This album by Rick Burke, the guitarist of Comacozer, is a psychedelic trip loaded with cool riffs and meditative synths that will take you out of the moment and drop you into some kind of spiritual temple that has Orange amps in it.
This album of French post-rock and psych is a stunning record that came to me almost out of nowhere and immediately caught my attention. The waves of it are both powerful and subtle.
#21: Doug Richards – Project 85 EP
This was a great return for a rave DJ from the 1990s who became a lawyer and then decided to get back into music after the COVID-19 pandemic and ended up dropping a stunning techno EP as a result.
Who makes the top twenty? Come back tomorrow to find out!
Roi Turbo is the new project of South African-born, London-based electronic duo of brothers Benjamin & Conor McCarthy. Today, they release a new single, “Bazooka,” via Maison Records. Born out of their shared love for dance music from around the world, the brothers infuse a hybrid of African and Western influences from the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s. Today’s new single, “Bazooka,” packs an explosive punch with its catchy synth and guitar leads. Inspired by ‘80s South African Bubblegum disco, its cheeky bass line and bouncy piano are sure to shake up the dance floor. “Bazooka” follows the previously released single “Dystopia.”
Roi Turbo was formed in their home city of Cape Town in 2020. Ben came from an electronic background as a producer and DJ, and became a mainstay in the club circuit in and around their hometown. Conor, meanwhile, came from a band background, playing in alt-rock and alt-pop outfits. The two had always wanted to start a dance project together, dating back to when they were in high school. During COVID lockdown, the chance presented itself. The brothers moved back in together and wrote music with no real agenda, just the two of them with time on their hands, having fun writing music that felt the most natural to them. “We were listening to ‘70s and ‘80s African disco and funk records at the time, and the contrast between the synths and raw live elements of these records really inspired us,” say Ben & Conor, who are also quick to note the likes of Larry Levan, William Onyeabor, Air and Pino D’Angiò as musical inspiration. “Over the years we bought as many synths, drums, guitars and microphones as we could get our hands on and would experiment for weeks on end until we got the sound we were going for. This combination of analog gear has now become a staple in the Roi Turbo sound.”
They continue: “We wanted to create a project that encompassed all our niche tastes in music, fashion, automobiles and design, free of any pretentiousness, just quality music that gets you moving!”
Roi Turbo will perform at Electric Forest in Rothbury, Michigan next June, with more live dates to come.
For A.M. Architect, everything is interactive. A concert by the electronic duo isn’t just a concert. It’s a multimedia installation, a visual show, an interactive technology demonstration, and more.
At a typical show, the duo, consisting of longtime friends and collaborators Diego Chavez and Daniel Stanush, perform while generative visuals react to the audio they’re creating. “We use a program called TouchDesigner, so it’s all in real time,” says Chavez, whose myriad roles include digital media artist, technologist, and producer. “We love not being the performer; not being the cool guys on stage who have this distant presence. Usually, shows are so serious. It’s just fun to see people at play.”
That technological curiosity, that bold desire to merge disciplines, animates A.M. Architect’s third and finest full-length album, Avenir, announced today for a February 7th, 2025 release date.
The album showcases the duo’s multifaceted approach to electronic production, with Stanush’s musical training and melodic sensibility guiding Chavez’s knack for soundscapes and sonic manipulation. The result is a rich tapestry of pulsating beats, grainy loops, cinematic sensibilities, and charged vocal samples that cull from sources as varied as old crime movies and obscure country singers.
Today, the duo share their title-track “Avenir,” accompanied by a music video. The track paints a lush electronic beat backdrop of exploration, with notable vocals from guest Delenda. Pre-order the upcoming album here, and check it out the video for the title track on YouTube.
On the track, Daniel Stanush shares:
“In creating the music video for Avenir, we were inspired by the lyrics written by our collaborator Delenda. We were interested in the relationships between different versions of ourselves: the person you used to be, as seen through your current self, or vice versa. Like when you remember the promises you made yourself when you were a kid, or the things you regret and wish you could erase, and then as you grow you have to reconcile your old and new self, and the past/present relationship that creates.
Graphically, we wanted to present a dissonance between our self-perspectives, and allow them to evolve and blend together, constantly growing and fracturing, feeding back and diffusing based on a responsive video network, so we shot some video with Delenda, the song’s vocalist, and then created an interactive network in Touch Designer that would respond to video inputs as well as allow us to control how the network would respond. We’re really looking forward to bringing this same setup to live events and allowing audiences to interact with the Avenir in fun ways.”
The two worked on the album remotely for about four years, trading files back and forth between Sacramento (where Stanush lives) and San Antonio (Chavez’s home base). Stanush developed melodic ideas on guitar, bass, and Rhodes piano, while Chavez manipulated the tracks in Ableton and incorporated a range of innovative techniques, including machine learning and live-coding with the help of a portable, open-source sound computer called Monome Norns.
Above all, Chavez and Stanush sought to create music that would feel untethered to any particular time period; music that, like their influences, feels timeless and unmoored.
Chavez and Stanush tend to refer to A.M. Architect as a “multimedia collaboration” rather than a traditional band. The two have been close collaborators since around 2004, when they met while playing in rock bands in San Antonio together. Realizing they shared a love of electronic music (everything from German cult artist Arovane to the early work of Caribou, then billed as Manitoba) and a deep interest in the intersection of art and technology, the two began a side project, which morphed into A.M. Architect.
In 2009, they released their first album, The Road to the Sun, a nimble, beat-driven collection pairing Stanush’s melodic instincts with Chavez’s drum programming. Stanush had studied music theory and knew his way around a guitar or bass, while Chavez came from a hip-hop background and knew how to treat his bandmate’s instruments as samples, with a DJ Shadow-like apt for manipulating rhythms
That division of labor remained largely constant through the project’s subsequent albums—2017’s Color Field, 2019’s Chroma Variants—as their stylistic ambitions grew and the group moved away from live instrumentation in favor of ambient production. With an increased emphasis on vocal samples, Avenir (a French word meaning “the future, or a time to come”) brings A.M. Architect into a new phase of their career, veering towards ambient electronica instead of instrumental hip-hop and instilling their chilly soundscapes with an unmistakable warmth.
Stanush developed melodic ideas on guitar, bass, and Rhodes piano, while Chavez manipulated the tracks in Ableton and incorporated a range of innovative techniques, including machine learning and live-coding with the help of a portable, open-source sound computer called Monome Norns.
Because it was written in the throes of the pandemic, the material felt heavier than usual, with both musicians reflecting on death, mortality, and memories. Such themes were front of mind during the early years of the pandemic, when the duo began experimenting with audiovisual installations. At a warehouse in Sacramento, they led a major installation, using cameras to track people’s motions through the space, which then triggered different lines of melody and visual art on the walls. “We want to be able to bring that kind of experience to more of our projects,” Stanush notes.
Such experiments proved formative to the inventive, free-form spirit of Avenir. As Chavez reflects, “It changed our idea of how songs don’t have to be linear. As long as you’re in it, you can make the song move around. We like to play with time differently.” And true to its forward-thinking title, Avenir brings the future to your headphones even as it summons poignant reflections on the past.
Today, Sydney-based artist Skeleten (aka Russell Fitzgibbon) unveils new single “Bodys Chorus”, ahead of his forthcoming second album release, Mentalized, arriving in full on February 7, 2025 via 2MR / Astral People Recordings.
“Bodys Chorus” pulls you in with hypnotic synth-bell chimes, and pushes you back with staccato overdrive guitar stabs, as if shaking you out of a daydream. Turntablist scratching is layered within the sonic texture of both the song and the album to come, an homage to nu-metal and trip hop’s humanistic approach to electronic music. It’s an attention to detail that Skeleten relishes in, and which rewards deep listens.
Mentalized exists in a rich sonic universe defined by hypnotic yet emotive songwriting, and organic production that draws from a vast blend of influences. Where Skeleten’s lauded debut album Under Utopia celebrated a world of hope and beauty pushed upwards by us all, his second record will posit that this push comes with a struggle. It is less about the fantastical, and more about asking how we are mentalized, and taken away from ourselves everyday. To play in this world doesn’t come without working for it, and that struggle is best when shared.
“Bodys Chorus” joins his recent singles “Deep Scene”, “Love Enemy”, and “Viagra”, alongside respective remixes by Axel Boman and Spray, in laying the foundations for Mentalized. The releases earned nods from Stereogum, PAPER, Brooklyn Vegan, Paste, KEXP, KCRW and more.
In 2023, Skeleten emerged with his critically adored, ARIA-charting album, Under Utopia. Described by The FADER as “perfect for the fans of the minds-eye psychedelia of Caribou and DJ Koze”, the record was nominated for the Australian Music Prize (2023), AIR Awards Best Independent Dance or Electronica Albumor EP (2024) and FBi Radio’s SMAC Award for Album of the Year (2023), named at #20 in NME AU’s Top 25 Albums of 2023, and #27 in Double J’s 50 Best Albums of 2023, and saw remixes from the likes of Logic1000 and Jennifer Loveless. Having performed with The Streets, Tirzah, SBTRKT, DJ Seinfeld, Hot Chip and Glass Beams, he has also since been booked for major Australian festivals Dark Mofo, VIVID LIVE, Splendour In The Grass, and sold a number of headlines including the Sydney Opera House.
Ahead of a special appearance at Golden Plains festival in 2025, Skeleten is curating a regular live series at Newtown’s Pleasure Club. Recently debuting this month alongside Hugh B and the Modern Pop Ensemble and Killian, the residency’s intention will be spotlighting local talent across the city’s different scenes, alongside Skeleten and his full live band. Skeleten is on track to make his North American debut next year – for updates and more, go here.
What do you get when you mix synth-wave with Italian disco, new wave, and a bit of dark wave? If you’re British producer / DJ Radondo, you get his new Deluge EP.
It starts with the bumping, thumping “Virtue,” which will have you on the dance floor in moments with its early Ministry-like percussion and dangerously sexy synth-bass. “Centrale” sounds like something from your favorite 1980s late night action-mystery film or something you haven’t heard since you stumbled into a Detroit night club in 1985.
The subtle, unintelligible female vocal sounds on the title track (performed by Neu-Romancer) provide a neat contrast to the dark-tinged synths, and the closer, “Overflow,” feels like, believe it or not, an upbeat goth track.
It’s a cool EP, and Radondo moves around all these different genres with ease, mixing them together in a way that’s not too heavy on nostalgia.
God’s Mom is the collaboration of Canadian artist Bria Salmena with producer and filmmaker A. Matthews to reimagine her ancestral Calabrian vocal traditions into a distorted portrait of the present. Today they share their new single/video “Dallo A Me” out via LMDD/Bonsound, taken from their album of selected works As It Was Given which is now available exclusively to stream and download via Nina and Bandcamp.
Across the selected works on As It Was Given, recorded between 2020-2024, God’s Mom expands on the short bursts of dancefloor energy from their previous EP with a more panoramic and nuanced expression. Inspired by vocal traditions rooted in her Italian heritage, Salmena packs the album full of mantras, fiery assertions, and personal confessions, often explicitly regarding womanhood. Studying the polyphonic singing in Calabrese tarantella’s, documented in recordings from the 1930’s-60s, she found that songs sung by these women from her family’s native region were especially haunting: “in almost every track it was clear that singing was the purest form of expression, singing to release energy, pass the time, mourn the dead, and even happy songs are almost unlistenable at times. They sound far more raw than any punk singer I had ever heard”.
Salmena’s urge to draw on her ancestral connection with these traditions became God’s Mom’s foundation, “in order to understand why I need to express myself musically in certain ways”, she says. “The voices of these women in the recordings were the only things that could not be silenced by extreme religious and gendered oppression, and in some way, I felt I could give a voice to the women in my lineage whose only value was seen in childbearing and serving men. God’s Mom’s performance and styling are not hedonism for the sake of hedonism, it’s a reckoning”.
Salmena, who releases her solo music via Sub Pop/Royal Mountain started working with Matthews (Dime Lifters) on the selected works that is As It Was Given in 2020, following several years of intensive touring with her band FRIGS and as a member of Orville Peck’s band. Between 2020-2024, they created the varied pallet of God’s Mom’s sound, which is laden with hooks, blown-out bass, and reckless genre jumping. Moving from rave anthems to moments that feel like some forgotten 80s Vogue classic or even a melodramatic wedding song from the Calabrian coast, the album switches footing fearlessly. It presents very much like a club that has different styles of music for different rooms, depending on whether you want to come up or come down. The album carries a shadowy undercurrent that often rattles like an exorcism but can also appear hymnal and celebrates the power and beauty of community. The cacophonous group vocals that haunt the record are the connecting thread, with Salmena singing in chorale with these ghosts of the past in harmony and admiration. As It Was Given is new body music that channels an old-world spirit.
Last month, Colombian artist Ela Minus announced her new album, DIA, out January 17, 2025 via Domino, and released the “swaying, cathartic dance anthem” (Brooklyn Vegan) “BROKEN.” Today, Ela unveils “UPWARDS,” presenting Ela relishing in pure pop splendor. An unabashed and addictive theme song for, as Ela says, “safeguarding yourself, your body, and your soul,” “UPWARDS” is unforgettable on first listen. It is propelled by an unrelenting pulse and sharp refrain as Ela chants over and over “I’d love to save you / but you’ve got to save yourself,” all while aggressive and busy synths bounce underneath, feeling like lasers waging a war against the song itself.
The “UPWARDS” video, which sees Ela collaborating with directors Albert Estruch & Marc Sancho (of Querida), creates a unique visual and auditory experience by featuring Ela in the center of a circle with her instruments, surrounded by cameras and screens that capture and show different angles of the action in real time.
Ela also announces several more 2025 tour dates, including headline performances throughout Australia, in London, Barcelona, Bogotá, Los Angeles, New York and Chicago (on sale this Friday, Nov. 22nd here). As Hearing Things described a recent live performance, Ela’s “hypnotic pop-techno made it feel like time had turned inside out.”
Following Ela’s charged 2020 debut, acts of rebellion, DIA is a rarified feat in electronic music, where cutting-edge production and space-shuddering sonics meet a burgeoning singer-songwriter’s real sense of self-reflection and private reckoning. Where acts of rebellion felt intentionally small, as if pounding inside the club with late-night reverie, DIA is both introspective and expansive, the wide sweep of its songs revealing more of Ela as person and producer than ever before.
Throughout the 10 songs, mixed by Marta Salogni and mastered by Heba Kadry, Ela seems to saddle a line between worlds of pop accessibility and experimental aplomb, her incandescent and catchy choruses always surrounded by meticulous and imaginative sonics. DIA is a record about becoming, from a process that entailed self-discovery at a deliberate pace to songs that seem to collectively ask where we go from here, long after we’ve been broken but long before we intend to be broken forever. “I want to be better,” Minus sings in the hook of the title track, her voice a militant chirp pulling against a plunging bassline. “I thought I was better.” Opening the mountain and exposing her deepest worries, DIA marks the next phase of Ela Minus’ career and life without declaring where any of it may or must go.
As previously announced, Synth Historyis launching an ongoing and in depth docu-series on Ela’s story and music. Preview the first episode here and second here. Ela recently launched www.forthebirds.xyz, a platform where fans can write to Ela, and she writes back, covering personal and technical topics or whatever approach grabs her interest.
Ela Minus Live Performance Dates (New Dates in Bold) Sat. Dec. 14 – Berlin, DE @ Silent Green (OPIA) Fri. Jan. 17 – Bogotá, CO @ Homecoming Release Day Show – To Be Revealed! Sat. Feb. 1 – Manchester, UK @ Victoria Warehouse ^ Mon. Feb. 3 – Paris, FR @ Zenith * Tue. Feb. 4 – Luxembourg, LX @ Rockhal * Wed. Feb. 5 – Utrecht, NL @ Tivoli * Thu. Feb. 6 – London, UK @ Roundhouse * Fri. Feb. 7 – London, UK @ Roundhouse * Sat. Feb. 8 – London, UK @ Roundhouse * Sun. Feb. 9 – Leeds, UK @ O2 Academy * Mon. Feb. 10 – Bristol, UK @ Bristol Beacon * Tue. Feb. 11 – Brussels, BE @ Ancienne Belgique * Wed. Feb. 12 – Brussels, BE @ Ancienne Belgique * Fri. Feb. 14 – Berlin, DE @ Velodrom * Sat. Feb. 15 – Barcelona, ES @ Astin (Nitsa) Thu. Feb. 20 – London, UK @ Oslo Fri. Mar. 7 – Moyston, AU @ Pitch Music & Arts Sat. Mar. 8 – Meredith, AU @ Golden Plains XVII Sun. Mar. 9 – Adelaide, AU @ WOMADelaide Sat. Mar. 15 – Los Angeles, CA @ Zebulon Wed. Mar. 18 – Brooklyn, NY @ Public Records Fri. Mar. 21 – Chicago, IL @ Schubas Thu. Mar. 27 – Mexico City, MX @ Foro Puebla Sun. Mar. 30 – Bogotá, CO @ Estéreo Picnic
English electronic musician and producer Jon Hopkins presents a new single/video, “Forever Held,” in collaboration with NASA. A full orchestral piece with string arrangements by Icelandic multi-instrumentalist Ólafur Arnalds, “Forever Held” is an emotive and deeply peaceful piece of cinematic music which touches on themes of our Earth and its context within space. “Forever Held” was created in collaboration with NASA & Erica Bernhard.
NASA JPL collaborated with Hopkins to compose “Forever Held” for Space for Earth,which isNASA’s first immersive experience open to the public, commissioned by NASA and located at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. The song was inspired by letters written by NASA Creative Director and artist Erica Bernhard during the creation of the installation. These letters, love letters from Earth to Space, ended with the phrase “Forever enveloped in your gravity.” From this, “Forever Held” was born. It has continued to evolve, grow, and live outside of the installation. The song, stills from its music video, the original letters and pieces of the Space for Earth installation, have been engraved and encoded onto a NanoFiche disk which will be sent to the moon as part of the Lunar Codex via NASA CLPS.
In discussing the music, Hopkins says:“I took this opportunity to create a full orchestral piece. I wanted to make something timeless that would transmit the feeling of being ‘held’ by the Earth. I was thinking about the fragility and power of our planet, and of the human race’s role in its own destiny.”
The music video for “Forever Held”, created and directed by Erica Bernhard, displays the range of her art-science studio COVALENT Collaboratory. It is a visual evolution of the love letters between Space and Earth – humans being an inextricable part of these interconnected systems. It poetically envelops NASA imagery and data onto two motion-captured dancers: the ‘Space’ character comprised of NASA James Webb Space Telescope while the ‘Earth’ character is wrapped in NASA satellite imagery of the Earth at night, as they perform their eternal dance.
Bernhard adds: “Space is not merely the backdrop to human existence, but a living, breathing dimension. There are invisible communications happening between Earth and the NASA satellites that observe our planet. The view from space offers a profound shift in perspective – astronauts call this the overview effect. Hopkins’ compositions capture that shift – infusing sound with the expansiveness of space while grounding us in the essence and rhythms of life on Earth. His soundscapes act as a bridge between these realms, translating the awe and wonder of space and Earth into a sonic and immersive journey that asks us to consider our place in the universe and our responsibility to the planet.”
Ahead of today’s single release, Coldplay used“Forever Held” to open their new album Moon Music and their Pyramid-headlining slot at this year’s Glastonbury. Hopkins also featured on the latest iteration of Charli XCX’s Brat, contributing to “I might say something stupid” with The 1975 on Brat and it’s completely different but also still brat.
Jon Hopkins recently released his latest studio album RITUAL,a 41-minute ceremonial epic built from cavernous subs, hypnotic drumming and transcendent melodic interplay. Having premiered the album at collective immersive audio listening experiences around the globe ahead of its release, Hopkins is pleased to present the first large-scale event at London’s EartH Theatre next month which has already sold out. There will be a live piano performance and a Q&A with Hopkins and his collaborator 7RAYS.
Additionally, Hopkins will perform at London’s Southbank Centre with Aaron and Bryce Dessner of The National on December 6thas part of the London premiere of All of This Unreal Time featuring actor Cillian Murphy. They will also perform at Manchester’s Aviva Studios on December 7th. Hopkins and The Dessners composed the soundtrack for All of This Unreal Time, which was written by Max Porter and directed by Aoife McArdle.
RITUAL is available to buy on DomMart-exclusive double clear vinyl (with artwork print and etching on one side of the vinyl), standard double vinyl, CD and digitally.
About NASA’s Space for Earth installation: The interactive physical exhibit is located in the east lobby of NASA Headquarters in Washington DC, where visitors are invited to see Earth as NASA astronauts see it from space. Open M-F, 8:30AM – 5:30PM. https://earth.gov/
The weather stayed nice for us on Day Two of Levitation Austin. There was no rain, and it was overcast – which meant that the sun wasn’t beating down on us at this place.
There is no parking.
We spent most of our day here. It was a first time for both of us at the place, and the Austin Psych Fest in the spring is held here. You have to take the bus or use a ride-share service to get here because it’s on a busy road and there’s no where to park for miles. That being said, it’s a nice place big enough to hold two outdoor stages and multiple vendor booths. I would’ve enjoyed more food truck options other than pizza (which looked delicious, by the way), and we’ll bring a blanket next time, but the place reminded me of the La Chabada venue at Levitation France. You can easily hop back and forth between stages at both places.
Up first were Meatbodies, whom I’d recently seen in Chicago. They were the first band of the day and had a good crowd for a 4:30 slot. They had fun and set the table for everyone else to follow with a night of garage-psych, electro, cosmic rock, and post-punk.
They had to cut their set a bit short, as the second band of the day was in the process of unleashing fierce dance-punk on the main stage. Special Interest came out ready to fight and / or fuck. “Fierce” is how my girlfriend described their wild set.
We could hear parts of Fat Dog‘s set, which was described by one of the sound engineers as “Like Fontaines D.C., but hornier.” We decided to get close for Gang of Four, who are on their final tour, and were the big draw of the day for me. They didn’t disappoint, playing a lot of classics and destroying a microwave in the process. Jon King‘s manic energy made my girlfriend wonder if he might have a heart attack on stage, but one look through his unbuttoned shirt showed how ripped he is.
We hung out in the same area for Dry Cleaning, who somehow had to follow Gang of Four. Lead singer Florence Shaw (whom my girlfriend described as “fucking weird”) spoke, a bit nervously, about all the great bands playing that day. She and her bandmates didn’t have to worry, however, as they put down a great post-punk set. I love the addition of their saxophonist on this tour. The echoing horn is a sharp touch.
We heard part of Pissed Jeans‘ set, which sounded crazy, and they had a lot of fans at the Far Out. I saw plenty of their band shirts on people in the crowd (“Excuse me, are those Pissed Jeans you’re wearing?”), and then headed over to see Slift, who were once again wrapping up their U.S. tour at Levitation. They wasted no time, using every bit of gas left in the tank. Crowd surfers were abundant during their set and they practically blasted the east fence off the place. “I think Slift stole the show,” my girlfriend said.
We wrapped up the night at Kingdom in downtown Austin, a venue that’s the opposite of the Far Out. It’s pretty much a rave warehouse that you can only access through a door in an alley. We hit the dance floor during MJ Nebreda and Doss‘ sets, which were full of so much bass that we were both buzzing by the end of the night. It was fun to hang out with a crowd of ravers (many of whom still in costume a night after Halloween) after hanging out with rockers for several hours.
Up next, night three of Osees‘ four-night residency at Hotel Vegas.
What do you do when you’re an attorney who doesn’t have much to do during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown? If you’re Douglas Richards, you go back to doing what you did before you became an attorney – being a rave DJ and making the Project 85 EP.
The first track, “Everyone Has Their Own Reasons,” is a tale of one of Richards’ friends experimenting with DMT, using his friend’s own telling of the tale for the vocals and stacking them with hot 303 beats and bouncing bass.
“I’m Here for You,” using more of the same conversation for more vocals, becomes a robotic techno ripper that bumps and thumps in all the right places. “I Move with Intention” has some retro vibes, sounding not unlike an early 1980s disco cut that you’ve been digging in crates to find for the last thirty years.
Richards is about to blow the doors off dance clubs across the world if he keeps up with stuff like this. Don’t miss out.
