Downbeat | Electronica | Leftfield Tape 413 Items

Hot suite of crucial House. TIP!

NYC's Sweater on Polo delivers a hammering six track mini lp for L.I.E.S. indebted to the sounds of early-90s psychedelic Chicago house, names like Gherkin and Pierre come to mind but the young producer tastefully and effectively puts his own vision to the forefront with this release.

In the confused world of modern dance music production, Sweater on Polo, throws all trends aside and sticking to the bare essentials...letting the 808s,303s,727s do the job and making this one of the most crucial modern House records to come out of New York City in many years. Many producers these days stake a claim to this music and it falls short, plain and simple, Sweater on Polo is the most promising young producer in the city these days and this record puts it on display. Highly recommended!

Born and based in Cape Town, South Africa, Gonubie is an interdisciplinary artist with a background in fine art, landscape architecture and urban design. A classically trained musician and flautist, her debut album, Signals at Both Ears, acts as a personal sonic exploration of the notion of space and ideas surrounding the making of home. On Signals at Both Ears, sonic elements are combined organically through a process akin to painting. Incorporating the movement of synthesisers and percussive drumming with expansive chords, the compositions aim to immerse the listener in a world where sound is the primary tool for navigation and finding refuge. Profits from physical album sales will be donated to Bridges for Music, South Africa, a non profit organisation focused on empowering young talent from under-served communities. Recently highlighted in DJ magazine (djmag.com)

LBD Sounds present the new album from World Wild Web. Based in Berlin, this one man band machine from France offers up a beautiful collection of balearic jams, soaked up with instrumental psychedelic keyboards, influenced by traditional music from all over the world. 10 organ-based tracks sound like a dreamy new age voyage from the 70s, yet this music is very here and now.

All the little live jams that this album comprises of have been tweaked and edited, some more and some less, but the feeling of raw improvised music has remained untouched. These don't mean to be no chart hits, actually quite the opposite. It may almost be called a set of B-sides and it would still carry this badge as proud as it gets. It's simple and complex at the same time, this collection has a potential to suck you in, take you for a ride through places unknown and spit you out at the other end.

Was that a dream?

Cold neon lights. Dreamy sounds. Pure, hypnotic visuals. Welcome to the brand new, mesmerising universe of synthwave - unlike one you've seen before, where the future is in the past, and the past in the future. If you’re looking for alternative background music to accompany your work/study/chill sessions, you’ve arrived at the right destination. Hazy resonances, lush synth pads and electronic drums with gated reverb will have you gliding through outer space, mixed with nostalgic reverberations reminiscent of the ‘80's - recharging your energy and creative inspiration upon returning to the present. There are mysterious faces to meet thrilling stories to be uncovered on the road ahead; but for now, let your thoughts drift to a place of pure focus and relaxation.

Hannah Archimbault is a multidisciplinary French artist based in London. Hannah opens up her inner deep emotions throughout minimal sequences and loops of sustained and touching organ notes, with reminiscences of Philip Glass, Eva-Maria Houben, Harold Budd or Kali Malone and a contemporary vein that questions love in current times. "The EP came after a break up as I decided to compose in the process of going through this love grief and how you could grow from it, learn to love oneself after the break-up. Each song represents a different stage on this life chapter.". Indeed moving anger, sadness and acceptance are well represented on this sonic, brave redemption of the grief through the artform.

A more upfront and streamlined proposition than last year's 'Dias da
Aranha' on Souk, 'Cornos' is a reflection of Serpente's solo live
apparitions throughout this last year.
A cycle tainted by tragedies and a maze-like feeling of loss, 'Cornos'
mirrors both the urge of overcoming and its ghostly remnants through
five digressions that pulsate with crippled rhythmic symmetries and loner
harmonic motifs. Maybe just the sound of moving on with broken legs.

Tenerife, 2054: The parrots of a local zoo inexplicably go mad, spreading a deadly virus that only affects humans. Unable to contain the disease, authorities were forced to isolate the island completely, sealing its fate in a perpetual quarantine.

Over time, the island transformed into a sanctuary for wildlife that now roams freely across its territories. Orcas and dolphins claimed the surrounding waters, while gorillas found their home in the mountains around Teide, once a popular tourist destination. The population of parrots and birds multiplied, filling the air with a cacophony of colours and sounds.

The remaining humans on the island adapted to their new reality, living in isolated communities and learning to survive in a world where they are the minority. Meanwhile, the virus continues its advance in the outside world, pushing humanity to the brink of extinction.

Infant joins Warm Winters Ltd. with "sigla, sone", an album of strikingly personal and diaristic sound postcards. It's an album conveying the most intimate of moments and memories, encapsulating the feelings of entanglement and interdependence. The Michigan-based producer utilises various field recordings from his personal archives (sounds of a burning garage, conversations, Lake Michigan waves, crunching beach shells, starlings nesting in a bathroom vent…) alongside various treatments of the human voice and reworked/resampled work of his to create music that's both tender and unassuming, as well as fascinating and complex. The whimsical and the deeply touching sit side by side on an album that exhibits the magic of what ambient music can mean in 2023.

Richard Hronský is a Slovak multi-disciplinary artist based in Bratislava. 'closures', his second album, is a document of his daily musical practice from the last several tumultuous months. His heavy use of samples which are stretched and spliced beyond recognition creates an uncanny world, an elastic, lo-fi, distorted and convoluted reality, and yet, the music holds tremendous emotional weight. It's an album of wistful reminiscence, but also of knowing that things are exactly how they should be, a dreamlike landscape of moments, sounds, impressions and hopes.

Glasgow’s Somewhere Between Tapes series has already introduced us to a trio of riveting new artists at the
intersection of electronic experimentation and songwriting; with debuts by Alliyah Enyo, Chantal Michelle
and Man Rei all requiring your full and immediate attention. NEY, however, leap into another realm entirely
with a debut album so deep and fully realised that when we first played it in the office the usual din quickly
descended into a deathly silence - followed by a clamour of interest in what the hell had just been playing.
Glasgow School of Art graduate Lisa Fabian began work on the album by capturing her thoughts, dreams and
memories in a series of sketches, field recordings and voice notes. Joined by percussionist Matt Robin and
guitarist Eddie Brooks, the trio set about working Fabian’s loose fragments into a more coherent - if foggy
- narrative. Dubbed directly to tape, they layered a patchwork of textures that Fabian followed with intuitive
responses, shepherding the flow with Swedish and German language singing and spoken word.
Drums crash and roll like a rousing pagan ritual while Fabian’s voice lifts from the angular bruit like murmurs
from a lucid dream, piercing the permeable membrane between the spirit world and our own. Her close-
miked recordings sit in the mix like an additional layer of instrumentation, drifting in-and-out of view to
affirm the music’s inherent liminality. Fabian plays harp and nyckelharpa too, while her synthwork serves to
amplify the album’s emotional swell.
On the half hour long ‘Listen to the water’, the trio cut into Fabian’s field recordings like a block of marble, on
what they describe as “an intricate mosaic of sonic fractions”. On one of the side’s most arresting moments,
a medieval Swedish lullaby is sung in a tunnel under the Glasgow River Kelvin during a rainstorm, with traffic
passing overhead. Fabian leans into the natural echo of the tunnel, weaving her vocals around raindrops in
a way that perfectly encapsulates the gentle interplay between the performer and their environment - a
sequence so moving and perfect it feels almost ordained by higher powers.

This is the first album by Yo, an electronic musician who took over the name from the ink painting artist Sesshu Toyo. While carrying a hint of caricatured folk music in the style of the Geinoh Yamashirogumi, Yo seeks something more virtual and sympathizes with the tribal beats radicalized in the background music of video games such as "evergrace" and "garage". At the same time, he was heavily influenced by dub / bass artist such as Goth-trad, and even swallowed the "ska-core" aesthetic of 54-71.

Downtempo techno stars The Connection Machine return with stunning re-release, featuring unreleased tracks and Legowelt remix of classic Echoes From Tau Ceti. Four years after the re-release of their debut The Dream Tec Album on U-trax, the Dutch downtempo techno duo The Connection Machine returns with a second highly anticipated re-release. BlackHole+ contains remastered versions of most of the tracks on their original The Black Hole EP, released on U-trax in 1995, plus five tracks from their highly sought-after EPs on Tabernacle Records: Lost Connection and Lost Machine (with electro outfit Lost Trax on the flipside). The original Black Hole EP had black labels and all details of the release were added as a computer-spoken track on the b-side. For this re-release, this track was removed and a Legowelt remix was added of the still immensely popular track Echoes From Tau Ceti. The CD, cassette and digital versions will bring even more goodness in the form of two brand new tracks (Theorems, Theorems and Together), bringing the total number of tracks to eleven. As usual with U-trax releases, the cassette version boast yet another previously unreleased bonus track, Thinking Machine 23, plus the original 13 minute version of 8 Minutes.

Live From The Gonsch showcases Sydney head (and O.T.I.S. label boss) Hugh Burridge aka Hugh B’s lesser known domestic dub mode, low-slung and low volume, tracked on headphones during hidden hours, often with his daughter strapped to his chest. The album’s eight cuts are built from rhythmic modular loops layered with snaky bass, swampy guitar, and occasional hazed vocals, dub-mixed to 2-track cassette through hand-built FX (Burridge runs a boutique delay pedal business). The mood throughout is loose, soupy, and slippery, shaded in echo and spring reverb, glimpsed through tall grass.

The title alludes to Burridge’s recently retired Skylab radio show, “Mornings From The Gonsch,” which repped a spectrum of home recorded modes, from bedroom dub to hybrid new age to lost synth songcraft. Here he blends these muses into a woozy fusion all his own, dub-adjacent daydreams of time, money, stasis, and absence, hummed and half-heard beneath a bleached blue sky.

Argentine modal master Acid Twilight’s third raga saga maps a dusty plain of tumbleweeds, circling vultures, and bleached bones, across which rides a nameless stranger: Shadow Wrangler. Inspired by visions of high noon dread and the textures of psychedelic twang, they turned westward, layering shakers, synths, spurs, and six-string navigations into 12 crooked canyon instrumentals.

Shades of spaghetti western, Spacemen 3, and outlaw country whisper in the wind, but ultimately AT’s mode is more silhouette than song, at the axis of campfire jam and commune improv. Loping and loose, windswept and waterless, blowing over the sand of trails long since vanished. Another smoke signal rises in the distance; another scorpion sunset begins to dim. The Wrangler rides on.

The third release from new label Doyenne Books is a split EP featuring four experimental sound artists from London/LA, Philadelphia, Krakow, and Portland/Berlin - released following their text and photography contributions to an anthology book D-002: 'Singing To Spirits'.

The luxurious threads of your recent tailored finds are a conspicuous reminder of the sins you can't outrun. Paradise, an elusive escape from the mundane bourgeois existence you yearned to shed, remains an elusive mirage.

Your opulent den, a sanctuary for the modern-day clone, is a testament to the tainted wealth accumulated by a first world that thrives on the exploitation of the so-called others.

Amidst the midnight downtown haze enchanting melodies of smart phones and social media, the allure of fame and recognition hangs like a heavy cloud, casting a shadow over the once-rosy promises of success. Your most recent purchase, which you once cherished, now appear tarnished, their value distorted by harsh realities.

Languor is the captivating and exhilarating new album by Sweden based electronic music duo Nothing But Heart. Languor depicts a suspenseful and honest collection of sonic creations. For fans of Bohren & Der Club of Gore, Com Truise and William Basinski, as well as the foreshadowing visions of Kathryn Bigelow, David Lynch, and Andrei Tarkovskij.

Dirty Electronics (John Richards) and Oliver Torr met in a bar in Prague. One thing led to
another. After collaborating at Prague Quadrennial to create a sound-installation in a
repurposed ice-hockey arena, gigs followed. They vowed to make an album together, which
finally happened in the geographical space between Prague, London, Brno and Athens. The
album brings together disparate spaces and connected artists as a distorted memory trace.
Improvised group scenarios and abrupt electronic episodes are placed side-by-side in a
brutal marriag.

Written during a month-long residency with Intonal Festival in Malmo in 2019 and later recorded at The Glue Factory in Glasgow, Dappled Shade is Total Leatherette’s fourth album.
The tape comes in a limited edition of 50 Smokey Grey Hub Tapes with a Risographed paper sleeve. Recorded by Richard McMaster and mastered by Sam Smith.
If your favourite word is ‘harder’ then this one is for you

On their debut album International Waters [evar Records], French duo XL Order dive into an aquatic underworld of futuristic trance, brutal bass and tingling techno, exploring the paradoxes between dystopia and utopia. Feelings of melancholia and nostalgia ripple throughout, alongside dark and moody textures, reflecting their ability to conjure sinister soundscapes and hazy melodies.
Due to drop onNovember 10th, the album ebbs and flows between futuristic trance, brutal bass and tingling techno that pens a story of a new world, resulting in a paradox between dystopia and utopia. Feelings of melancholia and nostalgia ripple throughout the album alongside dark and moody textures, reflecting their ability to conjure sinister soundscapes in tandem with hazy melodies.
Drawing influence from the metaphysical painter Jean-Pierre Ugarte and the sci-fi film Blade Runner, as well as the aesthetic of Cyberpunk, XL Order produce sonic elements aligned with each multimedia source. Fusing themes of unity between the ecosystem and mankind, International Waters tells a tale of biodiversity and the perpetual renewal of nature, with or without humanity.
Chilling, cinematic and captivating, the album begins in a mirage of ambient tones, evolving into a trance and techno-flecked collection culminating in ten tracks. With a combination of chuggy rhythms, eerie sound FX and resounding kickdrums, an impression of a new world order gurgles beneath the surface while a shimmering utopia remains just beyond reach.
"Realm" opens the album on an angelic note with spine-tingling chords potent enough to make your eyes water before a flash of AI-like noise ends the track abruptly, catching us off guard. "Ode" follows suit with sombre pads and choppy breaks while a bewitching melody swirls in the atmosphere — a myriad of heart-melting frequencies.
On "Ava", XL Order collaborate with Paris-based vocalist Dovae, whose mechanized vocals simmer between rapid-fire hi-hats and breaksy-percussion. Layered between a succession of claps and alarm-like noise, Dovae's lyrics hypnotize and haunt."Hybride" is a storm of staccato synth notes and metallic percussion, working in symbiosis to create an enticing patchwork of grooves, pulling us towards cyberland. It's a contrast to "Cleanse," which is a thunking trip of cow-bell noises and a doom-inducing bassline, whipping up a frenzy that's apt for peak-time raving.
The hint is in the name on "Clubbing Planet." A robotic vocal echoes in the soundscape as a wonky bassline punctuates the mood. Deconstructed breakbeats add a foreboding feel, alluding to the presence of AI. "Industrial Dance" switches pace to a frantic level as mutant kickdrums pulverize the vibe alongside a corrosive melody. Not for the faint of heart.
"Reef Breaks" takes us underwater with a beautiful trance-flavoured melody, coming up for air with a succession of siren-like notes. Pure, unadulterated euphoria bubbles on "Seamulation," evoking pleasure-filled chaos. It's a contemporary tune down to the last beat, with a confetti-cannon synthline and Eurodance melody.
Closing out on the album with "Digillusion", XL Order focus on natural themes, including the sky, clouds and thunder. They run their own vocals through a vocoder, amplifying the hands-in-the-air vibe that dominates. The idea of the final track is to reflect three emotions that they feel resonate with the vision of XL Order: happiness, melancholy and renewal. It couldn't be more accurate.
XL Order display their idea of the future on International Waters — one that is equally intriguing and terrifying. Merging sci-fi-inspired breaks, AI-shaped techno and classic trance with a nu-skool twist, the pair know their sound and deliver it with panache.

The Trilogy comes to an Epic end! Raydar delivers the final chapter to Evil Squad. Enjoy!

It doesn't stop. NRW is proud to present something very special for your ears. Beautiful soft synths with vast and dynamic chords make "Fermi Paradox" an instant definitive Retrowave album. A must listen to for all synth lovers.

A Huge moment for NRW. Presenting the debut album from Pylot. Axiom is a power-packed project that harnesses many facets of synth and delivers them with glorious, well rounded execution. Boasting encapsulating melodies and rhythms, Axiom is an album that all synth enthusiasts and Audiophiles will enjoy. Pre-Order Today!

Earthtones is the musical identity of Serge Bandura, an electronic artist, former jazz musician, meditation teacher and ritualist based in LA. Kevin Nathaniel channels sound as a universal healing force through traditional African instruments and is a former student of legendary master musicians such as Ephat Mujuru and Chief Bey K. Sending files back and forth during the pandemic, the two artists deepened a musical friendship and began a dialog between the Mbira Nyunga Nyunga, the Kalimba and analog synthesizers. Their music is offered in the spirit of peace + healing for all.

The album "Interstitial" is a document of a musical experiment, created in collaboration of the musicians Oh No Noh, Jenny Berger Myhre and F.S.Blumm.
The title refers to the process of the album's creation, to the letting go and filling of interstices, the temporally and spatially staggered collaborative composing, the accompanying addition and omission with the foresight to leave room for the ideas of others - without knowing how they would ultimately sound.
The three musicians layered individual elements from field recordings and improvisations into new units. The music developed in this way is a trance-like snapshot and spans wide arcs of ambient, sound art and soundscapes. Oh No Noh, Jenny Berger Myhre and F.S.Blumm each composed a piece, which served as the basis for the overlays of the other two musicians. Each of the three resulting pieces was processed, directed and shaped in its timbre and structure in different ways. The titles of the tracks describe the order of the overdubs (JBM Jenny Berger Myhre, FS Frank Schültge, MR Markus Rom).