Utility Fog

Experimental music, including narration with electronics, underground hip-hop, post-acid techno, deconstructed club music, classic glitch, tape manipulation, drone-folk and more.
Yes, those are all real genres.

LISTEN AGAIN to the sounds of this world and… others? Stream on demand @FBi or podcast here.

Ayala and Zac Picker – cardamom – cinnamon – cloves [Ayala Bandcamp]
Ayala and Zac Picker – wet cat – old bark – deep breaths [Ayala Bandcamp]
Based on a story by Zac Picker called “Bessamim” published in Soft Stir Vol 2, this stunning work combines Zac’s spoken word with music and sound design from Ayala aka Donny Janks. Picker is in fact a physicist, but his talent for that very mathematical of sciences is balanced by a talent for very evocative prose, generating nostalgia via all the senses in a story about being (almost) 13, training for bar mitzvah. Picker’s lush, wry storytelling is carried here by the sensitive setting by Ayala, allowing the spoken prose to float in a bed of electronic tones, occasionally subtly processing the vocals. I left out the core section of the story here deliberately – I can’t recommend enough that you listen to the whole thing from start to finish.

Daniel Rossen – Unpeopled Space [Warp/Bandcamp]
Daniel Rossen – The Last One [Warp/Bandcamp]
What a joy to have a new album from Daniel Rossen, who once sang about going to Yeshiva (Jewish scriptural school) (sortof). That first band, Department of Eagles, was an early discovery of Utility Fog which, like Tunng and indeed Grizzly Bear (who Rossen would shortly join) would define some of the show’s obsessions: adventurous anything-goes arrangements backed by brilliant songwriting & musicianship. Rossen is a singular talent when it comes to hearstring-pulling melodies with unexpected harmonic progressions, with a voice to match, as well as a characteristic ringing guitar style. That’s all present and correct on You Belong Here, his first solo album proper. As a whole, the one full listen I’ve given it so far hasn’t quite brought the transcendence of some of his earlier works, but it’s unquestionably beautiful.

billy woods – Wharves [Backwoodz Studioz/Bandcamp]
billy woods – Sauvage (ft. Boldy James & Gabe Nandez) [Backwoodz Studioz/Bandcamp]
billy woods – Haarlem (ft. Fatboi Sharif) [Backwoodz Studioz/Bandcamp]
It feels like billy woods albums come thick & fast, but that’s just because we had Armand Hammer‘s album with The Alchemist last year, and woods’ album with Moor Mother in 2020. So, woods is back in 2022 with Aethiopes, another single-producer album, this time working with Preservation. It’s almost as good as woods’ album with Kenny Segal (one of the best albums full stop of the last 5+ years), and it’s notable that there’s a continuity of sound with all woods’ work, regardless of who’s behind the keyboard, knobs and faders. The movie samples are there, the tone is grimy, the beats stumble off into free jazz at times (love the piano chaos in “Haarlem”!) and the lyrics concern themselves with the horrors of the world today. Nobody carries this off better than woods and his ‘woodz cohorts.

700 Bliss – Candace Parker feat. Muqata’a [Hyperdub/Bandcamp]
Here’s the second single from the aforementioned Moor Mother‘s project with DJ Haram, 700 Bliss. Proving this will be a hell of an album, their tribute to the bisexual, black basketball player Candace Parker is incendiary, aided with glitched breaks from the great Palestinian producer Muqata’a.

HUMANOID – sT8818r Yage remix [FSOL Digital/Bandcamp]
HUMANOID – sT8818r Acreationator remix [FSOL Digital/Bandcamp]
Way back in 1988, one half of the duo who would become ambient techno/idm legends The Future Sound of London created a masterpiece of acid techno that was dubbed Stakker Humanoid. Brian Dougans’ creation charted in the UK and really solidified the UK’s place in the realms of techno – and acid became central in the development of ’90s rave culture (a couple of years later FSOL’s Papua New Guinea made them forever synomymous with rave). In 2019, Dougans reworked Stakker as “sT8818r” for a DE:tuned compilation 12″, and since then a growing collection of remixes were commissioned, including ’90s acid-influenced idm heroes like Luke Vibert, Autechre and Plaid, Roel Funcken of Funckarma, techno/rave dons like Mike Dred and John Tejada and more. All these versions along with the original ’88 track have been collected on CD by FSOL now. I played a downtempo version from FSOL alias Yage (often referred to as their engineer, but always just Dougans and Cobain), and some break jugglin’ jungle tekno from young UK producer Acreationator.

ubu boi & r hunter – Lexiconfluence [Genot Centre]
r hunter – in retrospect (ft. ubu boi) [.jpeg Artefacts]
ubu boi & r hunter – Heedless [Genot Centre]
In 2020, Melbourne producer Asher Elazary aka r hunter released an excellent album called Dead Ambient on .jpeg Artefacts with two tracks featuring US producer & pianist ubu boi (a name that will generate chortles from anyone familiar with the work of Alfred Jarry). So it was great news when Prague’s Genot Centre announced A Symbol For Disguise – an entire album of duo work from the two artists. Here we have highly cromulent Genot Centre fare, the sounds of rave deconstructed into scintillating ambient, reconstructed into broken beats and shuddering subs, arranged symphonically and cinematically. It’s the strangeness of now, briefly pinned down like a cloud from an e-cigarette.

Whatever The Weather – 0°C [Ghostly International/Bandcamp]
Whatever The Weather – 17°C [Ghostly International/Bandcamp]
London’s Loraine James, rocketed to popularity through two albums on Hyperdub, inaugurates new project Whatever The Weather for Ghostly International. To these ears it’s musically a continuation of her previous work, mixing IDM-like beats with deep roots from jazz, ambient, classical and pop. Her electric piano brings soulful chords, and she continues to contribute gentle and sometimes processed vocals to her tracks. The weather theme sees each track described with a temperature in degrees centigrade, a metaphor that allows a certain abstraction without full-blown randomness. As always this is essential music for anyone into future-focused electronica.

Fennesz – traxdata [Editions Mego/Bandcamp]
Fennesz – Instrument 3 [Editions Mego/Bandcamp]
Fennesz – aus [Editions Mego/Bandcamp]
2022 marks 25 years since the original release on Mego of Christian Fennesz‘ groundbreaking Hotel Paral.lel. The digital micro-edits, glitches, smeared drones and resampled guitars blew my mind when I heard them at the time, and to this day it’s my favourite of his albums. The original CD release came in the classic oversized card sleeves of the early Mego days, and in 2007 it was remastered & reissued in standard digipak form. This year it sees a lush vinyl edition with enough space on the double LP to fit the 1995 Instrument EP (already digitally re-released on the Field Recordings 1995-2002 CD by Touch). This is the original deconstructed club music – glitches and crunches, throbbing subs, giddy beats. It’s all wonderful. The closing track from the album, “aus”, is a piece of crystalline beauty, with stop-start beats and guitar thrums split into shards like the diagonally-abstracted album artwork. The reissue is released in a little under 2 weeks.

Clara Engel – Golden Egg [Clara Engel Bandcamp]
Clara Engel – Murmuration [Clara Engel Bandcamp]
I first heard Clara Engel‘s voice on the title track of fellow Torontonian Aidan Baker‘s gorgeous Already Drowning album almost 10 years ago. Their name stuck with me, and it was great to rediscover them with their new album Their Invisible Hands. Elusive lyrics adorn the songs, scattered through, while other pieces are instrumental. Seemingly repetitive phrases on effected guitar slow evolve, tugged along by delays, with sighing melodies emerging from shruti box or chromonica. Like their contribution to that Aidan Baker album, the central songs here creep up on you and grab your heart when you don’t expect it.

Ben Vida + Lea Bertucci – Murmurations [Cibachrome Editions]
Ben Vida + Lea Bertucci – Static Pressure [Cibachrome Editions]
Following her extraordinary collaboration with Robbie Lee a couple of months ago, here’s a second duo from Lea Bertucci, this time with veteran US experimental musician Ben Vida (who released three beautiful albums as Bird Show on Kranky some years ago). Here Bertucci brings her wind instruments to the studio – sax, clarinet, flute – as well as the tape manipulation that made her Robbie Lee collaboration so special, and both her voice and Vida’s are divorced of meaning in cut-ups alongside the acoustic textures and the rumbles and gurgles of Vida’s synths. Compellingly off-beat stuff.

Lawrence English – Viento / Patagonia (Excerpt) [Room40/Bandcamp]
I always claim to not be into field recordings per se, but the two people to consistently prove me wrong are Kate Carr and Lawrence English. Here Lawrence revisits recordings he made in 2010 on a visit to Patagonia and Antarctica, with two stunningly dense and dramatic blizzard recordings. Both could easily be musicianly-created noise performances, and are absolutely visceral in force. Originally released on LP, they’re now available digitally and in a special CD+book edition from Room40.

Bill Seaman & Stephen Spera – Progressions [Handstitched*]
Bill Seaman & Stephen Spera – Voix De Lumiere [Handstitched*]
Out soon on Handstitched* is a sumptuous album from two sound-artists. Bill Seaman‘s career covers 3 decades, and in the ’90s he was active in Australia before returning to the USA. He’s joined by upstate New Yorker Stephen Spera for Architectures of Light, arranged from field recordings and Seaman’s signature “non-location recordings” along with piano, synths, tape deck and other devices, and various credited and uncredited vocals floating in and out of the mixes. It’s hard to describe this otherworldly music, out of time and genre. Sample tracks are out now, and you can – and should – experience the whole album on April 22nd.

Listen again — ~206MB

Internationalism, intersectionalism, experimental electronics, contemporary classical…

Listen again, for chrissakes! Stream on demand from FBi, podcast here.

Jessica O’Donoghue – Rise Up [Art As Catharsis/Bandcamp]
Starting tonight with the first single from a new album from Sydney-based singer Jessica O’Donoghue, released on the wide-ranging Art As Catharsis. Working with Alyx Dennison and David Trumpmanis, O’Donoghue adapts a traditional Greek song, “Dance of Zalongo”, which describes the mass suicide of Greek women and children in Souli after the invasion of the Ottoman army, into a powerful song about women’s resilience, with electronics and percussion along with the harmonised folk choir vocals. Can’t wait to hear the rest of the album…

Julmud جُلْمود – Saree’ el thawaban سريع الذوبان [Bilna’es/Bandcamp]
Julmud جُلْمود – Falnukmel فلنكمل [Bilna’es/Bandcamp]
Julmud جُلْمود – Juwway جوّاي [Bilna’es/Bandcamp]
From Ramallah, Palestine comes an album from hip-hop producer, rapper and percussionist Julmud جُلْمود. The Bilna’es label is co-run by Muqata’a, and some of his glitchy tendencies and love of breakbeats can be heard here – and of course the theme of oppression, unavoidable when living in the occupied territories. Here Julmud crafts varied tracks from chopped & screwed Arabic samples, drum breaks, percussion and more. Don’t let this slip through the cracks!

Slikback – PROXY [Slikback Bandcamp]
Another Bandcamp release from Kenyan producer Slikback, with more hard-hitting experimental club sounds. He’s a talented producer and is always pushing his boundaries.

Pugilist & Tamen – Resolute [Pugilist Bandcamp]
Lots of Bandcamp Friday releases tonight. Here, Melbourne bass producer Pugilist has put up two recent collaborative tracks, and this one with fellow Melburnian Tamen is a brilliant bit of bass & breaks, a slower version of the rhythmic mastery found in the jungle tracks they’ve made together for Repertoire and Tempo.

Brainwaltzera – tracing Rays [reality glo] [FILM]
Brainwaltzera – mixolydian transition 18 [FILM]
Brainwaltzera – ad interim [FILM]
Five years after his debut album on FILM, Poly-ana, enigmatic European IDM producer Brainwaltzera returns to the album format with ITSAME. It’s more highly nostalgic IDM, heavily influenced by the mid-to-late ’90s originals from Aphex Twin, Boards of Canada, µ-Ziq, Plaid and the like. But for any lack of originality, it’s never less than very well done, with pretty melodies and ever-shifting beats – not complaining!

µ-Ziq – Giddy All Over [Planet µ/Bandcamp]
But here’s one of the originals! Mike Paradinas is gearing up for the 25th anniversary of one of his most beloved µ-Ziq albums, Lunatic Harness, released before Planet µ was an independent label, but in 2022 receiving the deluxe treatment on the label. In the meantime, Mike was inspired to return to the jungle/’ardcore inspirations of ’97, and there will be an EP, a full album, and a second EP by the end of the year. Out now is the first EP, Goodbye, with joyful jungle breaks and splattered pop samples, along with “Darkside” and “Jungle Tekno” remixes of one track.

Morwell – Falling [Morwell Bandcamp]
Here’s a new producer mining the shining seams of UK hardcore and jungle. Morwell knows the history of soundsystems and rave and happily mashes it up with contemporary musical strains as well as pop tendencies. Of late he’s been creating edits and sneaky remixes, following an excellent debut album last year, but next week he drops the Strange Heart EP with four new originals. We heard “Falling”, with disembodied pop samples and a jungle tekno framework.

Harmony – Deep Breath [Over/Shadow/Bandcamp]
Subjects – Goblin [Deep Jungle]
Producing jungle tracks since the mid-’90s as (DJ) Harmony, Lee Bogush also heads up the excellent Deep Jungle label, which for 5 years now has been releasing top-notch 12″s from original jungle producers’ DAT archives, as well as new releases from new jungle artists. The latest Harmony 12″, though, is a two-tracker released by Over/Shadow, the label setup by two of the people involved in the legendary Moving Shadow label. Bogush’s own productions are regular highlights on the Deep Jungle release schedule, and this 12″ keeps the quality high; but Deep Jungle isn’t resting, and the mysterious Subjects keep up the quality too with their 6th 12″ for the label. Also recommended is the Orca 12″ with two circa-’93 jungle monsters from the duo of Kristian Townsend and Kosheen‘s Darren Beele.

Mick Harris – P section [Mick Harris Bandcamp]
Mick Harris – Gillis [pond version] [Mick Harris Bandcamp]
We’ve been following the HedNod Sessions from Scorn‘s Mick Harris for a while now, and he’s just reached HedNod Twelve, which gets to be a bit longer than the previous ones on his Bandcamp. It’s the usual fare from Harris – massive bass, head-nodding beats, here more on a hip-hop tip rather than the ponderous dubstep-adjacent beats that Scorn’s been known for for nearly 3 decades. Always a pleasure.

Gantz – Doomleg [Gantz Bandcamp]
And speaking of dubstep, Turkey’s Gantz has slid sideways from the genre, extending to mutant trip-hop and sub-aquatic electronics. For Bandcamp Friday, his ruff 2 collects four older 140bpm tracks – two instrumentals of older tunes and two others, great as always.

Julian Sartorius & Matthew Herbert – Four Twenty [Accidental Records/Bandcamp]
Drum Solo inaugurates a new series from Matthew Herbert‘s Accidental Records of albums recorded in a day. Here Herbert’s electronic treatments are applied, live, to the playing of Swiss drummer Julian Sartorius. Complex rhythmic formations are disintegrated and remade in realtime. Basslines appear, harmonic textures bubble up, and while it’s certainly anything but “Drum Solo”, the percussion is nevertheless the core of the music. I’ve been loving it.

Kane Ikin – New Forms [Room40/Bandcamp]
Lisa Lerkenfeldt – Notebook Of Interiors [Room40/Bandcamp]
Out this week is a new compilation from Room40 curated by photographer and musician Traianos Pakioufakis, originally from Perth and now resident in Sydney. Pakioufakis was asked to commission musical works for Musical Chair, a project by Pattern Studio for Melbourne Design Week in 2022. The concept is that the music would be played on a special chair fitted with Bluetooth speakers, as a kind of tribute to performances lost through Covid lockdowns. The music appears on Pattern Language, featuring Shoeb Ahmad, Lisa Lerkenfeldt, Chris Abrahams, Lawrence English, Jonnine, Kane Ikin and Ai Yamamoto, each of whom bring their unique musical styles to the table (or *ahem* chair). Tonight we heard the organic-feeling electronics of Kane Ikin (himself a Perth transplant, now in Melbourne) and the droned-out vocals and piano of Melbourne’s Lisa Lerkenfeldt.

Plastikman & Chilly Gonzales – Contain (In Key) [Turbo Recordings/Bandcamp]
Plastikman & Chilly Gonzales – Converge (In Key) [Turbo Recordings/Bandcamp]
Minimal techno purists may be perturbed by this. Some two-and-a-half decades on from Plastikman‘s classic of minimal techno Consumed‘s release in 1998, Tiga and Chilly Gonzales conceived of this reimagining: Consumed In Key. Chilly Gonzales plays his European chamber piano over and under the original tracks, transforming them into something new. Gonzales is a sensitive interpreter and clearly loves the source material. As I am anything but a minimal techno purist, I’ve found these delightful listening – just don’t expect the austere originals.

Field Works – Station 10 Review – Alva Noto Remodel [Temporary Residence/Bandcamp]
Field Works, Stuart Hyatt, Hanna Benn, Janie Cowan, Masayoshi Fujita, Qasim Naqvi, Pick a Piper – Station 7 [Temporary Residence/Bandcamp]
Field Works – Station 9 Review – Penelope Trappes Remix [Temporary Residence/Bandcamp]
For his 10th volume of Field Works releases for Temporary Residence (the first 6 were a 6LP set), Stuart Hyatt worked with the geoscientists of the EarthScope project to harness the sounds of the planet itself as source material for his ever-changing musical collaborators to jam along to. It’s hard to identify the seismic and volcanic sounds here, but the musicians bring peace and ecstatic joy to the proceedings, with vocal harmonies, upright bass, drums, vibraphone and electronics. The deluxe vinyl and digital editions also come with a suite of remixes of each of the “Stations“, ranging from 4/4 techno to drone, to the glitchy electronica of Alva Noto, and the gorgeous sparse piano, vocals and reverb from ex-pat Aussie Penelope Trappes.

BARNETT & COLOCCIA – Bristlecone [SIGE Records/Bandcamp]
Sparse piano and vocals are also found in this beautiful closer from Faith Coloccia and Alex Barnett, whose latest Barnett & Coloccia album Third Wilderness came out digitally last year, and is finally available on vinyl. The duo have been working together for a decade or so, drawing equally from the industrial noise of Barnett’s projects such as Oakeater and the gothic piano, ethereal vocals and sometime metal roots of Coloccia’s Mamiffer. On this last track, the industrial aspects are muted, leaving us with a sound that’s closest to Coloccia’s solo work as Mára.

Listen again — ~199MB

Very international experimental music tonight!
While preparing the text for this playlist, I was knocked about by the heartbreaking, unexpected news of Mira Calix‘s passing. She was in her early 50s, far too young. RIP Chantal.

LISTEN AGAIN via stream on demand @ FBi or podcast here.

Cheb Terro vs DJ Die Soon – ABTAL AL DIGITAL [Drowned By Locals]
Cheb Terro vs DJ Die Soon – PINE [Drowned By Locals]
In 2020, Daisuke Imamura (aka Berlin-based Japanese producer DJ Die Soon) was put in touch with Tunisian rapper, DJ, writer and more, Rayen Hermassi (Cheb Terro) by the Jordanian label Drowned By Locals. Tragically, just as this project was finished, Cheb Terro passed away. So this will be the only missive from the Underplanet, as Terro described it – an expression of Tunisia’s younger generation’s feelings of sadness and rebellion. Imamura provides bass heavy grooves, noisy and distorted, over which Terro raps in various languages (including scraps of English). It’s sinister and yet moving, and the instrumental “OUTROO” is a beautiful tribute to a creative life that ended too soon.

Maral – Lorestan Reggaeton (عشق edit) [Shaytoon Records]
Saint Abdullah – Lustre Ware [Shaytoon Records]
Shaytoon Records boss Sepehr released an excellent album of drum’n’bass & rave last year, and ended the year with a great release from Aria Rostami. Both Sepehr and Rostami are Iranian ex-pats living in New York, and Shaytoon’s latest release is the latest compilation to showcase the highly abundant Iranian electronic scene, both in & out of the country. LA-based Maral continues her penchant for combining bass-heavy beats with punk influences and Farsi vocals, while New York-based Iranian brothers Saint Abdullah sample Arabic voices over a loping hip-hop beat.

Azu Tiwaline & Al Wootton – Blue Dub [Livity Sound/Bandcamp]
Based now in France, Azu Tiwaline originally hails from the desert of Tunisia, and released an incredible album of percussive dub techno in 2020 as well as an EP on Bristol’s Livity Sound. Now she returns to Livity Sound, in collaboration with Londoner Al Wootton (fka Deadboy), presenting four different tracks all informed by UK bass and techno styles as well as North African percussion. The infectious dub techno of “Blue Dub” is a highlight.

Rookley – Warriors [Aimend/Bandcamp]
Berlin-based Rookley is originally from southern Europe, and lived for some time in Brooklyn, but his music sports the influences of UK club music and the commingling of UK and German influences in the Berlin scene. These influences are all over Playground, his new release, with the pitched down vocal chops on “Warriors” eventually building into a rumbling techno shuffle.

Herman – Sol [Fine Grains Records]
Released on Dutch label Fine Grains Records, the second EP from Surry-based Herman is also concerned with UK bass styles, broken beats sometimes veering towards drum’n’bass (and backed by a great drum’n’bass remix from Holloway). The disembodied vocal snaps are very much in keeping with the previous sounds from Rookley.

Bacchus Harsh – Untitled [New Weird Australia/Bandcamp]
Megadead – Stay [New Weird Australia/Bandcamp]
A couple of weeks ago I featured a few tracks from New Weird Australia‘s latest superlative compilation of experimental Australian music, Collapse Theories. Here’s a couple more. Christian Bishop is Bacchus Harsh, his latest identity after some years making breakcore and noise as Xian, and this untitled track is not unlike the dubstep, breakcore and classical-inspired heaviness of last year’s Caveat Tumultum, released by Heavy Machinery. Benjamin Shaw is Megadead, in this case dubby electronics, a sidestep from the indie/folk stuff he’s made under his own name.

Shelley Parker – Glisten [Hypercolour]
UK musician Shelley Parker is very versatile, at home with releases on dance labels like Hessle Audio and experimental labels like Entr’acte. Her new album for Hypercolour is Wisteria, combining urban industrial sampling and ravey breakbeats to very original effect.

Gooooose – Selector [SVBKVLT]
33EMYBW – Microcosmic [SVBKVLT]
Husband and wife Gooooose and 33EMYBW used to be part of legendary underground Shanghai experimental group Duck Fight Goose. They appeared at Soft Centre in Sydney’s west a few years ago, and are often featured together, so it’s no surprise that together they soundtracked an exhibition by UK video artist Weirdcore in Shanghai late in 2020. The split album Trans-Aeon Express that they’ve just released through Shanghai’s SVBKVLT is an extension of that work, with art provided by Weirdcore. It’s rhythmic work, and the pair’s individual tendencies are clear, ranging from Gooooose’s repurposed breakbeat, 33EMYBW’s electro-techno, and beatless synth patterns. Trippy indeed.

vigliensoni – Breccia [Chez Kito Kat/Bandcamp]
vigliensoni – Ooze [Chez Kito Kat/Bandcamp]
Montréal’s vigliensoni is a veteran of postpunk bands and has studied music technology and been immersed in house and techno. His interest in machine learning has led him to his new project, Clastic Music, an epic, evolving album that treats music like “clastic” rock formations, which are made up of fragments of rocks from earlier ages. So the tracks on this album sputter and tumble with generative rhythms created from templates of earlier techno, like dancing on an alien moon. It’s the best kind of strange, rewiring the brain.

Alessandro Chemie – Hybridization [Elli Records/Bandcamp]
Alessandro Chemie – The Schrödinger Equation [Elli Records/Bandcamp]
The latest release from the excellent Elli Records finds Milan musician Alessandro Chemie exploring quantum mechanics through modular synthesis. Uncertainty derives its sounds from random generative processes which are then looped and constructed into the final tracks. Surges and crackles produce music that’s like techno almost entirely stripped of rhythm. Compelling stuff.

The Leaf Library + Teruyuki Kurihara – Artefact [Mille Plateaux/Bandcamp]
The Leaf Library + Teruyuki Kurihara – Kite Beach [Mille Plateaux/Bandcamp]
Here’s a surprising thing – London dronepop/spacerockers The Leaf Library on Mille Plateaux(!), courtesy of a hook-up with Japanese producer Teruyuki Kurihara, whose bleak, minimalist Frozen Dust was released by the label two years ago. The Leaf Library sent Kurihara a selection of minimal synth drones, from which Kurihara constructed these spare, minimalist pieces – some motorik beats, some windswept ambient.

Pedro Alves Sousa – Má Estrela [Shhpuma/Bandcamp]
Portugal has a thriving free jazz & experimental scene, with a lot centred around Clean Feed Records. But Clean Feed also have a sister label called Shhpuma, which goes beyond Clean Feed’s jazz creativity into experimental music of all stripes. Pedro Alves Sousa and his collaborators on his new record Má Estrela (Bad Star) have free jazz cred, but use it here to construct very strange dub-electronics, with mangled samples and unbalanced beats and live basslines rubbing up against treated saxophone. Definitely unhinged, definitely great.

Too Tall To Sing – Flin van Hemmen & Jozef Dumoulin – Sweetheart Position [Shhpuma/Bandcamp]
Too Tall To Sing – Flin van Hemmen & Jozef Dumoulin – Little Bird of Bad Omen (Ty-Yt) [Shhpuma/Bandcamp]
Also recently released on Shhpuma is the debut release from duo Too Tall To Sing. Flin van Hemmen & Jozef Dumoulin played acoustic jazz together years ago, but now, separated by the ocean, they’ve created a beautifully subtle collection of electro-acoustic pieces, melding piano and voice with samples and scattered drum machines. It’s quite otherworldly and bewitching.

Isik Kural – pillow of a thought [RVNG Intl/Bandcamp]
Isik Kural – lo si aspetta [RVNG/Bandcamp]
Istanbul-born Isik Kural studied in the US and now lives in Glasgow, working in sound design. His in february echoes the folktronica of the early ’00s with a sophisticated palette, with beautiful chopped up acoustic guitar and piano floating and fluttering, and occasional vocal contributions from Stephanie Roxanne Ward. It’s impressionist, beguiling music.

Rachika Nayar – The Mechanics of Escape [Headphone Commute/Bandcamp]
Rachika Nayar – New Strands [NNA Tapes/Bandcamp]
Last week I featured a couple of tracks from Headphone Commute‘s For Ukraine, Vol 1. But I was sad to run out of time to play the beautiful contribution from New York-based guitarist Rachika Nayar. Like the music on last year’s NNA Tapes album Our Hands Against The Dusk, it features glitchily granulated sounds, not just of her guitar but also what sound like orchestral samples and more. I was very pleased to discover Nayar, and thence that album, via this compilation – although I’d heard a few other works via RVNG Intl previously (check her track with Nina Keith on the Salutations comp from last year).

Aidan Baker – A Condensed End of the World Drone Psych Blues [The Dark Outside/Bibliotapes/Bandcamp]
Christopher Scully-Thurston – Soundtrack Un·fixed Still Life of Dolly S. Dalí… a micro epic [The Dark Outside/Bibliotapes/Bandcamp]
Leo Cunningham – 4 Ukraine [The Dark Outside/Bibliotapes/Bandcamp]
We continue to explore compilations dedicated to the Ukrainian crisis, here with The Dark Outside and their novel-soundtracking Bibliotapes label – in fact, we heard Aidan Baker‘s soundtrack to a John Brunner novel just the other week. Baker appears along with 120(!) other artists, but this isn’t too huge a commitment as each track is exactly one minute long! Diary of a Madman draws its title from Gogol but its target is clearly Putin, and inside we find Baker, The Leaf Library, L/F/D/M and nobuka among others, with vignettes that range from drone rock to glitchy ambience and pulsating rhythms. Along with Baker’s noise outburst I played Christopher Scully-Thurston‘s “micro-epic” of scattered acoustic layers, and Leo Cunningham‘s peaceful ambience with scrabbling blurps.

Maria W Horn – Oinones Death pt. I [Hallow Ground/Bandcamp]
And finally tonight, a track taken from a compilation whose origins precede this conflict. Swiss label Hallow Ground tends to cover industrial darkness from rhythmic to drone, and for their compilation Ephiphanies invited musicians who’ve released on the label as well as like-minded people to explore “epiphanies through sound”. This resulted in a surprising number of organ pieces (not generally my favourite instrument) as well as power ambient and very subtle works, of which the contribution from Swedish artist Maria W Horn is a stunning highlight. The wheezy sighs of her piece are apparently not any kind of harmonium or accordion but rather a contrabass recorder with the sounds of pitched glass. It’s reminiscent of some of the sounds of FUJI||||||||||TA, whose own contribution here is beautiful but a little more abrasive. Also featured are a brief electro-acoustic percussion work from Valentina Magaletti, string & synth drones from Siavash Amini and pipe and synth drones from Lawrence English.

Listen again — ~201MB

African grime; drum’n’bass and experimental electronics from around the world; post-classical and ambient. Much music in support of Ukraine.

LISTEN AGAIN while the world burns… Stream on demand via FBi Radio, podcast here.

Ecko Bazz – Mmaso [Hakuna Kulala]
Ecko Bazz – Lwakyi? [Hakuna Kulala]
From Kampala, Uganda-based label Hakuna Kulala (sub-label of Nyege Nyege Tapes) comes a hard-hitting album of hard-hitting rap influenced by grime, hip-hop and dancehall from Ugandan local Ecko Bazz. Most of the beats are produced by Debmaster, known for his work with MC Yallah, and his fidgety, bass-heavy productions sit well with Ecko Bazz’s brilliant flow. You don’t have to understand Luganda to be drawn by the infectious energy here.

Slikback – TAKAYUKI [Slikback Bandcamp]
Nairobi, Kenya-based producer Slikback made one of the beats on the Echo Bazz album. This week he also dropped a single track on his Bandcamp, as is his wont, glitchy beats and glitchy sampled vocals.

Sylvere – Shellington [Monkeytown Records/Bandcamp]
Sylvere – Toys [Monkeytown Records/Bandcamp]
Now to France, with Paris-based producer Sylvere, whose second EP on Modeselektor’s Monkeytown Records just came out this week. Much like last year’s EP1, it’s bass-style sounds mostly for dancefloors, strongly influenced by soundsystem culture, dancehall in particular. On the new EP’s opening track “Toys”, jungle breaks are scattered through like icing sugar.

Source Direct – Diamonds [Tempo Records/Bandcamp]
New(?) music from jungle/drum’n’bass legends Source Direct, this is a b-side to the long-awaited vinyl release of Snake Style 2, a self-remix of a tune originally from 1995. Source Direct have a highly recognizable sound, directly descended from the groundbreaking drum programming and dark atmos of Photek’s productions from that era. It’s good to have some unreleased stuff available.

Fanu – Woodz n Moodz [Fanu Bandcamp]
Here’s a track from Finland’s great junglist Fanu, keeper of the drum’n’bass faith for some decades, maker of great DJ mix podcasts, production tutor and more. He’s accumulated a lot of knowledge over the years, but here he is in 1997-98, chopping breaks in Fasttracker 2. For some reason I’ve always found trackers confusing rather than intuitive, but Venetian Snares swore by them for ages, and I have friends who used them back in the day. The Old Tracker Stuff is a curio, but they’re good tunes regardless.

Aquarian – Dead Whale [Dekmantel/Bandcamp]
And now to some high-tech modern stuff, the new EP from the Berlin-based, Canadian-born Aquarian. His solo productions and tracks with Deapmash as AQXDM are bass-heavy techno and jungle, dancefloor-oriented IDM etc. All four tracks on this new EP from Dekmantel (does Mutations: I imply Mutations: II is on its way?) are ace, but this closer is completely insane, with a 13/8 beat (6+7), increasingly frenetic drum breaks and beautiful sub-bass drops.

µ-Ziq – Goodbye [Planet µ/Bandcamp]
2022 is going to be the year of µ-Ziq. Not that it’s the return of Mike Paradinas’ µ-Ziq productions – his Bandcamp has featured albums’ worth of unearthed ’90s tracks, new acid techno tunes, and there was a whole µ-Ziq album last year as well. But 2022 is 25th anniversary of Mike’s great Lunatic Harness album, a magnificent, beloved classic of drill’n’bass/IDM, which Planet µ will be re-releasing as a double CD and multi-vinyl thing with all the accompanying EP tracks from the era – and around this release will be two new EPs (one shortly, one at the end of the year) and a whole wonderful new album, all harkening back to the jungle, jungle tekno, IDM days of yore. The first single from the first EP, Goodbye, sets the stage with Mike’s talent for melody and mashed beats. Can’t wait!

Bogdan Raczynski – LADDE [Planet µ/Bandcamp]
Bogdan Raczynski – DLEDA [Planet µ/Bandcamp]
Polish-American Bogdan Raczynski gained notoriety for the three albums Rephlex released in 1999. Both primitive in production and advanced in programming, they were pretty damn odd – with Raczynski’s vocals recorded at times directly into the laptop mic. He’s remained a maverick, even when remixing Björk, and his beats have tended towards jungle & jungle tekno, so it’s notable that his new album ADDLE on Mike Paradinas’ Planet µ keeps things in a somewhat more placid place. The hecticness is more in the dense production than the beats, and the vocals are often a centrepiece, processed and smudged but soaring over the arrangements. Surprisingly beautiful.

Purelink – One for the Angels [Lillerne Tapes]
Purelink – Spirit & Sport [Lillerne Tapes]
The great Chicago label Lillerne Tapes brings us the debut album from Chicago trio Purelink – although it’s not their first release, with a brilliant pair of tracks available from last year on their Bandcamp, one of which is Basic Channel-style minimal dub techno, and the other LTJ Bukem-style ambient jungle. For their Lillerne Tapes release, it’s Puredub – dubby beats of a very ’90s nature, hinting at that Basic Channel fizz but mostly more on an ambient breakbeats tip, head-nodding and pure pleasure.

700 Bliss – Totally Spies feat. Lafawndah [Hyperdub/Bandcamp]
UK’s Hyperdub, always with the finger on the pulse, are releasing the debut full album from 700 Bliss, the collaboration between the incredibly prolific (and incredibly consistent) Moor Mother and DJ Haram. This stunning first single pairs Moor Mother’s rasp with the smudged, angelic tones of Lafawndah. Whatever the rest of the album brings, it’ll be abrasive, challenging and beautiful.

TEMO – 105 [Esc.rec/Bandcamp]
TRI – Gentle Push [Esc.rec/Bandcamp]
Before we get into Ukraine-related compilations, here’s the latest collection from Esc.rec of young Dutch electronic producers, Nieuwe Electronische Waar 16. Nearly 80 artists submitted tracks, from which 11 were selected, who benefit from a development program supported by venues, festivals and labels from the Eastern part of The Netherlands – and also get their winning tracks compiled on the NEW compilation for the year. There’s some great stuff in #16, including the drill’n’bassy leanings of both TEMO and TRI. These are free/PWYC downloads, recommended.

Laptop Kid – Dark and Light [Component Recordings]
Dafake – D.N.A. [Component Recordings
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has struck a nerve around the world, and of course the music community leapt into charity mode, with scores of big Bandcamp compilations coming out to raise money for various humanitarian organisations on the ground. We’ve already featured the massive drum’n’bass comp Together With Ukraine; well here’s one that’s even bigger. Ending at just shy of 200 tracks, For Peace. Against War. Who Is Not? was compiled by the people behind Component Recordings, a US label that I recall releasing IDM/breakcore-adjacent music in the late ’90s. It’s a truly ridiculous sized beast, but at USD $12 it’s not a difficult calculation, with artists like Scanner, Machinefabriek, Jack Dangers, Schneider TM and many others along with many new discoveries. It’s compiled to kind of meander through different genres, so there’s lots of industrial styles, a bit of breakcorey drum’n’bass, rhythmic noise, electro, dark ambient, and some nice IDM. Both tracks tonight are from French artists, Laptop Kid and Dafake, both of whom are influenced by drill’n’bass, but with great talents for sound-art and melody as well.

Machinefabriek – Texturalis 4 [Cassauna/Machinefabriek Bandcamp]
Machinefabriek – Texturalis 14 [Cassauna/Machinefabriek Bandcamp]
As mentioned, Machinefabriek turns up on that bit Component Recordings compilation, but he also released a little gem this week, via Important Records‘ cassette imprint Cassauna. Texturalis features 18 two-minute vignettes, each concerned with one particular sonic texture, many surprisingly rhythmic. Lovely.

Midori Hirano – Years Later [Headphone Commute Bandcamp]
Madeleine Cocolas – Emergence [Headphone Commute Bandcamp]
Mike Lazarev, the guy behind Headphone Commute, was born in Ukraine. Back in 2012, Headphone Commute curated a big compilation called …and darkness came, in support of the victims of Hurricane Sandy. This time it’s particularly personal for Lazarev, and there will be a series of compilations for Ukraine, the first curated by Hollie Kenniff. It’s mostly post-classical and ambient electronica, with a number of highlights including some typical noise-embedded piano from Midori Hirano, and a beautiful extended piece for piano & electronics by Brisbane’s Madeleine Cocolas.

Gregory Paul Mineeff – Exit [Cosmic Leaf]
Wollongong’s Gregory Paul Mineeff popped up a couple of years ago with a signature sound of neo-classical piano and ambient synths. The first single from his new album Incidental is out now, a touching piece for piano.

Listen again — ~209MB