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A companion album to 2022's restrained 'Spectral', 'Bodies' blurs the boundaries between bodies of water and human bodies, provoking presence by emulating wave cycles and heartbeats with deft electronic rhythms and obscuring vocals and field recordings with tense synths.

Cocolas headed to the Australian coast and explored the creeks and waterfalls of Far North Queensland to source environmental sounds for 'Bodies'. And although these recordings are mostly hidden, they provide the album with its backbone, over which Cocolas lavishes concealed chorals and orchestral waves of powerful, distorted electronics. There's a palpable tension to the material; we can hear Cocolas' cries on opening track 'Bodies I', but it's buried beneath saturated, cinematic washes that might be strings, and might be synths.

She wanted her collages to evoke memories and emotions rather than represent something more tangible, and handles this by drifting from digital to analog, electronic to acoustic, concealing everything almost beyond recognition. On 'A Current Runs Through', Cocolas turns her instrumentation into crashing, cinematic drones that emerge like bubbling waters, and on 'Exhale' it sounds as if she's sunk beneath the surface, her ensemble drowned by filtered bubbles and ominous groans.

Experimental enigma 1127 fuses grime and hard techno into early 20th Century Egyptian music on his outstanding second album for Cairo’s Nashazphone label, building a wall of floury, computerised noise that relentlessly pushes the dancefloor into the backroom, and the backroom towards the rally. Breathtaking, mind-altering gear, essential listening for fans of Mutamassik, Autechre, Kelman Duran, Nkisi, even James Ferraro.

The fifteenth letter of the Arabic alphabet, ض (ḍād) is one of only six letters that were added to the Phoenician alphabet to construct the language. It exists only in Arabic, and is notoriously difficult for non-native speakers to pronounce. As such, it's a fitting title for 1127's mystifying second album, a profound expression that challenges us to look beyond the aesthetic and unravel a knotty collage of influences and innovation.

On his acclaimed 2019 debut ’Tqaseem Mqamat El Haram’, 1127 delivered a shock to experimental electronic club musicks that snagged everyone from Rat Heart to Rabit and Elvin Brandhi with fractal decimations of Egyptian rave and street noise. On this new one, he simmers it down through reticulated junglist and trap modes, whilst crucially retaining a hallucinatory sense of chaos reflective of modern day Giza. With contributions from a whole bunch of collaborators including Minusdesire, Caironomixx, Emna Mâaref - plus many others, he deploys fractured melodies, voices and robust club structures at once distinctly recalling Mutamassik’s millennium-era fusions, with a crucial quota of controlled madness that 1127 can safely call his own.

There are traces of Autechre's latter-day autogenic reveries on 'hyperfals(E)xoteric@iro', sweeping up thunderous, asynchronous percussion in brisk sonic winds, folding in oud-like electronic plucks to illuminate unconventional commonalities and shared narratives between future / primitive practice. On '1446' he uses a heavy-footed drum battery, burying drill-warped subs and almost invisible vocals in a disheveled mix, shepherding us towards 'iii اعيش في جلباب ابي Lenn', a disco-baked headmelter that takes the language of French touch and uses it to carve new shapes into deconstructed Egyptian pop. On the Caretaker-referencing ‘complexity induced amnesia’, he creates a smoky aura, dissolving the rhythm and trace vocals into unstable FX-corroded loops, designed to melt the memory banks.

With thanks to Rashad Becker’s faithful vinyl master that presents the music with all its burred edges, pressure drops, and textures in tact, ‘ض’ is an absolute must check for anyone bitten by the unstoppable sprawl and refraction of traditional club and experimental musicks into new dimensions.

Kelela collaborator Florian TM Zeisig and sound engineer Jordan Juras (aka Pvas) set us adrift in the Bavarian wilderness, red-eyed and zonked, with a buoyant raft of blissed ambient sorcery on their new album for Huerco S.’ West Mineral Ltd. Gorgeous, uplifting gear, tipped if yr into David Moufang’s Studio Pankow and Reagenz collabs, early William Orbit, 154, GAS.

Successor to their Mo Wax flavoured debut album ‘Napping Under God’ (3xl, 2022), the languorous wooze of ‘BonGBoaT’ derives from a week the duo shared soaking up nature in and around a small Bavarian village, where days were spent hiking, boating, and recording flutes in caves - that sort of thing.

The music follows to metaphorically represent that atmosphere on a spiritual, rather than literal, level. Zeisig’s acclaimed feel for lushly variegated texture has already been well documented on these pages, and that space is here beautifully accentuated by the technical suss of Juras, between them bestowing a carefully plotted calmness and soothing conception of environmental ambient for discerning listeners.

The cotton-weft bleep dub of ‘Row’ pushes us off into scenes of lonesome folk strings heard over bobbin waves in ‘Kneippen’, and ‘Mud’ highlights their knack for projecting prismatic fantasies with its 3D swill of murky textures and glittering harp. ’Sky’ clearly recalls Wolfgang Voigt’s somnambulant waft around the Black Forest as GAS, and ‘Heat’ inverts jungle breaks, train horns and smoke puffs as heard from the sea bed. They reserve a voluminous burst of shoegaze bliss for the smudged finale ‘Drift’, lilting into the evocative dread of ‘Night’, calling lights out for listeners probably already firmly slanted to the horizontal.

Not overly sentimental or nostalgic, 'BonGBoaT' is a humid, after-hours descent into waterlogged bliss that takes elements from the dub-ambient canon and floats them into prismatic abstraction, providing much needed succour for the world weary. In other words, all of us.

James Devane returns with another adept investigation into minimal
techno’s spaces in between. “Searching” serves as both companion to “Beauty
is Useless” and the next logical step in James’ exploration of process as
guiding compositional tool. Conceptually simple, technically robust, the
end result elicits both an undeniable groove and a trove of detail for
listeners willing to go deep. In his own words: “These recordings are the
result of chance. Using hours of source material, everything was “chosen”,
manipulated, and assembled at random via custom software without concern
for key, tempo, measures, or rhythm. A search button and a save button.”

(2xLP, printed innersleeves, sticker sheet) nit is the genius underdog of the current French chanson scene. After playing along with Sébastien Tellier or Juliette Armanet (a huge success in France), after remixing Phoenix, Myd, Dita Von Teese, Cola Boyy, Tony Allen or Jane Birkin, here he comes with his debut album. The balearic sound is always a big nit influence, feel good electronics & lush acoustic chords.

Spotted by French label Record Makers (Sébastien Tellier, Kavinsky, AIR, Cola Boyy) with his 2017 “Dessous de plage” first EP, nit has since grown from funky DIY library music to a lush and complex groovy sound. The magic of this debut album “Big Bang Puzzle” is a keen sense of composition and an innate affinity for 90’s European electronica.

It’s a playful album, the work of an artist at the peak of his craft, determined to twist styles and references (Daft Punk, Ennio Morricone, Robert Miles, Vangelis...) in order to give them a new form.

“Big Bang Puzzle” is a tangle of psychedelic and cartoon-esque pieces, an abstract modernist painting of sounds inspired by vintage pop music. The cover, created by Swiss artist Flora Mottini, offers a first glimpse of his brand new universe.

But it’s also by collaborating with French iconic design studio H5 that nit suddenly enters the French Touch genealogy. nit takes the shape of an n that grows legs and arms to become a cheeky cartoon character traveling through a real space-time continuum. Parisian H5 studio has been involved since the end of the ‘90s in the design of strong visual concepts for French Touch’s elite (Etienne de Crécy, AIR, Mirwais). French music at its best from which nit is a direct descendant. And one who expands and opens even further: pop, italo-disco, trip-hop impulses, Morriconian cavalcades, lo-fi aesthetics, Caribbean music. Producer and mixer Lucien Krampf (Oklou, Ascendant Vierge, Casual Gabberz, Crystallmess) was the person in charge of mixing this ambitious record.

nit is both a question and an answer, and a musical enigma that pushes us to explore the far reaches of our imagination…

Pimao's debut album, 'Duangkamol,' is set to hit the shelves on March 22, 2024. The Berlin-based producer, DJ, and avid vinyl collector, Pimao skillfully weaves together samples from Thai, Chinese, Japanese, and Indonesian rarities, framing them with a cinematic sound design. The title, 'Duangkamol,' means ‘straight from the heart' in Thai, reflecting the album's deeply personal essence. It embodies the culmination of Pimao's long musical journey and his deep thirst for exploring diverse sounds and cultures. From the striking melodies of Southeast Asia to the bass heavy undercurrents of Berlin, 'Duangkamol' encompasses a rich sonic tapestry. The music flows effortlessly, taking unexpected turns but always remaining tethered to a soulful core, as heard on the captivating single 'Suay Isan.' With a musical career spanning back to 2005, Pimao's sound is both forward-looking and nostalgic, evoking the depth of iconic releases from labels like Ninja Tune and Stones Throw Records. Scheduled for release on March 22, 2024, 'Duangkamol' was polished by Blanka at Kasablanka Mastering Studio in France. The album's artwork, crafted by Subwway, features the imposing figure of 'Yaksha,' a protector deity whose calling into ward off malevolent forces. Pimao's 'Duangkamol' is a captivating musical journey, blending traditional influences with contemporary innovation, delivered uncut straight from the heart.

A new piece by minimalist / experimental composer PHILL NIBLOCK (1933 - 2024), co-
composed and performed by ANNA CLEMENTI & THOMAS STERN. Intense, menacing
layers of thick drones and alien sounds.
In summer 2022, within just a few weeks and by pure coincidence, 2 proposals regarding PHILL
NIBLOCK albums arrived: one suggesting an overdue vinyl reissue of a CD release (more on that
when the time has come for it), the other email was from ANNA CLEMENTI saying she and
THOMAS STERN were working on new pieces that PHILL NIBLOCK has written for her ...
when „Zound Delta 2“ was complete, PHILL sent photographs for the two artworks,
we met twice to discuss details, but unfortunately he died unexpectedly early january this year so
the album now is, sad as it is, a posthumous release ... an intense goodbye from one of 20
th
century most iconic composers.
Phill Niblock
Phill Niblock (1933-2024, USA) was an artist whose fifty-year career spans minimalist and
experimental music, film and photography. Since 1985, he has served as director of Experimental
Intermedia, a foundation for avant-garde music based in New York with a branch in Ghent, and
curator of the foundation’s record label XI. Known for his thick, loud drones of music, Niblock’s
signature sound is filled with microtones of instrumental timbres that generate many other tones in
the performance space. In 2013, his diverse artistic career was the subject of a retrospective
realised in partnership between Circuit (Contemporary Art Centre Lausanne) and Musée de
l’Elysée. The following year Niblock was honoured with the prestigious Foundation for Contemporary Arts John Cage Award.
https://phillniblock.com/

Anna Clementi
Italian-Swedish singer Anna Clementi grew up in Rome, where she first studied the flute and
completed acting training before moving to Berlin and studying experimental vocal music and
experimental music theater with the composer Dieter Schnebel at Hochschule der Künste (now
UdK Berlin). Anna Clementi sees herself as an “actress of the voice” rather than exclusively as a
singer. In this way she also articulates the diversity of her artistic expression, with which she is
always searching for new connections between voice, gesture, language, dance and theater.
During her decades spanning career, Anna Clementi has performed at the most important festivals,
has premiered numerous works, many of which have been composed especially for her, and
worked with Fast Forward, Michael Hirsch, Rupert Huber, Christian Kesten, Alexander Kolkowski,
Olga Neuwirth, Josef Anton Riedl,
Iris ter Schiphorst, Dieter Schnebel, Laurie Schwartz, Elliott
Sharp, and many others.
A special focus of hers is the work of John Cage, whose pieces she has performed worldwide.
https://www.annaclementi.com/

Thomas Stern
Born in Bremen, Thomas Stern moved to Berlin in 1984 where he joined Mona Mur with Alex
Hacke and F. M. Einheit (both from Einstürzende Neubauten, with which Stern also worked as live
sound engineer for many years). Around 1987 he co-founded the Berlin set up of Crime And The
City Solution (Mick Harvey, Alex Hacke a.o.). Over the years, he has has collaborated with artists
like Ulrike Haage, Phew, Nick Cave, Ton Steine Scherben, Meret Becker, Nina Hagen, Jaki
Liebezeit, Ben Becker, N.U. Unruh, Gry, Iris ter Schiphorst, Automat, Swans, Hans Joacxhim Irmler
and many more, on the road or in his own Sternstaubstudio

Somewhere Between: Mutant Pop, Electronic Minimalism & Shadow Sounds of Japan 1980–1988 hovers vibe–wise between two distinct poles within Light In The Attic’s acclaimed Japan Archival Series—Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980–1990 and Pacific Breeze: Japanese City Pop, AOR & Boogie 1976–1986. All three albums showcase recordings produced during Japan’s soaring bubble economy of the 1980s, an era in which aesthetic visions and consumerism merged. Music echoed the nation’s prosperity and with financial abundance came the luxury to dream.

Sonically, Somewhere Between mines the midpoint between Kankyō Ongaku’s sparkling atmospherics and Pacific Breeze’s metropolitan boogie. The compilation encompasses ambient pop, underground electronics, liminal minimalism and shadow sounds—all descriptors emphasizing the hazy nature of the nebula. Out–of–focus rhythms wear ethereal accoutrements, ballads are shrouded in static, and angular drums snake skyward on transcendent tones. From the Avant–minimalism of Mkwaju Ensemble and Yoshio Ojima, to the leftfield techno-pop of Mishio Ogawa and Noriko Miyamoto (featuring members of Ymo), and highlights from the groundbreaking Osaka underground label Vanity Records, these are blurry constellations defying collective categorization.

These tracks also exist in a space of transition when the major label grip on the Japanese recording market began to give way to the escalation of independents. Thanks to the idyllic economic climate and innovations in domestically–manufactured music gear, creators on the edges were empowered to focus on satisfying their artistic visions in the open headspace of home studios. While labels like Warner Music and Nippon Columbia explored new sounds through traditional channels, it was possible for Vanity, Balcony and other indie labels, not to mention self–released artists like Ojima and Naoki Asai, to publish their work via affordable media such as cassettes, 7" vinyl, and flexi–discs.

Expertly curated by Yosuke Kitazawa and Mark “Frosty” McNeill (dublab), Somewhere Between is a collection of music, much of it released for the first time outside Japan, that is bound more by energetic vibration than shared history, genre or scene. They are the sounds of transition and searching—a celebration of the freedom found in floating.

Note: The track “Days Man” by Yoshio Ojima is only available on the LP and Cassette versions.