Utility Fog

Sunday, 14th of May, 2017

Bit of… rock! A bit of minimal glitch and worldtronica and other stuff you’ve come to expect from the ‘Fog!

LISTEN AGAIN to the post-world electronics, post-r’n’b industrial grime, experimental rock, minimal weirdcore and the rest… You can stream on demand because FBi’s cool like that, or find the podcast here.

Maybe it’s weird to be playing classic rock on this show… but Midnight Oil really were such a groundbreaking group, and so truly experimental in their early ’80s period, that the massive new boxsets arriving on my doorstep this Friday were all the excuse I needed to visit a few brilliant blasts from the past. Not only did they bring environmentalism, reconciliation & Indigenous rights and so much more into Oz rock, they were so great at using the studio as an instrument… Crazily layered mixes, tracks switching from ring-mod guitar to acoustic bass and piano, oppressive atmospheres and sampled vocals. So good.

Aussie indie outsider Benjow has been releasing home recorded oddities and incredible archival tapes on Bandcamp as haddocks’ eyes for a few years now. A little while ago he released a bunch of stunning, restrained songs featuring helium-pitched vocals, and he has this week re-released them with his original untreated vocals. They’re just as gorgeous.

For almost ten years, Félicia Atkinson has been honing her craft now, starting with some lovely folktronic offerings and collaborations with some other very fine ambient and experimental artists. Her new solo album comes out from her own Shelter Press, and sets her whispered and muttered poetry against spooky minimal electronics and sound design. Highly accomplished stuff.

Another French artist, Sarah Foulquiere aka Fawkes has worked with innovative footwork producer Jlin recently, but steps out on her own with an amazing debut on Halcyon Veil with strident vocals, effects galore, and industrial grime/techno/bass beats. It’s an intense trip.

Tony Boggs used to go by the name Joshua Treble, and unreleased some excellent idm and techno under the alias as well as being part of the brilliant désormais with Mitchell Akiyama, who ran the beloved indietronic label intr_version for many years out of Montreal. Boggs is now running experimental label Kikimora Tapes in Toronto, and it’s so great to have these grainy, glitchy sounds back.

It is extremely good to have Digital Hardcore veteran, breakcore/dark ambient producer Christoph de Babalon back in action, releasing piles of archival material and simultaneously also equally fine, equally explosive and dark new productions. His new EP Grim Zenith finds him back on V I S, the label run by Nina Trifft of Hamburg nightclub the Golden Pudel.

Grey Filastine has been making his “postworld” political dancefloor music for over a decade now it seems – the brilliant burn it and Dirty Bomb came out in 2006 and 2009 respectively, brought to Australia by the like-minded Über Lingua collective, so Filastine has a long-running connection to this country. Those two albums were very much focused on the politics and music of the Middle East, and featured collaborations with the vocalist Jessika Kenney. Since then Filastine has worked closely with the brilliant Indonesian singer & musician Nova, and it’s great to hear the new album credited to both equally. Her songwriting is beautiful and brings out the best in Filastine’s inventive bass-influenced production. Also notable is the strong presence of avant-garde cellist Brent Arnold.

Andrejs Eigus brings us our last sounds tonight, acoustic instruments (including the beautiful warm double bass!) mixed with electronics. He calls himself Selffish and the album comes courtesy of the well-curated Welsh label Serein. Lovely clicky electronica, minimal jazz-inflected chords, enveloping late-night goodness.

Midnight Oil – Scream In Blue [Sony Music]
Midnight Oil – Power And The Passion (Extended Remix) (excerpt) [Sony Music]
Midnight Oil – Harrisburg [Sony Music]
Midnight Oil – Bells And Horns In The Back Of Beyond (excerpt) [Sony Music]
Midnight Oil – Doghead [Sony Music]
haddocks’ eyes – boat [haddocks’ eyes Bandcamp]
Félicia Atkinson – Hier le désert [Shelter Press]
Félicia Atkinson – Monstera Deliciosa [Shelter Press]
Fawkes – La Ghoula [Halcyon Veil]
Fawkes – Blatant Snake [Halcyon Veil]
Unfollow – I&I Fluid Co. [Kikimora Tapes]
Unfollow – Kate Kush [Kikimora Tapes]
Unfollow – LinkedIn [Kikimora Tapes]
Christoph de Babalon – Pure Dirge [V I S]
Christoph de Babalon – Luxury of Sadness [V I S]
Filastine & Nova – Miner [Postworld Industries]
Filastine – autology (feat. Jessika Skeletalia Kenney) [Soot Records]
Filastine – fitnah (feat. Jessika Skeletalia Kenney) [Soot Records/Über Lingua]
Filastine – gendjer (feat. Nova) [Postworld Industries]
Filastine & Nova – Perbatasan [Postworld Industries]
Selffish – I Came To Leave [Serein]
Selffish – As The Leaves Fall [Serein]

Listen again — ~199MB

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