Back in 2016, Lars Bartkuhn was on a quest to expand his musical horizons. Inspired by the idea of the desert as a transformative place – an alien environment whose combination of vastness and beauty challenges those lost within it to first find themselves before they can find a way out – he loaded up his sampler with sub-Saharan samples and set about making two 12” singles, ‘Nomad’ and ‘Massai’, which subsequently appeared on Utopia Records.

Following completion of work on his 2023 album Dystopia, a conceptual ambient meditation built around electronic and acoustic improvisations, the German musician and producer decided to return to the core ideas that inspired those two 12” singles. Once again, he wanted to challenge himself, explore the more exotic side of his musical influences, and discover a course through the musical desert to ultimately become a better musician, producer, and composer.

The result is Nomad, an album that not only brings together two sides of his work – the immersive ambient explorations at the heart of Dystopia, and the club-focused rhythms that marked out his early career deep house explorations – but also draws on a familiar palette of influences, from Latin jazz-fusion and the deep jazz brilliance of ECM Records releases, to the ‘fourth world’ works of Jon Hassell and the African music that had initially inspired the ‘Nomad’ and ‘Massai’ singles.

Searching from the start for a more ‘analogue’ sound – hand percussion, kalimba, piano, voice, bass guitar, acoustic and electric guitars, alongside the modular synth sounds that were such a part of Dystopia – Bartkuhn combined improvisational and traditional composition techniques, painstaking editing, tweaking and reworking tracks over an extended period.

Added to impeccable sound design – even the more dancefloor-focussed excursions are optimised for headphone listening – the results are startling, even by Bartkuhn’s impressively high standards.

There are, of course, radically reworked versions of previous singles – a sun-kissed, Brazilian jazz-fusion informed re-invention of ‘Transcend’ (where Bartkuhn offers nods to another musical hero, Pat Metheny), an expansive, solo-laden take on ‘Nomad’ and a ambient inspired re-recording of ‘Massai’ – plus the kaleidoscopic brilliance of 2021’s ‘Every Morning I Meditate’, but far more never-before-heard highlights.

There’s the 6/8 time, Latin-tinged sunshine of ‘Back To My Innerself’, a track built on organic performances that were improvised straight into the sequencer; the meandering, densely layered sound world that is ‘Flame’ (a tribute to ECM recordings of the 1970s); the lightly techno-influenced fourth world futurism of ‘Ghibliman’; the organic deep house bliss of ‘African Skies’, where Bartkuhn’s vocalisations come to the fore; and the slow-motion ambient house of ‘First Kalimba’.

Nomad, then, is an album that effortlessly showcases Bartkuhn’s unique musical personality and ability to craft warm, colourful sound worlds – some rhythmic, others not so much – while neatly sidestepping categorization. It could well be his strongest and most personal musical statement yet. More

Since relocating to Brazil some years back, Needs Music co-founder Lars Bartkuhn has returned to his long-held love of musical improvisation. Although it’s a product of his jazz roots and classical training, the German producer has constantly found new ways to apply it to his work in the sphere of electronic music.

‘Dystopia’, his first solo album for almost nine years, was born out of two interlinked ideas: a desire to create improvised music without the aid of computer sequencers or an electronic drum set, and a deeply held love of storytelling through sound. Bartkuhn set to work improvising with modular synthesizers, acoustic instruments and hand percussion, later adding light-touch overdubs to a handful of pieces. When he listened back to the recordings, an aural narrative emerged, and you’ll hear it if you listen to the album from start to finish, as is intended.

As you’d expect from a musician and composer of Bartkuhn’s undoubted ability, ‘Dystopia’ is a stunning album – an undulating, expansive ambient journey packed with emotional resonance. While Bartkuhn naturally sees it as a logical progression of his previous ambient-leaning work with Kabuki as The First Minute of a New Day (and particularly their self-titled 2020 album Séance Centre), ‘Dystopia’ also features subtle nods to many of his long-held musical loves, including John Hassell’s ‘fourth world’ recordings, the impossible-to-pigeonhole 1970s catalogue of deep jazz imprint ECM, and the far-sighted American minimalism of Terry Riley and Steve Reich.

The album’s emotional depth is evident early on, with the slow-burn title track – all bubbling electronics, billowing chords, clarinet-style notes and gently strummed guitars offering the most melancholic and bittersweet of openings. The becalmed ‘A Drop Of Water In The Ocean’ follows, with discordant aural textures and hand percussion mimicking the rolling ocean, before ‘Largo (Calm Before The Storm)’ hints at unsettling times ahead.

‘Water and Warm Air’, the only track on the album whose starting point was not Bartkuhn’s cherished modular set-up, bleeps and bubbles across the sound space, adding a starry and otherworldly slant to proceedings, while ‘Disembodied Journey (Parts 1, 2 and 3)’ is a sublime, slowly unfurling journey in three movements – all Tangerine Dream style synthesizer motifs, Pat Metheny-esque guitars and jazz-fusion instrumentation.

So the album continues, with the poignant warmth and looped motifs of ‘Still Existing’ and the sparse, dubbed-out minimalism of ‘Do You Know How To Get Out?’ – a kind of 21st century jazz-fusionist’s take on sparse electronic hypnotism – giving wat to closing cut ‘Into The Waves’, a gentle combination of undulating electronic arpeggios and echoing instrumentation that offers a hopeful and undeniably picturesque conclusion.

Fittingly, the album cover features a painting by the late Dutch artist Franz Deckwitz (1934-94), whose images of alien landscapes were used by Phillips on a series of music concrete compilations. The image featured on the cover of ‘Dystopia’, depicting a deep blue ocean and shoreline, was painted by Deckwitz in Amsterdam in the late 1970s and inspired by a trip to the island of Ponza, Italy.

Matt Anniss More

Multi-instrumentalist Lars Bartkuhn returns to Rush Hour following the brilliant ‘Transcend’ 12'' and the two exquisite ‘Needs: Not Wants’ compilations with two brand new cuts. ‘Melancholia’ is a mesmerizingly deep and dubbed-out workout with climbing basslines, distant vocal chants and jazzy percussion. Flip side ‘Icarus Ascending’ is a thick disco-bass invested house floor burner crafed to uplift all spirits to higher levels More

Needs member Lars Bartkuhn digs into his extensive archives for this one..

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With a name like "Elysium", you'd expect this EP from experienced producer Lars Bartkuhn to be blissfully melodious, unashamedly positive and musically expansive. It is, of course, with the original version of the title track expertly joining the dots between humid deep house, head-in-the-clouds jazz and the sun-soaked waviness of the Italian dream house movement. Bartkuhn makes great use of live instrumentation - horns, woodwind instruments and pianos, in particular - which are smothered in tropical field recordings and work in unison with a jaunty house groove. On the flipside you'll find two alternative takes: the effortlessly saucer-eyed, slowly building "Inner Experience" version, and the looser, more live sounding Paradise Dub, where the producer trades saxophone and synthesizer solos. Both are, naturally, superb. More

We are extremely excited about this new release, wich sets the return of Lars Bartkuhn to dance oriented projects. The Needs label founder and author of some many classics like ‘Worlds’, ‘Walking Through Circles’ under his Passion Dance Orchestra or masterpieces like ‘Midnight Ceremony’ with his brother Marek as Bobjazz, joins Neroli with a lush and joyful EP aptly titled ‘Music for the Golden Age’. Lars here offers the musical and deeply evocative journey ‘Golden Age’ in two versions that have great long building qualities and the subtle groovy ‘Daybreak Contemplation’. Lars is equally experienced in the production/programming field as in being a bandleader and composer. The exquisite trademark balance between the organic and more driving electronic elements is evident throughout the whole EP and delivers a breathtaking and delicate musical insight into Lars’ artistically unique language. A perfect addition to Neroli’s catalogue. More

Utopia Records uncovers the work of Alex Kassian the Kyoto born Berlin based producer and DJ whose work as Opal Sunn and Al Kassian has been turning heads and shifting feet in recent times.
Over the last decade Kassian hosted word of mouth dances in London and Berlin where he gained a reputation as one of Europe's most promising artists.
Kassian's recent output has been primarily composing scores for contemporary dance and theatre in Berlin, an approach he brings here to this 6 track EP 'Hidden Tropics'.
Kassian inspired by other Utopia Records artists such as Lars Bartkuhn and Vangelis Katsoulis delves deeper into his compositional scope for a sound that joins the dots between ambient, world music to spiritual house in parts inspired by his homeland of Japan as heard on 'Bells of Ukyo' and the 80's Sakamoto-esque 'Olson Waters'.
The title track is a breakthrough in contemporary house music, sure to be picked up on by the tastemakers from New York to Johannesburg to Berlin to Amsterdam to Tokyo and beyond.
Cover image of 'Tsuwaono Sagimai' by Makoto Furukawa, Shimane, Japan. More

Earth Patterns is a new journey into sound by London based Australian born musician Ben Davidson, best known for his disco tinged house singles as Ben Sun, that were championed by the likes of Gerd Janson and Larry Heard. The Earth Patterns concept presents a more expanded instrumental sound with live rhythm sequencing and synth work, sitting alongside Vangelis Katsoulis, Lars Bartkuhn and Soichi Terada on Alex Bradley's Utopia Records. Davidson joins the dots between Detroit by way of Tokyo techno on 'Sunflower' to Dream II Science deepness on 'Horus Rising' and some worldly organic rhythms for a modernist and dare we say it Utopian sound on 'After The Rain'.
The analogue sound from his London studio comes through on the gentle and harmonic B-side opener 'Transit Pan', perhaps the start of a journey beyond the dance floor for the producer. Artwork and liner notes by Davidson himself, all pressed by bespoke pressing plant The Vinyl Factory on heavyweight vinyl. More

The Avant Garde movement largely influenced Katsoulis’ early compositions. After which, he turned to minimalism, applying elements of jazz and rock into that genre. Since the 80s, the use of technology became gradually apparent in his compositions, whist not diminishing the importance of the human factor and the creative involvement of the performer. Today, he is striving for simplicity, trying to express the most, using the least, providing the context for this release. From the subtle ambience of title track “If Not Now When”, to the intense and confronting sound on “All The Blue Skies”, Katsoulis and his accompanying musicians deliver a diverse and contemporary work with a level of sophistication that will challenge the current electronic musical landscape. The purity of sound in stand out track ‘Tore’ is juxtaposed by the dark and gritty “Grand Delusions”, a remarkably modern composition which sounds like it has been composed for a Berlin Techno club, from a man we suspect has never been to one. ‘Slipping Beauties’, the most revered of Katsoulis’ back catalogue (recently remixed by Young Marco) is given an organic and intelligent reinterpretation for 2016. The haunting and provocative vocal performance by Anna Linardou on ‘Zarrin’ leads the record down an even more emotive and provocative path. More

The Avant Garde movement largely influenced Katsoulis’ early compositions. After which, he turned to minimalism, applying elements of jazz and rock into that genre. Since the 80s, the use of technology became gradually apparent in his compositions, whist not diminishing the importance of the human factor and the creative involvement of the performer. Today, he is striving for simplicity, trying to express the most, using the least, providing the context for this release. From the subtle ambience of title track “If Not Now When”, to the intense and confronting sound on “All The Blue Skies”, Katsoulis and his accompanying musicians deliver a diverse and contemporary work with a level of sophistication that will challenge the current electronic musical landscape. The purity of sound in stand out track ‘Tore’ is juxtaposed by the dark and gritty “Grand Delusions”, a remarkably modern composition which sounds like it has been composed for a Berlin Techno club, from a man we suspect has never been to one. ‘Slipping Beauties’, the most revered of Katsoulis’ back catalogue (recently remixed by Young Marco) is given an organic and intelligent reinterpretation for 2016. The haunting and provocative vocal performance by Anna Linardou on ‘Zarrin’ leads the record down an even more emotive and provocative path. More