¡-PAHL-! have released their debut album, which followed three singles, The Lepzig project dropped I on March 31st, 2022, brandishing their style of grandiose, dark synth/electronic music. The trio consists of Olaf Parusel as the mastermind behind the composition of the music, while lyrical penmanship plus production was done by Leonardovon Leibnitz and lead vocals rendered by Peter Hardlab.
LEONARDO VON LEBNITZ & PETER HARLAB
The single “Abraham” is a powerful start to the album, as the horns sound and then be lured into the depths of ¡-PAHL-!, as they make comment on the religious ownership of the figure. The next track is “Big Data” which goes from dirty growls, to soaring heights of vocals and synths with an orchestral backing. Another single is “Dyo” with its overwhelming adoration in this beautifully simple song, that showcases Hardlab’s vocal talents.
“Götter Neuen Stadt” or Gods of the New City, is deep and cinematic in sound and could easily be a favourite off the album for me. There is so much going on in the background of this track, the synths that float, the electronics that are the restless flow beneath and a stringed instrument, with what sounds like metal strings. To this end, “Mankind” is the reduction of average humans to slavish beings, with no rights, the vocals describe our reliance on technology that might be responsible for some of this. Hardlab’s voice mingles with ViolaManigk’s quite delightfully. The sweet singing is undermined by a crackling voice in “Mass Instruction“, the programming of the masses to accept everything. There is the overwhelming power of an electronic choral of angels and down beats.
Slow burn “On Conspiracies” which asks how much credence there is in these things. The harpsichord is a beautiful touch, a refined touch with the unearthly voices that are not human. The single “Telos” asks what is a person’s potential. The bleak electronics speak of sorrow, while Hardlab sincerely questions what is “Telos“. “Timeless” is a great finishing track. Full of emotion and longing yet a resignation that all might be lost, so not all is timeless. The electronics are just mesmerising and fade with the words, unless we be saved……
How do I say this…..? For music created by three individuals, it has this huge atmosphere to it, a bit like a Cecil B DeMille movie. In fact, it was that style of biblical high drama movie, that this album made me think of…… kind of a modern fall from grace where only the few may be saved. Made in Germany but relevant to many, as technology and super billionaires acquire more information about us and subvert our reality, an observance of modern society. The music itself is this wonderful mixture of divine grace, smashed together with industrial dirtiness, the lyrics are a looking glass into the modern psyche and the vocals will both catch your heart and break it.
Even though currently, INfest8 is in Sydney and Sai Jaiden Lillith in Melbourne, ZCluster are soon to release an EP but have given us a new single, titled ominously, “Death Drive“, out on the 22nd of April.
The tribal beats herald the vocals of Sai Lillith forcefully whispering in your ear to a set of dirty beats that slink along, until there is an explosion of near strangulated angst through the chorus. There is the screaming of the electronics to match the pained sentiment.
I do know that both members of ZCluster are big Nine Inch Nails fans and you can hear that influence, however, they are creating their own erotically charged, dark industrial music, born of their desires, frustrations and imaginations. It is name your price on Bandcamp so there is nothing stopping you from checking out “Death Drive“.
PANICMACHINE is the label. Phobos Reactor is the act. TFG, the gnome finder from TONTTU, is the featured guest. The single is “#FOLITWIBG” and in honesty…..yeah, you need to be told what this means. Fragments of life in the world infested by gnomes or had you already guested this? Released on April 18th, 2022, so hopefully not the beginning of the end!
There are five “#FOLITWIBG” tracks, literally numbered #1 to #5. #1 seems to be a gnome taking exception to humans in a simple trippy kind of way. It starts to get a bit groovy in #2…though the gnome is still not happy by the sound of him and by #3 the gnome is getting all sophisticated synth sounding. Maybe futuristic gnome and it is amazing like a bad trip. By #4 that gnome is become cyber mega cool in a very lurking way and track #5 is cyber loathing reloaded from #1, and so all comes full circle in the gnome of life.
Are gnomes out to get you? Probably. Do they want to steal our children? More than likely. Are they stealing our cats? Most definitely! One could ask if they (the musicians) are completely bonkers….but then again, one could say they know things most others don’t. Beware of the gnomes, for they are moving against us, so grab your cat and listen to Phobos Reactor featuring TFG (TONTTU), before the mayhem ensues.
Brutal Resonance have signed, Philadelphia’s Her Noise Is Violence, to their growing list of acts. With her soon to be released, first EP with Brutal Resonance, Out Of Time, coming soon, the first single, “Apathy” was dropped on April 15th, 2022. Her Noise is Violence is making a name for herself as a creator of industrial music with dark techno.
The beats and electronics rotate around your head, maybe in a state of confusion or a mind infected by a malaise. A male voice says everyone is dead and if they were dead, what would you? Deliberate and slow fuzzing rhythms plod on until….nothing. A sudden stop.
This is a lot more sedate than her normal fare, but as the artist herself explains, ‘Apathy’ is a chilled-out tune, it’s the last track on the EP and what I wanted to convey is the feeling of, well, apathy.‘. With this in mind, we await the EP and more of those beats with Her Noise Is Violence, plus get a load of the awesome artwork by Psyklon Industries.
Der Prosector is a project from Florida, that seems to have come to life around 2020. Made up of four members, Ged Denton, Andy Kenealy, Jules Seifert and Digby Denton, found themselves at a loss over the state of affairs in the US during the Trump administration, as the country turned inwards with internal fighting and backwards looking. So was born the single, “Standing In The Embers“, which came out on April 15th, on the label, Armalyte Industries.
There is definitely a punk aesthetic to “Standing In The Embers“, mixed with a mid 90s industrial guitar sound, topped with more modern synths. The beats are fast and furious while the vocals are sincere and imploring you to wake up because – ‘The problem is some people want to watch the world burn And it’s on fire‘. There are also two remixes included. The UCNX mix is understated and like a creeping doom, while the Gordon Young version, named The Pyroclastic mix is stripped back with a feel of anxiety and burgeoning insanity.
They sing of Covid, violence and extreme ideology which has touched everyone’s worlds in the last few years. Ironically, we now watch another power hungry despot, happily destroying countries for his own purpose. The world burns and if we do nothing, we will burn with it. A powerful statement in a time of great upheaval from Der Prosector.
What do you get when Mexico meets Finland? The single “Verenkiertohäiriö [Circulatory Disorder]” is the outcome. Mexico’s Exemia in conjunction with the Fin, TFG from TONTTU, have thrust into the world, this single on April 13th, 2022.
An merry dance you will get from this track as it bursts to life in all the vocal ferocity TFG gives to his performance, while Exemia simply kill with the amazing electronics that assault your senses. The whirl of angst and synths is a brilliant cacophony.
Industrial beats definitely make this feel so utterly alive and ripple under the skin. Great aggro-techno industrial music is often hard to get just right and this definitely ticks all the boxes. It is out on Bandcamp for name yourprice if that helps curry your fancy, but most importantly….. beware of the gnomes and their nefarious ways.
Disfigured Mistress is probably a project I should have talked about sooner but better later than never. Since 2010, Brisbane’s Disfigured Mistress has been releasing his experimental, industrial noise and as of the 8th of April, released the single, “The Depths Of Black Hatred“.
As the title may indicate, this is not a happy go lucky piece. It is an instrumental number full of harsh crackling electronic fury, that lashes your ears, in mounting waves. Primal with a dark brooding undercurrent of unrest which floods through senses without remorse. All until the last tick. You should definitely check this track out on Soundcloud or on Bandcamp where it is name your price and then check out more of the Disfigured Mistress back catalogue, as it is well worth your while.
Thieves are those that steal from others. Possessions, jewels or maybe even a life. VAZUM also have a double single out called “Thief“, which was released on March 25th, 2022. The dynamic and prolific duo of Zach Pliska and Emily Sturm have given you two versions of this track for your listening pleasure.
The original is full of those lovely post-punk twanging guitars and soaring vocals with Emily in the lead. She is going to take your all and everything because she is the undead and in the end you will willingly let her thieve everything. The second version is an electronic affair, where “Thief” the Dagger mixis maybe, and more so, a much darker creature that seems a little unhinged as it crawls to you for your (un)dying love.
It is always an interesting proposition to hear a song performed in two different ways by the same band. You can tell VAZUM get a bit of kick out of this experimenting in variation. So you get a goth track with a creepy electronic track which is well worth checking out. And the best thing, you can get this for a steal on Bandcamp as it is name your price!
If you search the name Elenor Rayner, you can be quite overcome with the amount of musical acts and bands she is involved in. Most recently, she released two singles for her project, Robots In Love as well as a remix of the JA/VI track, “Good Cocaine“. We were fortunate enough to be able to speak to the delightful Elenor about the music she has been involved in, what she is up to now and ….oops we may have created a monster. If you want to know how then read on!!
Welcome Elenor Rayner, the creative mind behind Robots in Love, to the Onyx mainframe, which is far dodgier than the holodeck in Star Trek and tinged with the macabre.
You started your musical career in Melbourne, Australia, but you now live in Dunedin, New Zealand. Are you a Kiwi or an Aussie, as inquiring minds want to know?
I was born in Australia but I now have New Zealand citizenship. I adore Dunedin. It’s a creative, eccentric place with more musicians per capita than anywhere else in the country. Everyone plays in 3 different bands and they’ll put on gigs anywhere. I do keep a keyboard at a friend’s place in Melbourne though, so I can pop over and play shows.
Elenor, you have had a varied and successful music career, which we’d like to touch on. Soulscraper was the first industrial band you were in, starting in 1991. That must have been a really exciting time to be getting into the scene?
The technology at the time was so exciting. To be able to sample anything and change it however you like was mind-blowing. We sampled a lot from movies, especially sci-fi, and playing those mangled cinematic sounds live through huge PA systems was really satisfying.
In fact, I met up with the other Soulscrapers last week and we talked about playing shows later this year. We’re all keen to play those songs again.
The next big thing was The Crystalline Effect with Pete Crane, which started in 2002. Pete definitely has a darker take on electronic music, so how do you think working with him affected the way you write music and is there a chance we might hear from The Crystalline Effect in the future?
The Crystalline Effect released 6 albums I think, so it was a prolific period for us. We wrote two songs before we even met. We used to send cds through the mail because we both disliked the sound of mp3s. I really enjoyed the subtlety of Pete’s programming, it was amazingly delicate and there was room for me to experiment with vocal melodies and harmonies. Some of those songs are incredibly beautiful. I still listen to them. Maybe one day I’ll do a show with all my bands on the line-up.That would be a rollercoaster of emotions.
Recording for yourself as Sobriquet and Sobriquet Nation, how different was this for you as opposed to writing and making decisions with a band?
In a band there’s a lot of compromising. Probably most bands do this, but I remember developing a theory that the singer should have the ultimate say because they’re the ones who have to really believe it. With Sobriquet, being on my own I learnt a lot, delving into the tiniest detail of a song and tweaking it until it’s perfect. Nowadays on about a quarter of tracks I am the producer, on a quarter I am the vocalist and on half I do both. On the ones where I do both I do tend to talk to myself. Vocalist-Elenor says to Producer-Elenor: “we need a dropout there”.
In 2019 you released the haunting album, July, under your Sobriquet moniker and before that, in 2018, another album, My Very Essence. You are very prolific, as each album has around 15 tracks, so do you find the process of creating music easy?
Yes, I do find it easy, and it is essential to me. I’m not very good at talking about feelings so I tend to pour everything into songs instead. It’s like: “I can’t say this to you, so here, listen to this song”. All the main events of my life, and my friends’ lives are there for anyone to hear.
This brings us to your project Robots In Love. 2017 saw you drop the 5-track self-titled release followed by various singles, including two new tracks in March of this year, the slower ‘Wish’ and the bass heavy hitter ‘The Raven’ (which actually made think of Paul Raven Killing Joke/Ministry). Can you tell us a little about these tracks?
Usually, I produce the music first and then when I listen to the song, I figure out what it’s about and the words come into my head. The Ravens is stompy and quite upset. It is about dementia. Wish is sad and resigned and it’s about inequality.
There was also the rip snorting dancefloor remix of the JA/VI song, ‘Good Cocaine’, that you recently let loose. What was it about this track that spoke to you?
As soon as I heard it, I could relate to the feeling of love lost. It’s a universal thing but I loved the melody and the sadness in JA/VI’s vocal. I kept the vocal as it was and added the music. I think smashing your emotions out on the dancefloor is a healthy thing to do. I really enjoy playing that song live, it definitely gets everyone moving. I’m glad it’s getting airplay.
Is creating remixes under the Robots In Love name a new thing for you and how much fun do you have reimagining someone else’s music?
I do quite a few remixes each year. The next ones coming up are for Tiny Fighter, a Swedish band, and IKON.
I never have a pre-determined idea of what I’m going to do, I just start and see what happens. One cheeky thing I like to do is alter the melody of the vocal somewhere in the song and add harmonies. Cellmod added harmonies to one of my vocals in a remix of “How I Get Out” and I thought it was great and wished I’d come up with it.
Sometimes I do remixes of remixes. For instance, I remixed the first Human Confusion single, ‘Overwhelmed’, then I decided I liked it as an instrumental then I accidentally found myself singing new words and melodies to it so now there’s a completely new song.
Will there be an album coming out soon?
Yes, and there’ll be a variety of styles on it. I’ve written a few Goth Trap songs lately.
You describe your sound as ‘darkly beautiful, emotional, melodic electronic music’. What is it about this style of music you love?
The emotion is the main thing for me. Songs are like little capsules of things you need. If I’m sad I will listen to a song like “Equilibrium” and by the end I’ll be back to equilibrium. Magic.
You are involved with David Thrussell’s Snog as a live member. Please tell us what that is like, and is it utter insanity?
I’ve been playing live in Snog for 23 years. Even though the song topics are as serious as you can get, David loves humour and so do I, so being on tour with him is great fun.
I’m looking forward to the Snog shows in Melbourne and Sydney supporting PWEI.
When you were young, what bands and people inspired you to get into industrial/electronic music?
I remember going a lot to a club called Thrash and Treasure in Richmond, Melbourne and jumping around to music there like Nitzer Ebb and Young Gods. I liked the dual bass guitars of Denial and Pre Shrunk and I remember being very happy when I discovered bands who had both bass guitar and electronic bass.
Who inspires you or makes you happy now in musical terms?
I have a few other projects which I really enjoy. My band Human Confusion consists of me doing all the programming and Miriam Leslie the vocals. Her voice is like warm salted caramel sauce and her lyrics have a twist to them. Our first single “Overwhelmed” has a line in it – “I tried setting fire to it, but it burned too bright and took the bridges with it”. We’ve almost finished an album.
I like doing vocals for DevilMonkey. Our collaboration “Deluxe” is my favourite song. Live, I play a combination of the original track and my remix. It’s a powerful way to end a show.
An artist called Dead Caldera released their first single last year which I listen to all the time. I keep asking them to release more. The intricate programming of Sirus excites me. And anything Ehsan Gels creates is always satisfying.
What sort of robot would you want to be, if you could choose between a replicant as seen in Blade Runner or a cyborg, with your memories and personality downloaded into it, like Ghost In The Shell?
That is a good question. I always thought I’d be the little sad boy in A.I. but now you’ve got me thinking – I could be something really innovative. I will ponder that. You may have created a monster 🙂
What do you see in your electronic dreams for the future of Robots In Love and Elenor Rayner?
I always just feel a need to create more music. I have three new band members of Robots In Love and that’s been great. We can play live some of my older songs like “July” now, and they bring their own interpretations. Also, it’s fun to have others on stage to jump around and interact with.
So I just see more songs, more releases, more gigs and endless moving around of sounds on a computer screen to make sure they make me feel.
Thank you, Elenor, for joining us in this electric dream.
Over the last two years, we have seen some amazing unions of international musicians, creating super-groups. One of these is Heatwave International, a band made up of Mario Alberto Cabada (No Devotion Records, Bolaspace), John Bechdel (Ministry, Fear Factory, False Icons), Roberto Mendoza (Panoptica, Nortec) and Ant Banister (Sounds Like Winter, Lunar Module, Sequential Zero). They released their debut single, “We Won’t Be Silent” on the 8th of April, on the label GIVE/TAKE, ahead of their impending EP.
I would know Ant Banister’s vocals anywhere and the message is there that they can’t be silenced any longer. There is a wonderful purpose to this track and I can definitely hear the Depeche Mode influence, through the graduations of the synths. There are two remixes of the single, the sublimely smooth Union Divine mix with those sparkling synth lines and the eerily wavering tones and cyber-punk style of the Tokee re imagining.
With such a plethora of musicians, all creating this track, I wondered how this was going to turn out. Actually, it’s pretty bloody good in all honesty. From the electronic to the vocals….it all meshes wonderfully and even with the serious nature of the lyrics, there is a seductive undertone. I say watch this space closely for HeatwaveInternational.
