Electro – Page 55 – 7th Level Music

Rewind Review: Blanck Mass – Dumb Flesh (2015)

I had heard Blanck Mass (AKA Benjamin John Power) before with his work in Fuck Buttons, but had unknowingly heard songs from Dumb Flesh five years ago not knowing who had created them. So, hearing this album in its entirety for the first time was a real treat because it reunited me with songs I didn’t realize were my introduction to his solo work – which I have come to enjoy through multiple albums like World Eater and Animated Violence Mild.

Opener “Loam” is a weird backwards vocal track that lets you know you’re in for something out of the ordinary. No Blanck Mass album is necessarily “normal.” They’re all soundscapes that range from strange and sometimes creepy dreams (like “Loam,” which almost seems to be the sound of a possibly haunted lava lamp) to industrial dance tracks to ambient psychedelia.

“Dead Format” is the first Blanck Mass song I ever heard, and I was elated to be reunited with it on this album. I actually first heard it when I saw Blanck Mass perform at the much-missed Levitation Chicago in 2016. The thumping electronic beats and futuristic bounty hunter synths are a wicked combination that get you moving and absolutely kill live.

The title of “No Lite” is a bit misleading because it’s full of shimmering synths that fade in and out like sunlight breaking through rolling storm clouds as wickedly subtle beats pound underneath them. “Atrophies” mixes synth swirls with karate chop-like processed beats. “Cruel Sports” would be a perfect theme for some sort of cyborg octagonal cage fight. The bass hits hard, the beats sound like metal clashing with metal, and the synths gleam like stark overhead lights.

“Double Cross” is a great synth-wave dance track that’s dark-wave at the edges with break-beat subtleties. It belongs in the next video game you’re designing or playing. “Lung” pops and chirps like some sort of alien machine. It becomes somewhat hypnotizing after a short while.

The album ends with “Detritus,” which is a wild eight minutes and thirteen seconds of what at first sounds like some kind of excavation machinery running with almost no oil in the gears. The synths slowly build, like a creature rising from a junkyard to see the sun for the first time in a century.

It’s a powerful record, and just one of many such records Blanck Mass has put out there. Brace for impact before you hear it.

Keep your mind open.

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Neon Coven “Blame It on the Drugs” with new single.

Neon Coven, the darkwave, alternative rock band from Los Angeles, CA, featuring Jacob Bunton (Mick Mars, Adler, Lynam) and Ace Von Johnson (LA Guns, Faster Pussycat) has released its brand new single “Blame It On The Drugs” today via New Ocean Media. The song is the first single from the band’s upcoming debut full-length album Future Postponed. The lyric video is available on the band’s official YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1hhGIA50jE

Neon Coven is comprised of Anthony Montemarano (vocals), Jacob Bunton (Keyboards/guitar/bass), Ace Von Johnson (guitar), and Kyle Cunningham (drums). The band’s debut full-length album Future Postponed will be released October 30th. Produced by Jacob Bunton, the album features 11 tracks ranging from songs about survival and balance to emotionally charged anthems of empowerment. The songs live in the space between challenging the need for certainty and, ultimately, learning to accept uncertainty. “Future Postponed is set to inspire, intrigue and terrify all at once,” states guitarist Ace Von Johnson. “The material within runs a musical gamut, in which we as a band proudly exercise our ability to take bold strides in diversity. From dance-pop to goth rock, each song will take you twisting down a new road. I’ve worked on a lot of albums in my career, and thus far, this is the one I’m most proud of.”

FUTURE POSTPONED track listing: 01. Blame It On The Drugs 02. Every Part Of Me 03. A World Without You 04. I’m The New Hit 05. Manic 06. Purgatory 07. Kiss Of Death 08. Spirits In The Hall (feat. Ramsey) 09. You’re Never Getting Out Alive 10. Dead To Me 11. The Other Side Of Nowhere

From Los Angeles, CA, Neon Coven abandoned much of the ethos of the tradition of heavy rock to create an intellectual and theoretical sound, linked to an emphasis on anthemic, synth-heavy dance-music. The band came together when Von Johnson, Bunton, Montemarano and Cunningham formed the band as a side project on the suggestion of a mutual friend. “We were all on the Monsters Of Rock Cruise,” explains Bunton. “Our mutual friend April Lee said, ‘you guys should start a band.’ Ace and I had been friends for years, and we both met Anthony on the cruise. After we got back to LA, we started writing songs whenever our schedules would align.” The band released their first EP Risen in 2017 containing the songs “Bleeding Love” and “No One Knows You’re Dead,” both appearing in the horror movie Hesperia. The band followed the EP with a cover of Depeche Mode’s “Never Let Me Down Again” in 2018. In 2019, the band released its second EP, The Haunting.

For more information: Facebook: www.facebook.com/neoncoven

Sound Cloud: www.soundcloud.com/neoncoven

Instagram: www.instagram.com/neoncoven

YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC1tGFRXHUJGkQqeo2q-_oXA

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/ycnmlpk5

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[Thanks to Gerard at New Ocean Media.]

Review: Automatic – Signal

I stumbled upon Los Angeles trio Automatic while listening to a radio station from somewhere in southwestern France. I was immediately hooked by their goth / no wave sound and had to find more. Luckily, their new album Signal was already available. I knew after one listen that I had to own it.

Halle Saxon‘s fretless, fuzzy bass opens the album on “Too Much Money,” and Izzy Giuadini‘s synths add a buzzy air of menace throughout it while Lola Dompé‘s drums are as precise as an auto assembly line. “Calling It” was the track I heard on French radio that made me sit up and think, “Who is this?” Dompé’s drums take center stage on the track and the echoed vocals are cold and sexy at the same time. “Suicide in Texas” is a goth-wave / David Lynch movie dream track. Automatic have cited Mr. Lynch and Dario Argento as major influences, so that already makes them great in my book.

“I Love You, Fine” is one of the best song titles I’ve heard all year, and the lyrics might be the best ones about female empowerment in a relationship since The Waitresses‘ “I Know What Boys Like.” “Highway” is a danceable industrial gem suitable for your next late night drive to an after-party. Saxon’s bass groove on the title track is undeniable.

“I see you turn into humanoid,” they sing on “Humanoid,” which I can’t help but think is influenced by Gary Numan‘s work. Giaudini’s synths and Dompé’s percussion on it sound like some of Numan’s work with Tubeway Army – which is never a bad thing. “Damage” is another killer goth-wave track as Automatic sing about walking away from a relationship that they know isn’t going to end well.

“Electrocution” has Dompé and Saxon in perfect synch on an upbeat track about what can be a downbeat subject – emptiness (“The sound of laughter, and then it’s over. There’s nothing after.”). “Oh no! We’re goin’ nowhere!” they sing on “Champagne,” which I think is a song about superficiality. The closer, “Strange Conversations,” is like something out of a goth prom night with its romantic bass line, slightly bright synths, and almost-slow dance drumming. Lyrics like “I thought I told you, I can’t stand anyone at all.” and “I’ve lost my patience. All you do is let me down.” also help boost the goth feel of the track.

The album mixes goth, synth wave, and no wave so well it’s difficult to tell where one influence begins and another ends, but who cares? Automatic blend everything so well that Signal becomes a lovely, hypnotic record that will surely be among my top releases of 2020.

Keep your mind open.

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Kelly Lee Owens’ new single, “On,” shows she continues to do no wrong.

Techno producer/musician Kelly Lee Owens unveils a new single/video, “On,” from her forthcoming album, Inner Song, out August 28th on Smalltown Supersound. Following “Night” and “Melt!,” “On” is a rustling electro-pop glimmer that gives way to yo-yo synths and a tough-as-nails techno backbeat. It’s the alpha and omega of the Kelly Lee Owens experience, reflective of her ability to contain sonic and emotional multitudes within just one song. Shot on the Norwegian coastline, its accompanying video sees Kelly collaborating once again with Kasper Häggström, who also directed her “Throwing Lines” video. Like the song, it tells the story of a breakup.

“This is perhaps the most intimate and personal song I’ve written so far – the two halves of the track reflect upon sad acceptances of the truth and then the joyous aftermath of liberation that can come from that,” says Owens. “This can definitely be heard in the production and arrangement of the track – the first half sonically connecting to the inner revelations and the second half, the liberation in action, the forward motion.”
Watch Kelly Lee Owens’ “On” Video
Inner Song is the follow-up to Owens’ self-titled debut, which “introduced an extraordinary artist packing a hefty one-two combination of intimate, powerful electronic pop and cavernous, brain-melting techno” (MOJO), and was recognized as one of the most critically praised albums of 2017. It finds Owens diving deep into her own psyche—working through the struggles she’s faced over the last several years and exploring personal pain while embracing the beauty of the natural world. Sonically, Inner Song’s hair-raising bass and tickling textures drive home that, more so than ever, Owens is locked into delivering maximal aural pleasure, whether it be on a techno banger, covering Radiohead, or collaborating with fellow Welsh artist John Cale on a psychedelic lullaby.
Listen to “Night” by Kelly Lee Owens

Watch Kelly Lee Owens’ Visuals for “Melt!”

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[Thanks to Jessica at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Turning Jewels into Water releases title track from upcoming album – “Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars.”

Photo courtesy of Red Bull Music New York

Turning Jewels Into Water – the duo of Haitian-born drummer, DJ, educator and electronic music artist Val Jeanty and Indian-born drummer, producer and educator Ravish Momin –announce their new album, Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars, out August 21st on FPE Records, and share the lead single/video. It follows their 2019 album Map of Absences. For Our Reflection Momin and Jeanty take their dynamic musical partnership to even greater heights and more intense depths. Imbued with the spirit of collaboration and influenced by cutting-edge sounds like South African Gqom, Our Reflection reaches across oceans and continents, connecting the ancient with the modern.

As a collaborative project, Turning Jewels Into Water began when Jeanty participated in a jam session at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn while Momin was artist-in-residence there in September 2017. Their collaboration, rooted in improvisation, evokes the esoteric realms of the creative subconscious. Drawing from the Vodun religion, Val recreates the ancient rhythms and pulse of Haiti through digital beats, while Momin, whose own musical background is rooted in Indian, North African and Middle-Eastern traditions, has developed an original blend of electro-acoustic beats, drawing together the improvisational traditions in Jazz and Indian folk music. Together, they employ cutting-edge music-technological tools such as acoustic drums outfitted with Sensory Percussion triggers, Force Sensing Resistor (FSR) drum pads and Smart Fabric MIDI Controllers, but still emphasize the ritual aspects of creating music in the digital realm.

Speaking to the collaborative approach they took to making Our Reflection, Momin explains that he and Jeanty lead an ensemble of musicians from around the world, with the end product being a challenge to the ethnic fetishizing that far-too commonly comes along with global/world music. In March 2020, Momin had already reached out to other artists for remote contributions, including Iranian singer/daf player Kamyar Arsani (based in Washington, DC) and friend Mpho Molikeng, a master musician of South African indigenous instruments (based in Lesotho). Jeanty had already set up a base in Boston (for her newly appointed position as a professor at Berklee College of Music) and was also planning on collaborating remotely. “Therefore, once mandatory quarantines went into effect across the US and the world in mid-March, it had little impact on our creative process,” says Momin. “The resulting album has elements that are at once familiar and unfamiliar, as we evoke a digital folk music from nowhere.”

Accompanying the lead single is a video created by Art Jones. “The video for ‘Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars’ explores the narrative of the Siddis – Indians of East African origin, who were merchants, sailors and even rulers of Indian territories, but have now been marginalized and have had their histories erased,” says Momin. “As the #BLM movement rightfully gains prominence across the globe, we wanted to raise awareness of the anti-blackness that is deeply embedded in other cultures as well.”

With Our Reflection Adorned By Newly Formed Stars, Turning Jewels Into Water uses forward-thinking electronic music and experimentation to tap into a continuum of folk music that is as old as time itself. Also, containing remixes from Laughing Ears, and EMB, the music here is Indian, African, Afro-Caribbean and global all at once. By combining their unique cultural experiences Jeanty and Momin are bold enough to allow all of the tensions and commonalities to play freely and resolve themselves in the music.
Watch “Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars” Video:
https://youtu.be/YWb1D-aNrUY

Pre-order Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars:
https://turningjewelsintowater.bandcamp.com/album/our-reflection-adorned-by-newly-formed-stars

Our Reflection Adorned by Newly Formed Stars Tracklist:
1. Swirl in the Waters
2. Flower in Flames
3. Janjira in a Flash
4. Our Reflections Adorned by Newly Formed Stars
5. Whispers under Dal Lake
6. Kerala in My Heart
7. Crushed Petals and Stones Fall on My Drum
8. Crushed Petals and Stones Fall on My Drum (Laughing Ears Remix)
9. Flower in Flames (EMB Remix)

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Tricky asks us to “Fall Please” on his new single.

ricky announces his 14th studio album, Fall To Pieces, out September 4th on his own label False Idols, and shares its lead single/video, “Fall Please.” The legendary producer might be over three decades deep into his music career but he’s currently on an especially prolific run. In the last year, he dropped the enchanting 20,20 EP and put out an acclaimed autobiography, Hell Is Round The Corner.

Watch Tricky’s Video for “Fall Please”

“Fall Please,” a song which Tricky likens to Washington, D.C. Go-go, has a strange and twisted accessibility that surprised even the man who wrote it. “With most of my stuff, there’s nothing else like it around,” he says. “But with ‘Fall Please’ I’ve managed to do something I’ve never been able to before, which is that everyone can feel it – even people who don’t know my music. It’s my version of pop music, the closest I’ve got to making pop.”

Fall To Pieces was recorded in Tricky’s Berlin studio in late 2019. Tricky is keen to point out that the tracks on the record can be deceptive; often short, ending abruptly and moving on to the next without warning. Although instrumentation varies from bursts of tense synths, distorted dial tones, and samples, the song’s lyrics can be dark and dense. Tricky’s music has always enlisted female vocalists to carry his ideas: the majority of tracks on Fall To Pieces, including “Fall Please,” rely on Marta Złakowska, the singer he discovered during a European tour when he was left without a vocalist on the opening night. She saved the tour from disaster. “I can tell when someone is humble and down to earth,” says Tricky. “Marta doesn’t care about being famous, she just wants to sing.”

The past year in creative flurry has no doubt been a distraction for Tricky, but it’s also been a period of reflection and reassessment. Struck down with grief, he had to ask himself a question: do I fight, or go down with the ship? “You’ve gotta fucking get up and fight,” he concludes. “Right now I’m in fight mode. And I feel really good. I do.”

Pre-order Fall To Pieces

Fall To Pieces Tracklist:
1.Thinking Of
2. Close Now
3. Running Off
4. I’m In The Doorway
5. Hate This Pain
6. Chills Me To The Bone
7. Fall Please
8. Take Me Shopping
9. Like a Stone
10. Throws Me Around
11. Vietnam

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[Thanks to Brid at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Fusilier puts a timely new spin on “Dancing in the Street.”

WATCH: Fusilier’s “Dancing In The Street” video on YouTube

Gothamist once described Blake Fusilier’s sound as “something you’d hear in a nightclub at the end of the world.” Last week that narrative shifted with the release of a meditative, deeply felt drone-ballad “Upstream.” NPR Music praised it as a “slow core revival” and Paste Magazine called it a “sweeping, minimal R&B-pop song led by awe-inspiring strings,” and one of the best songs of May, while The Line of Best Fit in the UK named it “Song of The Day.”

Now the nightclub at the end of the world returns with Fusilier’s re-imagining of the Motown classic “Dancing In the Street.” Fusilier’s version turns the song into a queer indie punk fever dream coincidentally released at the kick off of Pride Month.

Says Fusilier in a blistering critique of what the LGBTQ month of remembrance, Pride Month, had become in the pre-pandemic era: “Pride is so boring. A protest-cum-celebration of marginalized people has become a mirror for the existing hierarchies of society. The people who now need uplift and recognition are the people who ‘Gay’ movements hide. They’re women, they’re queer, they’re trans and non-binary, they’re poor, they’re HIV positive, they’re Black. They’re the ones who aren’t going to bank with Santander because they’re issuing debit cards decorated with rainbows. We should get back to our riotous roots.”

Of the song & accompanying video, Fusilier and his collaborator Kevin Alexander call upon a very different activists and artists who inspire him including Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, Toni Morrison and, least known of these, Black gay minimalist composer and vocalist Julius Eastman and his composition “Gay Guerrilla”. Eastman was a major presence on New York’s ‘downtown’ scene of the 70s & 80s who died tragically before the age of 50. Now experiencing a major revival, Fusilier connects to Eastman’s legacy of pro-Black and pro-gay provocations which did not eschew a potential for radical political violence.

Thirty years after Eastman’s death, Fusilier recalls one of the few times on record where we hear the deceased artist speak—literally transcribing Eastman’s words across his own likeness at the video’s climax. Says Fusilier, “In 1980, Julius Eastman once introduced one of his most popular works, ‘Gay Guerrilla,’ to an audience at Northwestern University on what we now know as the first day of Pride month. This is how he closed his introduction:

“A guerrilla is someone who is, in any case, sacrificing his life for a point of view. And if there is a cause, and if it is a great cause, those who belong to that cause will sacrifice their blood. Because without blood there is no cause. So, therefore, that is the reason that I use ‘Gay Guerrilla,’ in hopes that I might be one if called upon to be one.”

The video for “Dancing In The Street” is an expression of my subconscious. It’s a collection of imagery that I keep in mind when I make music. It’s an acknowledgement that there’s a legacy of Black, trans and queer voices that was largely disappeared to history and a reminder that the people who they opposed are still in power.”

Fusilier’s Upstream EP is out now via Brassland and is available on Bandcamp here.

Keep your mind open.

[Thanks to Tom at Hive Mind PR.]

Rhye’s new “Beautiful” video is just that.

“Rhye’s music video for ‘Beautiful’ is a lesson in social distancing . . . The pandemic made Michael Milosh think about his artistic motivations, and he channeled that energy into a calming music video for his newest single.” — Vanity Fair

Rhye – the project of LA-based musician Michael Milosh – presents a new video for his “slinky, understated” (Stereogum) “Beautiful,” released earlier this month on Loma Vista Recordings. Rhye debuted the track with a hypnotic 72-hour back-to-back stream hosted on his YouTube channel. The video was directed and produced by Milosh and filmed using telephoto lenses to ensure social distancing, with each dancer shot individually. Featuring intertwining clips of people moving throughout a vibrant desert landscape, it evokes the song’s message – finding beauty in everyday life. As with the single art created by Milosh, the “Beautiful” video, awashed in a gauzy filter, maintains Rhye’s distinctive, dreamlike aesthetic. Milosh discussed the creation of the video, other Rhye visuals, and more with Vanity Fair (read the article here).

Watch Rhye’s Video for “Beautiful”

Listen to Rhye’s “Beautiful”

“[‘Beautiful’] starts with a throb of strings before cohering around a sharp beat and muscular bass line, distantly echoing solo Bryan Ferry tracks from the early Eighties.” – Rolling Stone

“[Beautiful’] slots nicely into the subtly funky Rhye oeuvre” – Uproxx

“Plenty has changed in the last 12 months, and anxieties are at an all-time high, but Rhye is intent on finding and relishing the brightest spots in his life.” – Consequence of Sound

While staying home, Milosh has been performing livestreams as part of the LA based creative community Secular Sabbath, including morning ambient performances and a sunrise serenade with Joseph August, as well as the Corona Sabbath with Diplo. Secular Sabbath initially focused on live ambient music events, but has expanded with a range of offerings in quarantine.

Keep your mind open.

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Review: Nine Inch Nails – Ghosts VI: Locusts

The second of two free instrumental albums offered by Nine Inch Nails in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ghosts VI: Locusts is darker than its predecessor – Ghosts V: Together. The track titles alone don’t bring to mind hopeful images like the last album. Many of the tunes on Ghosts VI: Locusts could easily fit on a horror film score.

“The Cursed Clock” is just such an example – bleak piano and creepy timing. “Around Every Corner” brings in a lonely trumpet and sounds not unlike passing buses to remind you of a film noir. “The Worriment Waltz” is a good title for what a lot of people are doing these days. “Run Like Hell” is surprisingly subtle (and that great trumpet comes back to haunt us in it).

“When It Happens (Don’t Mind Me)” starts off with Dario Argento-film score manic percussion and synths. The sounds of “Another Crashed Car” bring to mind images of an open cell phone (probably being used pre-collision) call going unanswered and windshield wipers scraping across cracked glass. “Temp Fix” is short and…odd.

“Trust Fades” fades right into “A Really Bad Night.” The two themes go well together. “Your New Normal” is like a strange breath across your neck, and “Just Breathe” might be the creepiest song on the album. “Right Behind You” calms things down a bit.

“Turn This Off Please” is the longest track on the album (over thirteen minutes) and slinks around the room like some sort of smoky adder. The piano on “So Tired” is like something you’d hear on the score to Exorcist III. The closing track is “Almost Dawn,” which is a bit uplifting after all the doom and gloom of the previous tracks. Yes, it still has some creepy elements in it (like that warped music box) but it still conveys a sense that the sun will come out soon and we’ll all embrace the light.

Nine Inch Nails seem to be acknowledging that things look bleak, but they also encourage us to not become overwhelmed. Things will turn around in time. All things are impermanent, even suffering.

Keep your mind open.

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Soulwax’s next album was made with just one synthesizer.

‘EMS Synthi 100: Deewee Sessions Vol. 01‘ is an exciting new project from David & Stephen Dewaele (Soulwax) that celebrates the pioneering modular synthesizer, the EMS Synthi 100.

The highly collectible package, will be released on May 29th by DEEWEE and The Vinyl Factory, compiling a new album, created entirely using a lovingly restored EMS Synthi, alongside a 48-page book exploring the synthesizer’s history and the story beind the album. The Dewaele brothers hope to have the opportunity to create further volumes in the series in the near future.

“It was our belief that there were tons of melodies and rhythms hidden within the machine,” commented David & Stephen Dewaele. “We just had to make it sing. Every sound you hear on this record, however hard to believe, originates from the mighty EMS Synthi 100. Some were easy to make, some took days to get right. A few of the compositions were written beforehand, with the Synthi 100 in mind, then translated onto it. A couple were created by just messing around for hours, and some of it is the machine randomly playing by itself, inspiring us to build onto its unique chaos.”

‘DEEWEE Sessions Vol.01’ features the album on heavyweight 180g vinyl along with a fully-illustrated 48-page book exploring the background behind the album and history of the Synthi 100. The book compiles a foreword from David & Stephen Dewaele; an introduction from 3030, the specific Synthi 100 unit that was used for the album; a history of its creation and an exploration of its sounds; and finally an interview with Ivan Schepers, the IPEM technician who has been 3030’s long-term custodian.

Fittingly, this tribute to such an elegant machine is presented in a beautiful style, art directed by Ill-Studio. The vinyl is held in a perforated ‘patch bay’ cover with a fully artworked inner sleeve, while both the disc and book are housed in a clear PVC bag.

‘EMS Synthi 100 – DEEWEE Sessions Vol.01’ will be released on May 29th with catalogue numbers DEEWEE034 / VF301. A digital version will also be available via download and streaming services and all formats are available to pre-order from HERE.

This album was made with the kind assistance of and in collaboration with IPEM, Ghent.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Deewee Ltd.!]