guitar), Arturo Schneider (flute) and Jorge López Ruiz himself plays double bass on the fourth and fifth movements.

As the album’s sub-title explains, The album is a Jazz orchestra concept suite. Five movements, to be heard as a whole, that end where they begin.

“When I wrote it there was no history of a cyclical work in jazz. But I didn't notice that, I needed to express something and I did it. At that time they told me I was crazy, that such a thing was very difficult to do. But hey, I like challenges”.

Yet this is not challenging jazz. There are certainly avant garde, free jazz flourishes, but the hard bop characteristics make this a very accessible album: easy to listen to without being easy listening. López Ruiz’s love of film brings a definite cinematic feel.

The title movement opens the album in bombastic style. “El Grito” grabs you by the lapels and refuses to let go. Raw then controlled, it’s by turns stabbing then soothing, with rage weaved in and out of the elegant styles. “M.A.B. = Amor” is our favourite here. With a tense introduction and a patient build, a gentle sax sweeps in to lift everything up to meet the serene piano and soft drums. Elegantly paced, it moves back and forth between deep contemplation and a more urgent call and response between strings and horns. A near-eight-minute, slow motion marvel.

The second side eases in with the beautifully-titled “Hasta El Cielo, Sin Nubes, Con Todas Las Estrellas” (“Up To The Sky, No Clouds, With All The Stars”) a relatively brief mid-tempo piece featuring López Ruiz’s insistent bass notes high in the mix, and again blending the sublime with the emotive with its wild horns and tight rhythm section.

It’s followed by “Tendré El Mundo” (“I Will Have The World”) which also leads with hypnotic bass, but this time swifter, driven by crashing drums, rapid horn conversations and effortlessly cool piano flourishes. Rounding out the suite, “De Nuevo El Grito” (something like “The Next Scream” or “The Scream Renewed”) is a stylish closer. Whilst López Ruiz’s bass shifts the track along, the horns and piano are more restrained, yet no less stunning.

This Be With edition of El Grito sounds sensational, if we do say so ourselves. Working with audio from the original analogue tapes, the vinyl mastering chops of Simon Francis are on full show here in what he considers to be some of his best ever work for Be With. Pete Norman’s cutting skills have made sure nothing is lost. The tortured artwork has been restored here at Be With HQ as the finishing touch to helping this revered work find a rightful place in every protest art collection.

searching for freedom is the forthcoming fifth studio album from the Australian singer-songwriter, free-surfer, and environmentalist Ziggy Alberts. This release follows his acoustic EP 'Truly Acoustic', "the perfect blend of relaxing, soulful guitar and wistful lyrics" - Culture Collide, and collaborative EP with Sydney rap duo, Horrorshow, 'I Won't Give You Up' which was described as one of "the most exciting new music releases to listen to in August 2020" by L'Officiel. Ziggy’s platinum-certified third album, Laps Around The Sun 2018 peaked at #9 on the ARIA Charts and included the platinum-certified single Love Me Now, “a raw, pained plea to love” Atwood Magazine. Released independently via his own label imprint, Commonfolk Records.

On Board Music kicks off 2021 with Point C, the third in a series of Various Artist 12-inches. It continues Laura BCR’s exploration of the heady atmospheres between techno, dub and ambient, where the boundaries between the dancefloor and headphone introspection are blurred. Foreign Material’s opens Point C with a depth charge bassline and cavernous swells. It sets up the ethereal, light-footed skip of Hiver’s “Time Lapse” and Sylve’s dreamy “Cloudless Raindrops”. Alan Backdrop delivers pristine techno voodooism on the B-side, followed by the tunnelling shimmer of Hironori Takahashi’s “Exars”.

Hailing from Georgia’s capital Tbilisi, Gacha Bakradze is one of the national scene’s leading electronic music exponents. He returns to Lapsus Records with his new album 'Obscure Languages', his second release for the Barcelona label.

Following the superb LP 'Word Color' Lapsus Records, 2018, which appeared in several ‘album of the year’ lists for publications such as Pitchfork and XLR8R, the prolific producer now presents 'Obscure Languages'. This new piece of work could well be described as a sound continuation from his previous album and maintains a powerful narrative at its core.

‘Obscure Languages' delves into the world of cinematic soundscapes, replete with microscopic details and fragments that showcase a luscious IDM style audio palette, laced with ambient, avant-techno, bass and sound design.

A metaphor about diversity and passion for athletics. Looking for inspiration in our environment, as diverse as quality electronics, as extensive as a marathon. Biome Laps wants to take a lot of laps within the IDM universe, electro and the most evocative ambient. This new Madrid electronic music label of José Merinero, which in 2021 celebrates 20 years in music, 15 since he launched his �rst references on his own labels such as City Archives or Ultrix Records and 10 since the creation of .Àrtico Netlabel, his pretty girl, which has allowed him to move in the national underground, and in festivals like L.E.V. and what has been your home to look for that diversity, to �nd that electronics without labels under the name of JM. Here, in addition, it has been able to count on the collaboration of great spanish producers in some references. Passion for electronics speaking of José, he falls short, so he decides to create Biome Laps, where we will �nd timeless music, on vinyl and digital, and above all local music, made with a lot of passion. A veteran who debuts with his own name, showing himself without more, with a single objective, to give back to the music he believes in, everything he has received in return…

Former member of Rodolfo Alchourrón and Gato Barbieri's bands, Cevasco's first solo effort is a combination of fusion jazz with a pinch of unexpected Brazilian flavours and electronic sounds that now, more than 30 years after the original release of the album, still evoke a refreshing feel of modernity in the same vein as many other experimental Argentine and Uruguayan artists from the same era. Includes guest appearances from artists such as Litto Nebbia or Ruben Rada. Reissued on vinyl for the first time, including insert with liner notes and previously unseen photos. Details: Few musicians can boast of having played with "the greatest" without some eyebrows to be raised. The bass of Adalberto Cevasco has been heard in multiple concerts and recording sessions of artists as diverse as the Spanish divas Rocío Jurado and Isabel Pantoja, tango genius Astor Piazzolla or the cream of the Argentine jazz scene -from Pocho Lapouble, Gustavo Kerestezachi, Rubén López Furst or Andrés Boiarsky to the great Gato Barbieri- With the latter, as part of a dream band that included artists like Nana Vasconcelos as well as other Argentines such as Lapouble or Domingo Cura, he recorded two fundamental pieces in the Impulse! label catalogue in sessions held in Argentina and Los Angeles and also toured across various countries. The daily sold-out shows at the Regina Theater in Buenos Aires and their overwhelming performance at Montreux Festival are still well remembered. It is therefore out of question that Adalberto Cevasco belongs to that top-level league of musicians whose talent has also contributed to enhance those who accompany them. The history of this album begins with an encounter. Adalberto Cevasco joins Rodolfo Alchurrón's jazz-funk project Sanata y Clarificación as bassist and meets Litto Nebbia, who is invited to sing along. Some years on, when Nebbia's Melopea record company was developing, he would receive a cassette with a collection of demos recorded by Cevasco over the years. Some of the songs dated back to 1981 while others were made well into the decade and included such outstanding collaborations as that of the Uruguayan Rubén Rada, whom Adalberto Cevasco had met playing in a group of fusion candombe called Candonga. In addition to producing the complete album, Nebbia would also collaborate in a special way in one of the most outstanding tracks (Reencuentros Nº2) by adding to Cevasco's fusion jazz some unexpected Brazilian flavours and electronic sounds that now, more than 30 years after the original release of the album, they still evoke a refreshing feel of modernity. As the Argentine press of the moment highlighted, it'd seem as if the influences received and developed by the bassist during his career as a freelance musician - from post-Piazzolla tango to proyección folclórica (a movement of revision and modernization of the Argentinian musical roots) - had been added to their superb rhythmic work in this album. "Pájaros Eléctricos" was never presented live and has remained as the only published work by Cevasco as a soloist since the date of its release.

With a history 50+ years in the making, Tower of Power has been a funk
institution since 1968, knocking out hits like “What is Hip,” “So Very Hard
to Go,” “This Time It’s Real” and “You’re Still a Young Man” while lending
their soulful sound to collaborations with Santana, the Grateful Dead, Elton
John, Huey Lewis, Justin Timberlake and everyone in-between.
50 Years of Funk & Soul - Live at the Fox Theater captures their storied career
with no-holds-barred victory lap concerts in Oakland, CA, performing their full
spectrum of life-affirming funk and soul hits to sold out audiences in 2018.
Available as a 3-LP set, 2-CD/1-DVD package, standalone DVD and digital audio configuration, these historic performances include alumni special guests
Chester Thompson, Lenny Pickett, Francis ‘Rocco’ Prestia, Bruce Conte and Ray
Greene. PBS will celebrate the 50th anniversary with a 60 minute airing of the
performance beginning February 27.

Lunar Tredd – Fimber Bravo’s first album on Moshi Moshi since the much acclaimed Con-Fusion – tells the tale. The highlife fusion of You Can’t Control Me resonates in the wake of the global Black Lives Matters protests. There is fire in these impactful clarion calls to resist oppression, recognise strength in resilience and fight against the corruption of power.

Bravo’s been a constant collaborative force - as his time as leader of 20th Century Steel Band, as musical director of Steel ‘n’ Skin, and appearances with everyone from Sun Ra Arkestra to Hot Chip, shows. Lunar Tredd reflects the influence of the music handed down to him by “ancestors” . Helped by an enviable cast of friends and collaborators, Fimber has shifted those touchstones to create something that sounds resolutely like the here and now.

Those friends that appear on Lunar Tredd, include Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip and The Horrors’ Tom Furse; The Invisible drummer Leo Taylor and Senegalese percussionist, Mamadou Sarr dropping in on rhythm duties, while there are also appearances from Susumu Mukai aka Zongamin, the brilliant Kora player Kadialy Kouyate, vocalist Cottie Williams, Vanishing Twin’s Catherine Lucas, and production from Lapo Frost and Ghostpoet producer Shuta Shinoda. Some, like Zongamin and Williams go way back with Fimber, other connections are newer, but all have quickly become part of the London-based musician’s musical family.

Indeed, Fimber never loses sight of where he’s come from on LUNAR TREDD - even as he looks to where he might go next. As a musician, he’s still finding new creative peaks nearly 50 years after he began.

Xqui travels back one hundred years, navigating a twisted channel to the roaring Twenties. As this record crackles into life, sounds begin to melt and warp in a visceral transgression of time. Uncompromisingly immersive; startling; melancholic; confusing; beautiful - Twenties is the rebirth of a fading spirit song of ages. "Often when I have an idea for a new track with a new approach or sound, it snowballs into something bigger. Whether that be a longer track, an EP or even an album, each time I try to have a theme that carries through the project. Lleisiau was based around voices, Microchasm was my industrial ambient album and Ambients found me in a more reflective and serene state of mind. With Twenties it was simply the thought of using archive recordings and footage to expand into something more tangible. I found dozens of recordings from the 1920s which I thought worked well with some of my more trademark sounds. I was looking at images for the search term ‘1920s’ when I came across an image of a man from one hundred years ago who was wearing a facemask which was presumably from the time of the Spanish Flu pandemic. It was not until I saw it that I realised, with irony, that the same thing was happening here and now. The finding of the photo added another angle to the album, a little bit of horror, interference and mechanical sounds. I recorded and collated more field recordings and manipulated them to give the noise on the album. I feel it is probably my most complete work to date and I’m incredibly proud of it. I present to you, the Twenties." Xqui. Xqui first appeared in April 2018 with his Britannia EP which was swiftly followed by the Dragon album in May. Using field recordings which he manipulated via mobile phone and laptop, he created incredible soundscapes and was quickly compared to Eno, Basinski and Mansell. Since then, he has been in rich productive form with Twenties being his seventh full length album. Appearing in several Albums of the Year lists over the last three years, he has also remixed for the likes of Lark, Elizabeth Joan Kelly and Assassin of Sound as well as collaborated with Transmission 13, Radio Europa and Geiger von Muller to name but a few. His work with boycalledcrow under the moniker of Wonderful Beasts received massive critical acclaim resulting in the approach from a filmmaker to provide soundtrack material as well as a sold-out debut compact disc.

In a world of constant releases & quickly forgotten pieces, preserving our creations sometimes works out for the better.

In late 2019, Brainorchestra created this rap work after his highly anticipated debut rap, EP From The 908. This follow-up project features the likes of legendary producers such as Ohbliv, Foisey, Derrick Braxton, Good Food & more---Brainorchestra conjured up a medley of styles & let it sit.

With High Water Music, Brainorchestra is releasing his third rap oeuvre, Marmalade, with hopes that this time lapse favorably aged his records for the World.

Delicate Sound Of Thunder encapsulates a band at their best. Alongside the classic live album and full concert film (restored and re-edited from the original 35mm film and enhanced with 5.1 surround sound), included in The Later Years box set, all stand-alone editions feature 24-page photo booklets, with the 4-disc box edition including a 40-page photo booklet, tour poster and postcards. The 3-LP 180-gram vinyl set includes 9 songs not included on the 1988 release of the album, while the 2-CD includes 8 tracks more than its original release.

In 1987, Pink Floyd made a triumphant resurgence. The legendary British band, formed in 1967, had suffered the loss of two co-founders: keyboardist / vocalist Richard Wright, who left after sessions for The Wall in 1979, and bass player and lyricist Roger Waters, who had left to go solo in 1985, soon after the 1983 album The Final Cut. The gauntlet was thus laid down for guitarist/singer David Gilmour and drummer Nick Mason, who proceeded to create the multi-platinum A Momentary Lapse Of Reason album, a global chart smash, which also saw the return of Richard Wright to the fold.

Originally released in September 1987, A Momentary Lapse Of Reason was quickly embraced by fans worldwide, who flocked to attend the live tour dates, which started within days of the album’s release. The tour played to more than 4.25 million fans over more than two years, and, as a celebration of the enduring talent and global appeal of David, Nick and Richard was unsurpassed at the time.

Filmed at Long Island’s Nassau Coliseum in August 1988 and directed by Wayne Isham, the 2020 release of the Grammy Award nominated Delicate Sound Of Thunder is sourced directly from over 100 cans of original 35mm negatives, painstakingly restored and transferred to 4K, and completely re-edited by Benny Trickett from the restored and upgraded footage, under the creative direction of Aubrey Powell/Hipgnosis. Similarly, the sound was completely remixed from the original multitrack tapes by longtime Pink Floyd engineer Andy Jackson with David Gilmour, assisted by Damon Iddins.

Pink Floyd’s stellar supporting cast for the live dates included: Jon Carin (Keyboards, Vocals), Tim Renwick (Guitars, Vocals), Guy Pratt (Bass, Vocals), Gary Wallis (Percussion), Scott Page (Saxophones, Guitar), Margret Taylor (Backing Vocals), Rachel Fury (Backing Vocals) and Durga McBroom (Backing Vocals).

Technical credits include: Film Producers: Curt Marvis and Carl Wyant; Director of Photography: Marc Reshovsky; Lighting Designer: Marc Brickman, with conceptual footage directed by Storm Thorgerson, except ‘Money’ directed by Storm Thorgerson, Barry Chattington and Peter Medak. Animation on 'Time' was by Ian Emes.

Eternal Tears of Sorrow's long career kicked off with the more thrash metalish debut album in 1997, but it was on the 1998 follow-up Vilda Mánnu ("Wild Moon" in the Sami language of indigenous Lapplandish people) that the band really carved their own niche amid the crowded metal scene. Hailing from Finnish Lappland, ETOS are best known for well-crafted, fierce but melancholic melodic death metal with symphonic overtones, of which this album, their Spinefarm Records debut, is a prime example. This pressing comes in a gatefold sleeve and has been carefully remastered for vinyl.

Though any and all vocals on De Sidera are wordless, language is central to the album. ‘I try to make my vocalisms sound like words,’ she explains, ‘but it is a kind of invented language.
Somehow the form, the signifier, is enough to express meaning, sense, emotion.’ Burelli notes that this concept has resonance with her practice in Greek and Turkish music, in which wordless vocals and instrumental improvisations are common.
This is front and center on a song like the title track ‘De Sidera,’ where Burelli’s rising and falling vocals dance atop an undulating, contemplative bassline - close your eyes, and the clear tides of the Mediterranean lap at the sand - her wordless intonations guiding you to a tranquil state.
Burelli surrenders to the natural world and the ineffability of words - on De Sidera she shares the gem of universality she discovered while doing so.

‘I envisioned the record as a journey through human expression over the course of one day,’ says Chicago composer and ONO member Jordan Reyes.
When planning the album, Reyes wanted to consider the trajectory of American music, drawing a throughline from the oral traditions enmeshed in blues, country, folk to contemporary underground music, splicing together acoustic instrumentation with an experimental, electronic sensibility. The album begins with human-constructed wind on opening song ‘The Pre-Dawn Light.’.
From there, Reyes adds acoustic guitar, electric guitar, lap-steel guitar, trombone, keyboards, and an electronic drum to the compositional mix.’I wanted to push myself compositionally,’ he says. ‘My first album Close was all eurorack synthesizer, a lot of which was automated by control voltage, but Sand Like Stardust has no modular synthesizers, seeking to channel the warmth, immediacy, and vulnerability of hand-played instruments and voice.’

"Over the years, I have had the absolute pleasure of meeting countless wonderful people in every corner of this beautiful planet, and a lot of times these music enthusiasts have expressed a very similar-sounding story. That our presence – whether it be via a studio recording or our ferocious show – is capable of transporting them to a better place and washing away all earthly worries. Doesn't this sound amazing – especially during these challenging times?"
This gentle voice belongs to the vocalist-guitarist Jonne Järvelä, who happens to be the creative force behind the unique Finnish ensemble KORPIKLAANI. Having experienced multiple triumphant years within the inner circle of folk-influenced heavy metal, Jonne now acknowledges his position as one of the most recognisable artists ever coming from the land of a hundred thousand lakes.

KORPIKLAANI – preceded by Jonne's own project SHAMAANI DUO (1993-1997) and the band SHAMAN (1997-2003) – was founded somewhere deep in the primeval northern forests in 2003. Ten celebrated studio albums, numerous world tours and hundreds of millions of digital streams alongside multiple other releases, have established KORPIKLAANI’s status as one of the leaders of innovative heavy music. For their diehard legion of fans, they are known as Folk Metal Superstars.

"I have always been fascinated by ancient Lappish/Samish culture and the infectious melodies of aged folk songs. However, that's only one side of the coin as I have loved rip-roaring metal since I was a frantic kid looking for some rebellious sounds. My butt was kicked by the likes of MOTÖRHEAD, IRON MAIDEN and JUDAS PRIEST", says Jonne.
"Since the early 2000s, KORPIKLAANI has combined these elements as we have tirelessly attempted to pump new life into the ancient tales of joy and heartbreak, and added the enormous energy of current heavy metal into that folk metal melting pot.We have always been on a mission to create something new and unprecedented."

Here and now, KORPIKLAANI’s fearless journey continues on – and this time, the journey is powered by rather serious subject matter. Their eleventh full-length studio record "Jylhä" (which has no direct translation but can be described as majestic, or wild and rugged in a beautiful way) brings all the well-known and essential ingredients to the table: heavy-duty guitar riffing, rhythmic folk melodies and more.

What about the tales of the wilderness then? The fascinating and miscellaneous tales have always been a crucial part of KORPIKLAANI’s journey within the realms of unspoiled Finnish nature, ancient Scandinavian myths, shamanistic voyages and beyond. "Did I already mention that "Jylhä" offers some new angles?", the singer/guitarist laughs. "Well, lyrically, there are definitely some previously unknown passages – such as fables connected to the infamous Lake Bodom murders in Southern Finland in early 1960s."

KORPIKLAANI’s long-time lyricist Tuomas Keskimäki – the renowned Finnish poet and author, comments: "When I am coming up with narratives, interesting wordplays and other ideas for KORPIKLAANI, I often feel like I am diving into some absorbing fantasy world. I would describe this state of mind as some kind of a deep trance", says Keskimäki.
"As a whole textual piece, "Jylhä" is rather widespread. For example, there are stories about the fragility of life, revealed by using nature metaphors. ‘Miero’ is one of these tales: after all, it's a fact that the lifetime of a human being is just one blink of an eye compared to the eternal aeons of the cosmos."
"On the darker side, there are several murder songs - I wasn't really planning these rather untraditional lyrics, they just happened... One of these is ‘Kiuru’, and that story is inspired by a famous Finnish double homicide case, which took place in the small village of Tulilahti in 1959. In these lyrics, the character called Kiuru – Skylark in English – acts as eyewitness and a prophet, but at the same time, this creature also functions as an allegory of many things... All in all, I am really happy with the lyrics and all these new themes!"

When asked about his current sentiment regarding the new KORPIKLAANI opus "Jylhä", the commander of the forest clan sighs and smiles. "Using "Jylhä" as our solid steppingstone, we are able to reach completely new heights. For me, it's crystal clear that KORPIKLANI has never been better."
It is a fitting album for our dark times, summed up well by the song ‘Huolettomat’ (The Careless). It talks about living in the present moment, alongside a story of joy and celebration. Today is today, tomorrow is uncertain.

“The Vale” is in immersive electronic album of dark soundtrack work. It’s the first of several Everyday Dust releases scheduled for Castles in Space in 2021.

Everyday Dust is RJ McConnell. Based in Scotland, RJ ditched piano lessons when he realised I had no interest in being an instrumentalist. Instead he wanted to create his own musical works from the ground up. He goes on, “I was much happier working my way through music theory books on my own and applying my learning to my own music. We had a little home studio when I was a child. My Dad was also a musician and was involved in local amateur theatre where he prepared and operated all the sound cues on reel to reel tape. So from an early age I was messing around with tape machines, making tape loops and recording music. For years I tried to make the most interesting tones I could from a Yamaha home keyboard by passing it through my Dad’s guitar pedals, or recording to tape and playing it back at different speeds etc. My first proper synth was the Roland SH101.” He went on to study music and sound for theatre and worked for many years as a theatre composer before branching into larger events and eventually film and documentary work.

The Vale story starts in 2018. RJ again, “I was brought in as composer for an independent horror short that was being filmed in Istanbul. The film was a vampire movie, very atmospheric and beautifully shot. I was aware of being a Scottish composer on a Turkish film and therefore didn’t want to attempt in any way to make anything that sounded traditionally Turkish. I wanted to represent the idea of these ancient beings who had existed in one of the oldest cities in the world for centuries. I wondered how I could imply this “ancient” world with the instruments I had to hand. I recorded various old metal whistles, which were slowed right down to become eerie arcane horn blasts that sounded like they had come from another time. I also recorded lots of melodica, which was again slowed down to sound like wheezing old harmonium drones. I spent another day recording inside an old piano, plucking individual strings and also hammering them percussively with wooden beaters. Using synthesizers and effects as the “glue” to bring these sounds together I started to work on the cues for the film. I had scored most of the film by the time I heard it was being cancelled. The concept and story had been taken over by a streaming site who wanted to make it into a series - with a drastically different tone and style.

“Later that same year I had worked on a project that incorporated the folklore of a celtic water sprite who kept the waterfalls and streams running smoothly so they could turn the mills of the local village. In return the villagers would bring the water sprite bannocks (Scottish flatbreads) each day. I started to daydream about a darker, Lovecraftian twist on this story. Some Ancient One dwelling in the forests and controlling the water - the very life essence of the village - in return for offerings of the soul. The concept was filed away in the back of my mind for some months.

“The following year I was on a flight to visit my friend in Bodrum. He had been the producer and editor on the original disbanded Vampire film, and I found myself thinking about the project again. I wondered if the sound cue files were still on my laptop, which they were. It had been a year since I’d even heard them. Hearing the eldritch folk-tinged sounds of the whistles and plucked strings my mind instantly returned to the idea of the Lovecraftian folk horror story. I started jotting down notes and musical ideas and by the time I landed in Bodrum I already had the album title - The Vale. Having the album concept and prototype ideas to work with was a huge head start in making the album. Although all of the original cues were so dramatically developed and transformed that they really just served as the initial clay on the wheel.

“I used a Doepfer A100 modular synth to create the animalistic yelps, conches and horns that were improvised over the original cues as a response to the arcane “folk” world of the acoustic instruments. This half-acoustic half-modular landscape was the sonic scene-setter I needed to move onto the composition and musical journey of the album. I composed and developed most of the musical parts on an Oberheim Matrix 6 synthesizer. However all the percussion, rhythmic sequences and ornamental synth sounds were created from improvised modular sessions multitrack recorded. A lot of editing later, the soundtrack to the movie in my mind was finally there.

Fabrizio Lapiana continues to offer up deep musical escape from these troubling times with another expertly crafted techno EP, Cantamen, on his own Attic Music label. It features four of his own original cuts and builds on the success of his latest release, Collective Chaos, back in March.

For more than a decade, this Italian artist has been at the forefront of a techno scene that deals in deep and rolling drums, well sculpted synths and cavernous grooves that are rich in ambient detail. His Attic Music label has been at the centre of that thanks to careful A&R and always innovative releases, while he has also released on cult imprints such as M_Rec Ltd, ARTS, Figure Jams and Out-Er and many other collaborations.

Sleek opener 'Demons' is a mind melting and widescreen deep techno groove. Groaning synths creep across the face of the track as all manner of earthy and organic motifs drift by, as if you're racing through an underground network of caves. It's music for the mind as well as the body, and the hugely atmospheric 'Cantamen' is just the same - fizzing synth details and alien life forms fill the airwave with tension as the smooth and supple kick drums pound away down below.

The hypnotic masterclass continues on 'Kura' with rattling snares and harder hitting drums making you move your body before coarse claps and a majestic arpeggiated synth hook repeats up top and takes you to another level of rapture. Last of all is the fantastic 'Back Home', which has a skeletal electro groove run through with late night sci-fi pads. Its vast sense of cosmic infinity leaves you feeling floating adrift amongst the stars.

These are four evocative and cinematic techno tracks that take you into another dimension.

Viennese improvisation guitar/drums duo ALSO return with a superb live recording. Katharina Ernst and Martin Siewert(of Radian) have been working together for more than five years and continue to enjoy their compelling dynamics. This set is full of fire and thunder but also drawn by some striking fragile moments through a variety of effects and some delicate lap steel play – two true masters in working on the axis of refracting and reflecting, and throwing it back again.