It is with a singular pleasure that we welcome Marc Romboy to the ever growing stable of live artists at ASW! Marc Romboy is an artist renowned within the electronic scene for his eclectic, boundary-pushing approach and decades worth of experience working both behind the scenes and behind the decks. In recent years he has embraced performing live as another creative outlet and, indeed, creative challenge. As an artist and performer, Marc has always pushed the boundaries of his creativity and this, Marc’s first studio album in 6 years is a true masterwork of techno from one of the masters of the genre.

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The kick drums of tomorrow once again begin to rumble in the smog infested, strobe stricken clubs of today. Kompakt’s Speicher series always strives to provide the dance floors with a soundtrack to grant our mind and body temporary refuge and escape. We feel it is more than ever needed considering the darkness that surrounds us all in these times.

We welcome back Marc Romboy. A gifted producer, DJ and friend that has been behind the decks as a key supporter of Kompakt’s music since the beginning. Beyond that, Marc is an astute musician, with releases on many of the esteemed; from Ovum to Innervisions and of course his own Systematic Recordings his music is incredibly varied.

They say that the third time is a charm but in this case he returns to our Speicher series again with a two track EP that feels more like a sequel that is true to the excellent consistency of his previous output. Armed only with a Buchla Music Easel, the Roland TR-909 and an Arp 2600, “Randomized” is pure techno as it tweaks and twists into a complete frenzy. Marc pays homage to the legendary Californian synthesizer inventor Don Buchla with the very trippy churner, “Monsieur Buchla”.

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German veteran Marc Romboy is back on André Hommen’s ?These Eyes imprint with a stellar two track release entitled ?Elka, ?showcasing Marc’s effortless ability to portray alluring and emotive characteristics through music?. ?This offering follows up from ?Trapped In An Orbit?, which he released on the label in 2017 and remains a label highlight to this day. The title track ?Elka provides a stirring and suspenseful journey that plays out as it’s melodies unfold over a bassline that pulses gently and impels the listener. ?Unreal Sun ?ups the energy with a groove thats ready to fall into and chords that lead the way, dictating the pace as their intensity undulates.

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MARC ROMBOY returns to our KOMPAKT EXTRA series with STALKER / BEYOND. Since we last saw him in 2018 on SPEICHER 103, Marc has kept plenty busy with a release on Bedrock, a collaboration with Stephan Bodzin, plus a series of releases with Petar Dundov on his own Systematic Recordings. Beyond Marc’s rigorous DJ touring schedule, he performed live in a Planetarium and ended the year with a highlight, performing live at Philharmonie Cologne together with violinist Miki Kekenj and the Takeover! Ensemble. Marc appears to be looking back to the deep, twisted forms of techno that shaped his early years with this double header. STALKER clearly delivers a typical Detroit-ish 90’s grittiness and drive which resounded the dancefloors of the German rave scene of that era. BEYOND is a deeper cut for those late-night dreamers who are into the sound of Carpenter. A growling synth and laser light synth mingle relentlessly until a delicate piano quickly realizes that IT’S THE place.

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Unless you're too young to know or have been living under a rock for the past twenty years, there's little chance that you haven't come across Marc Romboy's music in one way or another. The Systematic Recordings boss has had many irons on the fire since establishing his first imprint, the now defunct Le Petit Prince - gathering an untold number of releases on labels as diverse as Ovum, Innervisions, Rebirth or 20:20 Vision in his two decades of intense activity. Tracing back to 1994, when he used to rummage through the crates of Delirium - the primitive incarnation of KOMPAKT (closed and revived under its new name in 1998), the friendship between Romboy and the KOMPAKT family has largely withstood the test of time. After losing touch for a few years, Romboy and Michael Mayer would resume contact during a festival in the south of France - a reunion that eventually led to Systematic joining Kompakt's distribution catalogue a couple months later. With such a longstanding complicity to build from, it was about time for the Rheinland natives to actually team up on a release from start to finish, and SPEICHER 103 is their inaugural act of faith. A cosmic storm in a teacup, the A-side opener 'Galaxy In An Atom' blows some furious stellar winds across a shape-shifting tide of loud kicks and mutant bass moves, beating across uneven arpeggiated synth reliefs through thick and thin. Then, the chaos makes way for emotive piano stabs to take over in the track's last third, gracefully gliding into a further appeasing compass. Following up pedal to the metal, the pulsating 'Elektrisiermaschine' makes for a proper peak time ball of fire. Built upon a rolling and pitching bass comber, the track sets its pistons and rods in dancing motion straightaway, tightening the bolts bar after bar as it expands its abraded melodic lines and batucada-like rhythms with amplified magnitude for over seven minutes of sustained mind-bending onslaughts.

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Kobosil offers four new tracks on his debut EP release for Ostgut Ton. Following up on his latest remix of Terence Fixmer's "Aktion Mekanik Theme" (Ostgut Ton, 2015) the 24-year-old from Berlin is back with four carefully crafted tracks for his first regular release on Ostgut Ton. 91 sees Kobosil focussing on a more steady musical approach by presenting tracks with a similar vibe and muscular impression rather than a varied selection of styles and aesthetics: the hypnotic synth pulse and bewitching strings of "Avernian" sit atop of a ripped, dark four-to-the-floor beat; "Konvergent" features a double kickdrum all the way with lush claps and a vocal bent beyond recognition; "Per" comes with an overall unfussy feel and a dry steam hammer drum. Only the interlude "Athtar" takes on a completely different direction with Drone sounds, Noise speckles and deep black, heavily processed vocal samples. With just a handful of records released in two short years, it may already seem as if Kobosil has defined his creative base as a versatile DJ and producer with a clear accent on dark Techno derivates as well as a soft spot for Noise, Industrial and Ambient textures. The overall tone may be set, but there's way more to come – his debut album will be released on Ostgut Ton in Januar 2016

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Format:
- Limited edition warm beige 12” vinyl LP.
- Housed in PMS printed inner sleeve, featuring custom fonts by No Format and spot gloss abstraction of the original album artwork.
- Accompanied with a double sided 2-panel insert and double sided 4 panel poster.
- All sleeved in a custom PMS reverse board outer sleeve with die cut square centre panel and belly band.

Mesmerising album of Yokota’s earliest sonic explorations that demonstrates his unique vision and sublime transcendence of boundaries.

‘Image 1983-1998’ is a collection of short miniatures, composed in two different time periods. Tracks 1-5 were recorded with guitar and organ between 1983-4 and tracks 6-12 were composed through 97-98, being inspired by the earlier material.

A musical scrapbook, or sonic design board. The sleeve notes give an insight into Yokota’s belief in a close connection between music, memory and his active imagination: ‘Encountering Acid House made me visualise music – I could clearly see the sounds sparkling… this experience led me to create electronic music.’

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Apollo Records proudly present the vinyl reissue of ‘Morning Light’, the acclaimed 1997 album from Mark Van Hoen’s Locust project; a work that blurred the boundaries between ambient electronics, trip-hop, and dream-pop with an emotional precision few have matched since.


Tracklist
1.1Your Selfish Wayss
1.2Morning Light
1.3Just Like You
1.4One Way Or Another
1.5Folie
1.6No-one In The World
1.7Clouds At My Feet
1.8Summer Rain
1.9Ancient Hometown
1.10The Girl With The Fairytale Dream
2.1All Your Own Way
2.2Juke Box Heart
2.3The Daydream Girl From Sealand
2.4I Am The Murderer
2.5Some Love Will Remain Unsaid
2.6Shadow Play
2.7On The Horizon
2.8Just After Sunset

Listen: https://open.spotify.com/intl-de/album/3BcDdBU8cdW1iaBuWBQ9lk?si=jHNnNLVOSSq7x53kD9BSyw&nd=1&dlsi=c304fa95f0f54b9c#login

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“Krok” means “step” in Belarusian - and for Alex Chumak and his band this word comes with a lot of meaning. It’s the title and theme that run throughout SOYUZ's fourth album, reflecting the journeys the band has navigated in recent years, having moved to Warsaw due to political unrest in their homeland of Belarus and the outbreak of war in Ukraine. Embracing the uncertainty became both the inspiration and main lyrical theme for Alex Chumak, SOYUZ’ composer and arranger, who also decided to go a step further and change the language in which he writes songs from Russian, which is used as lingua franca in many post-Soviet countries, to his native Belarusian. The result is nine songs about dreams and outer space, ordinary miracles, things very close and very distant at the same time.

In early 2022, Chumak and original members, Mikita Arlou and Anton Nemahai, joined tens of thousands of Belarusians seeking safety abroad. Resettling in Warsaw, the band released Force of the Wind in October 2022, garnering widespread acclaim, a string of major European gigs, and led to Polish musicians Albert Karch and Igor Wisniewski joining the band.

Deeper and more melancholic than previous works, KROK is quintessentially SOYUZ, laced with hope, dreams and a celebration of life. Given the difficulties with finding rehearsal and recording spaces in Warsaw and the departure of the drummer Anton Nemahai from the band, Chumak explored alternative options. He reached out to friend and fellow musical collaborator, Sessa, about the possibility of recording the new album in his recently finished studio in São Paulo, with Sessa and Biel Basile coming onboard as recording engineers.

At the tail end of 2024, Chumak and SOYUZ’ new drummer, Albert Karch, made the trip to São Paulo to record the first sessions for KROK. Sadly, they travelled without Mikita Arlou, SOYUZ’ co-founder and Chumak’s longtime creative partner, due to the financial impossibility of bringing him too. Laid down directly to tape, these sessions featured prominent Brazilian musicians Sessa, Biel Basile, and Marcelo Cabral, with a guest vocal feature by Tim Bernardes recorded at a later date. The final touches were then added back in Europe. Lush string and woodwind arrangements written by Chumak and Karch were recorded at the Polish Radio studio in Warsaw, and Rhodes parts were added by Chumak at Sven Wunder’s studio in Stockholm.

Though primarily recorded in Brazil, KROK is not a Brazilian or MPB album. It blends the bands' Eastern European roots with jazz, folk and global influences. The genre of the music is hardly identifiable: there are folk ballads and jazz-driven pop compositions covered in lush and often dissonant string and woodwind arrangements where each note is placed with care and meaning behind it.

Broad in its palette, KROK is full of highlights. The title track was the first song Chumak wrote in Belarusian as an adult, making for a fitting opener and one of the band’s finest tracks. Darker than most of SOYUZ’ songs, the tensions lift and lighten as the track progresses. The cinematic library jazz of 'Voo Livre', with ghostly vocals sung by Ciça Góes and Ina, feels like a modern twist on the Italian library composer Alessandro Alessandroni through its sublime choir and woodwind orchestration. Elsewhere, the heartfelt 'Lingua Do Mundo', composed, written, and sung by Chumak and the incredible Tim Bernardes, features one of the standout string arrangements from Chumak and Karch. 'Cichi Karahod' is an instant SOYUZ classic, almost Pat Metheny-esque as it opens, with the acoustic guitar and bass riff transitioning into jazzy AOR / pop-folk territory. The record closes with 'Smak žyccia', a gentle, dreamy spoken-word poetry piece in Japanese by singer-songwriter Manami Kakudo.

Despite immense challenges, SOYUZ have delivered a career-defining album in KROK. Heartfelt and beautiful, it is not an imitation of the past, but rather a truly original, contemporary expression all of its own.

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Tracklisting:
A1 Under Black Helmet - Impulsive Behavior
B1 Under Black Helmet - Track 9

Release Note:

***
serpentine butterflies
trickle to his chin
ceaseless punches
fall like moribund rain
cracked bones clang
like splintered glass
again and again
***

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