Loading
Belgium has some history when it comes to electronic music. Industrial, EBM, House and Techno have all had Belgian people in their pioneers. This connection faded away over the last ten years. But there is a growing electronica scene and Glamor is undead is a compilation whose aim is to put back Belgium on the electronic music map. The people behind it even coined a great word to qualify this new Belgian scene: Belgtronica.
Finland, the European country with the highest suicide and alcoholism rates. A country where nights are long, very long. Where days are short, very short. Or so say the clichés... But it’s not And then you die’s music that is going to deny them. Speaking of stereotypes, when it comes to music, Finland is the place famous for Nightwish, Children of Bodom or Spinefarm crap. Let’s hope the industrial driller of ATYD will kill them soon.
Frank Zappa-releases have been sparse since his untimely death in 1993. Only the Yellow Shark ‘prequel’ Everything Is Healing Nicely was released until now. His son Dweezil and the Zappa estate has started to search the enormous vault of recordings of material worthwhile and true to Frank’s intentions.
I just love Boris. And how could any sane being not love them? They’ve done everything: drone, doom, sludge, stoner, post-rock, slocore, ambient, noise. They've worked with Keiji Haino, Masonna and Merzbow. They've written a 66 minutes long drone track and Korosu, a 4 minute ultra-catchy rocking song. I tell ya, they’ve done everything, and they’ve done it better than anyone else. For real.
In 2001, former Sole and Moodswing9 associate jdwalker put out on Bluecyde Recordings this Loganprojects album called Character Assasination. Loganprojects is jdwalker and Blucyde (which I assume is the man behind Bluecyde Rec.). Motion Recordings had the good idea to rerelease this damn fine hiphop album...
DoF is Brian Hulick, a young American musician. He has an interesting story to tell us: what made him start doing electronic music was the crash of a meteorite in his garden. The “powerful cosmic rays” gave him the ability to hear, visualise and play way better than before. He is also able to instantly learn any instrument he wishes. Right on. Now he’d better have written one hell of a killer album...
Third album from Thomas Weber’s collective, Cicadidae is full of gorgeous quiet melodies at the intersection between Jazz and Electro.
While not always flawless, everything I heard from Motion Recordings thus far proved extremely interesting. One of the label’s latest release is an ep by jdwalker, full of demanding but rewarding hiphop...
I remember the first time I heard this album: I had a hard time swallowing the horrible clean vocals and production glitches (at various points some crackles and pops appear - vinyl nostalgia and all). I admit to not being familiar with Bathory's whole back-catalog, but I've heard the albums considered to be the most important ones and know about the band's history, so of course the atrocious clean vocals and low production values were no surprise to me.
The world has been demanding a new Strapping Young Lad album for years, but Devin Townsend always said there would never be a new one. Well, along came september the 11th, which sparked Devin's emotions into the right mood and here it is, the long awaited Strapping Young Lad album: SYL.
The curtains are drawn. Light falls on stage among shadows; the silhouette of a piano crouches in the limelight. A man appears from the left, followed by other musicians. They pick up their instruments: guitar, violin, contrabass, trumpet... Around the drums are various percussion accessories, gadgets and machines. A music box stands on top of a black synthesizer.
Already written off by many fans, yet Ministry dares to produce another album after the last two weren’t exactly “well received”. But now that songwriter Al Jourgensen is clean, we don’t need drugs anymore to sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old Ultra-Violence. Ministry’s latest effort, Animositisomina, is enough.
During his career Aphex Twin has done remixes for many artists. Not always with the same dedication as the rumour of Richard James getting a random tape from the shelve when the courier came to collect it aptly illustrates. These 26 mixes give a nice insight in his approach to the job of remixing and gives us a chance to hear some tracks stashed away on limited edition vinyl editions and other out of print items.
I've never been the biggest Katatonia fan in the world, but I've enjoyed most of their works over the years and so I own a couple of their albums. Viva Emptiness is their latest effort in depressive hard rock with it's legs firmly in the metal scene.
He got in the public eye with his two Silicom albums, evolving in a field not far removed from Autechre, but it’s with Indigo Rose that Aoki Takamasa shows his sheer class...
A few months ago, I downloaded one track by a band called Tarantula Hawk. It was so good that all I wanted was to buy the album. Alas, I didn’t find it in my local shops... Then I went to a Isis gig where Conspiracy Records (Neurot Belgian distributor) were selling some stuff, among which the Tarantulas second album. Cash changed hands and I found myself with a fucking great CD...
The laptops are taking over. In a couple of years, the laptops won’t even need humans to make good music. And maybe in a couple of decennia, humans won’t be needed anymore for anything at all and become extinct. But for now, we can still enjoy human creativity and Pulseprogramming's Tulsa For One Second is one of those albums created on a laptop.
A trio called Threnody Ensemble on Barry Hogan’s All Tomorrow’s Parties label, describing themselves as the best parts of Radiohead played by a chamber orchestra. Does that sound pretentious or what?
Sylvain Chauveau presents his third (mini)album, Un Autre Décembre. As a stripped down work of piano compositions, this subtle and frail piece of work constructed with minimal sounds and instrumentation now finds its way outside of France for the first time.
Displacer is one of the latest additions to the M-Tronic roster, and as we can expect from this excellent label for electronic music, this debut album is another jewel of dark cinematic melodies and carefully placed IDM beats.
What’s mine is yours was released on Neurot Recordings (Neurosis-owned label), recorded by Martin Bisi (who has worked with Cibo Matto, Sonic Youth and John Zorn a.o.) and features a member of The Angels of Light. Such simple facts should prove enough to have you interested.
The Giddy Motors are back with an excellent EP, released on both vinyl and as CD-single. The great debut album Make It Pop from this British trio has already conquered a big part of the rock / punk scene but the appetite for more blasting material isn’t satisfied just yet.
Tha Blue Herb is the best unknown band in the world. DJ O.N.O is the man behind their music. He is also part of Shigam who released a few months ago a stunning ep called Beauty. Unfortunately, it’s unavailable in Europe.
10 years ago Ulver still was this childlike old-school black-metal band. Playing in haunted forests, running around with swords and paint, hanging out with people who were their mothers nightmare. You know, the usuall kid stuff.