a centrifugal spin collapses inward
sucked into the ground
vibrating with the quake beneath the crust
the folding repeats itself in time
an echo amid the buildings of a primordial era

with closed eyes
the shapes begin to take form
in the debris
objects clump together into conglomerates

a scream
trapped in water-retaining cells
the moss that embeds itself after
a short passage of time
you talk back
but I can’t hear you

something springs forth
somewhere

a remnant that remains

—
Strange Meridians is an album by multidisciplinary artist upsammy. It is released by adventurous electronic music label topo2 on November 21, 2024. The record is pressed on 180 grams of ICCS-certified bio-vinyl, housed in a heavy full-colour sleeve, and comes with a download-code to the full release. Mastering is done by Isabel Schröer at Scape Mastering and artwork by courtesy of Thessa Torsing and Kees de Klein. Poetry by Thessa Torsing with editing by Eelco Couvreur.

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In many ways Spring seems to the perfect seasonal match for upsammy: no matter the tempo nor intensity, her style is colourful, restorative and carries a tangible promise of new beginnings. So Wild Chamber arrives at the right time, but it is an evergreen package - eight songs to slot into different situations, to speak to different moods, yet come from the same heart. A mini-LP that captures dawn mist, reflecting-pool shimmer, and occasional flashes of brilliant blue light. Swells of bass sag and yawn, time signatures switch up and break down, drums stutter and charge, and gossamer melodic trails are traced like ice skates atop a thawing lake. Innumerable shards of ideas are present, yet the music is airy and uncluttered. Wild Chamber is upsammy at her most pure, sketching sonic miniatures with a precise eye and an inquisitive ear quite unlike anyone else's right now.

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Now in its tenth year, Frankfurt-based record label Die Orakel has earned itself a strong catalogue of classy releases in a distinct sonic and visual attitude, its latest being a compilation called Braindance.

A fair assumption about Braindance as a genre could be, that it's rather in the zone of kaleidoscopic and whimsical quirktronica, less about IDM's futurist tropes. From Die Orakel's point of view, its very own Braindance compilation marks the label's tenth anniversary by releasing an intense listener's atlas, to its own and their creative collaborators' musical slant of mind.

While much could be said about spectral traces of a leftfield past, nostalgia isn't heard anywhere. The more you listen to this selection, the deeper the tracks plug into your brain—stretching from ethereal harmonic licks rippling with fragile glitches, bleepy to bass-heavy electroid steppers of any BPM range, to abstract-scientific neo-modular artistry.

Die Orakel's Braindance transmission can be had as a 15-track digi-release, as well as a 4-track vinyl EP. Pick either for your library of the future. The Braindance compilation will be released on 16 February 2024.

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Die Orakel welcomes Frankfurt based n9oc to its lookup-tables, hotwiring its community based operating system anew with 'Memory Allocator'. Her sonic information design echoes both fast-paced and beatless, early and spaced out melodic british IDM, complementing any 90s informed chord-code library. Compiling six sense altering code snippets onto vinyl, n9oc’s 'Memory Allocator' is future proof with any higher AI or real life form to come.

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Germany
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O-Wells is back on Die Orakel with his fourth transmission, called "Moldoom". This 4-track séance is mainly made of uplifiting, spaced out electro tracks, some rolling along with subtle or acid basslines, lush pads and gently subdued detroitish chords. Die Orakel leave it at your sonic discretion, whether the catalogue number references the year 1996.

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WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
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Germany
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Belia Winnewisser’s debut EP on Die Orakel, 'Mother Earth Took Poison In Her Soil', has her sonic exploration grounded in one of our most pressing topics to day, comprised of braindancing breakbeats intertwined with radiophonic artefacts, lingering between warm melodic pads.

With a slightly melodramatic tone, 'Mother Earth Took Poison In Her Soil' sets a pressing call to Side A, while 'Interlude 1' is a short radiophonic story to engage with your own imagination. This blends into a warm and melodic 'Dancing Patterns', embedded in soft pads. 'Haze' presents a darker facet of this EP, using eery synth pads and tension inducing fast arpeggi. 'Interlude 2' literally tells a sonic fireside tale, before 'Unattainable Promises' accelerate their breakbeats, intertwining with lush pads on half-step passages and sonic layers of different tempi.

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Germany
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Die Orakel long time collaborator Edward gracefully reappears with a three track emission called Time Stretch. Edward’s appliance of the titular technique is not restricted to various sonic elements at all, as it extends to the tracks’ mental notes and their trajectories beyond the digital realm.

Time Stretch fills the entire side A with vibrant sonic elements, a warm bassline along an eerie pad, all on top of a straight and punchy bass drum. La Grotta’s signature melody, plus chirps and cowbells, inject a slight touch of exotica to the musical meta-data, while time stretch artefacts refer back to a befittingly themed EP. Finally, the undercurrents of Black Sea evolve along a modulated melodic pad, a pulsating bass and beat structure, and a light 90s IDM morse figure on top of frequency sweeps.

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Germany
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Die Orakel reveals Lake Lemuria EP by Poly Chain, a full-on electro emission loaded with relics of British 90s IDM. The pun intending Max For Death commences the sonic diffusion with booming bass drums, reverberating acid line, plus an elevating meandering melody. Latter qualities extend and modulate subsequently, in variations joined by slowly shifting atmospheric pads and fast paced electroid geostructures, rendering a polychrome four-track braindance-scape.

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WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
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Further on the trail of 90s sonic specters, Die Orakel releases Ike‘s Stone Diviner EP, an affiliate with Index Records. The titular track amalgamates the momentum of sparse yet heavy weight breakbeats with the warmth of lush pads, and literally reverberating 90s trance or IDM elements along granular rave signals. The beauty of its subsequent tracks lies in their well-tempered, fresh exploration of past sonic phenomenons, devoid of today’s retromania.

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WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More