experimental

The Belgian artist Marleen Van Ende (also named Marluna Delfin)started to make video clips called The Snake Moans. She used existing music for her videos but got banned on social media for copyright infringement. So she created her own soundscapes using guitar, piano, Korg and all kinds of toys. Marleen Van Ende is nowadays based in Spain where she, besides her musical and visual activities, also makes artwork from litter.

The Hissing Link has mostly instrumental soundscapes with strange twists and psychedelic influences. The music comes in sonic waves of guitar and electronic sounds with hypnotizing rhythms and percussion.  Angels And The Shedevil, starts the album with a guitar sample from Kloot Per W and exceeds with a catchy baseline into Tarantino like movie sound track. Marleen Van Ende already collaborated with Kloot Per W under name The Claudio Serpentino. They released in 2015 a strange and cocky album with covers of the Beatles, The Wide Album.

Meanwhile, making music is now just as important as the images to the visual artist behind The Snake Moans. We feel the compositions have more to express then a gamut of sounds. The structures of the tracks are experimental but still recognizable enough to produce liquid day dreams with a slight darker and tense atmosphere. Floating voices and spoken word samples push the listener into the strange filmic surroundings of The Snake Moans. Moods switch from psychedelic, playful, experimental and eerie. The mysterious musical landscapes on this album have many forms and influences merging together into a fascinating piece of (art)work.

The Hissing Link comes only on (blue) vinyl. You have to take our word in an old fashioned way because there is at the current moment no streaming possibility to listen to this very good and interesting album. If you are in for some experimental escapism you can buy this vinyl blind. 

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Patsker

electronic / experimental / jazz

Boring Machines

I guess I'm really into the somewhat stranger side of the musical spectrum today, which is a perfect opportunity to plug this odd little gem. As some of you will know, Boring Machines is known to release somewhat unusual records and this one is definitively no exception.
Divus is a duo from Rome, comprised of electronic musician and techno producer Luciano Lamanna and saxophone player Luca T. Mai, of world-renowned band ZU. In 2018 they released their debut, now followed by this vinyl in which they expand their experimental spectrum. The result is an awe-inspiring brood of electronics, free-jazz saxophones and grainy dance tunes.

It took me the whole four and a half minutes of opener 'C1' to get into the music Divus creates. There was ambient, but also saxophone sounds, so it had to be moving into the dark jazz direction, no? At one moment I thought, "Bohren und der Club of LSD". I'm still not sure if that is a compliment. 'C2' quickly made me forget about the confusion caused 'C1' and 'C3' completely blew my socks of. Remember Speedy J's 'A Shocking Hobby' album? Well, combine that with dark jazz saxophone sounds and you'll have Divus. Besides, 'C4' is a neat ambient jazz tune, much more minimal than its colleagues. 

Now, before you go thinking that this is another nice dark jazz album, remember the beats and breaks. From lazy dance inspired percussion to breakcore-vibes, Lamanna throws it all into the mix. It's not all easy digestible, or danceable, or understandable but it's unique and impressive. 'D2', for instance, is something from a dystopian movie soundtrack, driving on heavy beats and dreamy sax. This is my personal favorite. The trouble is, who to recommend this thing to? Jazz freaks? Not really. Dance fans? Oh no, certainly not. People who enjoy the weirder side of life and thus their music collection? Probably. Just check it out. You won't believe your ears...


Serge 

electronic / experimental

At the end of 2018, the five CD box of Onsturicheit entitled Wanneer De Herder Doolt, Zo Dolen De Schapen was released on the Wool-E label. Since that release, Peter Moorkens has been a regularly requested artist at electronic music festivals in Belgium. This also gave him the opportunity to provide the old (Post X) post building with a dashing set of electronic excesses. This captivating performance is the second official live release from the Littl 'Antenna Records label.

Neurotisch Verslapte Aandacht slowly starts with an experimental ambient piece made up of samples and modular synth structures. Moorkens likes to mislead his audience by incorporating all kinds of crazy improvisation pieces into his compositions. A bouquet of undulating soundscapes is squeezed out of the modular modules with guitar and voice, before being kneaded into new sonic confirmation with otherworldly sound transitions. Psychedelics and mysticism are electronically amplified with floating waves that bubble up transcendental feelings. 

Hearing and seeing Onsturicheit  is like entering a sonic spaceship that converts unknown signals into our Earth's sound dimensions. With elaborate electronics, once hovering than pulsating, Moorkens' hallucinatory sound world is presented layer by layer to unexpectedly take new electronically controlled roads. Humour is also injected into the sound waves with funny samples and field recordings that linger paradoxically as recognizable islands in the Onsturicheit dimension.

Neurotisch Verslapte Aandacht  is a neurotic electronic masterpiece in which the attention never weakens. The Adventure Paths of Onsturicheit have addictive and hallucinatory side effects which we welcome of course. We are devoted to this stunning (live) release. 

This Littl 'Antenna Records release is distributed under the wings of Wool-E Discs.

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Patsker
 

drone / ambient / experimental

With a release title that makes you open your mind during the 'stay at your place' period in Europe and further, Music For Installations still sprinkles some tantalizing pepper in our electronic noses. Pieter Gyselinck is not only the man behind the ambient project Lounasan and the second half of the electronic duo Cycles Of Moebius, he also shows a lurid and experimental side of himself with Music For Installations.

Fractions Of Unity consists of ten sonic fractals that open up as infinite sound compositions filled with the reflection of a split personality. We already noticed the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde feeling in the various other projects of Gyselinck, which are further explored in Fractions Of Unity. The undulating soundscapes alternate with dark drones that produce an eerie atmosphere of madness. By means of mysterious signals, samples and percussion, Gyselinck's sound constructions scratched permanent scars in various places on our hard disk.

No lack of experiment, we were glued to the synthetic and threatening sound pulses that slowly brought all kinds of dust particles to the surface containing disturbed alien sounds. The unearthly rumble buzzed like mechanical bees back and forth between the eardrums. The dark and machine-like constructions of the tracks was encapsulated with bizarre signals that generated a strong sense of panic choking.

Fractions Of Unity listens as an experimental ambient drone trip that was rolled into an exciting and threatening electronic block full of stimuli. Music For Installations is unfortunately, still in the box unknown is unloved. With Fractions Of Unity there may certainly be some change. A Belgian quality release in the genre.  

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Patsker

post metal / death metal /experimental

I've often thought about what goes into making an album. How the push and pull of various influences plays out in creating a work of musical art. Does anyone have overall control of the project or do each member have an equal say in what is produced? Having only a tiny fraction of musical talent myself I am fascinated as to how great albums come to be in existence. I would love to know the answers to a few of my previous questions when it comes to the latest album by Italian band Nero Di Marte called Immoto.

Lead by the very distinctive vocals of singer Sean Worrel who sings somewhere between a controlled growl and a clean style, not a million miles away from Joe Duplantier. This lengthy album (it clocks in at over 67 minutes long) runs the gamut of several musical styles and does so exceedingly well. The first song Sisyphos is a great introduction to the rest of the album. It starts with gentle guitar strums before Sean's impassioned vocals come in over the top before exploding in a frenzy of blast beats and a wall of noise which ebbs back into calmer waters after a few minutes. This dynamic between the light ambient slower side and the cacophonous frenetic darker side are at the beating heart of this album. A lot of bands I've listened to have a great grasp of these dynamics, Nero Di Marte skate this line and come perilously close to falling off it at times, but most of the time they seem to correct the course and balance out the equation. I say most of the time as there are occasions when they fall prey to over indulgence and I can't help but feel with a bit of trimming some of the more indulgent passages, this album could have been stupefyingly good, rather than just great. Album highlight L'Arca is a maelstrom of heady extreme music and really showcases the best the band has to offer. Every member gets a chance to shine and the rhythm section in particular sound like they are having a blast, literally at times. 

Overall, this album is an outrageously good listen, the web-like strands weaved by the band create occasional magic. If you like your extreme music with a healthy dose of calmer sections then do not miss this album, it is wonderful. 


Simon

ambient / experimental / avantgarde

Unexplained Sounds Group

There are people on this planet, with a devotion for music, who are willing to dig as deeply as possible into the underground scene. The result of  Rafaelle Pezzalla (also active as Sonologyst)digging is almost unlikely. The sympathetic Italian is the driving force and seeker of the Unexplained Sounds Group label, which focuses entirely on the contemporary experimental and alternative electronic music of our overpopulated planet.

With the new Unexplained Sounds Group release 'Anthology of Contemporary Music from Middle East' he presents a new chapter of the Sound Mapping project with special attention to non-Western countries, following the selection of contemporary electronic music from the African continent.

This compilation focuses on experimental and alternative music from the Middle East and includes artists from Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iran, Israel, Iraq, Palestine, Jordan, Afghanistan and Cyprus. This anthology shows a very interesting look at the productions sounds of artists rooted in their traditions with a progressive look at the new limits of their music.

These (as yet unknown) sound paths explore both experimental and radical improvisation, disturbed electronic tribal sonic structures, and psychedelic noise-drone escapades that sublimate the grains of sand in steaming ground breaking soundscapes. Anthology of Contemporary Music from Middle East reveals here an incredible sound puzzle in which the listener will find his favorite way to new places of architectural music constructions.

Speaking of a musical mind fuck, this compilation is a must for fans of experimental and cross-border electronic music. We have been stunned by this collection in a supernatural way. Top!

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Patsker

ambient / experimental / avantgarde

Unexplained Sounds Group

And yes, the sound mapping series of the Unexplained Sounds Group continues. After more than three years, the CD version of the previously only digital Persian experimental underground survey, focusing on experimental and alternative music from Iran, is finally out since November 30th 2019. 

Rafaelle Pezzalla had a lot of help from inside the Tehran scene to discover and compile this unique compilation. The artists delivered shining musical diamonds that have an eclectic content and various emotions. We were immersed in experimental electronic sounds, avant-garde, drones and ambient. The roots of the artists are woven in their sound sculptures and breathing rare buoyant atmospheres.

More known names in the genre, like Alphaxone and Xerxes the Dark have already released work on the American dark ambient label Cryo Chamber. The digital version of Anthology of Persian Experimental Music contains four bonus tracks. Reza Solatipour delivers to our opinion, without question, the most intriguing bonus track. The dark drones, mystical electronic pulses and a wide range of unique voices display an amazing world of deep sound ambiance.

For more than two thousand years the Persians had already developed and imprinted the core of the theoretical framework in the music of Middle Eastern origin still valid to this day. The local underground scene explores the ancient sound vibrations with a new vision and modern approach without losing their identity. The abstruse and complex quality tracks provide a soul-searching survey in the avant-garde music of Iran. We could only think of one word to end this review: brilliant!

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Patsker

Winter-Light is a Dutch label specialized in ambient, experimental and drone soundscapes. During the year 2019 the label released a number of high quality productions like Rapoon, Sysselmann, NIMH and Abbildung. We took with pleasure the time to listen further and deeper in their beautiful catalogue of 2019.

drone / dark ambient

Trances is the sequel to the album Zwischenwelten of the German drone artist Seetyca. The album was conceived and recorded during several summers. No warm seasonal tunes appeared, on the contrary, deep and dark signals of winter spheres are introduced on this mysterious album. The drones and soundscapes shiver like sharp ice rain slicing away the last pieces of the so hopeful winter light. Trances is a hypnotic piece of work with a lot of hidden layers like piano sounds, distorted humming and floating soundscapes, proving that Seetyca is a sound wizard like no other.  We were very pleased with the mental climate change this album induced. Trances is a detailed beauty on ice.

dark ambient

With chiming bells on a bed of dark drones presented on the first track, Rngmnn introduces his new work. RNGMNN aka Ronny Engmann from Germany, previously released albums on Noctivagant and Reverse Alignment, as well as a collaborative release on Cryo Chamber with Dronny Darko. Arctic Interference contains eight tracks with polar ambiance ranging from drifting pieces to tight, rhythmic and dark pulsating soundscapes. The industrial moods lurk behind the corner of this sharp edged electronic release. The tracks were recorded in the month of December, over a period of five years. RNGMNN uses field recordings, elements of percussion, samples and darkened electronic paths creating a desolated world where the only orientation point is the silence behind the ocean of sound structures RNGMNN produced. An awesome album for the darker parts of life.

ambient

The music of Kloob beholds profundity. Barcelona based Dani Kloob focuses his creativity in deep ambient music since 2010. Unpredictable Signs is a fascinating descent into a maze of cryptic caves. The ambient soundscapes howl like eroding winds against the damp walls. Kloob uses all kinds of manipulated voices and field recordings to detail his compositions. Perplexing sound structures amplify the feeling of never coming back to the surface. This recording feels like entering a bottomless chasm without beginning or end. Kloob created an irresistible mesmerizing world filled with soft drones and refined electronic tunes. We are obligated to say that this ravishing album is very addictive.

ambient / experimental

Atomine Elektrine is a project of Peter Andersson, the artist behind the Swedish dark ambient project raison d’être. Inspired by the discovery of a mysterious analogue computer, Peter Andersson  bundles his experiences as a sound creator in a new project. The enormous variety in approach and experiment with electronic based sounds makes this album not that easy to absorb. The Antikythera Mechanism sounds like cosmic clock, not only questioning time with creative squeaking and ticking of sprockets, but also using soundscapes, exploratory accents, glitch and sequencing. The result is a unique multidimensional melting of enigmatic sounds with a slight dark and edgy punk attitude. The Antikythera Mechanism is also available on vinyl and CD.  


​Patsker

progressive rock / post rock / experimental

Revolution is an album released in November 19, by Spanish post rock experimental project EXXASENS. A very interesting, dynamic and energetic album, that fluctuates over a variety of ecletic atmospheres, the versatility of this fantastic project is something almost out of reach. With a cohesive, solid musicality, and a proverbially clean style, Revolution reveals itself as a primordially graceful, effusive, pristine, elegant and very audacious work of art, that generates in the apex of its diluted style a proficient and sophisticated diagram of creative synergy, whose singular strenght is able to reach an extraordinary vortex of artistic splendor.  

Sixty-nine minutes long, the album has sixteen tracks: 1) Massachusetts; 2) A Space Odyssey; 3) Twenty One Years and One Day; 4) Revolution; 5) Why Not?; 6) Bye Bye Moscow; 7) Vega; 8) Eden; 9) Dream Is Over; 10) Another Space Odyssey; 11) Inside My Brain; 12) Since I Met You; 13) Eden's Place; 14) Dreams Are Over; 15) Autumn Storms; 16) Air; as a project that explores the overall density of a very proverbial and authorial musical proposal, EXXASENS does a surprising work on this fantastic album. With a cohesive, but at the same time easygoing style, a formidable creative horizon and exceedingly sober vocals — at least in some songs, the vast majority of the album is instrumental —, Revolution is a deeply pronounced ambitious album, that expands the creative formula of the artist's perception of sound.

With prog rock being the basis for the sound, the artist's style works from the musical conjuncture of this genre. Nevertheless, the marvelous atmosphere displayed by the harmonies conceives a serene universe of sound, whose magnificent technique anticipates the wonderful grandiosity of the project's somewhat innocent, but overwhelming artistic pretensions. The music is felt as simple, but splendorous at the same time; certainly, the diluted consecration of the formidable melodies that are poured through the edges of the sincere tones of the sound gets more and more rapturous, as the album progresses. 

Betting on a diversity of genres, letting the authenticity of his style reverberate over each one, the artist has crafted a formidably great, excellent and versatile musical universe, full of unexpected arrangements and colorful tonalities, that doesn't recognize boundaries nor limits for its fantastic creativity. The eleventh and fourteenth tracks — Inside My Brain and Dreams Are Over — are my favorites; the most beautiful songs in the album, in my opinion. 

A very interesting album, whose deeply authorial style and audacious experimental sensibilities captivates the listener already in the beginning, Revolution is a majestic work of art, whose gloriously creative ambitions make this work stand out for its ingeniousness and sonorous grace. Despite the fact that the album is a little too extensive — and invariably you become somewhat bored in the more repetitive passages —, the end result is fabulous, to say the least. Revolution manages to be a sensational musical experience, whose extraordinary creativity has definitely crafted a peculiar work of art, that deserves praise for all of its quintessential tenacious virtues.   


Wagner

industrial / darkwave / experimental / post punk

Cascades are falling down, a constant repetition of collapse. A motif found frequently in music, soundwise, in the lyrics or the music itself. Lots of artists from blackgaze to classical use it. Additionally it is found in visual arts or modern literature and over the last few decades has been connected to a critique of the present in order to change something about the future.

A new artist from Pennsylvania uses the image of collapse and a future uncertain combining it with a sonic landscape taking its bits from shoegaze and ambient, from noise and industrial. Lunacy‘s debut album Age of Truth (after releasing four EPs since 2016) is indeed a challenge to the ear but a very thoughtful one. The idea behind the record is obvious after a few seconds already because after a short lush intro the near-ambient mood is disrupted by harsh industrial marching drums. We are drawn into a world beyond Blade Runner and before Mad Max, a place where the constants of past, present and future might either still be possible or already obsolete.

The musician behind Lunacy tries to remain unknown (which can also be seen when looking at the record covers on which he becomes more and more of a blur). He does so not for his personal privacy but to render a blank canvas in order to give the listener the chance of projecting his own interpretations of and ideas about the music and the future, our planet and life in general – maybe even about the future of the future. What if our industry and society will collapse and with it the hope of changing the course of human (interference with) life on this planet? What will happen to “the future” if the end is coming, if the facades of humanity collapse and we will face the industrial downfall and machine-driven end?

Musically, Age of Truth combines his vision of a post-apocalyptic, post-human industrial age with
the help of Connor Clasen (IXVLF) recording the album and Oliver Ackermann (A Place to Bury
Strangers) mastering it. Sometimes you hear breakbeats, distorted vocal chants, shoegaze moments like that Ackermann is famous for. The foundation for this experimental electronica is a kind of 80s industrial soundtrack stemming from the use of synthesizers from that era which were then combined with several layers of guitars. Whether Lunacy is igniting a new phase of music-making for the first century after mankind or whether he is developing a new form of shoegaze is up to the listener, however it is clear that as an artist he achieved his vision clearly for the album transports us to a different place and time. Age of Truth will be released by Parisian label Third Coming Records on November 22nd


Thorsten