RIP. A weekly roundup of releases on Bandcamp and Soundcloud selected and delivered by Aidan
Back in the zone again. I had a rough week last week and had to take some time away. I miss one week and I’m so far behind on what I should be sharing! Should schmould. While yes I’ve set myself a target of weekly mails come rain or come shine, life can and does get in the way and I can’t always squeeze everything in. Check out this interview with modern rock star claire rousay. And check out some amazing music below.
GEORGIA - State Effect (Accel)
Georgia always offer something unique, and this release for OOH-sounds is no different. In that it’s totally different from anyone else. Rambling, meandering electronic sounds, almost as if they’ve been left to play by themselves, each layer taking its own place beautifully. Sounds rumble and scream, whisper and hide. It’s clear that influences come from around the globe, coming into existence alongside otherwise incongruous elements, yet coalescing with wonder and beauty. Remember. You do not just wake up and become the butterfly.
Jennifer Touch - MOON IN ARIES
The first two tracks here are part acid ramblings, part spoken/rapped vocals, total brain ticklers. Real EBM-style slammers, rocking the house with quiet rage and terror. The third is a synth-led torch song that could be a lost Yazoo track. Overall, a wonderful introduction to this artist for me.
Marcel Sletten - California Delta Blues
“Folk music with an electronic bent” is how Marcel Sletten describes his sound, which goes some way to explaining the weird image on this release’s cover. Is it a cowboy? Are these body parts truncated? Do they swirl with an angelic halo or lens flare or is that just simply from digital rendering? Impossible to know. The feeling is definitely homely, wholesome, and yet it is delivered through sounds that are in no way “organic”, a 3D depiction of a homestead and an open plain.
Skulptor - Into the jaws of bliss
For the first time in a while, I think this mail is predominantly “club” music. This particular release is for the digital club in your digital sphere. The sounds are jagged, futuristic, utterly synthetic and wholly unknowable. Digital sheen, commands colliding as vocals veer in and out, potentially from the “real world”, customer experience rendered through audio programming.
The first Hemlock release in more than three years comes from Beneath. It’s…. banging. No doubt about it. It’s rough and tough, almost a smile-free zone, but in a good way I guess. ‘Bone Hum’ is an absolute head-nod shaker, while the melodies on ‘Shambling’ are utterly chilling. ‘Lesser Circulation’ features incredibly squidgy synth sounds and could be an alien transmission for all I know.
Is this a first ? I felt this video for Facta’s ‘Verge’ on Wisdom Teeth was worth sharing, not least because it was animated by Max D. It looks great and adds to the vibrant colourful sound of the track, and indeed the album from which it is taken. Much like last year’s WT album from K-Lone, this one is a winner that I’m sure I’ll be listening to throughout the year. I should add that this video is very flashy and may cause distress to some viewers.
Is this post-rock? Is that right? It’s got that wall of guitar sound favoured by certain 00s acts, it’s quite emotive and feels like the end of the world. It doesn’t start that way. It almost seems to start out in a kind of bleepy synth way, before devolving out of melody into sheer noise. A compilation of tracks from a three-year period where the group has focused on “sound, tone and atmosphere”, the music seems to journey and plod, repetition offering hope and solace. ‘Mystery Train’ is a real highlight for me, as well as the crunchy and hypnotic ‘City Blues’.
Rock is dead. Exhume the body if you ain’t scared. Physical Therapy shares some of his most tender moments under this new moniker, Car Culture, evoking Led Zeppelin in design if not in sound. The music is soft and gentle, dreamlike, wonderfully comforting and friendly, even in the face of disaster. Imagine the video for ‘Black Hole Sun’, but with this playing instead.
I tweeted the other day that I would feature something that wasn’t for sale on Bandcamp in this mail. Speculation was rife (ie from like two people) that I would feature DIY advice or an NFT (nothing in between). Nah, I’m writing about this album from Shinedoe on Jeff Mills’s Axis Records. It’s part of The Escape Velocity, a “curated techno project” that seeks to bring together visionary artists inspired by space science and science fiction. Digi only. It’s alternately light and airy, sumptuous in its warm and enveloping chords, and then pulsating with energy as it hurtles through time and space. Get with this programme.
Phirnis - Culinary Delights [Cassingle #15]
The ever-inventive superpolar Taïps label has been putting out Cassingles lately, short-form releases that show a brief insight into an artist’s mind at a given time. Contributors have included Cruel Diagonals, Nicholas Langley and Whettman Chelmets among others, and one of the latest comes from Phirnis. It’s a brief, riotous clamour of percussion, detouring through sustained hiss and ending without warning.
Manuka Honey & Riobamba - Mystery/Hope
This is a super banger from Manuka Honey and Riobamba, a lovely shuffle of garage drums, ghostly synths and MIDI horns.
Jack Ward - My Angel Rocks 4th & Back
Irish producer and DJ Jack Ward drops a single that’s been long in the making. A lovely track (from a lovely guy, it must be said), it’s effervescent and joyous, a “cute banger” as the blurb describes it. Hands in the air stuff, for the club in your mind.
Ra Gerra is a collaboration between Irish artists MuRli and Kobina, merging their distinctive styles into one project. The most fascinating moment of the track comes at its end, as the music slows down and MuRli’s vocals meet this pace wonderfully. The sound overall is both buoyant and nightmarish, the siren-like sounds adding to the titular pressure.