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Here is the debut, self-titled album from a.s.o., singer/songwriter Alia Seror-O'Neill, and producer Lewie Day. 'a.s.o.' is a thematic consolidation of the previous three singles and an impressive artistic progression. Day and Seror-O'Neill show they've mastered the format of the radio-friendly pop song and found how to subvert it completely. Across eleven songs, they have built a rich and compelling body of work.

We know where we are now, emotionally complex, trip-hop torch songs for club freaks. But the palette has broadened to encompass ethereal dream pop à la Cocteau Twins, slow-burning AOR-soul, and dubwise stylings. As a result, 'a.s.o.' is a satisfyingly coherent listen but never a musical monoculture. Variously there are nods toward Julee Cruise, Fleetwood Mac, and the uneasy listening of Portishead. It's an album that wears its influences lightly, is never weighed down by them, and always sure of its own identity.

It's anchored by Alia's unique voice. Her words speak of restraint and release, taking us from the elegiac to the euphoric. This elegantly crafted, perfect pop music sounds like it has had enough of your shit. And Day's music is the perfect foil; deep, slightly menacing, restrained, and powerful. The album has a cinematic texture, as with David Lynch; the seemingly familiar becomes uncanny and strange the closer we look. a.s.o. take our emotions for a joyride before leaving us floating in space.

'a.s.o.' is a journey; by its end, we all are changed.

This is it. Poly dance theatre 006 arrives. Fresh arrival. For the 6th Poly Dance Theatre release, androo has decided to release exclusive dubplates from NS Kroo sound system (androo & baba). Yes. 2 tracks from the smoky, always intense and sometimes very special sessions of the NS Kroo sound system over the last 10 years. Exxxperienceee. Wave Dub style is a blend of synth wave, dub stepper and club elements. A side: Fast Dub, tribute to Kitachi, (Iration steppas). Indeed, NS Kroo didn't wait for the recent re-issues to play Kitachi tracks, and has been inspired by this vibe from the outset. Club meets Dub! Fast Dub is trance, it's raw, it's sporty, it's for the legs, it's good support (aducteurs), it's for nimble feet, it's a book whose last sentence ends on the first, it's repetition, it's different style, it's dance, it's wild, it's club rhythm, it's baba operator, it's androo selector, it's sound system vibes, it's NS Kroo in 2019, it's a discreet, slightly punkish non-chalance, it's distortion, it's "we don't give a fuck about codes", it's that and lots of other things... B side: Wave Dub Style Is Back. It's all in the title. This track is probably from 2014? Wave dub... A mix of new wave/synth pop and dub, with a club mix feel. Again, trance music, the kind you play when the night never ends to end, an epic end-of-session odyssey. Soft and strange synth with strong 808 rhythm. 2 mixes. 1st mix: pop synth experience. 2nd mix: raw trance club mix. Wave Dub Style Is Back was remastered by androo in 2023 with the support of poly dance theatre compagnie.

13 tracks, that's a hell of an EP! Vinyl comes with download code!

Apichat Pakwan is a music collective put together by Olivier Schreuder, an Amsterdam-based musician, DJ & producer.

Together they produce “Isantronics” - a hybrid approach to blending Molam (folkmusic of the ethnic Lao, of whom the largest population is living in Isan, another name for Northeast-Thailand), electronic music, Dub & Hip Hop.

Apichat Pakwan consists of Olivier Schreuder (electronics, production, percussion), Pongsapon Upani (Kaen), Artit Krajangsree (Phin, bass), Robin Koek (drums), Angkanang Pimwankum (percussion) and is based in Amsterdam (the Netherlands) and Khon Kaen (Thailand). TIP!!!

Dreyblatt"s minimalist conception - a rhythmic drone played on a double-bass strung with piano wire, playing in concert with other stringed instruments performing in 20 unequal microtones per octave and changing key but keeping the same fundamental pitch - dates back to the 1970s, while he studied under La Monte Young and Pauline Oliveros. Resolve acts in intermittent dialogue with the first Orchestra of Excited Strings release, 1982"s Nodal Excitation. Since then, Dreyblatt has formed new orchestras across various countries and decades, with each phase of his music requiring several overlapping periods of gestation and arrangement. The current Orchestra is formed by Konrad Sprenger, Joachim Schütz and Oren Ambarchi. On Resolve, each of the members" playing brings new angles to the compositions. Konrad Sprenger"s involves solenoids, sine waves and a computer-controlled multi-channel electric guitar (as well as a relentless style behind the drum kit and oversight of the album production), while Joachim Schütz"s individual conception of electronics and electric guitar and Oren Ambarchi"s undeniable innovations with signal path work together with Dreyblatt"s bass (still strung with piano wire) as magnetic component parts of Resolve. These contributions lead to Resolve"s dialogue with the early Orchestra of Excited Strings canon - for instance, the track previewed here, "Flight Path" takes off at a pace not often found in the minimalist genre - a rolling lope! Yet the sense of play is palpable: the ensemble scale their microtonal keys with punkish brio, a stance sharing much with the original Orchestra"s downtown pulse, even as as the new Orchestra burn their own path through Dreyblatt"s music. Approaching his 70th birthday, with over 40 years of work as a solo artist, collaborator, composer, educator and bandleader, Arnold Dreyblatt views Resolve as an important expression within the long story of The Orchestra of Excited Strings. The album title"s tendency to mean different things is an indicator of the dynamic qualities of his music in all its different phases - an evolution that continues to produce new dimensions in acoustic sound with every new release.

Black Vinyl, Sticker, 50th Anniversary RE-Edition, first-ever official reissue on vinyl since 1975,
Re-Cut carefully overseen by Manuel Göttsching.

TRACKLIST:

A. "Amboss" 19:40
B. "Traummaschine" 25:24

Ash Ra Tempel is the eponymous debut studio album by the Krautrock band Ash Ra Tempel.
It features guitarist Manuel Göttsching with drummer Klaus Schulze and bassist Hartmut Enke.
Engineered by Conny Plank it was recorded in March 1971 and released in June 1971 on Ohr Records.
This 50Th Anniversary Album will be Released in Memoriam of all the Musical Contributors to this Release and on Manuel Göttsching´s MG.ART label.
It´s the fourth and headlining edition in this series and was finalised, carefully overseen by Manuel Göttsching himself in the late Autumn of 2022.

Much has been written about the record and band.

Having finished a first musical chapter with their Steeple Chase Bluesband and still at very young age of only 17 and 18 years old Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke met Klaus Schulze. Together they started to write and and compose what, to many,
became one the holy grails of Psychedelic Rock and early Electronic Music -
the German variant which was later also named "Krautrock":

Ash Ra Tempel´s self-titled first album "Ash Ra Tempel".

"The trio of Klaus Schulze, Manuel Göttsching and Hartmut Enke decided to abandon conventional composition and song writing, in favour of free-form improvising and developing a new musical language. As such, they became notorious for jams that could exceed 30 minutes." Says Discogs. "Some of these recordings can be found on Manuel Göttsching´s "The Private Tapes" releases", which will be re-released on MG.ART as well, following this edition.

"Krautrocksampler" author Julian Cope mentioned it to be "… one of the greatest rock 'n' roll LPs ever made." (Julian Cope Presents Head Heritage | Unsung | Reviews | Ash Ra Tempel - Ash Ra Tempel". 15 March 2000.)

AllMusic called the album "both astonishingly prescient and just flat out good, a logical extension of the space-jam-freakout ethos into rarified realms."

Here we would like the Band to be heard, for what can easily be said as the first time in 50+ years, with the exception of some early Journalists for whom the young Manuel Göttsching wrote a statement of intent (the original text can be found inside this edition) as following:

"Our musical concept is based on a combination of blues rock and delicate collages of electronic sound. These two elements should remain inseparable. And in their complex unity, the different musical philosophies of each musician find a common sweet spot. Our music is a permanently impulsive experience left to develop as it will, starting from a common fixed point of departure. This is where the difficulty of the music begins: No standardized formulation of our music can and should be possible. Only the constant reaction within the band can determine the musical result. And this requires constant listening with full concentration on the part of the creators. The idea of a particular musician will be - if flexible enough - absorbed by the others, transposed to their own instrument, and reflected back into the music as an individual contribution. This reciprocity within the band is then transferred over to the audience. And this process means that their reaction is not only a contribution to the end result; it actually makes them jointly responsible for the creation of the final musical product.
…
On our album, the track "Amboss" represents the first layer. Conventional instruments communicate familiar music which is in part expanded through electronic means. In the second track of the album - "Traummaschine" - the actual basic sound approach is dissolved into an electronic Nirvana which no longer allows the concrete identification of actual instruments. Innocent, virgin listening, free from any and every association, can finally begin - and the music can be absorbed and processed free from the limitations of categorization. That is the purpose of our music: To convey freedom without any predetermined criteria or traditions.

Thank you for your attention."
(Taken from the original A-R-T Bio 1970)

Hartmut Enke, Manuel Göttsching and Klaus Schulze aka. Ash Ra Tempel travelled to Hamburg in March 1971 to record their debut, with assistance of another Icon, legendary engineer Conny Plank.
The rest is history.

CD Jewel Case. In 1975 I was doing a series of concerts in France with Lutz Ulbrich, where we were presenting "Inventions for Electric Guitar” and other compositions, which we developed together that year. In August, we were invited for two concerts in the South of France, one in the wonderful Roman theater in Arles, the other at the Festival Palace in Cannes.This is where we met the musicians of the German band CAN and the singer Nico, who also played at the festival. After the concerts we stayed together a few days in the beautiful city of Arles. Nico's friend, the French director Philippe Garrel, was working at that time on a film starring Nico, Anita Pallenberg and Dominique Sanda and was looking for music to make you dream. I always recorded most of our concerts, that's how we were able to offer him the piece that we had performed as "encore” in Cannes. It became the main theme of the film. Other parts were recorded during several sessions throughout 1975 in my studio in Berlin. Instruments and electronic devices were relatively simple compared to today's technology: four-track tape recorder, an old Farfisa organ, the beautiful EKO Rhythm Computer (Italian machines controlled by punched cards), the EMS superb guitar-Synthi HiFli and of course, our "usual” guitars. All this combined with the patching, the filtering and echo has produced its own unique sound to "electronic dreams” of the 70s. , Manuel Göttsching 1993 Recorded in 1975 at Studio ROMA, Berlin, with the exception of "Le Berceau de Cristal", recorded during the concert on August 7, 1975 at the Palais du Festival in Cannes.

We proudly announce the CD REmaster Editionof the 1972 Original release , one of the most important German
Krautrock albums - Remastered by Manuel Göttsching himself.
As for the info we refer to Julian Cope´s review in his “Krautrocksampler” Book,
Publisher : Head Heritage (1 Oct. 1995) :
“Beware of Schwingungen!” That should be the large sticker on the front of all copies of this record. For it is dangerous to be casually
introduced to something that is life-changing, as I found out to my cost when first listening to this record.
It all starts fairly simply and without any cause for alarm - “Look at Your Sun” begins with a Doorsy lone groover guitar begins a pedestrian
blues, beautiful. Then the most crushed voice, a cross between Johnny Rotten and Tiny Tim, preaches its way into the proceeds. God, it
is beautiful - John L. repeats over and over, “We are all one, we are all one”, until a howling fuzztone solo guitar blows the whole onechord “Signed D.C.” ringing-cymbals torture to an end. And then the most far out track of all begins. This is called “Flower Must Die” and
it is a free-rock giant that transcends everything else in its field (there are no contenders.) As I've written before, PIL sounds like this. John
L. was John Lydon in a previous incarnation. After a slow weird build, a frantic streamlined one-chord mantra kicks in and it’s like the
Stooges’ Funhouse period but in a Righteous Vision Zone that fucks them right off. Phasing tears at the whole tracks as this Holy Racket
crosses into Hyper-space and everything gets all hyphenated just-for-the-sake-of-it. “Flowers Must Die”, man, it’s fucked up. Over on Side
2, the title-track (“Vibrations”) begins poetically enough with Wolfgang Muller’s epic and hugely reverbed vibraphone. Organ fades in and
FX guitars, and time passes by. Finally, tom-toms roll and the developing pace is built upon until that great eternal chord sequence finally
materialises — this is the one that Göttsching and Enke believed was the sound of heaven.
They may have been right. And Schwingungen was a gift from the Gods.“

At1980 are back with another immense release that may be there best yet. Featuring the melodically additive anthems "Back to Me" and "Pieces of Me", Forget to Remember is album that promises to keep you pressing that replay button and belting your heart out. This is a must listen for all synth lovers and AOR enthusiasts. Enjoy.

At1980 are back with another immense release that may be there best yet. Featuring the melodically additive anthems "Back to Me" and "Pieces of Me", Forget to Remember is album that promises to keep you pressing that replay button and belting your heart out. This is a must listen for all synth lovers and AOR enthusiasts. Enjoy.

A 1994 tape by Ghanaian musician Ata Kak called Obaa Sima is being reissued by Awesome Tapes From Africa.

The release is the culmination of a 13-year story for Awesome Tapes From Africa founder Brian Shimkovitz, who bought a cassette copy of Obaa Sima from a roadside stall in Cape Coast, Ghana, in 2002. The tape was the subject of the first post on his Awesome Tapes From Africa blog in 2006—the blog spawned a full record label in 2011.

Shimkovitz began searching for Ata Kat and says "Google and endless phone calls provided no leads." It was eventually discovered the musician, real name Yaw Atta-Owusu, had recorded Obaa Sima in Toronto before moving back to Ghana in 2006.

The restoration of the tape proved challenging. Only about 50 copies of the original tape were produced, and Atta-Owusu's master DAT had disintegrated, so the second-hand copy purchased by Shimkovitz was used as the source for the reissue.

2023 repress -

Rising star of summertime dance music, Barry Can't Swim, is the perfect fit for Shall Not Fade's Classic Cuts series. His delicate and classy take on house is a breath of fresh air and ideal for the new, hot weather, teasing the reopening of clubs and return to freedom that this summer hopes to bring.

His debut release on Shall Not Fade, Amor Fati EP is a perfectly curated four tracker of jazz with a modern twist, as shown on the opening track and first single "Lone Raver" and its bittersweet chords that blend with melancholy vocals and open out into a euphoric dancy beat. The anthemic trance overtones carry through to "Rah That's a Mad Question", which takes classic piano house vibes and more summertime heat with its Balaeric energy.

"Jazz Club After Hours" is a triumphant, high sheen lounge roller with intricate jazz instrumentation and playful percussion to boot. EP closer, "El Layali" shows the breadth of influence on this record, as it all coalesces into a catchy house number best suited to Mediterranean dances in the sun.

Beanfield’s mega classic re-release in a double 12” pack with old and new remixes by Toto Chiavetta and Art Department and a new Beanfield track. “Tides” was originally released in 2004 and evolved into an all-time club anthem by means of Carl Craig’s huge remix (C's Movement #1), followed-up by the stunning Ripperton remix.

»October Language« is the debut album by New Orleans based duo Belong, comprised of Turk Dietrich and Mike Jones. Since it's release in 2006, Belongs debut masterpiece has accumulated a dedicated cult following, with comparisons to the work of Christian Fennesz and Gas, with some claims that it plays like My Bloody Valentine's »Loveless« sans the songs. While these comparisons are useful for filing this album into a particular bin in the record shop, time has proven that »October Language« is a unique album which remains unmatched by its contemporaries.

Blacklight Chameleon, a new moniker by Austrian producer Martin Riedler, presents a confusing or rather odd introduction with his new project on Nutriot Recordings. Riedler's music takes a stance halfway between studio production and live jam.

Back in!

Welcome 2023 re-press of this sweet post-punk vocalist's heartfelt reggae/funk with analogue dubs. A unique slice of late-70s/early-80s niceness from Brenda Ray, whose previous EM release, Walatta [EM1071CD], has been embraced by a large number of listeners. Recorded in North West England, D'Ya Hear Me! is warm-hearted, open, fresh and slyly experimental. With a true D.I.Y. soul, these thirteen tracks, originally released in various formats by Ray a.k.a. Brenda Kenny a.k.a. Natalie Sand a.k.a. Polly Rith'm, and her musical friends under the moniker(s) Naffi/Naffi Sandwich, were recorded in a simple home-made studio, to tape. Far from media-crazed London, Naffi created a musical world free from lust for the spotlight, focusing solely on the music, and the results are fittingly pure. D'Ya Hear Me! is a wide-ranging release, with lovely vocal tracks, warm dubs and pleasingly odd instrumentals, all knitted together with a special trans-Atlantic rhythmic sense. Two songs of special interest here are "Moonbeams" and the Young Marble Giants-esque "Everyday Just Another Dream", which are early versions of "Starlight" and "Another Dream" from Walatta. Also noteworthy are several previously unissued longer versions of some songs. A year-round collection of summery breezes.

Buzz Kull is the moniker for Sydney musician Marc Dwyer (Marcel Whyler) whose sound is described as a cinematic blaze of industrial darkwave, minimal synth & post punk.The Australian master of the dark synth arts is back and - boy - he is out for blood. We've been missing Marc Dwyer solo project Buzz Kull since his latest single Last In The Club from late 2019 and since back then we knew he was up to something. At first glimpse, the minimal wave days of We Were Lovers seem far away now that Marc has gone full Club Body Music with his upcoming new album, but there is a thread that binds Buzz Kull hits from the past such as Into The Void, Avoiding The Light and New Kind Of Cross with these ten new cuts: a thread of darkness proper to the most handsome man in the game and that's here to stay. Echoes of 90's era Front 242 and Front Line Assembly will resonate from tracks like Fascination and Dead Inside; elements of early body music flirting with the dark side of British synthpop will rave from the grooves of Dancing with Machines and Man on the Beat, while late 80's Belgian new beat cellar-like vibes rise from Do You See and Burn it to the Ground. But Buzz Kull's third full-length is not just about music subgenres we all know and love, it's about a feeling that comes alive only with the dark and drives you through the small hours just to leave you drained and filled at once. The creature of the night is on the loose, the sticky dancefloor its natural habitat, its lust for the upside-down world of the club can't be cured. Clear red vinyl LP!

Italian, French-speaking and blessed with a Belgian accent Christophe Clébard brings a coherence that prevails both for his person and for his music: a wobbly mound, which sometimes resembles a series of explosions, sometimes a pile of layers cut by a flood of words from which parts can be distinguished. Relying on the amplified intonation of a saturated microphone, a pounding rhythm box and a synthesizer, his performances absorb the hearing to spit it out in a universe where nothing has any meaning, except "we're going to die". A punchline that he chants far from the cliché darkness of the dark wave, since for him death is jubilant and colorful, with the grim reaper as the owner of the nightclub. A nightclub well anchored in his head, without a future, with the upcoming emptiness and the hazy memory of his Christian upbringing.

All tracks composed and recorded by Christophe Clébard at les ateliers claus. The album was recorded during a residency at Les Ateliers Claus during the month of April 2021, mixed by Piccolo Bruno and Christophe Clebard, mastered by Elvin Vanzeebroeck at Rare Sound Studio. Photos and Cover projects by Jonas Meier

Church Andrews and Matt Davies weave intricate patterns from Fibonacci sequences on new mini-album, Yucca. Producer and composer Church Andrews (aka Kirk Barley) and drummer Matt Davies return to explore the outer limits of rhythm on a six-track suite that is at once angular and fluid, natural and systematic. Drawn to the restrictions of working solely with one synth and live drums, the pair found creativity in limitation, developing a compositional dialogue between the sonic timbres of Kirk’s productions and Matt’s percussive practice. Evoking the primitive yet complex form of the plant from which it takes its name, Yucca features tracks that are built around rhythmic ratios of the Fibonacci sequence. Mirroring spiral patterns exhibited in nature, each track evolves like a cellular structure of its own, from the livewire syntax of ‘Chirp’ and the deconstructed ebb and flow of ‘Ferns’, to the mini-album’s title track, where crisp grooves flit between modulated electronics like fireflies. “I’ve always been inspired by music that is complex without sounding complex,” Matt explains. He maintains a sense of bounce amid the intricate phrasing and cites drummers Roy Haynes and his grandson Marcus Gilmore as inspirations, alongside sabar drummers from Senegal and Mridangam drumming of South India. With a shared background in hip-hop and the swung beats of J Dilla and Flying Lotus, Kirk Barley and Matt Davies were also inspired by the minimalism of Terry Riley and the sparse palette of dub techno. Written and recorded in Lewisham in the spring and summer of 2023, Yucca follows the release of Axis in 2022, with the duo having also performed at festivals such as Rewire and Waking Life, and recorded live sessions for Fact magazine and Worldwide FM. The third release on Yorkshire-based Odda Recordings, following Kirk Barley’s Marionette and Flaer’s Preludes, Yucca confirms the label’s reputation for championing music on the unstable ground between the organic and the synthetic.

Following her debut album on Aus in 2020, Berlin's Cinthie marks another milestone in her career delivering the latest installment of the esteemed DJ-Kicks compilation series for !K7 Records. Berlin-based producer, DJ, record store owner and head honcho of numerous labels, Cinthie, has long been a key figure in the House scene. Her career in the industry dates back decades, working behind the desk of a record store in Saarbrücken near Frankfurt and as a resident DJ at several clubs in the city. Now in 2022 the highly acclaimed artist has well and truly cemented herself as a driving force for the contemporary house scene, releasing material on the likes of her own 803 Crystal Grooves, Aus, Shall Not Fade, Key Vinyl and taking crates from Tokyo to Paris, London, Amsterdam and beyond with her DJ sets as well as regular appearances on her home turf and clubbing mecca, Berlin.

Civilistjävel! returns to Copenhagen label Felt with a four track EP following on from 2022's Järnnätter album. Equally well placed next to the Biosphere / early Fax +49-69/450464 camp as well as various decades of electro-acoustic drone practitioners, Fyra platser (Four Places) also includes a trip-hop leaning collaboration with Cucina Povera. Whilst Järnnätter drew influence from the cyclical, chasmic nature of dub techno, Fyra platser hones further in on the ‘between’ areas in a minimal, reductivist fashion. The rhythms are there to follow but are primarily beatless and more expansive, though skewing perceptions of time in the same trademark manner. Three locations in the Nordingrå area of the Swedish high coast are exorcised and channelled through sound. ‘Kolugn’ is a deliberately grainy, sepia-tinged continuation of the likes of Robert Rutman’s work across the 70s American avant-garde. It sits in contrast to the more obviously synthesis-led direction of fellow longform piece ‘Valmsta’. The location slowly changes to Finland via Athens, scenes of cafe conversations and hazy polaroids informing the lyrics of ‘Louhivesi’. The result sounds like a 90s illbient record dropped around 30 bpm and the stylus has caught on a perennial 8-bar loop. The balance of Cucina Povera’s cold, reverb-heavy vocal inflections drive the track into another dimension. If Moral were the Scandi Joy Division, this pairing must be the Scandi Massive Attack.

Compuma, a.k.a. Koichi Matsunaga, reaches back through time to 1970s Hawaii to perform a mind meld, his old-school Roland drum machines and present-era compumagic vulcanizing and reshaping Haku's original home-grown analog synth madness. Not merely a remix, this a synergistic reconstruction, a transformation at the molecular level in which Haku's source-code DNA is reborn in 2015.

Reveries is Zach Frizzell, Marc Ertel and Damien Duque’s first album for over three years, and follows the success of their debut Liberamente. Together, the trio craft delicately textured and slowly unfurling sonic vistas, occupying a unique aural domain that lies between guitar-driven drone music and modern classical compositions.With their individual projects they are incredibly prolific, but Dawn Chorus releases are few and far between and Reveries represents a refined evolution, leaning more heavily toward string-based arrangements and compositional virtuosity. It is the very essence of what they are calling “dronegaze”, pushing the boundaries of the ambient genre while embracing a profound auditory expression. According to the trio, the six, long tracks on Reveries are “heavily reliant on improvisation, intuition, and allowing the compositions to exist in their own moment; the aim was a feeling of fluidity and a sense that every instrument has its place and purpose”. And they’re right. The opening title track emerges quietly in a swirl of strings; lead single ‘Deus’ eases its fittingly reverent grain into a glorious minor-key immensity; ‘Cadere’ pulls together a cast of orchestral instruments into a comforting devotional; ‘Somnium’ plays out in diffuse, shimmering melodic rounds; ‘Vale’ blossoms from a pair of sparse, alternating chord swells; and ‘Aufero’ is the perfect coda that reprises the low-end rumble of the album’s overture before being swept away on a sea of dissonance. “We live in an era of infinite distraction,” says Zach Frizzell, “where often the most valuable thing you can find is a respite for the soul.” How right he is. This, truly, is music from a higher place.

So while people are still struggling to wrap their heads around Dean Blunt's previous long player The Redeemer, Blunt has already announced his new album and debut for the popular label Rough Trade. The new album is called Black Metal and the ghostly first single is called “50 Cent.” It sounds like neither of those reference points. It doesn’t really sound quite like anything, but still falls into a tradition of rap, rock, and the confessional intimacy of a singer-songwriter. It’s as dark, absorbing, and all-encompassing as that void of an album cover.

Unwashed acid house and disco through a broken South London filter - from "70s New York bathhouses to "80s Chicago nightclubs via the Brixton Windmill. Bring a towel. Decius are brothers Liam and Luke May, founders of Trashmouth Records, together with Quinn Whalley (Paranoid London/Warmduscher) and Fat White Family frontman Lias Saoudi. Those with an ear to the ground will have picked up on a string of self-released 12"s over the last few years, supported by the likes of Daniel Avery, Honey Dijon, Ivan Smagghe, Mike Servito, 2 Many DJs, Moxie and Erol Alkan. Decius Vol. I is a lean entry point to their sordid world - dark, uncut, unrefined and unrepentant.

M.E.S.H., Karen Gwyer, Ital Tek, Lord of The Isles Remixes. Emerging artists rarely exceed listeners’ expectations with a complete album right out of the box, but Deena Abdelwahed is the exception that proves the rule. While the young artist of Tunisian origin stood out with her daring DJ sets, it is her surprising first album, “Khonnar", released at the end of 2018 on InFiné which sealed her status of eclectic producer, guaranteeing her a place among the best releases of the year by Resident Advisor, Trax, Tsugi, The Quietus and Vinyl Factory. Khonnar remixes compiles a series of remixes in 12”, inspired by the unique atmosphere of Deena Abdelwahed’s first album, while extending it across the entire spectrum of electronic, club and experimental music.

Their newest release “For Barney, Who Was A Bad Dog, But A Good Boy, And Very Much Loved” comes from Brooklyn-based Dekalb Works (debut ‘Duologue’ on Where To Now? Records), the collaborative project of Austin Peru (Vision Fortune) & Daniel Creahan (Sweat Equity / Alien D).

The release summarizes a series of experimentations between live performance contexts and sample-heavy collage work. Since starting their residency on Radio alHara, Dekalb Works found themselves drawn to the act of performing, whether as a live act or DJing, and the space between these two often overly rigid modes.

“For Barney…” draws heavily on the sonic palette of American country and western music, treated through the lens of heavy studio processing and the production techniques of dub, ambient, and trip-hop. Recording hours-long live improvisations with guitar, piano, or drum machines and samplers, they pillaged these sessions as source material. Whereas previous work focused on the voice and the interaction of text, voice and music, these recordings pulled from the sounds of musicians playing together in a room. The arrangement process remains the same, chopping and manipulating small samples and momentary gestures into dense, rhythmic collages.

Dettinger’s Intershop and Oasis have long been held, by many fans of ambient and electronic music, to be some of the finest albums in their field. Produced by the mysterious Olaf Dettinger, about whom not much is publicly known, they were some of the earliest full-lengths released by the then-nascent Kompakt, and in many ways, they both articulated and defined the sound that would come to be known as Pop Ambient, while also existing, somehow, to the leftfield of any clearly recognisable genre.

Beautiful, sui generis works, it is a rare pleasure to see them being reissued on vinyl for a new generation of listeners to embrace. Originally released on CD only in 1999, Intershop was Kompakt’s first artist full-length. The music here simmers and broods, with opulent banks of tone marking out territory for rhythms that seem to be built from the clacking detritus of technology – hisses, thunks, knocks. Bass is deployed carefully, each drop a dubbed-out depth charge; drones spin and spiral, warping and weaving between the beats.

Oasis, released in 2000, refined the palette that Dettinger had explored on its predecessor. A blurred crusade of ambient texturology, its unassuming patterns, and subtle, incremental dynamics, admit to real beauty, and a kind of abstract sensuality that you don’t often experience with music that is, perhaps, similarly tooled, but not as poetic. Through seemingly simple gestures – whether lushly expansive repetitions, hyper-acute tremolo tones, or ear-tickling rhythms – it builds complex emotional resonance. It’s no surprise to discover Oasis is held in high esteem by artists like Panda Bear of Animal Collective, who once said of Dettinger, “For us, he was the dude.”

There is, of course, other music to know Dettinger by, too – his three excellent EPs for Kompakt, Blond (1998), Puma and Totentanz (1999), the latter of which, Michael Mayer once argued, “invented dubstep.” There is also a small, yet graceful run of compilation contributions, many of which can be found on Kompakt’s Total and Pop Ambient series. All this music has plenty to recommend it, sharing a clarity of purpose, and a rare, human warmth and depth. But Intershop and Oasis are the releases that distil Dettinger’s singular vision, and allow him, should he wish, to claim his place as a modern master of ambient and electronic music.

Dettinger’s Intershop and Oasis have long been held, by many fans of ambient and electronic music, to be some of the finest albums in their field. Produced by the mysterious Olaf Dettinger, about whom not much is publicly known, they were some of the earliest full-lengths released by the then-nascent Kompakt, and in many ways, they both articulated and defined the sound that would come to be known as Pop Ambient, while also existing, somehow, to the leftfield of any clearly recognisable genre.

Beautiful, sui generis works, it is a rare pleasure to see them being reissued on vinyl for a new generation of listeners to embrace. Originally released on CD only in 1999, Intershop was Kompakt’s first artist full-length. The music here simmers and broods, with opulent banks of tone marking out territory for rhythms that seem to be built from the clacking detritus of technology – hisses, thunks, knocks. Bass is deployed carefully, each drop a dubbed-out depth charge; drones spin and spiral, warping and weaving between the beats.

Oasis, released in 2000, refined the palette that Dettinger had explored on its predecessor. A blurred crusade of ambient texturology, its unassuming patterns, and subtle, incremental dynamics, admit to real beauty, and a kind of abstract sensuality that you don’t often experience with music that is, perhaps, similarly tooled, but not as poetic. Through seemingly simple gestures – whether lushly expansive repetitions, hyper-acute tremolo tones, or ear-tickling rhythms – it builds complex emotional resonance. It’s no surprise to discover Oasis is held in high esteem by artists like Panda Bear of Animal Collective, who once said of Dettinger, “For us, he was the dude.”

There is, of course, other music to know Dettinger by, too – his three excellent EPs for Kompakt, Blond (1998), Puma and Totentanz (1999), the latter of which, Michael Mayer once argued, “invented dubstep.” There is also a small, yet graceful run of compilation contributions, many of which can be found on Kompakt’s Total and Pop Ambient series. All this music has plenty to recommend it, sharing a clarity of purpose, and a rare, human warmth and depth. But Intershop and Oasis are the releases that distil Dettinger’s singular vision, and allow him, should he wish, to claim his place as a modern master of ambient and electronic music.

Peter Andersson, aka Lina Baby Doll, is the man that sustain the heavy structure behind Deutsch Nepal. A legend in the scene of industrialism, avant-garde, music and art in general. He is capable to re-create and re-design old school industrial and electronica, taking elements from apparently dissimilar concepts such as Dadaism and Tribalism, or “contradictory” ideas such as Heathenry and Christianity and converge them into a typical cocktail blend that characterises a unique and now famous style. Manic rhythmic redundancies, strange indefinable samplers, metallic sounds, distorted guitar chords are common elements found in all his works. His main goal?. Mesmerize the listener to subjugate the mind and put the spirit into reverberation mode.

It is difficult to reduce his works to a simple description. All of them seem to be the evolution of an early idea, a baby that grows old, getting monstrous and divine while doing so. The music itself is a never ending universal paradox in where beats and rhythms have a primary role. Deutsch Nepal is surreal landscapes strongly conducted and cut through with the violent and precise pounding of the repetitive aspect of percussion. It’s a black and white obsession, changing shapes and tonality.

This boxset compiles the first five albums released by Deutsch Nepal throughout the 90’s (“Deflagration of Hell”, “Benevolence”, “Tolerance”, “¡Comprendido!… Time Stop! …And World Ending” and “Erosion”) plus an extra record (“Dystopian Selection”) with a selection of tracks taken from old compilations. Limited edition of 535 copies with six vinyl records on individual sleeves, three postcards set, numbered certificate and a sticker.

Hand-numbered edition, 250 copies signed by Wolfgang Müller, with download code.

Die Tödliche Doris were always an outlier, a performance art / music project that originally surfaced in early 80s Berlin, on the outer reaches of the post punk / new wave scene that included acts like Einstuzende Neubauten (Collapsing New Buildings) and Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft.

Inspired by post-structuralism and modern / post-modern philosophers, they deconstructed the accepted popular format of both the mainstream and the underground with their second release, "Chöre & Soli". To confound the vinyl obsessives of the day, what appeared to be an LP box-set, in fact contained eight tiny plastic toy-records, with their own player. Each disc contained 20 seconds of low grade sound. "We want to become the most independent band of all independent bands–even independent from a usual record player." Wolfgang Müller stated "But also independent from music reviews and critics, which want to put you in her sound- and identity-system."

Kashual Plastik take up Müller's dogma and re-present it for our times, where these issues seem only more compounded. Once again to flummox their audience, old and new, the tape comes as a kit of separate parts with assembly tool - a mini screwdriver. You can listen with the download code as you work. Now that's what I call outsourcing.

The Kashual Plastik tape, digitally enhanced, features contemporary producers including, among others: Aaron Dilloway, Brandstifter, T.V.S.T., Hugo Capablanca, ML, Beau Wanzer, Nika Son, Laura Not, or Saskia Lavaux. They followed a call from the modern-day social network spheres, where Die Tödliche Doris asked the world to reshuffle some old original tape recordings. Out of the millions of submissions, Doris selected works that together shape the Doris of today for a brief moment of time.

In the summer of 2009, Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley and the band’s long time sound engineer, Jeremy Lemos, invited Lemos’ White/light bandmate Matt Clark and Chicago spacepunx Disappears to come over to Lemos’ Semaphore Recording studio and jam. Their one-afternoon, two-drummers, three-guitarists, no-rules jam evolved into a productive and glorious multi-day freakout, which resulted in the recording of these eight songs. Producer John Congleton (St. Vincent, Angel Olsen) later mixed the marathon session with Steve and Jeremy at Echo Canyon West in Hoboken, NJ. Limited to 350 2xLP’s pressed at 45rpm and housed in “bootleg-style” hand-stamped and numbered LP jackets.

Ditterich von Euler-Donnersperg, also known as Uli Rehberg and most certainty other names, is a mythologised figure in Germany’s industrial underground. The man behind Walter Ulbricht Schallfolien, a label responsible for early releases by Throbbing Gristle and SPK and for being the home of the enigmatic Werkbund, it is long believed that Ditterich is part of, or completely behind, Werkbund himself. A Colourful Storm presents another piece of his puzzle.

Three murderous steppers dubs on a propulsive, rat-tat-tat rhythm, combining mystical spaciousness with detail and ferocity. Angry-lion bass and smears of brass, fusillades and explosions, scares and shocks, oriental pentatonics, clattering percussion and synthy transcendence… the business. The second mix is nastiest; the third is the wildest and most discombobulated (and our favourite).

Letter-pressed, poly-lined sleeves.

Precious, timely, moody reflections on migrating from Côte d’Ivoire to Moss, in Norway, over ruff breakbeat funk supplied by the nimble bass-playing of Maimouna’s old man (from Kambo Super Sound), and the expert conga and kit-drumming of Stliletti-Ana (from Jesse, in Helsinki). Even in their delirium, b-boys and girls will savour traces of the Incredible Bongo Band, in the chorus. Over the eight minutes, and going deeper on the flip, the mix lifts off into a cosmic steppers dub, featuring Gilb-r alongside Sotofett on keyboards, with no let up for the dancefloor in energy and vibes.

In beautifully letter-pressed, poly-lined sleeves.

“It was in 2001 / I got the letter / A letter that said / I would travel to a cold world / Not knowing what would happen / I was full of loneliness / No country / Everyone was different / Not only skin colour / The way people spoke / The way people behaved / That’s the adventure / Obey / This is the story we’re told / The key to success / So we can do everything for our parents / Who need us / Desperate for a better life / That’s the adventure

Following the release of “Joined Ends” in 2014 – a deeply intimate and textured project he describes as his “chamber music” record – Dorian Concept performed everywhere from Glastonbury to Sonar to MoMA PS1’s Warm Up and then deliberately took himself off the radar. The time since has been spent meticulously un-learning his prodigious production process and developing a brand new sound that even the most clued-up won’t be expecting – showcased on ‘Promises’, in the most prominent use of his voice to date. The recording and processing of his vocals represent not only a more human expression of his highly technical sound, but also an inclination toward recursion – the challenge, ephemerality, and demand for attention of “unequal repetition” which shapes the build and deconstruction of energy throughout the record.

Taking inspiration from multi-generational eclecticism (‘60s jazz, ‘70s fusion, ‘80s neo prog-rock, ‘90s electronica), Dorian Concept sought to replicate “modern” music elements with old-fashioned methods, live-playing and hand-recording deceptively digital sounds in service of a tongue-in-cheek “parody of nostalgia”. Having produced the record largely in the years 2016 and 2017 – widely characterized as periods of a cultural reckoning throughout the democratic world – he ambitiously took timely themes of cumulative error, shortening attention spans and subjective experience and transposed them into his making. As is to be expected from him by now, for all the considered, high-concept musing, the result is refreshingly unpretentious: dizzying swells, cacophonous breakdowns and formidable rhythms are both expert and childlike, hyperactive and hyper-focused.

Born Oliver Thomas Johnson, the self-taught keyboardist and producer should be no stranger to those in the Brainfeeder orbit. He first caught the attention of the crew in its infancy, when head honcho Flying Lotus discovered Dorian Concept’s MySpace profile and swiftly included a remix in his lauded debut Essential Mix (2008). Dorian Concept went on to tour with FlyLo’s live band, appeared at some of Brainfeeder’s earliest international label nights in 2009 (Off-Sonar in Barcelona and the infamous Hearn Street Car Park session in London), and released a string of celebrated EPs and albums for Kindred Spirits imprint Nod Navigators, Affine and Ninja Tune – as well as remixing Taylor McFerrin, contributing production to Thundercat’s “The Golden Age of Apocalypse” and playing keys on Flying Lotus’ seminal “Cosmogramma”.

limited edition on white wax, only 500 copies made!

Dottie Doppler is a three-headed entity. When she comes to life, she manipulates modular synthesizers, and throws acoustic waves in every directions, with textures that rub, pulsations that bounce, coil and weave together. Then emerge stimulating ballets for tremulous electrons, punkoid nanoparticles that are thrilled to escape from the silence of printed circuits. In her sonic playground, Dottie plays with her world of very little troublemakers she invites to dance, intertwine and resonate together, tearing through the ether with their dazzles. Dances that fréquences critiques is proud to present for the first time, on vinyl and digitals. Dottie Doppler is made up of three members who have already performed under the names of Blason (on the program of the forthcoming Présences électroniques, organized by INA Grm), Napalm Jazz (soon to celebrate its 25th anniversary with a french tour), as well as A/n/t/i/o/p/e, Ero Babaa, Blase of 69, Oïmiakon, Bison Skull Mountain, etc., and whose recordings can be found on top-quality labels, such as Scum Yr Earth, Tanzprocesz, Vice de forme, Galerie Pache, Notype, Decimation sociale, among others.

Drapizdat is the umbrella banner for Russian producer Vladislav Godzevich’s rogue gallery of musical identities. Its name derives from a fusion of samizdat (illegally reproduced publications of censored materials within repressive regimes) and drap (slang for marijuana; an early beat music alias was Papa Drap), which aptly evokes his ethos of covert altered state transmissions. МИФ presents a constellation of tracks spanning five projects, four years, and 73-minutes; taken together it fully delivers on the hidden acronym of its title: M = music, И = elected, Ф = fragments [combined = ‘Myth’].

Each entity spelunks its own vibrant catacomb: Сам Себе Па (“tropical industrial 5th world dada”), Ито Кумаре (“metaphysical ambient music”), Jeans Escape (rhythmic liberations from reality), Reather Weport (“free form music of the spheres, vibrations beyond the universal caves”), Drapula (“black moon feasts on the blood of soul and funk”), Клаксон Гансон (“psychedelic ethno-mutant punk”).

Godzevich describes his process as a metamorphosis, created at night, “with minimal light.” Percolating loops of percussion, texture, and melody, summoned into warped trances of alien grace. Elements align and obscure like celestial phenomena half-glimpsed, half-dreamed: “I plunge deeper and deeper to gather golden sand from the bottom of time and show it to the world, building islands in this dilapidated world.”

Dreems returns with his second full-length album, a languid journey through ambient dimensions. Following up his self-titled debut from 2014, these two LPs will stand together as test of time, a snapshot of the atmosphere that surrounded him throughout the decade.
As a versatile club-DJ with a respected catalog of mixed-tempo club remixes, and as half of the ‘Krautback’ / elementally Australian industrial act ‘Die Orangen,’ Dreems merely hints at his musical identity as an album artist, an expansive space in which he truly does soar with the spirit of a true artist, plumbing the depths of his emotional being, achieving catharsis in the shimmering pleasure of sound.
Diamond Bay’s 12 tracks surprise and reward the listener with the great gift of capturing your attention without ever attempting to hijack it. In a world gripped by the algorithmic nightmare of millennial whoops and material hooks, Dreems has charted a course for something altogether different - a peaceful kind of sonic painting. These are pastoral, passing vignettes. They highlight our awareness without forcefully directing our thoughts, except on the vocal pieces which reinforce the contemplative themes, adding not only specificity, but bringing a real sense of intimacy to the record.

This EP contains six tracks previously released as three 7" singles in 2003, and have not been available for almost two decades. Emerson Kitamura played his favourite songs from different eras and places with his organ equipped with bass pedals and accompanied by the legendary drum box TR-808.

Having had a long career playing keyboards in bands and sessions, Kitamura came to the fore in Japan with his self released 7" on his Bubblingnotes label. In 2018, he burst onto the international scene with his EP for EM Records, The Countryside Is Great, which gave him an opportunity to stretch out his inimitable style to make a bass/dub re-work of the Thai hit. The EP also debuted his collaboration with the guitarist/singer/songwriter/ mmm, with their cover of George McCrae's Rock Your Baby. The duo went on to release their LP Chasing Giants on Kitamura's label, and to grace Europe with a few legendary gigs.

This EP represents Kitamura's roots, with two Jackie Mittoo covers, some jazz evergreens, and a stellar version of the Lou Rawls classic You'll Never Find.

In meteorology, the word Norther refers to a cold wind that blows down from the north. For Liverpool’s Ex-Easter Island Head, it’s also an apt title for the strange and multi-faceted sound of their new album that now descends upon the world at large: ever shifting, a multiplicity of sounds both acoustic and manipulated, and yet one that still moves as part of a single mighty breeze. At times it might recall the experiments of Rhys Chatham and Glenn Branca, the widescreen beauty of The Necks, the relentless experimentation of Arnold Dreyblatt or the boundary-pushing roster of Kompakt Records, yet ultimately this is music that has no direct compare. Each of its six pieces demonstrates a different creative process. On blossoming opener ‘Weather’, whirring motors dance fairy-like atop strings and drums; on the dizzying ‘Magnetic Language’ voices are played back through phones and amplified through pickups made of magnets wrapped in copper wire; the title of ‘Golden Bridges’ refers to the brass rods the band shift beneath the strings of their guitar. All, however, tap to one degree or another into that abiding theme of the weather. Norther is Ex-Easter Island Head’s first studio album since 2016, a time spent on collaborations and one-off performances with everyone from classical musicians and fellow experimentalists to schoolchildren. “All of the projects we were involved in between 2016 and 2024 have expanded the boundaries of what we do by exposing us to a huge variety of instruments, personalities and ways of working. It's really allowed us to see the purity of making music with a four-piece group,” says the band’s Benjamin D. Duvall. That status as a quartet is a new one, with the addition of longstanding friend and collaborator Andrew PM Hunt. Having a member of the band handling recording and mixing helped them push further and further into sonic territory that until Norther remained entirely unexplored – not just by Ex-Easter Island Head, but by any other band on earth.

Excelsior Ruth is a composer, DJ and producer born in the North-East of England but who currently resides in South London.

On her eponymously titled debut, she combines a life-long love of euphoric trance with echoes of her live performances as exlRuth, which incorporate sound recordings, drone, traditional choral music and the makina backdrop of her youth. Embedded in community heritage, it’s a record that probes connections between the classical and contemporary.

Gossamer harp drifts across time on ‘Haunt’, leading to the affecting arpeggios, strings and high BPMs of ‘Dream Of Night’, programmed, as much of the EP was, on classic 90s synthesisers, including the Roland JP8080 and Quasimidi Rave-0-Lution 309. Drinkwater’s ‘Dawn Return mix’ reduces ‘Dream Of Night’ down to a moment of 6am E-motion, limbs weaving through dry ice like mist on long-forgotten moors.

A cathedral of angelic voices swells in ‘Dream Of You’, their hymn to oceanic feeling rooted to earth by a raining cascade of kicks. And ‘Sleepy Hollow’ journeys further into deep, unspeakable bodily knowing, pushed and pulled between propulsion and stasis as fizzy high hats and restless melodies weave through shrouds of ambient pads.

Words by Joe Roberts.