GENRE/S: Experimental Folk

TRACKLISTS:
A1. Cotenius X - Intro
A2. Cotenius X - Oceans in Flames
A3. Cotenius X - Burunduk
B1. Cotenius X - Plastic Bag (feat. Sergey Letov)
B2. Cotenius X - Fukushima Tuna (feat. Sergey Letov)
B3. Cotenius X - Melting Pot
B4. Cotenius X - Udarnitsy

SHORT INFO:
Cotenius X is an exploratory improvisational project of the Ukrainian sound artist Daria Redkina and the
Russian experimental vocalist Varya Pavlova aka Lisokot. Improvising together since 2017 they
incorporate folk, electronic and musique concrète elements into their spontaneous compositions. “Plastic
Bag” is a testament to collaboration - an archival reflection of the time the duo spent experimenting
together. Their theatrical performances involve impersonation or adoption of different characters and are
informed by social, political, historical, and site-specific narratives. The duo has been compared to The
Residents and see themselves carrying the psychedelic absurdity of the US group forward by giving it a
feminine twist.

More

Format : Vinyl 12” (180 gr., Limited Full Cover)

Track list:

A1 Mirage
A2 Coffee
B1 Tapioca
B2 Mirage (Elisa Bee Remix)
B3 Abalone

Release Info:

Label mainstays Fouk just dropped the perfect dancefloor Bomb with ‘Mirage’ paired with a high-octane Elisa Bee remix

We all know Dutch duo Fouk from their soulful, bouncy take on house music. They’re also responsible for some of Heist’s biggest tracks like Kill Frenzy or their Lil Louis inspired 2021 release ‘Blue Steel’. On their new EP, the talented duo shows us a fresh side of their sound: the main-room hands-in-the-air-going-wild side. To top things off, Italian producer Elisa Bee made time in her busy schedule of DJ’ing and releasing for artists like Ben Sims on his Hardgroove imprint and Unknown to the Unknown to deliver a killer remix of the title track.

Fouk’s return to Heist after 3 years is a welcome one and with ‘Mirage’, they might just have given us their biggest house track in their decade spanning career. The track is built around a stuttering synth loop and a seductive female vocal chanting ‘What made you wanna…” The real star here is the bassline, which propels the track into a seriously infectious groove. Add some lush strings and moody changeovers and you’ve got yourself a full-blown dancefloor weapon. Mirage has been a staple in Dam Swindle’s sets for the past months and has been one of their set highlights ever since.

“Coffee” is one for the classic Fouk fans. It’s got lovely Rhodes, a joyous combination of whoo’s, snare-rolls and synth hits grooving on top of an infectious orchestral background loop. “Tapioca” is a hybrid latin-electronic groove that builds on punchy synths, live percussion and drunk keys to balance the energy of the track.

Elisa Bee’s remix of ‘Mirage’ is an intense percussive workout that builds on a breakbeat loop and a rave-bassline. The tempo is turned up a notch or 2 and that stutter synth and vocal of the original make this remix a wild warehouse affair.

Closing track of the EP is ‘Abalone’; A lovely bleep-house affair that still has a bit of that warehouse vibe. It’s got the perfect amount of distortion the drums while keeping things dreamy with some face-melting pads throughout the track.

As always, enjoy the music and play it loud!

Lars & Maarten More

LP

Special remarks:
180g


Tracklist LP:

A1 Rooftop Machines
A2 Clean Clear White
A3 4056
A4 Underground

B1 Stairs
B2 14th Floor
B3 NMR
B4 Through The Window


Having flown in from Tbilisi, Anushka Chkheidze found herself completely alone inside the empty and as yet unoccupied University of Basel's Biozentrum: just her, a piano, and the surrounding spaces. Over a two-week period the young Georgian musician and composer was able to explore the building, designed by Ilg Santer architects, with the piano, microphones, a mixing deck, a computer, and her voice. She also assembled a small choir from the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis music academy in Basel, who performed in an auditorium in the basement.

Anushka used her field recordings and compositional ideas from her on-site sessions to create the music for this album in the studio in Tbilisi, Georgia. The eight tracks are an acoustic and associative journey through the Biozentrum with a nonvisual form of perception: she encountered eight very different places in the building, and the spatial acoustics and nonvisible interior spaces all play their part.

'Clean Clear White' was mixed by Taylor Deupree (Pound Ridge, New York), mastered by Christoph Stickel (Vienna), cut by Sidney Claire Meyer at Emil Berliner Studios (Berlin), and pressed on 180 gram black vinyl by Optimal Media (Röbel/Müritz) with love and care to audiophile standards.
More

Tracklist:

A1: Constant
A2: Big Cabin
A3: Western Arrogance
B: Inside

Release Info:
Tbilisi-based artist Gacha Bakradze creates cinematic soundscapes on his Die Orakel debut entitled 'Western Arrogance' – a genre-transcending exploration of electro, breakbeats, trance and IDM.


More

Genre: Deep House

Track list:
A1 Heel Goed
A2 Lift Adrift
B1 Fine Rise
B2 Asanti
B3 Expanding Signal

Release Info:
Our 20th celebration year continues with a very special comeback! It’s exactly ten years now since the last Ben La Desh release on our label, his sublime “Stellar Talk EP” hit big waves and together with the “Midnight Rendez-Vous EP” from 2012 he cemented himself in the lo-fi deep space house scene as an artist to look out for, no one produced deep house like he did back then. After a longer break from releasing music he is back and we think stronger as ever, with analogue gear and well curated sampling and live field recording we present you his “Fine Rise EP”.

The opener “Heel Goed” is an amazing track with that distinctive 909 beat and DX bass driven “La Desh” flavour and a truly wonderful vocal sample from a 90s TV commercial, hilariously funny and brilliant at the same time! We can’t wait to see the faces of people, especially on the Dutch dancefloors, when they try to figure out and discover what the ladies are talking about! Second A side track is the super funky “Lift Adrift” that flanges itself to outer space, etherical with chopped break beats and various percussive and rhythmic Pearl Syncussion layers running through effect pedals, Lift Adrift!

On the other side we start out with the deep title track “Fine Rise”. Here Ben treats us again to his trademark spaced out effects driven sound and on top a killer bass line and synth lead melody, reminiscent of the golden age of (good) trance music. Followed by the break beat gem that is “Asanti”, cautiously cut up breaks and layered machine drums with bubbly Syncussion sounds, rain drops falling down on different surfaces recorded in a garden in the French Drôme and processed African Kalimba. Did we already say Etherical? It is!
Closing out this great new record is the ambient piece “Expanding Signal”, an analogue tune that consists of field recordings and deep dubby chords, a building Juno pulse, swooshes and again a profound DX bassline, think of “Sun Electric” or “The Orb”.

Enjoy this one and play it loud on the dance floors or silently in your bedroom, it works everywhere as far as we are concerned!

All tracks mastered by Salz Mastering in Cologne. Photography & Art by Break 3000.

More

GENRE/S: Electronic, Nu-Disco, House

TRACKLISTS:

A1. I'm Coming Out feat Mariseya (Extended Mix)
A2. Take Me Up feat Mariseya (Original Mix)
B1. Take Me Up feat Mariseya (Gerd Janson Remix)
B2. I'm Coming Out feat Mariseya (Instrumental Mix)

SHORT INFO:


“The Dirty Love EP” marks the union of the artists' creative minds, but also a blend of Old School - New School: is not just a meeting of musical minds, but reflected in both the production and the soundscape. The release conquers with a new take on Italo House, giving it a modernised edge: a reinterpretation of Italo House, enhanced by world music influences, thanks to Mariseya's vocals.


More

LP

2. GENRE/S: Electronic / Trip Hop / Breaks


3. TRACKLISTS:

1 - Time To Hold Better
2 - This Time Last Year
3 - We Keep Us Safe
4 - Melancholy Sabotage
5 - Measures
6 - We Don't Owe
7 - Breaking Points
8 - Eviction

The new album from Lebanese-American musician Solpara, Melancholy Sabotage, marks his full length debut and return to Nicolas Jaar's Other People label. While it was recorded over Covid lockdowns, Jaar had been talking about wanting to back a Solpara full-length since he put out Swing. The album came to life while Solpara was living alone in a Brooklyn loft, collecting unemployment checks and viewing ample free time as the artist residency he'd dreamed of; he'd previously been forced to make music in odd windows between numerous jobs and the unmerciful pace of city life. Free from obligations, he would wake up early to take Arabic lessons online, read Tracey Thorn's autobiography, and skateboard the deserted streets, then come home and design sounds until he had a track that felt like it needed to be released. While this easy going lifestyle was peaceful in many ways, Solpara found more complex inspiration in the emotion that stemmed from participation in Black Lives Matter protests and the 2020 Beirut Port explosion, which rocked all of his extended family members in Lebanon.

Melancholy Sabotage explores the theme of sabotaging melancholy. Echoing sounds from the post-punk, trip-hop, and ambient genres, it is about sabotaging the cycle of melancholy and looking at this process without ignoring the sources that put it into motion. It may be compared to a rattling breaking free from retention, reaching states of dreamy euphoria while simultaneously acknowledging the sources of retention, viewed from above. The sources can be personal, political, or socio-economic. They are to be apprehended post-melancholy, after the sabotaging of the initial cycle of melancholy. In other words, it is about transcending melancholy and understanding where it came from with some distance. It may be beautiful and healthy to feel for a while, but how may one sabotage this cycle when it becomes paralyzing? Ultimately, this album is about feeling melancholy but also resisting it and naming the sources that initiated it.

"Time To Hold Better" points to neglect on both personal and group levels. "This Time Last Year" is a personal time capsule. "We Keep Us Safe" is about solidarity, autonomy, and care witnessed within protest groups. "Melancholy Sabotage" is a sonic exploration of the album concept illustrating anger and sadness, but finally, resistance and liberation from these feelings. "Measures" is a more fluid exploration of the latter after the initial storm has passed. "We Don't Owe" points to bigger bodies inflicting harm on populations that we owe nothing to. "Breaking Points" harkens the times that we may lose focus while pushing to transcend melancholy. "Eviction" is about being pushed out of a space unwillingly while simultaneously being forced to move forward.

Melancholy Sabotage pulls from a range of genres, uniting electronic sounds under the same post-punky glow. It pulls from complex, heavy themes including damage and injustice, presenting Solpara's most moving body of work to date. It highlights the poignance that has always been at the heart of his fluid sound, which caters to dancefloors and avant-garde spaces in equal measure. Working with a mix of dissonant guitars, distorted drum machines, and distant, reverb-washed vocals, Melancholy Sabotage is Solpara's uneasiest outing to date. The record pinpoints the duality at the heart of Solpara's sound, which is as plaintive as it is searing.



5. VITAL SALES POINTS:

Solpara launched the label and event series Booma Collective with Oren Ratowsky and Valentin Stip - a lowkey institution in the international techno circuit.

His 2015 EP, Swing, marked both a sonic and professional turning point. It split the difference between noisy techno and spacey ambience, capturing the essence of a young artist settling into a singular lane. Issued by Nicolas Jaar's esteemed Other People label, it solidified Solpara's place as an inimitable up-and-comer. "Nicolas and I met in high school, played in a band together, and have been exchanging music ever since," he says. In part thanks to Jaar's powerful co-sign, subsequent Solpara releases landed on imprints such as Quiet Time Tapes and Bruta?.

Solpara fuses elements of post-punk, ambient, house, and dub techno. While plenty of his cuts would fit within the context of an energizing DJ set, many are arrhythmic and avant-garde. When asked about his influences, Solpara cites artists ranging from Laurel Halo to Laurie Spiegel to Massive Attack to Denis Mpunga to Lily Tchiumba. His eclectic tastes were nurtured while studying film and philosophy in college, with German expressionism, Tarkovsky, and Chris Marker's La Jetee allowing him to realize the atmosphere he had been searching for. This curiosity was further encouraged by Booma Collective members and his roommate Jurg Haller, who went on to found the label Forbidden Planet Records. Later, after Solpara returned to his New York City hometown, he worked as a buyer for the now-shuttered record store Halcyon. In that job, he listened to copious amounts of music every day. His deep knowledge of culture has had a strong impact on a sound that is simultaneously fluid and commanding.


More

Merzbow (aka Masami Akita), Animal Rights Activist, Writer, and Musician, an Iconic Figure in International Noise Scene

Renowned for his pioneering contributions to the noise music genre, Merzbow (aka Masami Akita) has solidified his position as one of its most significant and recognizable figures. From his groundbreaking utilization of tape loops to craft expansive industrial landscapes in the late 1970s, to his transition to laptop-generated static noise at the turn of the century, Merzbow has consistently pushed the boundaries of sonic experimentation.

Modern Obscure Music is delighted to unveil Merzbow's debut release on the label, "Tsubute Mosaic."

Tracklisting:
A. Tsubute Mosaic Part 1 - 19:06
B. Tsubute Mosaic Part 2 - 17:41
More

Territories: WORLD minus FR

2 x Vinyl LP, Gatefold, OBI, Printed innersleeves


Saigon Supersound is delighted to present the 3rd and final volume of its pre-1975 Southern Vietnamese music collection. A curated collection of music from Saigon during the 1960s and early 1970s. The music has been restored and remastered in order to present listeners with audio quality on par with its original quality upon release more than half a century ago.

The first few songs in this Volume are songs Vietnamese people used to call “Stimulus Music” or “Action Music”. These are songs that borrow vibrant melodies, inspired by the west, performed by the best representatives of this genre. In addition, this volume includes songs, famous in clubs both past and present like “N?u Anh V? Bên Em” by Mai Huong and “Hình ?nh Ngu?i Em Không Ð?i” by Thanh Lan.

Many believe that "Southern Golden Music" is just popular music, simply because it "pleases the listener". Volume 3 include melodies most Vietnamese might have considered “unpopular”, but popular with “golden music” lovers. Today, people often call “gold music” bolero music, because this is the most popular style found in this golden era of music. In this volume, Saigon Supersound have selected typical bolero songs like,“Hàn M?c T?” sang by Trúc Mai, as well as, “N?ng Chi?u” by Lê Tr?ng Nguy?n.

In addition to the variety of melodies, Volume 3 also shows the diversity of genres found in old Southern music by introducing songs that praise the homeland such as “Tình Reo Trên Sóng Lúa Vàng” by Thanh Lan, praising peace in “Xin Cho Tôi Gi?c M?ng Bình Yên” by Thanh Tuy?n, witty music in “C?u C? Lên Thành” by Connie Kim.

Volume 3 closes with the song “Xuân Mu?n” (Late Spring), performed by Hoàng Oanh. The song talks about the end of a lunar year - a cycle of heaven and earth, the end of sad stories and opens up new hopes for more positive things to come.

Finally, the face of the movie star Ki?u Chinh is chosen to grace the cover image of Saigon Supersound 3rd Volume. Although she may not have had any direct relations related to music, more than 50 years ago, Ki?u Chinh's image appeared many times on the covers of various music sheets. The image of Ki?u Chinh was chosen for the mix of Eastern and Western cultures present in her life and career that mirrored the music of that era. These songs, with melodies originating from Europe, the Americas and Africa have been an integral part of Vietnamese music since the 1960s.

Tracklist:

A1. Thý T.nh Cho Em - Mai L. Huy.n
A2. Tu. Anh Tu. Em - Hùng Cý.ng
A3. Anh Ðâu Em Ðó - Connie Kim
A4. Ði.u Ru Ný.c M.t - Carol Kim
A5. Ngý.i Hành Hýõng Trên ..nh Núi - Khánh Ly
B1. B.c Thý T.nh Trên Lô C.t - Ban Sao Bãng
B2. C.u C. Lên Thành - Connie Kim
B3. T.nh Reo Trên Sóng Lúa Vàng - Thanh Lan
B4. Xin Cho Tôi Gi.c M.ng B.nh Yên - ThanhTuy.n
B5. N.ng Chi.u - Sõn Ca
C1. Ð.ng Quên Anh Là Lính - Trý.ng H.i
C2. B.n nh.c không tên - Ban Nh.c Lê Vãn Thi.n
C3. Mýa Bay Trong Ð.i - Duy Khánh
C4. Hàn M.c T. - Trúc Mai
C5. N.u Anh V. Bên Em - Mai Hýõng
D1. G.i Ngý.i Em Nh. - Duy Quang
D2. H.nh .nh Ngý.i Em Không Ð.i - Thanh Lan
D3. Trách Yêu - Hùng Cý.ng & Mai L. Huy.n
D4. T.nh Anh T.nh Em - Túy Phý.ng
D5 .Xuân Mu.n (Chi.u 30 T.t) - Hoàng Oanh More