$39.00
Tenderlonious returns with a brand new 4 track EP, seamlessly cooking up a blend of hybrid house and broken beat with his unique analogue productions and signature flute instrumentation.
The title track ’After The Storm’ picks up where 2019 album ’Hard Rain’ left off (Bandcamp's electronic albums of 2019) - a stormy, atmospheric 4/4 groove, with flute flurries, build the track to a state of euphoria. The EP continues with G Flex, a tune dedicated to Tender’s mentor Sterling Styles, aka Equinox (Scientific Wax). Broken drum machine loops are brought to life by classic Tender flute and synth solos. Fans of his 2016 ’On Flute’ EP will be feeling this one!
’D Low’ is the 22a squad pick on this cut. Deep house vibes, with a classic London soundsystem style hook, shaking bass lines and twisted synths. ’Broken Heart’s Club’ rounds things up, and may sound familiar to 22a heads. Beefy broken drum machines take centre stage, making way for some more synth magic from Tender’s vast array of hardware. First time on vinyl for a track that’s been doing the rounds for a couple of years! - Bandcamp
Label: 22a – 22a 033 |
Format: Vinyl, 12", EP |
Country: UK |
Released: Mar 2020 |
Genre: Electronic, Jazz |
Style: Experimental, House, Broken Beat, Future Jazz |
$39.00
Umwelt allies with Midnight Shift for the release of the mini LP Superior Life Forms, featuring six devastating tracks on the vinyl release and an exclusive number seven for the digital release.
Known for his take no prisoners approach to searing hardware-based broken electro with the spirit of 90s French rave parties where he participated in, Umwelt himself is founder of labels such as Fundata, New Flesh Records and Rave or Die, and a diehard scene activist, pushing the resistance for the past twenty years and more.
A dark, sci-fi bleak horror theme runs through his prolific cosmos of productions and Superior Life Forms continues the narrative. It’s a tri-invasion attack between man, machine and foreign sentient beings. From the snarling Shadow Entity creeping from the sidelines to the ominous sound of the day of reckoning depicted on title track, Superior Life Forms, Umwelt has full control of the genre – telling a story with tightly programmed sounds, deadly textural atmospherics and an uneasy, foreboding tension of a world signalling its end. - Bandcamp
Label: Midnight Shift Records – MNSXLP0001 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Mini-Album, Limited Edition, Grey Marbled |
Country: Singapore |
Released: 18 Oct 2019 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Dark Ambient, Electro, Industrial, Techno |
$40.00
.gif have earned critical comparison to the likes of Bjork, Yukimi Nagano, The xx and Portishead, but the illustrious pair have managed to retain a fresh and unique dynamic to their chimerical sound, one that proved so compelling that the pair began filling a void of their own making within the Singaporean music scene.
Following the acclaim of their past releases, .gif's sophomore LP HAIL NOTHING still showcases the haunting vocals, deft lyricism and obsidian production that has become their distinctive sound. The album is named after a line in Ernest Hemingway' s A Clean Well Lighted Place - "Hail nothing full of nothing, nothing is with thee."
The duo digs deeper on HAIL NOTHING; an ode to chaos and nothingness, a love song to the void. Expanding on their synth-driven soundscapes, haunting vocals and poignant lyrics, the album also features guests Bani Haykal and Usaama Minhas.
The Analog Vault is supremely honoured to be working with .gif for their first-ever vinyl release on TAV Records.
Label: Tav Records – AV002LP |
Format: Vinyl, LP |
Country: Singapore |
Released: 24 APR 2020 |
Genre: Electronic |
$48.00
Matthew Dear’s contribution to the DJ-Kicks series is his most engaging commercial mix yet. Intricately and intuitively mixed, it incorporates a handful of his own unreleased tracks.
Dear’s mixing is a treat. Unless you know the tracks inside and out, it’s virtually impossible to tell where they begin and end; he favors long, careful blends, and rarely leaves a given track to play out by itself for long. His selections benefit from the hands-on style. Pay attention to the way energy pulses between two cuts running in parallel, and you imagine the motion of a pinball as it ricochets off bouncers and flippers: wildly kinetic and keenly controlled. - Pitchfork
Label: !K7 Records – K7346LP |
Series: DJ-Kicks – |
Country: Germany |
Released: 27 Jan 2017 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Deep House, Techno, Tech House |
$48.00
Perte d'identité, which translates to “loss of identity,” is the debut LP by composer, singer and poet Marie Davidson, one of the finest artists rising from the electronic dark-synth scene in Montreal. Her voice is a stark half-spoken monotone which will tell you stories from which you can’t escape unchanged. With this release, she refines her storytelling with suffocating tales that are both intimate and melancholic. Meanwhile, her miraculously human electronic rhythms are as frantic and hypnotic as an intense stare. In her premier full length album, she invites you to take a look in the peephole, revealing a fascinating cinematic picture. What you will be shown are the parts of yourself which you're scared and ashamed of, but also the ones that reveal a haunting and glamorous sensuality. Not only will she spin you a tale, but her music will immerse your soul in images of sweet anxiety. "This album is about romance and a quest for meaning." - Bandcamp
Label: Weyrd Son Records – WyS-005 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Limited Edition, Reissue |
Country: Belgium |
Released: 04 Apr 2017 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Minimal, Dark Ambient, Electro |
$48.00
Marie Davidson is a spoken-word poet and electronic artist who is also one half of the duo Essaie Pas. Her third solo release, examining club culture, shows near-exponential growth in her abilities…
…One of the most successful and captivating practitioners of spoken-word electronic has been Marie Davidson, one half of the Montreal coldwave duo Essaie Pas. Her two previous solo releases (Perte D'Identité and Un Autre Voyage) mingled gothic ambient music, poetic repetitions, and analog synthpop to great success. Her work has never felt campy, but is darkly rendered, probing, and redolent of Lizzy Mercier Descloux. In her third solo release, Adieux Au Dancefloor, Davidson presents a project that indicates exciting and near-exponential growth in her ability as a writer and producer. - Pitchfork
Label: Cititrax – CITI021 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Repress |
Country: US |
Released: 2017 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Experimental, EBM, Synth-pop, Techno |
$38.00
Pan Daijing, a Chinese artist now based in Berlin, discovered techno on her first trip to Europe, when she was 20. But unlike many who have had a similar epiphany in Berghain's dark halls, Daijing didn't suddenly dedicate herself to dance music. "It's not so much 'music,' but 'sound,'" she told RBMA last year. "Sound has always been the thing I've been the most interested in." Or maybe "noise" is a better way of putting it, as her interests in industrial and experimental music have been a major part in the intense, sexually charged performances she's become known for. All of which is to say that Daijing has taken a roundabout path to making techno, which gives her second release an interesting angle. A Satin Sight isn't light on rhythmic force, but the drums are sometimes utilized more for their sonic blasts than time keeping. "What I like about techno is the energy," Daijing said in that same interview. "Whether you're making it, playing it, listening to it or dancing to it, it's an energy exchange. – Resident Advisor
Label: Bedouin Records – BDN 013 |
Format: Vinyl, 12", EP, Limited Edition |
Country: United Arab Emirates |
Released: 2017 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Techno, Industrial, EBM |
$48.00
A futuristic collection from Midnight Shift and Voitax!
Label: Midnight Shift Records – MNSVOI 01, VOITAX – MNSVOI 01 |
Series: Midnight Shift X – MNSVOI 01 |
Format: Vinyl, 12", Compilation |
Country: Germany |
Released: 07 Feb 2020 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Breakbeat, Breaks, Broken Beat, Deep Techno, Dark Ambient, Dub, Dub Techno, Electro, Experimental, IDM, Industrial, Noise, Techno, Ambient |
$39.00
Tobias. returns to Ostgut Ton with his third full length Eyes In The Center and expands the musical narrative laid out by his Helium Sessions EP (O-TON, 2016). The Berghain resident keeps exploring the vast modular synth-driven Techno, Experimental and Ambient territories on a journey in-between genres.
Label: Ostgut Ton – OSTGUTLP25 |
Format: 2 × Vinyl, 12", Album |
Country: Germany |
Released: 21 Apr 2017 |
Genre: Electronic |
$39.00
"This is the new album by Modeselektor. It has been in the works for two years and was made within a month. It’s a record offering essential Modeselektor, a record formed by experience, self confidence and the usual madness. It raises a question and answers it straight away. „Who Else” is yet another counteraction to boredom and formulaic approaches. Hear Modeselektor casually kicking against the pricks. Somebody’s gotta do it. Who else?" - Monkeytown Records
Label: Monkeytown Records – MTR096LP |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album |
Country: Germany |
Released: 22 Feb 2019 |
Genre: Electronic |
$45.00
“"Live shows and clubs and festivals, for me, have taken on an entirely different meaning the more the world has changed over the past 18 months," Matthew Barnes said around the time of his last album, Compassion. "It can feel a lot more like a shared and beautiful experience." A year later, the producer's DJ-Kicks mix also reflects obliquely on the power of live music experiences. It's inspired by DIY nights he went to when he was younger: events driven by the urge "just to share music between people", where "DJ etiquette" was ignored and artists instead seemed to be "cook[ing] up their personal mixtape in front of you."
Forest Swords' first licensed mix is his own personal mixtape. A patchwork of sounds and moods with a few of Barnes's own "voice note" field recordings thrown in, it's casually and playfully eclectic, hinting at influences and nodding to his peers. There's only one Forest Swords track, the scratch-itching exclusive "Crow." But with its sombre mystical mood, clever combos of acoustic and electronic sounds, and the odd bright shot of pop, the mix as a whole has many of the qualities that define Barnes's own music.” – Resident Advisor
Item description:
Artist: |
Forest Swords |
Title: |
DJ-Kicks |
Label: |
DJ-Kicks |
Format: |
2 x Vinyl, LP, Album, Compilation |
Pressing: |
Germany |
Release Date: |
18th May 2018 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
IDM, Techno, Leftfield |
Catalog No: |
K7365LP |
Condition: |
New |
$39.00
“Moriyama is the first release on Palto Flats by Nagoya-based experimental producer Foodman. A 5 track 12” focused on deep, tactile rhythmic and offbeat tracks, Moriyama tilts on some of the producer’s most dance-friendly work. “Mizuboro,” (meaning water bath) elicits the feeling of soaking in a tub of warm bassy synth pads, metronomic patterns of woodwinds and skittering percussion suitable for latenight winds. Elsewhere, on “Soudesu,” Foodman experiments with traditional instrumentation & vocal forms to create a special post-ambient/dance hybrid of familiar sounds reconfigured.
Named after the district he lives in, Moriyama represents some of Foodman’s most direct, accessible work - a full helping.” – Bandcamp
“Nagoya-based artist Takahide Higuchi will release some of his most "direct, accessible work" to date, the label says, with an emphasis on "deep, tactile rhythmic and offbeat tracks." It's the second release of the year for Palto Flats, the New York label that's perhaps best known for reissuing rare Japanese albums from the '80s—Mariah's Utakata No Hibi, Midori Takada's Through The Looking Glass and Yasuaki Shimizu's Kakashi among them.” – Resident Advsior
Item description:
Artist: |
Foodman |
Title: |
Moriyama |
Label: |
Palto Flats |
Format: |
Vinyl, 12", 45 RPM |
Pressing: |
US |
Release Date: |
16th November 2018 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Experimental, Leftfield, Abstract, Techno |
Catalog No: |
PF009 |
$36.00
"5 years since Midnight Shift’s first release in 2012, the label assembles a collective of artists, most of them are in advance of their full EPs releasing later.
Representing the now and future sounds of the label, the motley crew also comprises the alternate sides of familiar faces — Amato (The Hacker), Terry Lamborgini (Marco Bernardi), INNYSTER (Seixlack), Hodge in a new formation with Gramrcy, and an electro moniker from an undisclosed artist: Thermocline. From abstract acrobatics to the abrasive and the ultimate gob smack to the floor — The Midnight Manual is in the bag." - Bandcamp
Item Description:
Artist: |
Various |
Title: |
The Midnight Manual |
Label: |
Midnight Shift Records |
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, 12", Compilation, Limited Edition |
Country: |
Singapore |
Released: |
Mar 2018 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Techno |
$55.00
Ten years after his first release, UK artist Lone is putting out his
first ever commercial mix CD. His entry into the celebrated
DJ-kicks series lands on 29th September and features four of his
own new and exclusive tracks.
Lone’s DJ-kicks very much feels alive, lived-in and authentic. It is
a hugely personal view into his unique musical world and marks
another landmark entry into !K7's long running series – Bandcamp
“Tapping Detroit techno, IDM, and boom-bap hip-hop, Lone’s horizontally inclined DJ-Kicks mix uses expert selection and programming to highlight his own distinctive musical sensibility.” – Pitchfork
“Unlike his productions, it's not a seamless weave of trends, genres and ideas. Instead, DJ-Kicks lays out each of his influences piece by piece, almost like listening to a deconstructed Lone album. For fans of Cutler's singular music, it's an essential entry in his discography.” – Resident Advisor
Item description:
Artist: |
Lone |
Title: |
DJ-Kicks |
Label: |
Studio !K7 |
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, 12", Compilation |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
29 Sept 2017 |
Genre: |
Electronic, Hip Hop |
Style: |
Techno, Experimental, Downtempo |
Catalog No: |
K7353LP |
Condition: |
New |
$48.00
“For many enlightened club goers in Chicago, Hieroglyphic Being is as much a part of the house and techno scene as the sticky floors and the sweaty walls. His appetite and passion for the Chicago club scene as a DJ, producer, and promoter has solidified his standing as one of the most important house artists to come from Chicago since the peak years of Chicago house in the mid to late '80s.
Hieroglyphic Being, aka Jamal Moss, is an artist who marches to the beat of his own drum. He is a willfully prolific artist, confident in his ability but certainly not one to shout about it. With releases on his own Mathematics Recordings label and a slew of releases for Spectral Sound and Soul Jazz, he has proven himself time and time again to be a unique talent. Last LP, 2016's The Disco's of Imhotep seemed like the perfect summation of his career up to that point as he confidently moved from trippy experimental techno to classic kinetic Chicago house all with a healthy sprinkling of jazz fusion. While that album was purposely concise and succinct, The Red Notes sees Moss let loose as he trusts the listener to buckle up and stay along for the ride.
On this album, Moss takes his cues from jazz as he describes the album as, "an homage to the Blue Note jazz sound of Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, and Herbie Hancock". In effect he applies the attitude, freedom, and sounds of jazz, especially it's liberal application of form and structure before fusing it with characteristic leftfield techno and Chicago house.” – PopMatters
“While jazz stylings have previously played crucial roles in Moss’s unique sound, it was 2015’s We Are Not The First (credited to Hieroglyphic Being & J.I.T.U. Ahn-Sahm-Buhl) which expanded on the links between cosmic jazz methodology and acid house. Live players such as Daniel Carter and Marshall Allen seamlessly applied decades-old practice to Moss's electronic circulation and the whole vibe of the record felt akin to what Sun Ra might have brought out in our present day had he not been called away from Earth. On The Red Notes, however, Moss’s sonic template is recognisably that of classic acid house but filtered through jazz’s interstitial phrasing and exploratory dynamics. As you’d expect from Moss’s considerable body of work, this is no exercise in fusing electronics with virtuoso hyper-noodling so as to enable a soulless vacuum. In terms of sheer uplifting joy, the nearest comparisons I can make for The Red Notes are with Alice Coltrane’s spiritual music or Laraaji’s sun-eyed exhortations.” – The Quietus
Item description:
Artist: |
Hieroglyphic Being |
Title: |
The Red Notes |
Label: |
Soul Jazz Records |
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, LP |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
Feb 2018 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Techno, House |
Catalog No: |
SJR LP 394 |
Condition: |
New |
$45.00
Hieroglyphic Being’s debut album for Soul Jazz - The Acid Documents - is an album made up of tracks first released last year only ever available in a bespoke edition of 100 copies (yes 100) – in the form of a homemade CD-R – made exclusively for the Sounds of the Universe record store.
This album is now released officially as a one-off edition of 1000 copies on coloured double vinyl, CD and digital, fully remastered with artwork by Japanese artist 2Yang.
Hieroglyphic Being, aka Jamal Moss - who features on the front cover of Wire magazine’s current issue – is a DJ/composer/sound artist who makes pioneering, experimental, boundary-pushing Afro-futurist electronic music.
Born and based in Chicago, Moss’s music embodies two of the cultural foundation blocks of the city’s musical lineage; that of Chicago’s original Acid House sound (c. 1986), that of Frankie Knuckles, Phuture, Marshall Jefferson et al, alongside a rigorous experimental sound searching that taps into the cosmic musical lineage of pioneering artist Sun Ra whose Arkestra landed and was based in the city from 1946-61.
This association with Sun Ra is by no means hypothetical, having just been in the studio with the Arkestra leader Marshall Allen and a host of free jazz players for the album Hieroglyphic Being & JITU Ahn-Sahm-Buhl’s ‘We Are Not The First.’
Similarly his relationship to Chicago’s original acid house pioneers of the late 80s is no hyperbole. Originally menotored by artist/producers Adonis and Steve Pointdexter, Moss also now runs his own Mathematics label which has released music by foundation acid house pioneers Lil’ Louis, Adonis and many others. To quote Moss, ‘I am the last of the line of producers directly influenced by Ron Hardy (the pioneering acid house DJ) at the Music Box.’
Moss grew up in the south side of Chicago. After being thrown out of the home of his adoptive parents, he then spent three years homeless living on the streets of Chicago, living a nocturnal existence as a gigolo in Chicago’s alternative clubs. He began his career as a DJ at the pioneering Liquid Love parties at Chi-town’s legendary Power House (home of Ron Hardy’s MusicBox) around 1989.
What clearly defines Moss’s music is that while sometimes pushing the limits of sound to an ear-splitting dimension of experimentation and DIY-electronics – the music is always clearly a progression of the lineage of black music. In the words of fellow Chicagoans, The Art Ensemble of Chicago, it is simply ‘Great Black Music.’ And yet in this uniquely defined sound, Moss somehow manages to draw into this world elements of industrial music, German electronic music (Cluster, Harmonia etc), Detroit’s sci-fi techno artists (Atkins, Saunderson, Craig) and more. – Sounds of the Universe
“Jamal Moss' 'The Acid Documents' album sees a necessary vinyl issue on Soul Jazz Records. The ten tracks now have titles but don't worry; they're still raw as f**k and unaltered from the original CDr.
In full, psychedelic flow he jacks-a-body from lo-fi, curdled house in 'Culdees' thru to the gurgling ceramic acid of 'Aurum Solis' and a warped slow motion ace, 'Hollow Earth', peaking out at the cryptic tribal patterns of 'Illumiates of Thanateros' and the spannered, chaotic harmonics of 'Burlesque Degrees'.” – Boomkat
Item description:
Artist: |
Hieroglyphic Being |
Title: |
The Acid Documents |
Label: |
Soul Jazz Records |
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, 12", 33 ⅓ RPM, Album, Limited Edition, Orange |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
2015 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Abstract, Experimental, Techno, Acid House |
Catalog No: |
SJR LP322 |
Condition: |
New |
$39.00
A suite of electronic laments, tone structures and dreamtime rhythms, with a conceptual arc taking in death, life, sleep and religion.
Right from Hazyville, Actress’s music has been deeply marked by London’s rave music heritage. But after the angular dynamics of Splazsh, R.I.P heads out into deep space. The rhythms and pulses are smudged or blurred, or are hinted at by their absence. 2-step garage is collided into gamelan, and freeform interludes explore microtonal spaces and imagined string instruments.
R.I.P underlines Actress’s reputation as one of the most eloquent voices to emerge from the sub-bass nexus of London dance music. His intuitive and original grasp of beats, textures and rhythm puts him on a parallel path to dance music innovators such as Basic Channel, Burial and Aphex Twin. But the way he engages with electronic sound from first principles, realising his own self-contained sonic worlds, hints at less obvious kinships outside the dance music fraternity, with pioneers of homebrewed sound experiments such as Cabaret Voltaire, Pan Sonic and Oval. It moves the body but the sounds also tap into to something more intangible inside you; you dance, but also ‘slip/drift into another realm, probably without even realising.’ – Honest Jon’s Records
“Darren Cunningham is a dance producer who references extroverted, populist music to create a meditative, introverted, immersive experience.…It's not the sound that makes the music, though, but the structure of it. R.I.P. is a deliberately uncoordinated album. Rhythms, basslines, and melodies slip in and out of line with each other. Comparatively straightforward, house-oriented tracks like "Shadow From Tartarus" are situated next to murk and ambience like "Tree of Knowledge". The emphasis here, though, is on "comparative": Even R.I.P.'s steady 4/4 tracks sound grimy and deconstructed. But there's something almost flirtatious in the way he lets the sounds worm around in the dark, looking to hook up with something firm. When they do, it's both mechanical and mystical, like watching a sculpture cut from raw stone.” – Pitchfork
Item description:
Artist: |
|
Title: |
R.I.P |
Label: |
|
Format: |
2 x Vinyl, LP, Album |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
2012 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Leftfield, Glitch, Techno, Experimental |
Catalog No: |
ZEN 241 |
Condition: |
New |
$48.00
A TAV Curator's Pick.
Actress, real name Darren Jordan Cunningham, known to friends as DAZ, returns with a new album, now on Ninja Tune and a new music system called “AZD” (pronounced “Azid”), a chrome aspect journey into a parallel world. An artist who has always preferred to make music than to talk about it, in “AZD” he has achieved another remarkable landmark, one which is as resistant to interpretation as it is demanding of it. Following on from his previous albums, R.I.P, Splazsh and Hazyville, an epilogue poem attached to the press release for Ghettoville was construed by media, commentators and spectators that Cunningham had retired. This led him to conceptualise this mass of conclusion as the key to ‘Giving power back to identity.’
So a few pointers, or possible ways to think about “AZD”. The album is themed around chrome – both as a reflective surface to see the self in, and as something that carves luminous voids out of any colour and fine focuses white and black representing the perfect metaphor for the bleakness of life in the Metropolis as suggested by Anish Kapoors Cloud Gate.
Another way to approach would be through the art of James Hampton and Rammellzee (who inspired “CYN,” which Cunningham also sees as a vision of New York in reverse…) – both of whom, though of different generations of the African-American slave diaspora, created art through “Sourcing castaway materials from their environment and reinterprating them into absolute majesty given from the fourth dimension.” There is also the career-long influence of the Detroit techno pioneers, something which becomes clear on this album “there is a contrast in the type of glow or reflection”.
Alternatively, you could write your PhD thesis on Jung’s Shadow Theory and AZD: “Lots of ideas come from dreams, this isn’t new, but sometimes the conscious mind starts to meld into the universal consciousness through constellation tunnelling.” If that sounds too taxing then you could always fall back on Star Wars and, in particular, the Death Star: “It has a dark dystopian backdrop, with highly sophisticated technology, but it is fading into the ether, still holding on and emitting a powerful energy. The music remaking the embers, binding them together and pulling them apart again.”
Alternatively, just listen. That “glow” Cunningham talks about makes this in some ways more immediate than previous Actress releases. Take lead single, “X22RME” (pronounced “Extreme”) which elegantly plays between the lines of Oriental classic rave and Balinese warehouse Techno machined in a Rotherhithe lock up welding the grooves into a seamless cracked joint.
At the other end of the spectrum is “Faure in Chrome,” a byproduct or development from his collaboration with the London Contemporary Orchestra, in which he “repatterns” aspect of Faure’s Requiem into a piece which sounds like the very institution of classical music being encased in electronic ice and scanned through a high frequency bandwidth. In between are gems like “Runner,” a personal re-soundtracking of Blade Runner “its from the deleted Fade Runner scene where AZD in a Peckham Cafe realises his barber has over the years etched a faded scroll into his head using early 80s African synthpop as a vexing serum“, or “Falling Rizlas,” an alienated music-box ballad. It’s a remarkable piece of work, that harks back both to Actress’ previous productions and to earlier iterations of the (broadly conceived) “techno” project without being beholden to anything but Cunningham’s forward-facing, individual and disembodied vision. – Ninja Tune
The simplest you could say about “AZD” is that it’s art – the unique creation of a unique mind. There will be few more distinctive, brilliant or visionary suites of music released in 2017. Call him what you will, this is the year that Darren ‘Daz’ Cunningham - aka Actress, aka AZD – asserts more clearly than ever before his complete independence. “Actress has a talent for melodies that snag at you, as demonstrated on the music-box ambience of Falling Rizlas, or Blue Window, on which house music battles to be heard over the sound of tape hiss. He also has an ability to twist the sound of dance music until it sounds private and intimate. Even the album’s most upbeat moment, X22RME, has a strangely introverted atmosphere to it: when the beats drop out, it doesn’t feel like a euphoric breakdown, but rather as if someone’s mind has wandered in the middle of the dancefloor.” – The Guardian
“…for all its artfully-deployed discordance, *AZD *maintains a musicality that holds the listener close. Sometimes this comes through in more danceable techno moments, like the single “X22RME” or the 80s-leaning synth-driven track “RUNNER,”; elsewhere, it’s in the emotive minimalist breaks of “FALLING RIZLAS” or “THERE'S AN ANGEL IN THE SHOWER.” Cunningham participates in a futurist tradition, following an arc set by artists and writers like Rammellzee and Eshun. But that futurism isn’t predictive, something yet to come; rather, his combination of science fictions, music histories, and socio-spatial realities feels deliriously adjacent to the world we’re listening to it in.” – Pitchfork
Item description:
Artist: |
|
Title: |
AZD |
Label: |
|
Format: |
2 x Vinyl, LP, Album |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
2017 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
IDM, Techno, Experimental |
Catalog No: |
ZEN 241 |
Condition: |
New |
$45.00
Jamal Moss, aka Hieroglyphic Being, returns for a new second album on Soul Jazz Records, after last year’s debut The Acid Documents. this time under the name Africans with Mainframes.
Hieroglyphic Being and fellow Chicago producer Noleian Reusse have been releasing music under the name Africans with Mainframes for over 15 years now, ever since their debut on Hieroglyphic Being’s own Mathematics Recordings label in 2005. ‘K.M.T.’ is the debut album from the group, a collage of apocalyptic Chicago acid meets industrial and transcendental post-house machine funk.
Both intense and unique, the album of forward-thinking, experimental, boundary-pushing Afro-futurist electronic music shows why Hieroglyphic Being is regarded as one of the most serious purveyors of experimental black music today. You can't stop the prophet! – Sounds of the Universe
“Devastating album of epic dancefloor rituals and visions from Jamal Moss (Hieroglyphic Being) and Noleian Reusse in their prized Africans With Mainframes guise, amounting to their most substantial and impressive collection.” – Boomkat
“…Working with fellow producer Noleian Reusse as Africans With Mainframes, [DJ and producer] Jamal Moss swings from Windy City jazz to Chicago acid at its most caustic. While the duo have released a slew of 12”s dating back to 2001, K.M.T. is their first full-length. Kemetic Modulating Textures is eight tracks of Moss and Reusse at their most unrelenting and there’s a coarseness to every texture that at times might make you mistakenly think it was just slapped together. Yet the frequent references to Egyptology (Googling each track title reveals a profound knowledge of prehistoric culture) suggest a greater thought at work, and if you manage to survive the bruising BPMs of the album's first half, it becomes mesmerizing.
Opener “Anachronistic” sets the table for what lies ahead: everything in the red, a snare fill stumbling and slipping across the grid, the 808’s edges increasingly fuzzy with distortion. And then just when it verges on pure noise, that telltale acid squiggle worms through and the snare coheres into a visceral thrill.
Last year, Moss explained his first encounter with Sun Ra’s music as a shock to the system: “His music wasn’t about making sense: it was just about receiving these transmissions, this knowledge.” It’s a lesson that Moss carries forward with K.M.T., suggesting that while some of his tracks might scan as scrambled transmissions, continued exposure reveals a profound signal beneath the noise.” – Pitchfork
Item description:
Artist: |
|
Title: |
K.M.T. |
Label: |
|
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, 12", Album, Limited Edition |
Pressing: |
UK |
Release Date: |
2016 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Acid, Techno, Industrial |
Catalog No: |
SJR LP333 |
Condition: |
New |
$55.00
Following last year’s full-length LP, ‘&’, which saw him extensively collaborate with an impressive host of contemporaries and friends, including Joe Goddard, Prins Thomas and Agoria, Michael Mayer is set to contribute to the legendary DJ Kicks series. Spanning sixteen tracks, the mix finds Mayer is just as generous of a mood, composing a musical journey that spans his ever-expanding record collection, and above all, his defining instinct to share the beauty of music with others.
“On an abstract level, the approach was basically the same for both projects”, observes Mayer. “For & I put together a group of people that are close to my heart. For Kicks it was a group of records that are like friends to me. All of the tracks I used went through heaven and hell with me. They've become true companions. Circling in on and bringing together these friends was the only criterion for the making of this mix. I wanted it to be as personal as possible.”
Perhaps unnervingly to some, fifteen years have passed since the debut edition to Mayer’s breathtaking, scene defining mix trilogy, Immer. Not that it’s legacy - Resident Advisor’s #1 Mix of the 00s, one of Rolling Stone’s 30 Greatest EDM Albums Of All Time - has disturbed Mayer’s formidable workload. A catalogue of no less than 23 EPs, 4 albums and 170 remixes informs a near constant level of international touring. Exhausting as this can be, even after all these years, it’s a ritual that informs the delicate construction of Mayer’s contribution to the DJ Kicks series.
“Kicks has turned out to be a pretty international affair, especially if you compare it with Immer 1 or Fabric 13, which consisted almost 100% of German productions”, highlights Mayer. “At that time, there were such incredible things happening in my direct neighborhood and all over Germany. In the meantime, that spark has traveled a lot since then. The sound I've been pushing is often falsely described as "minimal". Minimal used to be a thing in the pre-Kompakt days, mid 90s. After that I took much more interest in an eclectic way of playing music.”
Alongside this consistent, all-embracing attitude to music, ‘Emotive’ is still perhaps the term best associated with Mayer’s leanings as a DJ, and as the man himself once observed, “there is room on the dancefloor for emotions other than euphoria.” Certainly, DJ Kicks delivers on this expectation, balancing wistful passages with frequent bursts of high energy aimed squarely at the dancefloor.
Mayer’s own reliable talent and golden touch for remixing the likes of Kasper Bjørke, Dreems and CSS provides much of the mix’s atmospheric backbone, supported by dispatches from the contemporary underground from the likes of Jon Hopkins, SAVE! and Boreal. Resolutely a forward thinking affair, the Cologne master nonetheless takes a trip to revisit his timeless love of Throbbing Gristle, slides back over a decade for the electro euphoria of Mekon and Royksopp, as well as his good friend Roman Flugel’s Alter Ego persona.
“I'm constantly scanning my record collection for older tracks that could make new sense in a contemporary context”, reveals Mayer. “There's no system behind it. My record collection is too chaotic for a systematic approach. As much as it annoys me having to search for a particular record and often not finding it - during the search I'd always find 10 other records that deserve to be revisited.” – DJ-Kicks
“DJ-Kicks is Mayer’s first commercially released mix since 2010’s Immer 3… But the new set is clearly cut from the same cloth as its predecessors. It is quiet in places and raucous in others; its selections are sometimes intuitive and sometimes wildly idiosyncratic, but its forward motion is always fluid. Leaning mostly on fairly obscure house tracks from the last several years, it also reaches back and gathers up some real oddities—a Marc Almond feature remixed to hi-NRG heaven by Röyskopp; a 2004 remix by Basement Jaxx’s Simon Ratcliffe of Throbbing Gristle’s 1979 song “Hot on the Heels of Love”—to carve out a unique corner of the dancefloor.” – Pitchfork
Tracklist:
A1 |
Throbbing Gristle |
Hot On The Heels of Love (Ratcliffe Remix) |
|
A2 |
Jon Hopkins |
Abandon Window (Moderat Remix) |
|
B1 |
Boreal |
Canopy Target |
|
B2 |
Michael Mayer |
The Horn Is Conspiracy Club Mix (DJ-Kicks) |
|
C1 |
CSS |
Honey (Michael Mayer Remix) |
|
C2 |
Alter Ego |
Gary |
|
D1 |
Mekon Feat. Marc Almond |
Please Stay (Röyksopp Remix) |
|
D2 |
Dreems |
Mirages (Michael Mayer Remix) |
Item description:
Artist: |
|
Title: |
DJ-Kicks |
Label: |
|
Format: |
2 × Vinyl, 12", 33 ⅓ RPM, Compilation |
Pressing: |
Germany |
Release Date: |
2017 |
Genre: |
Electronic |
Style: |
Techno, House |
Catalog No: |
K7348LP |
Condition: |
New |