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The 31st of October was a rather busy time for releases that I’m working my way through. In that vein, the Boston based label, Info Sec Records has put together a compilation of electronic artists called Music For Hacking.

INFO SEC RECORDS

The Neon Droid brings a “Cloud Of Ashes“, sailing across the net, floating in the electronic world, while “terminus” from Rap2h has its video games inspired tones.

There is the cool beats and ambience of Inter Gritty’s “The Chase” or you can go full cyber angst with Psi Drive with the tracks, “Master’s Revenge” and “Hail Overlords“…. plus there is the synthwave crossed with crunchiness of “REJUVENATE” by TWINKLE MARIA きらきら マリア.

Not all is instrumental, with Neon Tuesday covering “Rhythm Of The Night” which is a bit more calm that the original and later also providing another cover in the form of the Amiga game theme from “Lotus III” which is full on cheesy and amazing. ThyHarvest has this wonderful techno sound, with synths trickling down, making you think of the Matrix code in “Net Terminal“.

M73 is surfing the “Interlinked” data, like a stream of conciousness, with dark synth intent and, oh my, _NetNomad with “Build“, makes me think of the old games like Prince Of Persia, with its whimsical chip tune style.

This is another project where a label is showcasing independent musicians to help raise their profiles but also garner more interest in the electronic scene. There is an inclusiveness in this compilation with synthwave along side darkwave, chip tune, ambient and even industrial, all sharing a deep passion for experimental electronica. So plug in and become one with the interface with some Music For Hacking.

Music for Hacking | Info Sec Recs (bandcamp.com)

https://neondroid.bandcamp.com/

https://rap2h.bandcamp.com/

https://intergritty.bandcamp.com/

https://psidrive.bandcamp.com/

https://twinklemariamusic.bandcamp.com/track/it-s-out-of-this-flaesh-world

https://touzimsky.bandcamp.com/album/rhythm-of-the-night

https://thyharvesting.bandcamp.com/

https://m73dk.bandcamp.com/

https://netnomad.bandcamp.com/

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Halloween brought us the spooky release of the latest Simon Carter & Fabsi EP, Witch But Not Famous. With two new tracks, nine remixes and three guest mixers in the ghoulish countenance of Studio-X, C-Lekktor, Teknovore and Ruinizer, what is there not to love?!

“Omens” is just a smooth techno/ electronic filled track with Fabsi’s vocals meandering through the mix, predicting your doom. There are three remixes of this track but we will turn our attention to the Studio-X mix. You can picture the light show on the dance floor for this reimagining and Studio-X almost literally wind this up to maximum effect, before dropping the explosive techno.

The next new track is “Witch Hit” like an out of control steam train on its way to wild woods where you just know some crazy shit is going to happen. Again there are three remixes and we take the guest artist’s version, C-Lekktor doing the honours. They have taken the wonderful Fabsi’s cackle and used it to perfection in this heavier industrial customisation.

Next we have the track “We Are The Witches“, that was previously released on, The Bitches Potion. So we look to the last two remixes of the three by Teknovore and Ruinizer. Teknovore just has this beautiful symmetry between mesmerising soundscape and glorious danceability. He has stripped back the track and injected a magical night ride. Love the hint of something exotic within while launching into a rhythm infused piece of joy by Ruinizer.

Fabsi brings the Witch vibes with her vocals and lyrics while Carter pulls it all together with his enormous talent for amazing techno industrial music. With that talent also comes some wonderful friendships, and these musicians definitely help showcase that artistry as well as their own. More fun than a naked night dance in the moonlight because we are Witch But Not Famous.

https://simon-carter.bandcamp.com/album/witch-but-not-famous

https://www.facebook.com/FabsiMoon

https://www.facebook.com/HumansCantReboot

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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.

https://concentrationconcentration.bandcamp.com/album/arent-you-gonna-introduce-me-to-your-friend

https://m.facebook.com/concentrationconcentration

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The latest single from M73, has just been released, off the album Motor Romantik., on the record label, LÆBEL. “Vampire” has been given a lush video, care of Anna Tartaglia, exploring the visual concept that not all vampires live off blood but many are regular humans who feed off the power of controlling another person. As always the synth lines are stunning and John R Mirland completes the track with his vocals.

https://m73dk.bandcamp.com/album/motor-romantik

https://www.facebook.com/m73official

https://www.facebook.com/laebelmusic

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Today I added a new tag to my list. Industrial space music.…. I’m pretty chuffed about that. The reason behind the new tag is the debut EP from Perth ambient electronic/industrial project, Open Mirror, called Contact Void, out on Western Australian label, Lightarmour Editions. Grant Slee is the human component of Open Mirror, as they windup for the release of the full length album, Contact Mortis.

The three track EP starts with “Contact Void” with its vast tendrils of sound and synth wavering out into the reaches of unknown universe, amongst the stars, quasars and heavenly bodies. Expansive and glittering. Somewhere in the back of my head, “Oxygene Pt 4” by Jean-Michel Jarre is prickling at my concious, because it reminds me very much of the space sound scapes created by the electronic French genius. The next track is “Contact Void” revisited as the Liminal mix, longer than the original. Brusque, more drawn out, as if this wasn’t the shiny and smooth trip expected. There is hesitation in the music as it plucks up the courage to sail forth. Those brighter synths are there but also an underlying ground swell of harsh noise creeping into the rhythm. Maybe contact with aliens beings, in the transmissions.

Sequentially, the tracks keep getting longer, with “The Dead Hotline“, clocking in at 13 minutes and 40 seconds. This is the Signal Extended mix, a different concept in some ways as it is not space related. There is a sadness in the music and the harsh noise is making its presence felt now, like the static on the radio, unable to find a channel. The music is now a spirit box, a conduit for the voice of the dead. A very Australia voice asks the aether questions, with the hope of a rely.

Though one is Earth bound and the other about space, there is a common theme… discovering what is it, there in the dark, or rather who. Well played Open Mirror because not only is this EP thought provoking, it’s genuinely both fascinating to listen to and very enjoyable. So how will you Contact Void?

https://lightarmoureditions.bandcamp.com/album/contact-void

https://sptfy.com/M2mQ

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When it became October the 15th, Orrphoiz dropped his debut album, Kill The Gods. German based, Orrphoiz, is a mixture of dark synthwave and EBM with a much harsher edge.

It’s an angry and emotional album, raging against the injustice of the world we live in and the systems we live under. – Orrphoiz

When they tell me they have an album and it turns out to have a lot of extra stuff on it….this is Kill The Gods, chock full of original tracks, some featuring guest artists and guest remixes, with a rich variety of styles. There are eleven original tracks, with feature artist, grabyourface, plus a further six remixes, done by ES23, SynthAttack, STAHLSCHLAG, Miss Suicide, BolPaVoX and RNZR.

Let us kick off with “Impostor” with a message of doom and Orrphoiz’s rate of verbalization really impresses me, like a machine going off and without missing a beat. Vocally, “The Lost Ones“, is creepy, dissolving into far more soulful tone. All the while, the synths hypnotise your senses. “Electric Crash” might be the song to sum up the album with its pumping beats and circular rhythms, about being under the influence of electronic music, unable to get enough. The intricate and sparkling instrumental track, “Gathering The Tribe“, wends it’s way like an Arabian tale. The grabyourface collab, “Eat The Rich” makes you wonder how one can say so much without seemingly taking a breath. There is a venom within the overwhelming sound and the vocals. The dance grooves let fly in “Kill The Gods“, pounding, pounding, pounding to remind you that those smiling plastic faces, want to lull you into a false sense of security.

The premise that all human bleed the same and have all the same fears and needs, so why do we feel the right to wage war and take another’s life is “Industrial Hate Machine“. It is abrasive and feels like splinters of metal under your skin. “Synth City” is yet another instrumental tracks with a beautiful array of whirling electronic synthwave, pulsating and seductively warm. The synthesized Hatsune Miku features on “Plastic Popstar“….wow, so smooth and the vocals are to die for. How do you express the perfection of a track? We are somewhat back to harsher vocals, intermingled with the smooth in “Femboy Incubus“, and I have to say I have flashbacks to early Eisbrecher. Last of the original tracks is “Dancefloor Annihilator” and a instrumental to finish off with. Musical sirens and techno inspired beats consume you.

The RZNR mix of “Kill The Gods“, throbs with demonic intent, while the keyboard work on “Electric Crack“, has SynthAttack’s fingerprints all over it. ES23 also gives us another version of “Electric Crack”, heavier and dirtier, then we get the crunchy beats of STAHLSCHLAG, as the light and darkness of “The Lost Ones“, are given an epic soundscape platform. MissSuicide imbues “Femboy Incubus“, with a glittering synth dance makeover and “The Impostor” mix by BolPaVoX, has a rather enticing rhythmic noise attitude.

First of all. I was not expecting that voice. When Orrphoiz drops the growling and sings, that voice is as smooth as silk and as deep as a placid, dark lake. Utterly stunning. The album itself is a tapestry of styles, carefully woven together and it works. The feature artists and mixers have really gone to town with the tracks allotted to them and it is a treat to get to hear their work and interpretations. Well worth the money as you get a lot and there is so much to explore in Kill The Gods by Orrphoiz.

Kill the Gods | Orrphoiz (bandcamp.com)

Orrphoiz | Facebook

https://push.fm/fl/qctamjws

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Who is Andrei Rikichi? Hmm, even with the bio, we think he might be a bit dodgy. A multi-instrumentalist son of a Japanese diplomat, working between Switzerland and Belgium. Seems legit. His album, “Caged Birds Think Flying Is A Sickness” was released on the Scottish label, Bearsuit Records on August the 31st

From the first track, “Theme From The Butcher’s Parade“, the first salvos are fired, giving one an insight to the unbound lunacy and charm within this very short album, the whole thing weighing in at just over 26 minutes, for fourteen tracks. Tastes of hurdy gurdy classical music, warbled operatic singing and crazed hazed guitar barrelling through. Some tracks are like sitting inside someone’s head while they trip out on acid, glitching electronics binding it all together.

“Whatever Happened To Whitney Wallace” assaults your senses, “This” literally being a 10 second noise, which amused me to no end, and “They Hide In The Dark Forest,” is kind of like Laibach on mind altering drugs married to elevator music. The title track, “Caged Birds Think Flying Is A Sickness” is slightly more winsome and thoughtful, similarly for “Death Of A Postmaster” in a wandering, ambient way.

We have no pictures of Rikichi and some say he only comes out at night to hunt for food and record. Who honestly knows and unless you are willing to set bear traps to find out……. probably no point in losing sleep about it. For some reason, I fully believe the fellows from Monty Python’s Flying Circus would have found it all rather inspirational, due to the psychotropic qualities, which may well have you sitting on the edge of your seat wondering what could happen next.

Caged Birds Think Flying Is A Sickness | Andrei Rikichi | Bearsuit Records (bandcamp.com)

Andrei Rikichi | Facebook

Bearsuit Records | Facebook

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Riveting Music are a US label, whom have decided to make a stand and with the help of a whole bunch of artists, created a compilation of twenty-one cover songs, all previously recorded by powerhouse women of pop/rock. The recording of this compilation is in reaction to the overturning of the historic Wade Vs Roe and the degradation of a woman’s rights to have autonomy over her own body.

There are three singles off the album consisting of The Joy Thieves robust kick arse version of Pat Benatar’s “Love Is A Battlefield“, Laurie Anderson’s “The Day The Devil” by The Blue Hour, which I think is much better than the original, and File Transfer Protocol with their rather stunning recreation of Eurythmics’, “Here Comes The Rain Again“. Of course there are plenty more musicians and their cover versions to encounter here and most of the song’s originate in the 80s, going into the 90s, so there is a chance to find music you do or don’t know, as well as checking out current electronic/industrial musicians.

All money raised will go to the Global Fund for Women but not only that, it is about raising the profile of this subject and saying that this new trend against the rights of women is not okay, because if this is happening in a first world country such as North America, then how long before other countries decide to go down the same path? My body, my life. So fucking Regulate This!

Regulate This! | Riveting Music (bandcamp.com)

Riveting Music | Facebook

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Melbourne’s Snog, with David Thrussell firmly at the helm, stole a place in our industrial hearts, from the first time we heard “Corporate Slave” back in the early 90s. Now in 2022, a new EP, Jaded has been released on the Australian label, Lightarmour Editions, in both digital and limited coloured vinyl. The track “Jaded“, was previously released on the album Eight Offerings For The Undead, but now you get to hear it remixed, with others, rounding the EP to six tracks.

“Jaded” is a bit like rant poetry but with an electronic twist. Thrussell airs his grievances about a world that had left him more than a little dusty. Hushed tones creepily balance over the music. Brisbane based, Nam Shub Of Enki remixes “Jaded“, with his style described as grimecore, though I like to think mad man let loose and having a damn good time. Nam Shub lays it down with his signature tones and enthusiastic rhythms. One last remix by Sir Real, of “Jaded“, gives us an almost darkwave feel with those synths mixed with a modern tribal beat, lulling you into a trance.

Oh my, it’s the “Spaetzle Machine” the DiscoMachine RMX!. As expected, one machine mixing another is going to result in a robotic love fest. The Morpho RMX of “The Sweet, Sweet Treacle (Of Surrender)” trickles through your senses, the electronics burying into your brain. Last track has a near magical aspect to it. The Theme to “The Great Reset” has never been released. Brooding and languid, it runs at its own pace, which highlight the brighter synths that meander. It reminds me very much of work the late Vangellis.

I might be a bit biased as Snog gave the Australian electronic and industrial scene a good kick, back in the 90s, showing that world leading quality music was not something just from Europe and the USA. Thrussell has been at the forefront of some pretty kick arse albums since then and this special edition EP proves he’s still forging ahead with some powerful allies.

Jaded E.P. | Snog | Lightarmour Editions (bandcamp.com)

Snog | Facebook

Lightarmour Editions | Facebook

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The label Machina ad Noctem, is back with another compilation, inspired by author Philip K. Dick, called PDK II. As like the first compilation, this is a group of musicians whom have pursued their love of the science fiction, written by Dick, though the music they compose.

The beginning of “VALIS” by Edge Of Decipher, starts off hesitantly but soon grows in sweeping assurance, waking out of dream perhaps, into another plain of reality. Cumsleg Borenail gives us “Man Has Not Eaten God, God Has Eaten Man” is as quirky as the name suggests, synths like synapses sparking in a metaverse, unable to be contained by man or God.

A train has set the rhythm in “Second Variety” by Non Union, on a journey to who knows where, but it seems otherworldly and ominous, before we are met again by Edge Of Decipher. The track, “The Future We Create“, inspired by Ubik, speaks of stars, moons and whirling galaxies beyond ours. The experimental HyMettus Woods, bleeps, fades in and out of static in “A Scanner Darkly“, trying to find the rapidly fluctuating channel but constantly on the knife’s edge until the fuzz clears momentarily, rapidly gaining veracity.

The only track with vocals is Priestessdeath and their “Like Tears In The Rains V” with smoldering female singing that meanders like rivulets of water down a pane of glass, inspired by the Orient. A change of pace for Edge Of Decipher as the music becomes urgent and the synths are trying to catch your attention for “The Agentic State“. There is a movie like quality to this track which leads onto the final number, “Eye In The Sky” by Non Union, as the electronics reach out in waves, invading all spaces and detecting all.

The music is eclectic, electronic and often experimental just as science fiction is. The tracks are like points of light in a sea of literature and dark electronic music, bidding you to further sink into the worlds of Philip K. Dick with them. So I bid you adieu on your journey as you experience this new adventure with PKD II.

PKD II: Philip K. Dick | Machina ad Noctem | machina ad noctem (bandcamp.com)