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On the surface, Giallo Oscuro is a pop-oriented project about 60's italian love songs. Giallo Oscuro is the missing link between romance, lightness, recklessness and fear, terror, murder and psychosexual dementia. It's an homage to the music of those "maestri" who forever changed the sound of pop music, as much as the movie soundtracks of the time: Bruno Nicolai, Egisto Macchi, Alessandro Alessandroni, Gruppo di improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza, Ennio Morricone...

More than a rereading of this beautiful music, Giallo Oscuro is about love, loss, distance, time, heartbreak, falling, "pop star's" fall and decadence. This project is about death, about the dead.

Silk-screen, hand printed cover.

Dieter Moebius (1944-2015), Teil des legendären Duos Cluster und Pate des Elektro-Krautrocks, war ein Avantgardist der deutschen elektronischen Musik. Tim Story und Jon Leidecker sind zwei amerikanische Elektronikmusiker, die unterschiedlicher kaum sein könnten: Story ist bekannt für seine warmen Soundscapes, Leidecker hat sich unter dem Pseudonym Wobbly vor allem mit experimentellen Klangforschungen einen Namen gemacht. Außerdem ist er Mitglied des Musik- und Kunstkollektivs Negativland. Im September 2012 quartierten sich die Drei in den Bergen Montanas in Brett Allens fantastischem Aufnahmestudio Snowghost ein, das hoch über dem Whitefish Lake inmitten der Rocky Mountains thront. Dort verschmolzen die Tage ineinander und hatten weder Anfang noch Ende. Aus Improvisationen entstand Musik, die erst im Moment des Klangs zu dem wurde, was sie war. Nach sieben Tagen hatten die Musiker eine Festplatte voll mit Material gefüllt, aus dem später die Alben "Snowghost Pieces" - das 2014 bei Bureau B veröffentlicht wurde - und "Familiar" entstehen sollten. Auf "Familiar" scheinen explizite Anspielungen auf die Schönheit der umgebenden Natur nur schwer zu finden zu sein - das Album enthält etliche der ruhelosesten und abstraktesten musikalischen Arbeiten des ganzen Aufenthalts.

'Trax Test' is the first ever survey of Italy's pioneering, visionary and influential label and mail art collective Trax, which ran from 1981 - 1987 as a network for the creation of collaborative projects. The collective included a pre-NWW Colin Potter and some of the earliest work from Masami Akita aka Merzbow, but also had deep connections with the art world; a few trax members went on to become famous designers and artists - Ettore Sottsass of hugely influential Memphis Group even guests on vocals on the last track of the compilation. The whole selection here is rare as heck and sorely in-demand by collectors, much of it now making its vinyl premiere some 30 odd years after the fact.
With credit due to compilers Vittore Baroni of Trax and Ecstatic's avowed wave fiend, Alessio Natalizia (Not Waving) - who was also behind the 'Mutazione (Italian Electronic & New Wave Underground 1980-1988)' compilation - 'Trax Test' is a portal to the international scene which laid the grassroots for a proliferation of electronic music over the proceeding decades - a pioneering part of the infrastructure for independent music distribution which could be said to pre-echo the myriad social networks and platforms which exist for sharing music today.
As Frans De Waard astutely points out in the 16-page booklet, there were no 'templates' for this thing back then - as opposed to the forms of Soundcloud, Spotify or YouTube nowadays - meaning artists did everything DIY: from cutting, pasting and xeroxing their artwork to xperimenting with recording techniques and disseminating their work; all resulting a wonderfully daring and freeform mosaic of ideas which valued the virtues of ostensibly 'unfinished' or open-ended work, when compared with more expensive, 'proper' studio output.
Traces of disco, cosmic krautrock, jazz, electro-pop and industrial noise are all tessellated across the compilation's 25 tracks, with a number of artists and the same equipment - cheap drum machines, synths, FX and tape - cropping up in various, mutant formations.
In terms of obscurity, quality and variation, this set is right up there with the best compilations from Vinyl-on-Demand (an early supporter of this project), Light Sounds Dark (although Ecstatic guys did it legit, lol), or Minimal Wave, and likewise probably saves you the few months wages it would take to track down all the originals. Fucking bravo, we say!









REDNIGHT (EXCERPT)

This is Amateur Childbirth's Christian Rock album. The previous LP from Ivan Matthew David's solo project, 2015's Pripyat, concerned itself with the blighted belief systems of UFO worshippers, Your Afterlife Is Cancelled expands this compelling solo project's field of enquiry to look at a wider array of religious anomalies' - cults, for want of a better word. Each song is about a different such anomaly.To call Hicks' vision apocalyptic would be to underplay its cruelty. The Bible's rampant sadism pales in comparison.

Hungarian composer and musicologist László Hortobágyi, took his first expedition to North India in the late 1960's to record music, study philosophy and learn traditional instruments such as the rudra-vina, sitar, surbahar and tabla. These ongoing trips heavily influenced his musical style and much of his recorded work. LFI is happy to announce the reincarnation of one of his most illustrious works, Transreplica Meccano originally released by Hungaropop in 1988.
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As a child László fantasised about interacting with otherworldly muses and imploring them for the hope and guidance he yearned to escape the intellectual bareness of his surroundings. His early feelings of alienation combined with the almost sensual pleasure he remembers from these interactions, influenced and helped shape his life long musical journey. In 1980 he established the musical society called Gáyan Uttejak Mandal. It was named after the Hindu-Moslem musician's society founded by Navraojí Kabrají in 1870 (it was the school of the great musicologist, V.N Bhátkhánde).
The society expanded throughout the 1980's with an archive of oriental music, to be considered unique and unrivalled in Eastern Europe, which has operated parallel to the Gáyan Uttejak Studio and the Gáyan Uttejak Orchestra. The members have made it their duty to practice and study the world heritage of traditional cultures.

The remastered and revised edition of Transreplica Meccano is reborn after 31 years. László weaves a tapestry of sample based magic, transcribed from travels across the orient, transporting the listener to a fascinating world of archaic musicality. His sound palette is rebuilt and restructured using PCM morphology and FFT spectrum analysis as well as virtual overtone processing synthesis software he developed in 1988. The new live program's repertoire is also based on the classical Indian instrumental technique of the Gáyaki-Ang and the Tablá-tárang polyrhythmic structure, and is mixed with his developed sound morphology of the granular systhesis technique according to his original 'computed memesis of music' concept. The result is an incredible amalgamation of musical worlds, allow yourself to be immersed in a truly unique dialect.

Following up on their intricate and thought-provoking cassette from Berlin's Circula, and a string of highly appreciated Bandcamp compilations, Loose Lips turn the tables to present this debut album from Japanese producer, Masaki Uchida.

The mysterious composer presents his inaugural venture into album territory with a full length LP soaked in atmosphere, intimidating noise and razor sharp attention to detail. Uchida's uncanny approach leaves the listener dazzled, moving from perturbed ambience and experimental sound design through to baffling broken rhythms.

Xenolinguistics' thoughtfulness comes from anger, prayer and sorrow. Despite sounding alternative in its construction, Masaki's desire is to to share these expressions with popular culture.

The album is rounded off by 2 remixes from Loose Lips crew members, Rico Casazza and T-Scale. Following Casazza's masterful album of moody electro on Archipelearlier this year, the inspired Italian here covers 'Logos' in sophisticated breakbeats & moving instrumentation. Then T-Scale's remix transforms the already overwhelming 'Black Puzzle' into a lengthy industrial labyrinth.

Mastered at Dadub Studios.

Dear ladies and gentleman, May I allow myself to present to you something quite special. Perhaps you are not quite able to imagine, or maybe you just don't know any better, but incase it is not already obvious: OTTO - whose last album 'Greatest Hits' created furore not only with their female fans - have just backed it up with a new release more advanced than most. Which of the two can play the flute, or which has a drivers license you ask Most likely can the strongest clues be found in their delirium. Do enjoy.

This new soundtrack album features 13 original compositions by the acclaimed experimental composer Ben Frost, creator of the critically-lauded studio albums by The Throat (2009) and Aurora (204), as well as music for the film Sleeping Beauty and 2015 British television series Fortitude. For this release the artist creates vivid minimalist textures that capture the drama of the compelling new film Super Dark Times. When Kevin Phillips approached me to write music for his film it resonated immediately. As a composer, the thing that perhaps excited me the most is that Super Dark Times, is in many ways of a period drama, and that within that idea there was a largely untapped world of sound to explore. Whilst the sound of the '80s has long since moved into the realm of retro, 1995 still feels uncomfortably close. CD Walkmans, digital delays, Boss Metal Zone distortion pedals, Intel Pentium chips, and Peavey practice amps inadvertently defined the music of the period (and my teenage years), and it was from that world of technology and my own memories of the confusion, the anxiety, the black hair dye the music for Super Dark Times was born.' - Ben Frost

Limited edition 180g vinyl reissue 2LP's on Virgin EMI. Download cards included.

Holotype Editions was founded as a means of bringing out music by some of the most unique and peculiar artists of the last decades. What could be more fitting for the imprint's seventh release, than the duo of cult artist Ghe´dalia Tazarte`s and multi-instrumentalist, composer and singer Maya Dunietz.
Recorded live at Cafe Oto, in December 2013, Schulevy Maker documents the duo's first live appearance. An amalgam of bizarre samples, concrete sounds, live piano and bells, juxtaposed with the otherworldly voices of Dunietz and Tazarte`s. At times light and humorous, at others dark and ritualistic, Schulevy Maker can hardly be labeled or tagged. The album title refers to Shoemaker-Levy 9, a disrupted comet that collided with Jupiter in July 1994. Tazarte`s and Dunietz freely reassembled the syllables of the comet's name, coming up with this obscure title.
A truly life-affirming record, by two artists defying categorization, Schulevy Maker comes in a limited edition of 300 copies, pressed on black vinyl with a beautiful cover designed by We Are Still Bold and Beautiful.

Photay's debut full-length Onism inherits the same historical tension in an age of climate change and social media addiction. It is also a reflection of personal conditions, a meditation on place, community, and its creator's own embodied history. The word 'onism,' invented by John Koenig, means the frustration of being stuck in just one body that inhabits only one place at a time. Shornstein contrasts spacious near-silence with bombastic saturated peaks. Fangled robotic tones ('Screens') meet with forest floor ambience ('Storm'), evoking visual designs for the built and natural worlds, while the overwhelm of metropolis ('Balsam Massacre') and the digital age ('The Everyday Push') is eased by the liberatory forests of Woodstock ('Outré Lux' feat. Madison Mcferrin) and assumptions into imagined realities ('Bombogenesis'). The demonic swing of 'Balsam Massacre' imagines the sounds of a tree's innards as it is felled with a chainsaw, while 'Storm' thunders distantly in triumphant reverie. On 'Aura,' Shornstein sings for the second time in his career ( Take the time to hear yourself'). The message hints at a common denominator to his meditations, resonating also as a warning to the world, an everyday push to the role of electronic music in storytelling the future of the global environmentalist movement. 'Onism' is pressed on 12' 140 gram clear transparent vinyl and includes a double-sided full-color 12' insert along with a digital download card.

Montreal stalwart Roger Tellier Craig (of Le Révélateur / Fly Pan Am) returns to Root Strata under his given name to offer a stunningly abstract pair of compositions indicating a severe departure from his earlier work. While Instantanés might at first evoke Acousmatic and Musique concrète traditions, the two side-long snapshots Roger presents feel far more spontaneous and rustic than those trappings might suggest, or as Luc Ferrari would say a concrète music of the poor.' A studied meditation over 10 years in the making, Instantanés is a surreal mix of the familiar and the alien, a lush garden indifferent to human cultivation or experience.

Two previously unreleased recordings from one of Greece's pioneers of electroacoustic music. Stephanos Vassiliadis (b.1933 - d. 2004) founded in 1979, together with Iannis Xenakis, the Contemporary Music Research Center (CMRC) and remained its director until his death in 2004. His largely undocumented artistic output consists of works for theatre productions, mostly unfinished or fragmented electroacoustic pieces, as well as numerous children songs. Vassiliadis was also a significant pedagogue and some of his initiatives have reformed the musical education system of Greece.

EN PYRI (1973)
Recorded in 1976 by Andreas Rodousakis on double-bass and the composer himself on the mixing desk of Radio Sweden Studio in Stockholm, En Pyri presents a previously unreleased version of Stephanos Vassiliadis's composition for tape and double-bass written in the memory of Jani Christou. En Pyri was composed three years after a multi-fatal car crash that caused the untimely deaths of Anastasia Vassiliadi (first wife of Stephanos Vassiliadis), Jani Christou (acclaimed composer, close friend and collaborator of Stephanos Vassiliadis) and of Christous's wife Theresia Christou Choremi. The title En Pyri, translating as In Fire, comes from the First Epistle of the Corinthians ..for the day will disclose it, because it is revealed in fire..', referring to that what remains after death, or in the composer's words: man's song-creation is the only thing that can withstand and overcome destruction'. The fire is clearly pictured during a particularly long climax starting midway to the end of the piece. The dramatic aspect of this spectrally dense section is even stronger during live shows, with the performer centre-stage fiercely playing double-bass, but failing to be heard over the full-range audio of the 8-track tape. This staged element of En Pyri is inevitably lost with the reproduction of this recording, but the audio alone carries a heavy load. Sounds as if written out of total need and almost physical necessity to deal with death and loss. At the end of the composition, while the performer is still onstage, a quiet tone is revealed' and held for a few minutes signifying that what remains, that what is revealed in fire'. In most performances of En Pyri, Vassiliadis was on the mixing desk. According to statements of his close friends and collaborators, he would gradually increase the level of the 8-track tape to the point he could physically feel the sound on his body. Needless to say, playback of this track in maximum volume is highly recommended.

BACCHAE (1974)
Bacchae was written for a production of Euripide's tragedy The Bacchae directed (and choreographed) by the distinguished choreographer Zouzou Nikoloudi. This particular play was part of the University of California Intercampus Cultural Exchange Program and was never performed in Greece. From the 25th of September to the 3rd of October 1974, it was staged seven times in different campuses of the University of California (Santa Barbara, Irvine, San Diego, Riverside, Davis, Santa Cruz, Berkeley) . These seven shows were to become the only occasions this composition was presented to the public. Bacchae seems to be Vassiliadi's first attempt in bringing together his background in electroacoustic music with the music he grew up to. He beautifully achieves this by juxtaposing modular synthesizer tones with samples of greek traditional music from his collection of archival recordings. These two elements ebb and flow throughout the composition, at times becoming indistinguishable from each other. The manner in which Vassiliadis mixes acoustic and synth drones together resembles electronic music of following decades. Developed gradually over a duration of 23 minutes of uninterrupted and texturally thick audio, Bacchae is a kind of proto-ambient, folk-drone electroacoustic piece, luckily rediscovered in the archipelago of recorded music.
This release was made possible thanks to the invaluable support of some close persons to Stephanos Vassiliadis. We would like to thank the composer's family (especially his grandson Stephanos Andreou, for his artwork, and his daughter, Evi Vassiliadis, for the research in her father's archive and the editing of the texts) as well as the composer's friends and collaborators Andreas Rodousakis, S. K., Charalampos Daradimos, Dimitris Karageorgos and Anargyros Deniosos.

- 180 GRAM AUDIOPHILE VINYL
- GATEFOLD SLEEVE
- FIRST PRESSING OF 1.000 INDIVIDUALLY
NUMBERED COPIES ON TRANSPARENT VINYL

Seven is the seventh studio album by Soft Machine, released in 1973. Roy Babbington, who had previously contributed to Fourth (MOVLP1601) and Fifth (MOVLP1599) on double bass as a session musician, replaced Hugh Hopper on bass guitar, who left to begin a solo career.

Their unique take on jazz rock was groundbreaking. Seven is a highly diverse album combining minimal, spacey elements and some great instrumental jamming. It was also the last of their studio releases to carry a numbered title.

A limited run of 1.000 copies will be available on transparent vinyl.

A-side fully hypnotic, frontal, skeletal & static live drum track with dubbed vocoder throughout the whole side. Helsinki's Jesse duo with a special non-album track from their album sessions produced by DJ Sotofett (upcoming LP on Keys Of Life). On the flip LNS collaborates with DJ Sotofett for a shimmering and pad warming ambient track kept coherent by liquid driplets of echoed synths at the beginning and later the tickering & harmonic arpeggios.

Debüt-EP des neuen Warp-Signings aus Italien: Lorenzo Lenni offenbart aus der Perspektive des Ex-Straight-Edge-Hardcore-Punkers eine frische Sicht auf den 1990'er Hardtrance und seine Auswirkungen auf EDM und Dancehall. Allerdings sind seine Emotions- und Sensationsstrukturen verfeinert und eindringlicher, was seine EP in eine Reihe mit den Arbeiten von SOPHIE, Plastikman, Ennio Morricone oder Squarepusher stellt, die das schnelle Auf- und Ableben in den Zyklen der modernen Musik überdauern.

"Feeling numb from all the electronic dancemusic coming out, moaning about how its become a bit samey, or are you just tired of your shitster friends saying its not like in the 90's anymore. This record will shut everyone in the room up. A1 is a deeply psychotic acid death march into confusion, so minimal and primitive (kick, snare, acidsquelch) it will challenge every beard and armpit and might even hypnotize the dj to the point he cannot mix in the next one. A2 is a straight up Commodore 64 SID track with mongoloid data elephants tooting over a wobbly and tarded electroish beat. B1 is a dystopic dreamy rave stomper, starting out kinda datacuddly but gets more and more serious, with choirs of fable mooers taking you into that virtual bad trip you need. b2 continues as expected with more c64 SID madness, so snary I cant even determine if its in 115 or 230bpm. But it leaves you with the feeling your ears and mind just been wrestled, smacked and poked at, and thats the point. This is no record for the safing chickenshit DJ." - /DJ Joakim Cosmo, Sweden.

* PE-010 is a pretty trippy split tape between L.Zylberberg and Belia Winnewisser that should strike anybody's soft spot for esotericism.

* 'Chatter', a 15-miuntes balearic/electro-jam by L.Zylberberg, feels like a warm handshake between Manuel Göttsching and Heinrich Müller. L.Zylberberg does ring a bell Then you've probably run into her at Berlin hotspots like Sameheads, O Tannenbaum or Griessmühle.

* The other side of the tape features three synth-pop-y oddballs by Belia Winnewisser that are equally fragil, haunting and strong, and they sit somewhere between the smell of melted butter and having a nude jog. Belia is a Lucerne-based artist that is part of a=f/m (alongside Rolf Laureijs) and goth-outfit Evje, among other projects.

* The split tape marks the 10th audio-release of Präsens Editionen. Black ink printed on pink cassette, housed in a glossy cardboard slipcase featuring calligraphic designs by Kaj Lehmann - 100 copies only.

Press / PromotionPräsens Editionen was founded in 2011 to give home to zweikommasieben Magazin. Ever since a bunch of magazines, books, zines, records, tapes and oddities have been published. After the quickly sold out tape by the American experimentalist Robert Turman, PE-010 is the next opportunity to get hold of a Präsens Editionen tape.
zweikommasieben is a Swiss magazine that has been devoted to the documentation of contemporary music and sounds since the summer of 2011. The magazine features artist interviews, essays and columns as well as photography, illustration and graphics. In addition, zweikommasieben organizes concerts, parties, club nights, matinees, raves and other fun events in various cities—and started to release music with its mothership Präsens Editionen.

Print / Internet-716 La Vie (1.2k followers on Soundcloud): Track premiere and/or mix by one of the artists-zweikommasieben (print run of 1700 copies; distrubited worldwide): 1/1 page ad
Social NetworkingPräsens Editionen - Facebook = 320 likes.zweikommasieben - Facebook: zweikommasieben = 4500 likes. Twitter: @zweikommasieben = 490 followers.

Mary Ocher (Klangbad) - 'hoohoo. it's lovely '
Steve Warwick (aka Pan's Heatsick) of Birds Of Delay "Late night / early morning hazed meditations"

Following up his self titled 12 inch earlier this year Austin, Texas based Shane English continues in his path exploring the deep and bizarre edges of the American DIY electronic world. *DOWNLOAD CARD INCLUDED!*
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Over these eight tracks we get English's wide spanning take on the music touching upon elements of industrial on "Invasion Threat" darker ambient with opening track "Sanctuary" and even hints of Stinson on "Bilocation Drift". English's signature sparse and melancholic tone is present throughout again using minimal percussion and voice to glue it all together in a haunting fashion. Another engaging listen direct from the depths of the American underbelly.

Originally released on Art Yard in 2017 finally back in print!

Solo album displaying a collection of foggy electronic dub meditations recorded between 2000 and 2005 by Berliner Ring member Alexander Christou under his Al Chem guise.

In 2009, the label Art Yard sent a probe into the outer regions of contemporary electronic music, releasing Berliner Ring's "Orbital" album, a dub techno hymnal for Berlin’s orbital ring road. Drawing together the disparate elements of invented instruments, modified keyboards, customized rhythm and string machines, it was built around moods and themes drawn from the Berlin landscape.

One member of the Ring, Alexander Christou, also a part of the Berlin electro rock group Elecdrones, recording for Katzensonne. The band were “not interested in the crafting of chunks of music ready to be consumed”. Christou has since been recording under the moniker Al Chem, crossing analogue and digital realms, synthesizing a kind of philosopher’s stone. As Al Chem, he released on Tummy Touch Records, and now follows with a collection of foggy electronic dub meditations recorded between 2000 and 2005 in a full album.

In the battle to harness the elements, ancient mists permeated Chem’s music. A murky, mercurial humidity saturates the project. A distinctly north European descendant of dub, a kind of Seventh Seal that Bergman could have made, if provided enough hydroponic infusions.

No Hopper is a rework of the Ras Michael song No Hoppers, from his legendary album, Rastafari Dub, Chem's version shuffles the pack of electronic percussion with organic, Moondog-like rhythms and hazy atmospheric chords; The Prophet pinpoints Chem's GPS firmly in Berlin, just as The Red Tower blurs that kick-drum parallel between reggae and house music; Baudelaire sputters digital delay, piling on the pressure, a clatter of surgical implements performing an operation out of Dead Ringers, the patient storming out of the theatre with loosely fitted mechanical body parts; the instrumental No Hopper only serves to highlight the distant gathering storm. Ladder of Perfection rounds off the set with a drone, creaking with bubbling digital mud pools

Mogwai return with their 9th studio album which was recorded with renowned producer Dave Fridmann (Mercury Rev, The Flaming Lip's, Mogwai's Come On Die Young and ROCK ACTION) at his Tarbox Road Studios in New York State.

Every Country's Sun named after a friends lack of knowledge in how the universe works, takes two decades of Mogwai's signature, contrasting sounds and distills it, beautifully, into 56 concise minutes of gracious elegance, hymnal trance-rock, and transcendental euphoria. It will definitely appeal to fans of the band and will gain many new ones along the way.

***Boxset includes: White vinyl double LP, 12" black vinyl (containing 6 tracks of album demos), CD, plus a set of Tarbox Road photographic prints - Includes download card redeemable from the label.***

In Another Land Pt. I is the first part of a planned trilogy. It is more or less electronic music, generated through long processes of editing and sampling. It's experimental in terms of that its shape and its meaning were not planned, were unclear during its creation and still now are not evident but somehow hard to reveal. It is based on a strict concept which could be very well explained, which the composer decided not to do. Instead of that it is full of hints. It's not a riddle, it's just an invitation to listen closely and carefully. And an invitation to think, to reflect or to imagine if you might hear something which is worth doing so. Probably this music heralds nothing!

The two staples of Polish electronica are on it again. Mirt and TER, after solo releases are back together with their next offering.

Culled from hours of "live-in-the-studio" improvisation, these 45 minutes stand out among the contemporaneous albums with a one-of-a-kind mix of post-ambient electronica having as diverse roots as techno, minimal music, krautrock electronica and afrobeat.

Based on sounds created with modular synthesizers with a dash of Prophet 12, Mirt and TER venture on a journey into thick textures obscuring lace melodies. Instead of typical four-on-the-floor rhythms they draw inspirations from African music and translate them into rich yet subtle digital structure. Subtlety is in fact the key word here. Instead of immediacy of many present-day acts they prefer their music to unravel in a leisurely manner. Each of the five tracks here has a different focus. "Bacchus Theme" is a rhythmic-oriented, almost tribal 5-minute piece, whereas "Disaster Reworked" is a floating composition carrying dense drone structures. The centrepiece seems to be "Wooden Object" closing in at 14 minutes, where Mirt and TER seem to play with their toys, but at the same time not losing focus on creating a cohesive piece of work. You can say the same thing about the whole album: it's varied, each fragment stands on its own, but at the same time all five of them create one coherent record.

ONLY 100 UNITS

Four days before New York noise musician Margaret Chardiet was supposed leave for her first European tour as Pharmakon, she had a medical emergency which resulted in a major surgery. Suddenly, instead of getting on a plane, she was bedridden for three weeks, missing an organ.

After seeing internal photographs taken during the surgery, I became hyperaware of the complex network of systems just beneath the skin, any of which were liable to fail or falter at any time,' Chardiet said. It all happened so fast and unexpectedly that my mind took a while to catch up to the reality of my recovery. I felt a widening divide between my physical and mental self. It was as though my body had betrayed me, acting as a separate entity from my consciousness.'

Consumed by these ideas, and unable to leave her bed, Chardiet occupied herself by writing the lyrics and music that would become Bestial Burden, the second Pharmakon LP for Sacred Bones Records. The record is a harrowing collection of deeply personal industrial noise tracks, each one brimming with struggle and weighted with the intensity of Chardiet's internal conflict.

Bestial Burden was recorded at Heaven Street Records in Brooklyn, N.Y. with Sean Ragon (Cult of Youth, Venerence), who also recorded 2013's critically acclaimed Abandon. Ragon allowed Chardiet to experiment with a mix of live recording and tracking, and some of the vocals were recorded live with a small group of people packed into the studio so she could feed off their energy. The result of those sessions is the bar-raising follow-up to Abandon, and an invitation to go even deeper into the sometimes terrifying, always fascinating labyrinth that is Margaret Chardiet's mind.

Recorded as part of an ambient set at Ostgut Ton Nacht 2016 in Berghain, afterwards remixed, recut and layered with some additional sounds. Clocking in at 35 minites.

Brought together in 2005 for a performance at San Francisco's venerable The Luggage Store Gallery, Anla Courtis and Thomas Dimuzio are introduced through the raw power of amplified music. Brothers in arms the duo remained in contact and in time began a recording project from afar. With a nod to classic cassette culture the distant combo exchanged source recordings with each artist concretely preparing a long-form work. The two tracks contained herein are a result of this collaboration.

Seven yers ago, it was winter break at university in Madison, Wisconsin. There was a snowstorm that covered the city with a still white haze. Not a single person in the streets. I was sitting on my bed with a cheap keyboard and a computer, screaming into the void. I barely remember writing the songs. It was a chaotic point in my life. I had no time to think about process or intent. It was a purge. I do remember taking a break from recording, bundling up, and walking through the barren streets while listening to the demos I'd made. The world, at once, felt clear. After writing and producing what would become the Stridulum EP, I contacted a new friend, Alex DeGroot, to come over and record my vocals. He was studying audio engineering and had more knowledge and gear than I could dream of. He helped mix Stridulum, too, because all I had was a pair of headphones. (Since then, Alex has stuck by me, as a live bandmate, technical director, co-producer, mixer, and engineer.) These songs were a huge leap of faith back then. It was my first time singing without layers of distortion, echo, and reverb. It was the first time I peeled back the layers to find out what was at the core. I'm still on that path today, seeing how far I can push myself into unknown places, whether through clarification or destruction. It's like Stridulum's still here with me, underneath it all. Still, it's surreal to think that this record, made by a 19-year-old girl sitting on a bed in a freezing old house in Madison, would make its way into strangers' ears seven years later.'

* Moa Pillar returns with his second LP, 'Hymns', on Karelian label Full of Nothing. To be released on July 28th, 'Hymns' follows the epic album 'Humanity' (2015).

* Offering up five tracks of transcendental heavy bass and beats, Moa Pillar aka Fedor Pereverzev, slams the worlds of authentic folk, tribal music, forward thinking electronica and dark techno together, unapologetically creating illuminating effects on his latest LP. Refusing to follow convention, Pereverzev produces his own, soul elevating sound art with his eclectic textures and sounds.

* Each track on 'Hymns' challenges the traditional meaning of its namesake. Even the meditative 'And the Moon Stopped' has an undercurrent of darkness offering, itself listening like a sacrifice to the higher energies. Developing a niche sound the producer explains; 'my music is all about energy, no physics, it's about the spirit'.

* Pereverzev first rose to prominence during his late teens after setting new age trends in the Russian beats scene circa 2009. Two years after the excellent 'Hunting' EP, Moa Pillar began to experiment with harder sounds and different forms, leading him to the sounds he creates today. Outside of Moa Pillar, Pereverzev is one of Russia's leading sound designers and co-founder of audio-production studio, Monoleak - they have recorded music for the likes of NASA and Mercedes. He has also enjoyed great success with film Bonfires and Stars premiered at Visions du Reel Festival, which follows him to the Caucasus where he collaborated with local folk musicians.

Raunachte huntsmen Die Wilde Jagd return to Jennifer Cardini's Correspondant. Previously spotted on the label's far-reaching 'Compilation 4' album earlier this year, the duo ride back into town with two more chilling tales.
Building on the immersive, otherworldly scenes they've painted on Bureau B - including last year's self-titled album - the duo, comprising Ralf Beck and Sebastian Lee Philipp, continue to paint lavish landscape scenery with thick oil paint synthesis
'Geisterfahrer' (translating to wrong-way driver or ghost driver) is all about the anticipation. The second those introductory cymbals splash and the sinewy synth bass texture start to loop there's an overwhelming sense of drama and suspense that pays off with every detailed ingredient.
We hurtle through the night to the sound of 'Drachenfels'. As its name suggests, it's a mountainous sonic hike which surges higher and higher into the clouds. Bar by bar, ripple by ripple the scenery and physicality grows with a sense of triumph as more elements are added. Reaching the summit the moment the beats finally kick in.
It's down to DFA's Factory Floor to close this vast atmospheric scene with a remix. And they do so with a beautifully blunt electro twist where chunky 909 drums punch a slo-mo break while immense dubby washes of drums scatter down across the analogue groove with a kilter-teasing defiance. A fittingly brazen contrast to the cinematica conjured by Beck and Philipp.

Stefan Schwander aka Harmonious Thelonious is definitely not a newcomer. He has been around for a long time and has already released lots of amazingly varied music on labels such as Emotional Response, Italic, Meakusma and Diskant. He's also an integral part of the infamous Duesseldorf / Salon Des Amateurs axis that is an obvious hotbed of talent. He describes his style as "American minimalism vs. African drumming vs. European sequencing", a heady mixture which is clearly evident on this EP though with a definite Middle Eastern twist. Here at Versatile HQ we were introduced to this clutch of tracks by one of the members of Acid Arab and we were totally blown away. Stefan has a very unique production style, fusing all of the above elements with a hint of Gamelan, a dash of tweaked FM synthesis type sounds with a dose of warm ambience and finally his own singular touch on the mix. We are very happy to present you these 4 tracks to you, an essential EP from one of European music's true originals.

Finders Keepers and Demdike Stare's Dead-Cert label unearth a record that has evaded collectors and online discographies for over 40 years - perhaps the rarest artefact they have reissued thus far. It's an impossible-to-find Italian library music oddity from semi-mythical producer and Fabio Frizzi collaborator Giuliano Sorgini, aka Raskovich, with a spellbinding collection of obscure and mind-bending oddities, Minimalist tape experiments, mechanical noise and musique concrète.

Best regarded for his groundbreaking electro-acoustic and concrète sound design input to The Living Dead At The Manchester Morgue and Zoo Folle, Raskovich is also linked to a wealth of impossible-to-find cult LPs with Alessandro Alessandroni's Braen, Giulia Alessandrini's Kema, and their mysterious supergroup The Pawnshop, all amounting to a catalogue which assures his place in the pantheon of library music greats.

Going deep into their under-the-counter channels, Dead-Cert have again outdone themselves with this outing, salvaging Science & Technology from total obscurity to reveal an innovator working at the full extent of his avant imagination in a sort of cybernetic symbiosis with his studio-as-instrument. Keening between sounds as much suited to a blood-lusting horror as a psychedelic, drug-fuelled thriller or some esoteric sci-fi, he penetrates and opens up vividly magnetising realms of abstraction that just beg to be explored by listeners who think they've heard it all before.

Erring closer to the kind of minimalist negative space and fractured dynamic favoured by Belgium's IPEM, or even pre-echoing the atonality of Maurizio Bianchi, for example, as opposed the fluffier lounge tendencies found on many recent reissues from his field, Science & Technology lives up to its title with impressionistic depictions of industry and plugged-in life evocatively animated under titles such as Fissione Nucleare and Biochemica, or accurately modelling processes in the mutant, polymetric patterning of Germinzione.

It really takes albums like this one to remind us of the prescient collective and individual genius of the Italian library music scene, especially at a time when the quality levels, in terms of musical intrigue and uniqueness, not just presentation, is being called into question by a swell of inferior, or just plain unnecessary library music relics. As Andy Votel explains, "this release is quite unlike the many projects that have recently flooded the reissue market and stands up as one of the truly unobtainable and wholly original records to come from this important era of European studio music by a composer whose reputation is slowly approaching monarchial status."

Simply, it's an engrossing example of the innovative technique and inventive imagination which made Italy a most legendary crucible of experimental music.

'ELSEWHERE MCMXIII' is a compilation full of electronic textures with a unique character to it, analog, lo-fi, slow dancing vibes.

Compiled by DJ soFa for Débruit's ICI label, the record is a 12-track journey through future retro oddities, that navigate in disco, coldwave, kraut territories, with a taste for experimentation, while being great to dance to.
It showcases a scene well represented at clubs like "Salon des Amateurs" or close to labels like Antidote, Music From Memory, Macadam Mambo and Dark Entries.

12-track double vinyl. Digital version also available.

All music recorded between 94-96 on several different budget machines such as the Amiga Mastersound Sampler Interface, Fostex X-26 4-Track Tape Recorder, Korg X3R Sound Module & an Alesis Quadraverb Effects Unit.

Appealing to those who seek a spiritual journey across the many terrains of Techno, this is music not for the faint of heart. All tracks serving a specific body healing purpose - receiving, assimilating and expressing life force energy, A1-20 takes you on a hypnotic trip and should be played at high volumes to fully receive all its properties. B1-81 is a one-way ticket down the river of emotion and will transport you to the 5th dimension if you don't be careful & finally B2-05 (Edit) is something unquantifiable. don't be fooled by the short nature of this track, it's hidden properties allow for an expansive journey through the mind, body & soul.

Ben UFO '20 is my jam!!'
Kowton 'rough and ready music for the floor, proper techno as its meant to be.'
Pariah 'floating away to the sounds of DJ Guy. all caps 4 can't come soon enough.'..

I Speak Machine are vocalist and synth nerd Tara Busch and filmmaker Maf Lewis. Together they make brooding soundtracks and horror/sci-fi films, creating the audio and visual in unison and giving both elements equal prominence. Their approach is inspired by Spaghetti Western cinema duo Ennio Morricone and Sergio Leone, who used to play with score ideas for scenes while scripts were being written.

Following the release of The Silence (the score to their own sci-fi short film) in 2014, Busch and Lewis have teamed up with Benge from Wrangler/John Foxx & The Maths to work on their latest short film and album, Zombies 1985.

REPRESSED !
Marionette wanders through the polyrhythms and shifting harmonics of Benjamin Kilchhofer's 'Dersu'. This is an expedition into modular synthesis and physical modelling, where patches become complex instruments, and the instruments become music. Kilchhofer composes the 4th Marionette instalment, enveloped in a film of spring reverb and tube distortion.

Belgian composer Lieven Martens Moana, formerly known as Dolphins Into The Future, interprets and re-imagines Spaniard Juan Alberto Arteche Guel's 1990 Finis Africae album "Amazonia", a Balearic classic. Utilizing analog and digital instrumentation and recording techniques, Martens, inspired by Takemitsu, Ives, Joji Yuasa and others, refers to ethnomusicology, collage, sound art, electronic music and modern composition in the construction of a narrative take on the original release. Using excerpts from the original recording, which was re-issued by EM Records in 2015, as well as various other sound sources, "Three Amazonian Essays" was composed and recorded in early 2017. Available on CD and LP, this is an extension of the original Amazonian adventure.

Cross out the all seeing eye and ears will open onto questions tracing the lithic grooves of an anachronic industrial. Why the Eye's paleo-futurism suggests a mode of Rock in Opposition displaced into alternative timelines. It is as if the Leg End of Henry Cow has escaped its retro-avant 'chamber music' fetters, toward the hypnotic patterns of dance floor exuberance. These rituals exhume unidentified audio relics from a future yet to be within a deep past that will have been. Each track on Why the Eye's debut leads into an exploration of an entranced dreamscape that would be mislabeled as an 'interlude'. Instead, Why the Eye weave numerological significance into their myth: the energetic, odd-numbered tracks are counterbalanced by the mesmeric reveries of the even-numbered tracks. Using for their titles, these unpronounceable names express the unconscious catacombs of their invisible sonic worlds. Why the Eye uses an array of handmade instruments, each featured on the album's insert: hurgy, papillon, radiocaphone, castabignettes, drumkit, and the various sizes of lamellos. These hybrid tools give an elemental presence to their lithic grooves and a uniqueness to their spectral techno. The album's opener, 'Dombo', could equally be heard as the audio parallel to the 'pataphysical Museum of Jurassic Technology as much as the reopening of the Bay-area's Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. The heavy hypnosis of 'Plastique' sets the machine churning, with its breakbeat skit closing side A. The nouveau post-rock of 'Free Gluten' continues the meditation to side B, as 'Papillon' Afro-punk invites us back to dance. 'Bragitto' lightens up the energetic weight and its dream closes the album with murmurs suitable for any ambience. If music will have been made to announce the retrieval of lost futures, the initiation of Why the Eye might be said to have incepted some of its timbres. LP + insert + download voucher.

* Experimentalist Cooper Bowman presents Maud Variations: six tracks of frayed ambience on limited cassette via the Resistance / Restraint label. Maud Variations is a collection of tense loops and meticulous synthesis, showcasing Bowman and his accomplished approach to composition and practise. At times cool & tense, Maud Variations is music for the pensive house-dweller. Have you made it out yet

* Recorded in 2016 in Melbourne, Australia.

* As Altered States Tapes boss & cassette aficionado, Cooper Bowman has diligently curated cover 70+ releases for cassette & vinyl.

* 2016 & 2017 saw Cooper performing under many pseudonyms in both Australia and worldwide, supporting artists such as Helm, Puce Mary & more.