Techno News

El Absurdo comes as the first Release of Colombian label Disidencia Records.

An EP made up of 100% synthesiser sounds that navigates through the realms of Electro, Techno, EBM and Breaks.
These genres get all tied up in this 4 track instalment with brief Spanish lyrics that question some of the reality of South-American society.

Skuum calls for total exhaustion on Strictly Strictly with his infernal Blue Nespresso EP. Side A is a triple overdose of heavy bass and well-distributed breakbeats, putting a ban on any attempt to rest. On side B, Luz1e kills it with her heretic Electro interpretation of FORZA while Shedbug takes the E R A V E to another level of pure Hands-Upness. Strictly no eye kept dry on this one.

Nite Fleit steers a course through electro, breaks, techno and acid to deliver a debut LP made up of two distinct halves, exploring contrasting emotional states and new sonic territories.

Shifting between styles, emotions and eras with ease and hiding surprises around every corner, Nite Fleit owes her rapid rise as a DJ and producer to an ability to keep dancers perpetually on their toes. Coming up through Sydney’s underground club scene, the Australia-born, London-based artist started producing as recently as 2016, making her production debut for Steel City Dance Discs in 2018. Since then she has appeared on labels across the globe including Return to Disorder, Planet Euphorique, Unknown To The Unknown, International Chrome, Acid Avengers and her own imprint, Atomic Alert.

‘Day Fleit / Nite Fleit’ is an LP with no front or back cover - depending on the listener’s intended destination the album’s two discs can be listened to in either order. ‘Overload’ wastes little time in setting the tone for ‘Day Fleit’. Densely layered, soaring arpeggiated acid lines twist and dance around Nite Fleit’s spoken lyrics, inspired by Delia Derbyshire and Barry Bermange’s iconic 1964 ‘The Dreams’ sound collage. On ‘Like I Used To Be’ warm, dreamy chords are decorated with sparkling synth melodies and vocals from Nite Fleit’s friend and fellow producer Mesmé. From the triumphant EBM textures of ‘The Flower Dance’, which features a theatric monologue by Partiboi69 reciting an Alan Watts speech, to the video-game pop melodies of ‘Dark End of the Street’ and ‘Morning Song’, on ‘Day Fleit’ Nite Fleit infuses her sound with a new buoyance and musicality.

On the flip, those rich colourful harmonies make way for the imposing, mechanical rave energy on punishing percussive techno and electro cuts like ‘Double Digits’ and ‘Nah’. Nite Fleit’s graceful acid lines turn feverish and frenzied on ‘Airs & Graces’ and ‘Paranoid Energy’ - a pair of break-heavy, mutant club tracks fine-tuned for dark and manic basement raves. ‘Bold Poke’ provides a moment of brooding, melodic respite, before ‘Serious Effect’ a cinematic closing electro workout. Across these 12-tracks, taken from a vast pool of demos sketched out over the last two years, Nite Fleit provides a sonic snapshot of swinging emotions and dancefloor yearnings, delivered with uncompromising energy, melody and contrast.

Dancing as an act of rebellion is the first Abraxas LP in collaboration with the Valencian label Soil Records. A compilation of the first project recordings released between 2020 and 2021 plus some new tracks and, in addition to this, a second vinyl by other darkwave electronic artists remixing the first one: Geistform, We Are Not Brothers, Ober Dada, Melting Dogmas, SMforma, HBK1, José Rodríguez, SOJ and PanDemian.

Abraxas is a halfway project between dark dance electronic music, philosophical reflection, socio-political activism and musical entrepreneurship. Its main goal is to shake bodies and minds by spreading messages of individual and social self-criticism from the point of view of duality, extremes and contradiction, inherent to the human being and capitalist society.

Flickering ears. A sharp blue sky. You get a hint of the sun, squinting through the broken windows of the former, northern ammunition plant. Concrete slabs beneath your feet. You still taste the fume, you feel bricks and steel and your warm, inner voice purrs soothingly in last night's rhythm: „understood“.

Flimmern in den Ohren. Schneidend blau strahlt der Himmel. Du erahnst die Sonne blinzelnd durch die zerbrochenen Fenstern hinter der ehemaligen Munitionsfabrik Nord. Die grauen Betonplatten unter deinen Füßen, schmeckst du noch Rauch, fühlst Stahl und Backstein, während dir deine warme, innere Stimme beruhigend im Takt der vergangenen Nacht zuschnurrt: „verstanden.

Minimal Synth, Darkwave, EBM, Synthwave and New Wave from Sweden.

> French Electro Caster DynArec, appears almost like a living sequencer, breathing keynotes patterns among forgotten FM modulations. Four tracks for true Electro lovers…

Ladislav Zensor returns for a 3rd EP on the label with Notions of Causality. The Czech producer showcases his trademark atmospheric electronics, soundtracking a world on the verge of collapse. The EP is completed by a remix by d&b producer Overlook.

Levat strikes back on Storno with four haunted cuts for the non-believers. Unpolished hardware jams made from the dancefloors for the dancefloors.

Launched in 2016, Lunar Orbiter Program continues to prove the ability of his pilot Torai who is just back from his second moon landing.

2022 Repress

The first album in 7 years from seminal electronic music pioneers and twice Mercury Prize Nominated, Leftfield. Currently reaching a new audience through Idris Elba’s Gucci ad, this will be their 4th album in their 28 year history. The new single will be featured in the soon to launched eFootball by Konami (previously PES).

Their last tour (in 2017) featured 7 sold out UK shows (including 2 X Brixton Academies), a sold out world tour and various festival headlines.

Quote from Neil Barnes: "I wanted ‘Pulse’ to be the first statement from the new album. It felt strong. Dance floor. Human. Positive. And I love the bass. It’s Leftfield."

Full pitch notes with bio to come

CULTURE

Leftfield (originally comprised of Neil Barnes and Paul Daley), have been at the cutting edge of dance music since the 1990s, releasing albums that have become some of the most influential electronic records of all time around the world with their debut LP 'Leftism' being widely regarded as one of the most boundary-pushing electronic LPs ever released.

In 2010, Neil Barnes reignited the Leftfield name, and went on to release an acclaimed new album (Alternative Light Source) touring the world with the full live band. Neil has also been cementing his reputation as a top-tier DJ and record collector unleashing modern dance floor weapons, selling out venues, headlining festivals and creating some amazing nights with his sets.

Junction Forest is back with its second Shroom, this time by the well named notorious Wesphalian trance duo.. Trancesetters Of Westphalia.

3 trippy cuts coming right from the heart of the woods,
Pulse of The Trees is before all the untold stories of what is happening when the forest sleeps,
what can't be seen but be sensed,
what can't be conceived but be felt,
what is being concocted deep inside the woodland, beneath the brambles, where the sunlight barely makes its way through, where the darkest things happen...

Label owner Steffi and Sepehr team up!!! Fast banging contemporary electro is what they serve. Fierce Psychedeli(c)a wrapped in timelessness.

BRUCE, K-LONE, RHYTHMIC THEORY AND GLANCES line-up on this tearing 12" comp. TIP!

The 12" brings these four artists who have close ties to Chris Farrell’s Bristol based label and shop.

Bruce with a contemplative dancefloor dub in tribute to Alex T, esteemed Leeds record shop worker and DJ - sadly taken from us too young.

K-LONE delivers a subtle and subby house roller.

Rhythmic Theory makes a final appearance with a bumpy and bassy techno track.

Glances bring a deft funkiness to the broken techno sound.

This is the end of a chapter. The last Idle Hands release for the time being. The shop continues and new projects beckon.

#PF005 ITRIA VOL.3 is a slow techno-inspired cosmic journey that condenses in a single orbit a great cast of artists coming from different galaxies. It marks an evolution in sound and mood, taking us to a deeper and more visceral dimension.
The first track by Interstellar Funk is a 100% pure electronic mind-trip, a machined groove where thoughts still roam frenetically paves the way for a more intimate experience.
Tamburi Neri’s downtempo track shapes a space-time portal in which to sink; their sound is like a beat echoing from the bottom of the chest and spreading to the tips of the fingers softly.
For the first time, Salamanda co-works with Polifonic framing a Korean unknown soundscape, an ambient loop track through which we break away from this dimension and move towards the exotic.
Hiver restore a connection with reality through their pulsating bass. The heartbeat speeds up, but we still float into a dreamy techno atmosphere.
Claudio PRC & ZIPPO come into play with a powerful combination of techno textures that gets us to resurface and awaken the senses.

Morphid and x(eptional signed to Lucid Recordings in quick succession back in the day, their complementary styles helping to establish the label as a purveyor of pioneering and divergent quality techno sounds. They often worked in the studio together, and now they’re gleefully doing it all over again with this perfectly pitched platter of originals and remixes from the two duos.

x(eptional’s epic breakbeat techno sound always went down a storm at the original Lucid events – live and on disc – and second-hand prices prove their Lucid releases have lost none of their dancefloor appeal.

Morphid’s sparse, offbeat sound was always different, otherworldly. Delightfully strange while always warm and witty – and a little bit spooky!

Side 1 presents two classic originals, one by each duo: x(eptional’s a-whole-night-in-one track classic Dark Waves, a ten-minute-plus banger of epic proportions and soaring highs, followed by Morphid’s ethereal Gezouten Dessert, with its pared down bare breaks and brooding tones.

Side 2 sees x(eptional and Morphid switching roles to present radical and thrilling reworkings of each other’s tracks. Morphid strip down x(eptional’s Dark Waves into a cut-up of eerie, angular funk rhythms, voices and sounds, while x(eptional extract the beats from Morphid’s Gezouten Dessert and transpose it into a whirlwind of jazz-tinged breakbeat techno that gets a grip from the get-go and just won’t let go.

Recorded live in Birmingham, 8th of November 1997
Duration 45’30”

All Tracks written and produced by Daft Punk for Daft Life
Retouche Janvier

Published by Concorde Music Publishing for World excluding France
Delabel Editions / Daftmusic for France

Seasoned heads may already be aware of DynArec. The project of one Chris Kalera, DynArec has been a force in the electro underground for more than two decades at this point, releasing numerous records and helming the Vaporwave label to boot. He has marked himself out as a purveyor of top-quality machine-funk during his career, a producer who runs with the spirit of Detroit to craft club traxx of wicked intensity.

After a period of relative quiet in the late 2010s, Kalera has roared back into action recently, with a run of releases emerging in 2021 and 2022 across labels including Cultivated Electronics, Superluminal and Umwelt's New Flesh. Now the Vaporwave Records founder takes his Central Processing Unit bow with the Force In The Sum EP, and his hard-hitting electro style is immediately at home on the Sheffield imprint.

Force In The Sum commences with 'A Dispatching Role', a track where eerie vocal snippets and delay-drenched anti-melodies cluster around a volatile low-end wobble and crisp 808 snap. It's equal-parts ominous and invigorating, kind of like the Thom Yorke of 'Kid A' times if he'd been granted an audience with Gerald Donald. 'A Dispatching Role' is prime slalom music, and the mood carries through to following cut 'Stabilized'. After a stentorian opening of unerring kick drums and fizzing keys, 'Stabilized' soon blooms into a retro-futurist robo-electro joint which comes off like a more textured iteration of Unit Moebius.

Things open up a little more on first B-side 'Canonical Form' - at least, they do before the track's pretty opening flushes are interrupted by a vicious blurting bassline reminiscent of, say, Jensen Interceptor. There are no broken beats here, the track's unyielding four-on-the-floor thud pushing the joint a little more towards techno mode than the A-side jams. This straight beat remains on Force In The Sum closer 'Classification Of Elements', with sputtering hi-hats playing off the groovy pings of the synths to devilishly danceable effect. Slip-sliding saw sounds and spine-tingling, almost 'X-Files'-esque lead lines enter to up the ante, but the mood shifts after DynArec starts to lace lush chordal stabs and delay-drenched modular runs through the track. All the while, a voice repeats the mantra "what matters is the sound" - and who could deny the truth in this statement?

DynArec's prolific recent run continues with the four track Central Processing Unit debut Force In The Sum. Tense, expansive and worldbuilding, this is wickedly danceable electro done right. Truly, what matters is the sound.

RIYL: Jensen Interceptor, Cardopusher, Cygnus, Silicon Scally