Favorite Releases from October 2022
Nature’s first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold
Her early leaf’s a flower
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf
So Eden sank to grief
So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay.
-Robert Frost
The sun is setting in the warm terracotta autumn sky and the trees are transforming into vivid hues and kaleidoscopic colors with an explosion of vibrant orange, red, and gold fall leaves. Summer is officially over, but we are excited for the fall and a harvest of stunning new releases featuring Synkro, Nueen, Brigade, Artefakt, Konduku, Philipp Priebe, Leo Anibaldi, Donato Dozzi, The Vision Reels, Laura BCR, Moiré, map.ache, and Lowtec.
Synkro
Last Breath
R & S Records
Joe McBride AKA Synkro, has built up a hugely impressive catalogue of releases over the last few years. Via albums and singles for Apollo, Exit Records, and his own Synkro Music imprint, the Manchester-based producer and sound architect has amassed a dazzling archive of elaborate, emotive, and intellectual soundscapes drawing in influences across a spectrum of bass culture and electronica.
On the ‘Information’ EP, it’s business as usual, as Synkro deploys four fresh and forward-thinking tracks that slither across the genres with ease. From the frantic percussion and dubwise tones of title track ‘Information’ to the absorbing textures and crackling ambiance of the beatless opener ‘Cycles’, the attention to detail and the depth of layered sonics across all four tracks afford the listener a truly mesmerizing experience. The dusty and dark skank of ‘Signal’ is a real mood piece, while ‘Last Breath’ closes the EP drenched in sanguine sentiments.
Nueen
Maxima
Balmat
For Balmat’s fourth release, we turn our attention close to home: to the Mallorca-born, Barcelona-based artist Nueen, aka Nacho Pezzati.
Nueen has been developing his highly personal style of blissfully Balearic ambient over the past few years, with releases on labels like Quiet Time Tapes and Good Morning Tapes. On Diagrams of Thought, he explores new depths in his sound. His atmospheres remain bucolic, but there’s a disturbance at work, a hint of uncertainty swirling beneath seemingly placid pads.
While Diagrams of Thought retains the ambient (or at least ambient-adjacent) focus of all Balmat’s releases so far, the album also marks new frontiers for the label; the album’s first half is graceful and largely beatless, but the mood grows murkier with the foggy drones of “Dome” and the intimations of liquid drum ’n’ bass on “Maxima”; “Veta,” meanwhile, might just represent the most forceful rhythm to appear on a Balmat release yet.
Brigade
Rhythm Analysis
Laut & Luise
The Berlin-based production and live electronica act Brigade present their debut album, “Hard Times, Soft Music” through Laut & Luise imprint. The twelve-track album sees Brigate exploring hazy moods centered around some alchemy of textures, melodies, and rhythms without following genre limitations. Here is what the label intends to say about the album:
“The record is a meticulously calibrated work of room temperature, a home-cooked meal between friends, or a warm sonic blanket that tugs you in after a rainy day. Pushing their club roots to the side, Brigade‘s debut album con- dently sits between ambient, house and hip-hop. „We took the pandemic as a cue to take a break from dance floor productions and play around with different genres and production styles.“ The first single, „International CommunicationTM“ showcases that breadth and introduces an album pretty much anyone in the post-Shrek cultural landscape could agree on. Basically, if you appreciate a good hug, chances are you‘ll enjoy this LP. Also, there's a pretty cute dog on the cover.”
Artefakt
Rail
Delsin Records
Artefakt dives deeper into their electronic universe with a worthy follow-up on their Days Bygone LP on the Delsin Interstellar series from early 2021. ‘Brain Dripper’ EP explores adventurous paths in dreamy electronics, experimenting with emotive melodies and floating chords rendered into immersive idm and ambient pieces. On the flip, the pair fuses their trademark deep techno jams with stepping electro-brain workouts.
The second track, “Rail,” is an undefinable blend of IDM and breakbeats infused with a dreamy melody and reverberating sonics allowing a gorgeous atmosphere to unfold.
Konduku
Özlem
Mantis
Konduku returns to the Delsin Mantis series with an exciting double pack that dives deeper into his remarkable fractured rhythms and light-touch synthesis. Over the course of nine tracks Ruben Üvez straddles the space between introspective headphone trips and hypnotising dancefloor elegance, operating in a liminal zone of fluid tempos, submerged atmospheres and pointillist beats. It's an open-ended but clear-sighted approach that aligns perfectly with the direction of the Mantis series.
On Mantis 09 Üvez follows a progressive, patient arc of energy from the glassy chimes and pin-prick percussion of 'Özlem' via 'Scale's reduced, atonal echo chamber and the half-time prowl of 'Derinkuyu' to the dense, humid pressure of 'Swerve.' Restraint maintains throughout, even as we take in a broad spectrum of the Konduku sound.
Mantis 10 opens up with the circular electronica of 'Trail,' masking the start and end points of the groove with the kind of polymetric construction Üvez has made his name with. The pattern continues through the displaced, dubby experimentation of 'Lust' before the more sharply defined transcendental tone of 'Lavender' cuts through the fog. 'Dalgin' rides its pattering percussion on a minimalist D&B growl, setting the scene for the dislocated, avant-darkside closer 'Helles’.
The Vision Reels
Aconites (Laura BCR Remix)
Huinali Recordings
UK producer The Vision Reels continues his well-crafted design on the “Aconties” EP released through our beloved Huinali Recordings from Jeju Island, South Korea. Offering up two aquatic compositions carefully balancing with artistic programming, The Vision Reels creates delicate fusions between ambient and atmospheric soundscapes. The package comprises two original pieces, two alternative versions & four remixes from Inhmost, Launaea, Owl & Laura BCR.
Laura BCR’s remix of the title track is a powerful reinterpretation of the original track that presents an organic feeling. The vivid elements of the propulsive deep techno rhythms make the track versatile and perfect to be featured in DJ sets.
map.ache
Love (S.O.S)
Gielgling
Leipzig-based electronic music producer, one-half of the Manamana DJ duo, KANN Records label boss, the label he operates in partnership with Sevensol and Bender, and an essential member of the Giegling family map.ache has unveiled the new “So Oder So” EP.
Following up his 2021 solo work “What Is It,” he delivers five tracks, masterfully building a single nexus from minimal to raw house infused with sophisticated musical elegance.
Love (S.O.S) draws the listener in vibrant atmospheric ruses of sound and a unique blend of timeless melodies and layered elusive instrumental flourishes that resonate long after the last note fades.
Leo Anibaldi
Endurance 4 (Version II) (Donato Dozzy Remix)
Vargmal Records
Vargmal Records is an independent record label and multidisciplinary platform founded by Gent Gjonbalaj. Operating from Prishtina, Kosovo, the imprint publishes hypnotic compositions of various forms, exploring the realms of electronic music and beyond. The label's debut release marks the birth of an initiative started several years ago, reflecting on a process of growth, research, and refinement.
Conceived as a foundation record, the ‘Classics’ EP demonstrates Vargmal’s concept and overall spirit. The Italian pioneer Leo Anibaldi inaugurates the label featuring two cuts on the A-side, originally produced in the early 1990s—‘Muta 5’ and an as yet unheard version of ‘Endurance 4’—replete with Anibaldi’s signature sound programming and high-octane output. On the flip, the torch is passed to another Italian master, Donato Dozzy, who takes them to another level with his peculiar and precise remix treatment. Where Anibaldi paves the way for a possible future, Dozzy applies a modern touch to the same fundamental approach—a balancing act that shows a spectrum within the conceptual framework from two different points in the continuum, transcending any individual style or place in time.
Philipp Priebe
Unfold
Feuilleton
German producer and Stólar label boss Philipp Priebe continues to produce a steady stream of impressive releases consistently. Following on from his “Everlasting” EP released earlier this year through Lithuanian imprint Greyscale Music, Philipp Priebe debuts on Mainz/Hamburg‘s Feuilleton with his second long player, “Apparent Calm Palms,” a collection of ten tracks that brings the listener into a hypnotic daze. The label describes the album as follows:
“Throughout the 'Apparent Calm Palms' LP, Priebe delivers a concoction of styles and sounds cohesi-vely fused together to form the bigger concept which is he tells us is "an album about small towns and villages and the needs and desires that brings one night out in clubs. The transport/travel, the preparty, all the things that you had to do, when you are not directly living in the big party places, but still want to have a decent night out, away from your usual suspects".”
We had the pleasure of premiering the track “Unfold” from the album. Read the full article by Zach Huenink
Moiré
Circuit 04 (Lowtec’s Objects People Visions Remix)
Acid Test Records
Moiré's rain-streaked and masterful Circuits album dropped this past September. RA's Andrew Ryce stated the eight-track album cast the shadowy producer into "a rarefied air occupied by only the finest and most influential of ambient techno artists."
Now, in short order, the label returns with a remix EP charting out multiple hubs of oblique dance floor innovation. If there's a sonic motif on the A-side, it's vastly reactive interpretations of the "factory floor" element that inspired techno's pioneers. Matthew Herbert, a pioneering force in his own right, mixes steam engine percussion with the dreamy atmospherics of "Circuit 15" and comes up with eight minutes of cerebral machine funk. Tolouse Low Trax, meanwhile, continues his masterclass in modern motorik on his remix of "Circuit 7," integrating a chiming piano into a fascinating, perfectly-timed 110 BPM rhythm.
The B-side, meanwhile, doubles down on the oneiric nature of the original material. Workshop head and Avenue 66 alumnus Lowtec builds allows "Circuit 04"'s synths to billow into Gas-like immersive layering, sheets of melody are anchored by a restrained beat for an ambient techno track that doesn't tip the scales too far in one direction or the other. Rather, it achieves a perfect balance. Dial mainstay Lawrence closes things out with his version of "Circuit 18," which also concludes the original album. While the original has a wistful, Deckard's dream quality, Lawrence's version is deeply-rooted in the late-night German style; a low-slung bassline will keep dancers deeply rooted while those wistful chords sweep in like the violet before dawn