Suche:silent em

Repress.

Back in 2015, Japanese DIY house pioneer Soichi Terada stepped back into the limelight courtesy of Rush Hour's 'Sounds From The Far East', a Hunee curated retrospective of material first released on his own Far East Recording label in the 1990s and early 2000s. Buoyed by the positive response and renewed interest in his work, Terada went back into studio to record his first new album of house music for over 25 years, Asakusa Light.

Developed over 18 months, Terada tried to recreate the mental and physical processes that led to the creation of his acclaimed earlier work. Those familiar with Terada’s celebrated, dancefloor-focused sound of the 1990s – a vibrant, atmospheric, and emotive take on deep house powered by the twin attractions of groove and melody – will find much to enjoy on Asakusa Light.

“I tried to recall my feelings 30 years ago, but when I tried it, I found it super difficult,” he explains. “I didn’t even know what I thought about myself five years ago, and the mental metabolic cycle seems to be faster than I thought. I tried different methods, including digging up my old MIDI data and composing by remembering old experiences. With the help of Rush Hour, I found some of the light from my heart that I had 30 years ago. I nicknamed the light I found in my heart, ‘Asakusa Light’.”

Produced using the very same synthesizers and drum machines that powered his 1990s work, the album is a joyous, colourful and life-affirming collection of timeless house music that not only recalls Terada’s own impeccable back catalogue, but also that of similarly celebrated contemporaries such as the Burrell Brothers or Ben Cenac (Dream 2 Science, Sha-Lor).

Terada, who has spent much of the last two decades writing video game music, has always had a gift for combining warm, undulating synthesizer basslines and perfectly programmed machine drums with stirring chords, smile-inducing melodies and mellow musical flourishes. It’s this immersive, sun-kissed and tuneful trademark style that takes centre stage on Asakusa Light, an album for the ages.

The set begins with the alien-sounding chords, soft-touch percussion and dawn-friendly warmth of ‘Silent Chord’ and ends on a high via the bouncing string stabs, starlight chords and thickset grooves of ‘Blinker’; in between, you’ll find a deluge of effortlessly feelgood music that’s the aural equivalent of a dopamine rush at sunrise.

There are subtle variations aplenty throughout the album – see the 8-bit lead lines and pulsing electronic textures of ‘Takusambient’, the vintage Tony Humphries flex of ‘Diving Into Minds’ and the effortlessly funky ‘Marimbau’ – but it’s the uniquely atmospheric, vivid and tactile nature of Terada’s loved-up sound that resonates. After well over 30 years in house music, the light in his heart is shining brighter than ever.

Dear listener,

On behalf of re:discovery records, it is with great excitement that we announce the release of Stryke – The Introspection Trilogy (1994-2022). rd011 features a track that is very close to my heart. My senior year in high school. I was heavily into chill-out music at the time. Labels like FAX, Instinct Ambient, Reflective, Astralwerks, em:t, Silent, Moonshine, Rising High, Warp, Exist Dance, Visible, Eye Q and others were giving me such a wide array of beautiful sounds of more subdued techno and rhythmic ambient music. I was buying every compilation I could at the time that looked remotely different based on the artwork, the unusual artist names or the tracks. I was soaking in everything I could under the chill-out style. That year 1994 I picked up the 2nd edition of Moonshine's 'United State of Ambience 2'.

It has so many good tracks on it. One track that always held a special place in my heart was Stryke's 'Introspection pt.1'. The simple but catchy melody layering. The easy atmosphere made me feel like I was floating in the ocean. The deep 808 bass notes (I hope one day you and I will hear this on an amazing sound system). The amazing strings reach a crescendo nearing the end. This track has so many simple but beautiful sounds on it. It's a great example of what I call sequencer-styled electronic music. At a time when producers layered tracks in more of a sequence then building or placing sounds. In 2021 I was able to get a hold of Greg Chin to see if he was interested in putting the track on my label and letting it breathe freely on its own side alone as the highlight of an EP. Greg was enthusiastic about the opportunity and told me that he always wanted to complete the trilogy he had in mind of a part 2 and 3. The ominous and eerie part 2 adds a terrific tension to the finale of part 3. The last being almost an updated part 1 really concluded the trilogy for me. Both parts melded together on side B pushing near 17 minutes. I want to thank Greg for letting us be a home to complete his journey.

- Tim Humphrey aka TIM aka errorsinspace

Von der erfolgreichen Vinyl-Compilation-Serie. “Golden Chart Hits Of The 80s & 90s” gibt es jetzt bereits die dritte Ausgabe. 12 ausgewählte Hits für alle Fans der 80er und 90er Jahre, u.a. mit einem der legendärsten Titel überhaupt : „Relax“ von Frankie Goes To Hollywood“.

Desweiteren mit dabei: Camouflage „The Great Commandment“ , Gigi D’Agostino „Bla Bla Bla“, Black “Wonderful Life” , Rednex “Old Pop In An Oak”

Attrition are pioneers in darker electronica. Formed in 1980 in Coventry, England, influenced by a mix of punk ideology and experimental art aesthetics, They emerged as part of the early '80's UK Industrial scene alongside contemporaries Coil, Test Department, Legendary Pink Dots, In The Nursery, Portion Control, and others. Founder Martin Bowes has steered the band through a 40-year career, fueled by a succession of critically acclaimed albums, selling over 100,000 to date. The band has regularly toured Europe, North and South America, Russia and Asia, appeared at major festivals and had their music included on a number of TV and film soundtracks.
The band celebrates their 40 year anniversary with their latest release, A Great Desire on Sleepers Records. The album is a compilation of some of their best tracks from 1986-2004, some never before on vinyl.

Irish producer and DJ Mano Le Tough announces his new record, At The Moment, out August 20th on DJ Koze’s Pampa Records, and presents the first single, “No Road Without A Turn.” After more than a decade of releases and touring, Mano has spent the past year at home in Zurich, rearing his young family and focusing on the positives of 14 months without performing, amid the uncertainty of the pandemic. In the face of horror, Mano channelled inspiration. With At The Moment, the follow-up to 2015’s Trails, those struggles have produced a record which balances the ambivalence of the current moment, with wistful streaks of unguarded optimism.

At The Moment shows Mano’s modes of expression evolving too. The synths and rhythms common to earlier works are now complemented with less familiar sounds and influences. Jangling guitars and sun-bleached chords envelop his own tender, plaintive vocals in a dappled wash of summery pop. Another track grounds overlapping melodies and sci-fi soundtrack pads with hip hop beats, creating a hypnotic slice of slinky retro-futurism. Where there is reflection, there is also a sense of being unafraid.

“I’ve always liked that Mallarmé quote, ‘poetry is the language of crisis,’” says Mano. “It’s hard to make good music about everything being amazing. Everything is going great – who wants to listen to that? Anything I’ve done - anything which I thought had any kind of artistic merit, has been through struggles I’ve had in my life”.

Mannequin's 100th - a comp looking forward featuring an international and serious cast... BIG TIP!
The modern synthwave scene would be significantly poorer without the keen ear and tireless efforts of the Mannequin label run by Alessandro Adriani. Geographically situated within the nerve centers of Rome and Berlin, yet with a musical spirit that easily transcends these boundary lines, Mannequin's back catalog has been an important component in the modular assemblage that makes up electronics-based independent music in the 21st century, and an important reference point for those who need to defend against the lazy accusations that this such is purely retro' in its form and content. Recent accolades and accomplishments - being named Resident Advisor's label of the month' for May of this year, starting the 'Death of the Machines' 12' series, and being given the 'green light' for bi-monthly parties at the Säule room in Berghain - have been earned through Mannequin's unflagging commitment to sonic diversity and Adriani's own realization that the anxious and sharp-edged sounds associated with, say, the Cold War of the 1980s can convey a completely different message today. Adriani says it best when claiming that there is no such thing as 'old' or 'new' music...only the music of now'. With this cogent statement of intent, Mannequin continues to go on exploratory missions to find the best and most relevant aspects of genres like acid, industrial, EBM, post-punk, coldwave and still more.

Which brings us to Mannequin's newest project and 100th release overall: the Waves of the Future double LP compilation, which itself is not a conventional retrospective collection. Case in point - none of the artists appearing on this collection have put out their own releases on Mannequin yet, despite acting as Mannequin's unofficial ambassadors (via DJ sets and other means). This makes the set even more compelling rather than less so, since it shows how Mannequin fits into a larger picture that includes other scene leaders and label owners including Beau Wanzer, Willie Burns (WT Records), Silent Servant (Jealous God) and Ron Morelli (L.I.E.S.). Of equal importance is how Waves of the Future projects a sense of aesthetic resilience and continuity, showcasing just how well the current artists allied with Mannequin employ and re-interpret the sonic lexicon that appears on that label's reissues of 'classic' acts such as Nocturnal Emissions, Bourbonese Qualk, Din A Testbild and Doris Norton.

However, none of this would matter as much if the music itself didn't have strong potential for lighting a blaze in the dark corners of the human imagination, and of course for forcing bodies into motion. Each track here pivots around a couple of key sound elements that seem to set the stage for the next track to come: see the sputtering / chopped ghost voices on Morelli's Charges Won't Stick,' which easily informs the slicing drone and authoritarian beat of Shawn O' Sullivan's Ill Fit,' which then lays down the emotional foundation for the sequencer-powered With You' from An-I & Adriani or the glassy landscape of Illum Sphere's Exhaustion'. Elsewhere, the wired mischief of Not Waving intersects easily with the spherical electro-funk and coded commands of Beau Wanzer. When all the disparate parts of Waves of the Future are soldered together, it perfectly illustrates Mannequin's non-linear philosophy and Adriani's suggestion that Mannequin listeners directly engage with the music rather than trying too hard to analyze or dissect it.

The London based singer and keyboard player Dominic Appleton, known since the early eighties for his musical activity in the post punk/dream pop band Breathless, and perhaps even more for his vocal contributions to the legendary This Mortal Coil project on 4AD, joins forces with the Milanese producer and sound artist Matteo Uggeri, active from 1993 behind several projects spanning from industrial to post-rock and ambient soundscapes, known for collaborating with artists such as Maurizio Bianchi, Nocturnal Emissions, Controlled Bleeding, De Fabriek, OvO, Giuseppe Ielasi, Lau Nau, Giulio Aldinucci and many more.

Starlight Assembly’s first album, “Starlight and Still Air”, was released in 2021 by the American label Beacon Sound. In Italy the album received amazing reviews in all four of the main music monthlies. It was album of the month in Blow Up and Rockerilla ran a four page interview. Several articles and reviews were made, including a special issue on Foxy Digitalis by Brad Rose.

A remix project was launched afterwards, including old and new friends and fans of the two S.A. members: among the others, Robin Rimbaud/Scanner, Auscultation, Gabriel Saloman (Yellow Swans), Patricia Wolf, Insides, Julia Sabra with Fadi Tabbal, Sawako and Pan American.

The new album, “There Will Be Fireworks”, continues the duo’s complex cross-genres approach to music by melding Uggeri’s intricate musical textures with Appleton’s sweet and melancholic melodies, in this case even supported by the haunting guitars of Gary Mundy (in Breathless as well but also in Ramleh and Broken Flag’s label manager). The tracks on this album are more songlike, the journey more cohesive, with the artists playing more to one another’s strengths. The mastering will be done by Martin Bowes/Attrition, making it even more powerful and clean for its publication on Silentes (ex-Amplexus), historic italian label well known for releases by Rod Modell, Gigi Masin, Dirk Serries, Eraldo Bernocchi, Merzbow, Fabio Orsi and the latest releases by AUBE and much more.

1) WAIT FOR THE WORLD
2) TIME
3) THIS DESERT
4) ALL THE LOVE THE STANDS BESIDE US
5) MOTH TO THE FLAME
6) FRICTION
7) SYMPHONY IN MELANCHOLY
8) THE NOT DEAD
9) RELIEF
+
10) THERE WILL BE FIREWORKS (ghost track)

Musubi is an album conceived as a puzzle without a predefined plan. Each artist created their track independently, without listening to the others, yet the result is a coherent journey of downtempo, psychedelic and elegant pieces that naturally resonate with one another. This album reflects the essence of Wabi Sabi Audio Imprint: embracing imperfection, spontaneity, and the beauty found in the unexpected.

MTY-3.14 “π”, released on March 14, 2026, is the fifth and final chapter of a journey begun fifteen years ago.



This standard edition presents the final form of Polar Inertia across three 12" vinyl records, featuring 11 tracks. Nothing added, nothing removed—only the music, unfolding in full.



Images dissolve, words fall away. What remains are faint echoes, like footprints slowly erased in fresh snow.



This final opus does not close the path. It fades into it. π is not an ending, but a state: the moment where movement continues, even as the world turns silent.



A last step.
A final trace.
Still moving, beneath the cold.



POLAR INERTIA



We are no one because we want to be no one,
And to be no one we have to be everywhere and nowhere- Polar Inertia examines the enigmatic and blurry realms, embracing the art of obscured vision.


Encountering the collective Polar Inertia is much like being absorbed by fog and captivated by its ever-shifting forms and densities, with things being as indistinguishable as in a whiteout.



Formed in 2010 by a group of artists, Polar Inertia transcends visibility, delving into structures that lie beyond the public gaze. Layers upon layers intertwine within the fabric of Polar Inertia, extending beyond their profound electronic compositions and live performances. It manifests as a conceptual universe, where sound, monochrome aesthetics, and elusive narratives converge, much like trying to grasp the intangible fog. The entity that is Polar Inertia is involved in installations, print- and video work and texts created for different contexts and live in different spheres such as Palais de Tokyo in Paris or the Lyon Biennale of Contemporary Art. Still, clubs and festivals are perfect spaces to experience these nebulous soundworlds and immerse in them. Fittingly, some of Polar Inertia’s appearances include the colossal halls of Berghain and Bassiani and at experimental festivals like Mutek Montreal and Atonal Berlin, that like to break with the classic club conventions.



Polar Inertia's sonic landscape unfolds with wafting textures accompanied by resonating beats and drones, reverberating through empty spaces, merging with the vast expanse of nothingness. Their sound exists at the crossroads of ambient, experimental, and deep techno, interwoven with vocal narratives. Since their inaugural release “Indirect Light“ on Dement3d Records in 2011, they remain a stronghold of relevance and captivation in the electronic domain.



Mastered by sixbitdeep, with artistic direction by Diplomatie Studio.

Produced by Josh Schroeder (Lorna Shore, Dayseeker), the record captures Varials at their most instinctive and unfiltered. Imperfect takes, emotional performances, and new melodic textures create a sound that's both crushing and alive. Onstage, the lineup ( Skyler Conder , Mike Foley , Sean Rauchut , and Shane Lyons ) continues to prove why Varials remain one of heavy music's most cathartic and commanding live acts







[g] [wouldyoufollowme]





[m] [intothequiet]

Shall Not Fade welcomes Pugilist for SNF140 "Maternal".

If you don't already know (and love!) Pugilist's prolific output, you need to get to know! The Naarm/Melbourne based DJ, producer and Rinse resident has released on Martyn's 3024, Melbourne's killer Modern Hypnosis, Silent Era's Of Paradise, Samurai, Rupture, ZamZam, J:Kenzo's Artikal, Sub Basics' Temple of Sound, Whities/AD93, Al Wooton's Trule, Banoffee Pies, Best Intentions and now his own buy on sight Ruff Kutz imprint.

'Maternal' is four blissey dubwise house blurring cuts. Embracing, medicinal, lush & corrective. Vibrations for heads and feet.

'Title track 'Maternal' is deep grooving infectious and honeyed house. Hypnotic, pulsating with head-meltingly warm padwork. 'Bona Fide' sees Pugilist team up with UK duo Mystic State. Drums sidestep with jazz swing while graceful piano and an ensemble of pads are topped with an introspective vocal sample dialing for your subconscious. The B1 'Anomaly' is a stepper - FWD charging drums backed with sub low pulses all brought together by trumpet echoes and woozy melodics. Finally comes 'Marigold', a soulful jungle excursion > early hours business, caressed nostalgic percussion, brushed rhythms, fleeting guitar licks and undulating vibes.

Nach dem 2023 erschienenen „Are You Lost Here?“ betritt der junge belgische Singer-Songwriter mit diesem Album neues Terrain – ein Werk, das gleichermaßen weitläufig wie zutiefst persönlich klingt. „Salt Moon City“ verwebt die bekenntnishafte Songwriting- Intensität von Künstlern wie Sufjan Stevens und Paolo Nutini mit der majestätischen Klangfülle von Coldplay – und deutet zugleich subtil auf die harmonische Raffinesse von Bach und Debussy hin.

Dieses Album wirkt wie eine Verfilmung in Breitbildformat. Nach zwei Jahren gemeinsamen Spielens mit seiner Band hat sich Moon´s Sound geöffnet: Streicher und Bläser durchziehen die
Arrangements, verwandeln stille Selbstbeobachtung in etwas Strahlendes und Gemeinschaftliches.

Im Mittelpunkt steht Moon´s Stimme – leise, rau und ungeschützt – und sein Gespür für Songs, die Zerbrechlichkeit und Selbstbewusstsein gleichermaßen in sich tragen. Auf „Salt Moon City“ zeigt sich Moon als Produzent, Arrangeur und Multiinstrumentalist, der seinen Sound vollständig im Griff hat. Er spielt Schlagzeug, Bass, Gitarre und alle Klavierparts selbst und erschafft eine Atmosphäre, die zeitlos und lebendig zugleich wirkt – eine Stadt aus Salz und Erinnerung, irgendwo zwischen Traum und Tageslicht leuchtend.

In February 2025, more than 1,000 musicians came together to release a silent album protesting the UK government’s planned changes to copyright law, which would make it easier to train AI models on copyrighted work without a licence. The album, titled Is This What We Want?, featured recordings of empty studios and performance spaces, representing the impact on artists’ and music professionals’ livelihoods that is expected if the government does not change course.

The digital release in February 2025 reached no. 38 in the UK album charts. Now, it is being released on vinyl, with a bonus track - a recording of an empty studio - from Paul McCartney. The vinyl is being released by state51.

Under the heavily criticised proposals, UK copyright law would be upended to benefit global tech giants. AI companies would be free to use an artist’s work to train their AI models without permission or remuneration. The government’s proposed changes would require artists to proactively ‘opt-out’ from the theft of their work – reversing the very principle of copyright law. ‘Opt-out’ models are near impossible to enforce, have yet to be proven effective anywhere else in the world, and place enormous burdens on artists, particularly emerging talent.

Facing major backlash from the creative sector and beyond, the government has said its previous proposal is no longer its preferred option. However, it has not proposed an alternative, simply recommitting to its plan to “modernise the copyright legislation”. In the meantime, it has sent creatives a worrying signal, five times rejecting House of Lords amendments to the data bill that would have given rights holders visibility over when their work was being used against their wishes by AI companies.

The album’s track listing spells out a simple message: “The British government must not legalise music theft to benefit AI companies.”

Ed Newton-Rex, the organiser of the album, said:
“The government must commit to not handing the life’s work of the country’s musicians to AI companies for free. Doing so would be hugely damaging to our world-leading creative industries, and is totally unnecessary, only benefiting overseas."

Paul Sanders, founder of The state51 Conspiracy, said:
"When tech companies lobby governments to give them songs for free, it’s not so they can cure diseases, feed the hungry, or provide clean water where it is needed. It’s simply so they can make millions of fake songs and keep all the profits for themselves. As a company with a lifelong commitment to musicians The state51 Conspiracy was honoured to be asked to help get this message out on vinyl. All profits go to Help Musicians, which is what our politicians should be doing instead of sucking up to tech bros."

Danish bassist and composer Jesper Thorn has become one of Scandinavia s most distinctive musical voices, known for blending introspective storytelling with the understated lyricism of Nordic jazz. His award award-winning albums Boy and Dragor earned international praise for their emotional honesty and cinematic depth, establishing a sound world where fragility, melancholy, and quiet beauty intertwine. A deeply personal meditation on the search for calm, connection, and meaning in a world that often feels overwhelming, the album continues his exploration of sound as refuge, a place to pause, reflect, and breathe. Joined by long long-term collaborators Marc Méan (piano), Andreas Bernitt (violin), Cecilie Strange (saxophone), and Maj Berit Guassora (trumpet), Thorn reunites with producer Mette Damm and engineer August Wanngren to craft an atmosphere both intimate and expansive. Where 2023" s Dragor confronted the ghosts of Thorn s past, STILLE (meaning quiet " or silent " in Danish) looks outward - and inward - toward reflection. For me, music has always been a refuge, Thorn writes. It s a place where I can reflect and immerse myself - both as a listener and, maybe even more, as a composer. Each composition functions as a kind of musical still image : fragments of emotion captured in time, responding to both the chaos and fragile beauty of the modern world. From the flickering calm of Fragmentarium , to the urgent, primal fear of Run (written as wildfires swept through California) to the tender domestic peace of Stilleben , these pieces balance melancholy and hope in equal measure. Thorn s writing continues to thrive on collaboration and trust. Such is Fate emerged from a discarded melodic fragment, reimagined through the expressive playing of Bernitt on violin. Recover and Rebuild form a quiet hymn to resilience, with Guassora and Strange lending understated, breath breath-like power to the ensemble. The closing track, Shimmering (for MM) MM), is dedicated to pianist Marc Méan, a constant presence in Thorn s projects since 2014 and, as Thorn puts it, the touch and sound I hear in my head when I compose ". I wanted to create a space that feels like silence, peace and quiet in a noisy world that often moves faster than it feels possible to keep up with. says Thorn.

Childhood Intelligence Nineteen by Dan Piu “The Mystic Mind” 2x12 LP

As the vortex of time evolves, Swiss Underground Legacy “Dan Piu” returns to his home planet “Childhood intelligence”. A rare specimen and artifact known for his timeless & intelligent soul-infused music, arises with his 3rd solo album on Childhood. “The Mystic Mind” 2x12 Lp as the trilogy, the sequel of “Tru Time And Ages” and “Inside Universe”.

This Full-Length player is a voyage through yet another unexplored realm of Dan's creativity, where listeners are invited to explore a vast network of emotions. As the album organically unfolds, tales of spooky synth worlds emerge, where hypnotic atmospheres collide with analog technoid elements, guided by classic JUNO chord progressions. Witness the alchemy of vintage ARP, Jupiter, Mono/Poly, and 80s Yamaha sounds as they morph into an elusive journey of electronic mysticism crafted by the otherworldly mind, the “Mystic Mind” of Dan Piu.

2026 Repress

Flickering in ultraviolet, there is an elusive place where blue pill meets red, ups become downs, and day merges with night. Those liminal spaces where anything is possible is where you’ll find Nightbus and their hypnotic debut album Passenger. Doom, uncertainty, and opportunity lurk in the shadowy corners of their murky existence with stops at disassociation, co-dependency, and addiction before reaching its final destination - a glimmer of hope.

The in-between of Nightbus’ own Gotham lies where Manchester’s city pulse meets Stockport’s outer realm. An audio-visual entity formed among a musical family of friends, freaks, and foes in messy mills and after hours on dancefloors alike, their sound bleeds from tension where collective creative forces are bound together and collide with the fallout of being torn apart. Before even playing a show, their So Young released single ‘Mirrors’ – a knowing nod of respect to some well-known gloomy Northerners - may have made old school indie heads shimmy at shows in Salford’s The White Hotel but also signalled the duo’s knack for offering listeners a Bandersnatch approach to hitchhiking their own personal Nightbus in whatever direction they choose to take. “Everyone can have their moment with our songs; the music is our response to who we are as young people, living in the city full of this energy right now,” they say.

Whilst reverb hefty melodies and dread-filled loops embody isolation from writing at each of their home studio set-ups, magic happens in the ether across 90s trip-hop, indie sleaze and electronica; Jake’s production layers Olive’s pop sentimentality with drums and samples whilst tales of a cast of faceless characters place Olive as puppet master; her severed self’s perspective manipulating their stringed limbs at arm’s length to see how their stories play out when scenes reflecting her own lie close to the bone. “It’s a bit fucked; like having this out of body experience with a made-up movie running through my head,” she says. “As I write I can see they’re all from a similar world, but they allow me to explore different feelings without giving away part of myself.”

Recorded at The Nave in Leeds with producer-engineer Alex Greaves (Heavy Lungs, Working Men’s Club), surprise and danger lies in every crevice. Brooding whispers turn to chants on 6-minute opus ‘Host.’ Improvised when performed live, its immersive shift in tempo leads to hefty dub courtesy of Jake’s pedals. Even then, you won’t know shit’s hit the fan until its mid-point reveal when ominous bass blasts a thunderous soundtrack as its protagonist defiantly walks away after committing the perfect crime. “It makes you wait, and more songs should have sirens,” Olive grins.

Leaning deeper into alter-egos via the video game-psychological horror of a Silent Hill dystopia, the band’s Fight Club moment ‘Angles Mortz’ turns its literal translation of death angles on its head as it reflects upon kink and internalised shame reincarnated as pride. Elsewhere the ice cool ‘Landslide’ is a Requiem for a Dream about the addiction of being in a band; ‘The Void’ explores co-dependency and estranged relationships; and carefully selected samples revive house track ‘Just A Kid’ from the band’s early incarnation. Passenger’s every direction is to face challenges head on. “That is what’s so great about horror; you can see through predictable patterns so when the unexpected occurs it's more realistic and uncomfortable… I want to own the dark stuff!”

As for Passenger’s first single, the pulsating ‘Ascension’ is a spiralling deep dive into death, suicide, and legacy around who or what we leave behind. A noughties club banger by way of NYC beats - ergonomically designed for those who like to stay out a little too often and too late - it throbs like a house party’s partition wall as the literal levelling up undergoes a neon transformation; blue glitching to pink, diffusing the white construct of the Nightbus Matrix. “It really does feel like the end of something and was purposely written that way,” they say, “the ascension is like a firework going off!”

With wheels in motion, Nightbus has become a movement surpassing sonic realms. Between shows from Porto to Brighton taking in The Great Escape, Rotterdam’s Left Of The Dial and Paris’ Supersonic; DJing; remixing; guesting (BDRMM’s Microtonic album); and even enlisting talented like-minds to craft a 3-part queer coming-of-age music video series which ties in with a new ‘hyperpop’ phase in the evolution of their popular Nightbus Soundsystem club night, heads are now being turned from sports brands to high-end fashion designers. “There are things we can’t reveal just yet,” tells Olive, “but we’re excited about the direction this beast we’ve created is heading.” As the album philosophises and asks one ultimate question; what does it truly mean to be ‘Passenger’? Nightbus may not claim to offer a definitive answer, but it might make you feel a bit better about those demons.

Recorded in just two sessions at Abba's former studio, the resulting songs are a testament to the idea that art, music, or expression itself can be a kind of faith as well as a way to find meaning after control is gone.

T.O.Y.'s new album, The Prophet, is passion, history, a vintage museum, and full of great songs that are waiting to be heard. T.O.Y. is a German synthpop and futurepop band founded in 2001 by Volker Lutz. Highlights include collaborations with Alphaville's singer Marian Gold ("Turn On!") and FAITHLESS drummer Andy Treacey ("Silent Soldiers"), blending T.O.Y.'s atmospheric sound with iconic voices from the electronic music scene. "The Prophet is something truly special. During the Corona pandemic, wrapped in isolation, we all needed consistency, a sense of comfort, and security. I found that feeling through sounds--the sounds I have known my whole life: the music of the 80s. Courageously and full of ideas, one song after another emerged. Motivated by the wonderful collaboration and friendship with Alphaville frontman Marian Gold, who kept encouraging me with words about how good this record was, the pandemic passed, and so did one year after another. Through my friendship with Faithless drummer Andy Treacey, I got in touch with Jonathan White, also a member of the Faithless family. A true genius on bass in live performances, he became part of the album as well." - Volker Lutz