Akustikkoppler (Acousticcoupler) is Hamburg duo, MatthiasSchuster (Geisterfahrer, DasInstitut) and MalteSteiner (Notstandskomitee, DasKombinat). They create experimental electronic music and last year they dropped their fourth album. AllesMußRaus (EverythingMustGo), which was mastered in 2021 but the actual recordings were made between 2008 – 2012.
The whole ten tracks are instrumental and they most certainly run along the lines making noises that please them and incorporating those noises into music that they inspire. There is the space like “Heimweg“, with a 70s kitsch feel, and yet it could be a science fiction horror in the cold void. Or the throbbing and wandering nature of “Horses And Carriages Burn“, as spikes of electronics speak up or the oddity that is “Dinge, Die Unter Dem Tisch Lagen” or the things that were under the table, which could be a whole new world with out of place bleeps and reverberations.
It might be experimental but AllesMußRaus is very enjoyable. There are bright noodling bits and even tracks that have a dance beat, yet overall the album is nearly hypnotic as you become engrossed in listening to everything going on. Akustikkoppler seems to be hitting all the good notes.
What do you get when you cross Australian with German avant-garde music, on a UK label? Possible insanity, Concentration and the label Avon Terror Corps. What the actual fucking fuck have I gotten myself into? Just reading the Bandcamp bio is leaving me feeling slightly unhinged. Well played as that just increases my curiosity of the latest release, Aren’t You Gonna Introduce Me To Your Friend?.
Oh well yes, of course there is a starting track called “Who Wants To Fuck Me“, with no question mark. The creeping electronic and deluded sax make for a cathartic oddity. The party goers get their demonic funk on while the sax mournfully lusts.
“Grün Im Gesicht” is your sexy wake up call in a gutter of that strip club you visited last night and still can’t think straight enough to find your keys but you did still dream you were in a bordello song and dance routine.
Fancy a walk on the electric sidewalk of life? “Sailin” rolls on a swell of hip, semi enthusiasm, so put on your boating shoes and get on down to the psychedelic cruise ship. We seem to be idyllically lost at sea, drenched in the washed up dreams of a mariner.
A supreme mellow vibe starts”Gehäutete Bräute“, with disembodied vocals that start off angelic, but soon show the angel might have been getting into the spirits a bit too much. It builds into both something painful and calamitous simultaneously, with the drunken angel having a grand time.
One might feel a little seedy and blue on a “Diet Of Worms” with that angry voice buzzing in your ear, his dissatisfaction with the general world like a bee in constant motion. The sax warbles in and out of dimensions and eventually gets to drink a pina colada in the rays of a dying bogan sun.
Five songs would normally denote an EP but with the length (and girth) of such sizeable tracks, they are able to give you a full payload. They are wacky and wild plus the questionable bird on the front…. judging you. Everyone needs a judgemental bird eyeing them off, while listening to an album covering genres such as avant-garde, experimental and smut. Concentration, an aural enema for your ears, you lucky bastards.
UNFEELING is one of Derek Rush’s projects, a New York electronic artist who has recently been on the road touring. His latest ambient album, VERTICAL SLEEP, is out on the CHTHONIC STREAMS label, created between June to October 2022, on the previously mentioned US tour.
Ever been so tired that you drag yourself around while everything and everyone is conspiring against your ability to shut down? This is the premise behind VERTICAL SLEEP, where one’s sleep cycle is so contaminated, nothing seems real. The music is slow like being caught in a nightmare, every movement laboured.
Even the names of the tracks conveys the near death like state of the subject due to the trauma of not being able to rest. There is “PAROXYSMAL” which is at such a low level of noise, that when there is a change it actually seems like a big deal, to “BAROTRAUMA” slowly pulsates and grows in seeming pressure, from the void, that slowly dissolves into the state of near nothingness.
The burbling and twittering of “SURRENDER” definitely conveys the loss of one’s senses, as the conscious stream goes for a wander due to the inability to turn off, or in other words that unhinged feeling and spacing out. The whole point of this electronic quest is to express how the mind reacts once it has passed the limits of regular sleep patterns, into the realms of mental torture and numbness. UNFEELING might be not as unfeeling as they pass into VERTICAL SLEEP.
HXGNL Sounds is where the single “Saturn” was recorded in Barcelona, by 6ymo. Is it is single? It goes for over 17 minutes but there is only the one track, but this is an album. So, with that in mind we should delve into space and see what this track, released on the 2nd of September, has to offer.
This is an electronic, instrumental, noise track and the beginning loops and pulsates like a cosmic life force. As you travel, there is monumental interference that reverberates and clashes, swooping the flight. This is the music representation of the heart beats of the solar system, solar winds and things we have yet to experience.
Juan Pablo Egúsquiza is 6ymo and he has created this opus experimenting with both analog machines, effects pedals and electronic instruments. The more you listen, the more immersed you become in his world of “Saturn“.
Howard Gardner, Max Rael and Daniel Vincent are some very British men who are also in Decommissioned Forests and their mission is to create interesting and inventive industrial music. To this end, April the 1st is the release date for the new album, Industry, a curiously befitting title, as the previous debut was called Forestry.
From the first time you listen to any Decommissioned Forest track, you get the sense that this is definitely part of something bigger than just the music. It is electronica painting pictures, with Rael’s vocals and lyrics breathing life into them, in spoken word. The single “Ants Part 1 – Our Last Summer” is, and to quote myself, like dissonant journey that seems pleasant, yet the lyrics are the disembodied oddities of strange and disturbing sequences. Though this is not as dark as “Triggers” that drones and eats at your frailty. without a by your leave, while “Ants Part 2 – Every Trauma Ever After” is a slower refrain in a twilight, that is dimming quickly as life seemingly slips away from us. The organ style music as if is a church of pointless sadness.
Quite frankly, I love the name and concept of “Spectral Kleptomania” as it amazing to think that a spirit can be blamed for nicking everything you can’t find or seems to be missing. Another single, “Drop Brick” could be a mantra to an old Frankenstein movie, with the disturbing and repeating synths while the monster seethes from being unable to be accepted into the world. There is the space and time warping, “Dust Ashes And OtherUnimportant Ephemera” as it slowly engulfs your being. When these guys created a short movie, “AComforting Uncertainty” was the track used. A slow realisation that nothing ever turns out exactly as thought out and you feel disappointment trying to stalk the inevitable misfortune. The final track is “Ants Part 3 – TheUniverse Is Unaware” and the ants are feigning indifference.
We will keep coming back to the whole Coil thing as it is uncanny how much Max Rael sounds like JohnBalance.Howard and Vincent have created musical scores that pay homage to an older style of British industrial music, while experimenting to see how they can keep pushing this avant garde genre. Industry is like looking at a polished stone but inside you can see all the jagged, geometric structures within, that contain their own beauty. forged by immense primal forces.
Honestly, there are very few people who are into post-punk music, that do not know the name David J. David JohnHaskins, a founding member of Bauhaus and a member of Love And Rockets, also known as The Bubblemen, has worked on a solo career since 1983. While being very prolific in the avant-guard music world, he has had a huge influence on many musicians with his writing style, experimentation and most definitely his bass playing. To this end, David J has released a compilation of tracks, originally only available to his Patreon fans but now available on CD, digital and vinyl. Called “What The Patrons Heard“, these are previously unreleased tracks and it all drops on March the 25th, 2022, on the label GIVE/TAKE.
There is the overly jaunty “Lay Over And Lay” and it sweeps in and takes your breath away with a joyous veracity. What a start to this venture. “(I Don’t Want To Destroy) Our Beautiful Thing” is a far more subdued affair. A slight country feel in this one as David J goes deep on the title of the song. A love song about the person that has stuck with him through the good and bad… and it really is a beautiful thing. After being associated with one of the most goth bands and having a huge amount of input into writing the most famous and possibly longest vampire song ever, maybe you do get the “Vampire Blues“. However this vampire seems to be definitely on the fuzzy pedal of undead music. Slow and deliberate, with what sounds like something being dragged across the strings of a piano, give it all a deranged quality.
“Gimme Some Truth” is almost a throw back to the Love And Rocket days, with near staccato vocals ie “BallOf Confusion” style, mixed with hurdy-gurdy fair flare and cuts of Trump in full flight absurdity. There is some backwards tape playing and Spanish inspired guitar while David J narrates a story about “His Majestiy The Executioner” while the music swirls in the background in support, trickling like a train of thought. A story of a State were there is very little tolerance -not very nice having the ice cream seller executed! There is something so very charming about “The Shadow” even if they are a creature of the night, whom has a penchant for a touch of murder, for he is Death. The near whispered tale of the shadow that has no pity for the humans who are leaving this mortal coil.
The name “The Rape Of The Rose Garden” sounds a little serious but this is almost a Pogues style piece, it feels like a Irish dittie about apple trees being planted in the White House garden by Jackie Kennedy. There is such a overwhelming feeling of loss or being lost in “Scott Walker 1996“. A drone in the background and what is presumed to be castanets, keeping the time to the spoken word. There is a certain amount of absurdness in “Down In The Tenderloin“. And yet there is also a certain amount of wistfulness in this oddity. “A Girl In Port” is the last tune and it is a sweet track, with reference to Camden Town. A gorgeous homage about a girl, done on acoustic guitar, piano, some slide guitar and violin. His voice melts into you, warm and golden.
For me personally, it is heartwarming to hear David J performing these tracks. They are quirky, symbolic and have the ability to transport you away to another place or another life. It is also nice to see that unlike other “gothic” heroes, he still enjoys the macabre and dark, mixing grim history with his tongue firmly placed in cheek. As an orator Mr J is beautifully spoken and as a singer, he calls to your soul with a voice, it seems, untouched with age. My favourites are “The Shadow” and “A Girl In Port“, so maybe you need to discover yours from “What The Patrons Heard“.
If you drive west of Brisbane, through the beautiful countryside, you can reach Mount Nebo on the land of the indigenous Jinibara people. This is also the home of Ghostwoods, a new project by musician James Lees. Lees is better known in the scene for the more rock’n’roll style bands he drums with but he has found this didn’t quite feed his soul.
“During lockdown last year, I lost most of my work, so I had a lot of time and was pretty much isolated here at my place in Mt Nebo so the seclusion and influence of the environment throughout the winter was really strong. I had made a start on the project prior to this, but the lockdown made me turn back to the music for solace. Another element of the project is for me to do some music with my partner Karl who plays bass and some acoustic guitar – he also loves playing super-dark spooky music, so he agreed to this pretty readily!” – James Lees
JAMES LEES – GHOSTWOODS
There is the magical tinkling of chimes that heralds the dark tones of the slow, deep piano and cymbal that is “Dark Moon“. It might be a flute that mournfully cries like a storm bird in the night. Soon joined by an electric guitar that languidly plays as if it is somewhere on a grim bayou. Anticipation fills the air and dissipates again with chimes like the frost in the heat of a new day. There is something austere and aloof about “Spiral Up” and yet a sadness pervades throughout, until the saxophone invades to bring a sense of longing. All the while the synths swirl of pulsate beneath, a creature wanting to escape. The recording of parrots crying out at the beginning and end of the Panoptique Electrical remix of “Dark Moon” is so utterly Australian. The mix by Jason Sweeney, is such a powerful noise inspired soundscape that almost is on the edge of becoming overwhelming and yet does not. You could swear it was trying to consume the light and air around it as it becomes a vortex, circling. Final track is “Spiral Down” and this is a much more electronic in feel than “SpiralUp“, however oddly the flute in the back ground gives it an unearthly feel in combination. The morose tones of the blues sax in juxtaposition with the ground swell of electronic noise .
Though this is James Lees’ project where he played piano/synths/drums/percussion, he fortunate enough to collaborated with Mark Angel on electric guitars, Karl O’Shea on bass guitar/ acoustic guitar and who is also in the band Daylight Ghosts, as well as Andrew Saragossi playing flute/clarinet/saxophone. These are very emotive pieces created in a time of uncertainty, in a remote and timeless landscape and a lot of that seeps into music.The Ghostwoods are mysterious and once you go in, you might not come out the same way…….
If you are looking for some experimental ambient music, then possibly we know of the EP you need to hear. Spectrograph released at the end November, their EP, A Giant Leap Of Faith, on Depth Records.
This project began in 2012, combining the talents of multi instrumentalist and vocalist Virginia Bones with Phiorio who is a producer of electronic/dance music, as well as a DJ. They describe their style as post industrial/electro.
SPECTROGRAPH
The tones are low and seemingly, almost basic but the more one delves into “Dmbt“, the more complex and convoluted it becomes with its revolving beats and tonal injections for this instrumental piece.
The single, “Dead Kittens“, is a dark affair. Slow and foreboding with fuzzy electronic pulses and synth keys that at times feel like they are wandering randomly within a space that has been forgotten.
Minimal clicks and whirs in a loop present “A Giant Leap Of Faith“, and there begins a layering effect of sounds. An occasional cymbal, electronically altered vocals of Bones and two notes of a piano creep across this piece, only to be joined by other noises. Strangely enough it never feels overwhelming or crowded and yet there is a claustrophobic ambience.
Last track, “If You Think You Can Fly” seems to convey the most urgency, like it needs to be on the move on a midnight jaunt to who knows where. It is bleak, metallic and wonderful with those odd noises.
Well constructed and rather interesting to say the least. If you don’t get electronic music then this won’t be for you but if you love electronica that push music limits with intelligence, then you should most definitely have a listen to Spectrograph’sA Giant Leap Of Faith.
From Wroclaw, Poland comes the band xDZVØNx with their album Everything We Dreamt About, released April 3rd.
Welcome to the sweet insanity that is Børa on main vocals, synths plus mandolin and Snufkin on backing vocals, synths and programming.
They describe their style as noisepop, mixed with brutalistic architecture and glitch art, and originally were associated more with the witch house scene in Europe.
XDZVØNX
Intro piece to the album is “Why I Called You“. Just by listening to the lilting short number, you can tell that this is going to be a highly electronic album.
Current truth is “Face By Face” right now is my favourite track off the album. The vocals are wonderful and just something about this is almost soul deep.
“The Final Boss” really feels like a cheesy platform game tune gone cyberpunk. It’s fast and fun, brilliantly light yet bassy massive beats in this short piece.
Rolling seamlessly straight into “Panic“, the vocals puncture your ear membranes as they shred straight ahead, frantic with a reprieve at the end.
The dulcet and seductive tones of Børa in “Pray” lead into fast paced beat, that spirals and twists in an almost out of control fashion.
“Bubbles” actually does sound like foamy spheres floating and eventually popping. A low electronic buzz in the bass ties down those light bubbles of sound.
The somewhat dirge start of “You Have To Be Alone” is a bit confusing until the cacophony of noise breaks through. And so we have lulls and crescendos of screaming synths as well as the human machine.
You might find “I Want To Find This Girl“, sweet and understated, almost ballad like. It is pieces like this that show a lot of depth.
Like a bad trip, the single, “Litzmannstadt” featuring Belmondo, wavers, like you are in and out of consciousness and there hints of DieAntwood. Belmondo is the rapper that embellishes this with his deep vocals and polish lyrics.
Imagine an 80’s electronic wonderland mixed with Ladytron and you have “Playground“. This is nearly hypnotic in the way it is written.
“I Will Vomit Glitter” is a get your punk/industrial on extravaganza of a single. A fun upbeat track about literally vomiting glitter.
The song, “No Eyes” just explodes in a glorious wave of sound. It will suck you in with the tune and make you want to bounce.
Angelic vocals over soaring synths and hard bass is the style of “Stupid Smile“. Booming and echo filled visions of a smile that is left in the mind. You might think for a moment that something is wrong as the sound skips and wobbles like a tape being eaten by the deck but this is part of the experience.
Not sure if the vocals are Børa or Snufkin on “I Am Saint“, as they have been slowed right down to a deep rumble of a voice. And this is also the last number for xDZVONx and it leaves you wondering who that was.
There is nothing boring about this album. This is avant-garde, experimental expressionism in electronic art form. We hear Børa both sweet and harsh and Snufkin helps push the boundaries of electronic music as an extension of themselves. Every time I listen, I hear something new. This is Everything We Dreamt About from cool tunes to dance beats from xDZVØNx.
From the online music publisher, Ton Doigt Dans Mon Cul Netlabel comes the artist La Flore Intestinale, whom recently released Onani: Ambient Works Volume One.
La Flore Intestinale is the nom de plume for the female mind and noise artist, Florence, behind this experimental, avant-garde music, who is based in Saguenay, Quebec.
“Apres Le Guerre Lorsqu’il Ne Reste Que Les Morts” literally means ‘After the war when only the dead are left’. A haunting, wavering electronic noise breaking with distortion greets your ears. You can almost image a far off war being waged in the distance getting louder as the mortars go off, as it closes in on you, only to fade out.
Is it industrial knocking of a machine in constant motion? Getting gradually louder with a near imperceptible buzzing drone above it all that eventually takes centre stage. This is “Blank Keurig Space Tape”.
The science fiction effect of “Tentaculas” is a temporary interlude before “Satic Black Tits”. Like a radio in a Faraday cage, the voices cut in and out as the static takes over the airways, creating its own morse code calling out to the world.
Beautiful chords strike out for “Melissa, The Professor’s Daughter”. This is relaxing and floats with lightweight synth, lulling you into a sense that all is in equilibrium. It gently charms your ears into another realm.
Ton Doigt Dans Mon Cul Netlabel puts all of its music online for free download, so what is stopping you from checking out La Flore Intestinale? Absolutely nothing, so enjoy the electronic soundscapes today!
Onyx Music Reviews 