Toledo’s System Efe has released a killer EP of Detroit techno-inspired music, Carpetania. The title track fills you with slow-burn energy with its swelling synth-bass and perfect electro-beats. It’s like a bowl of steel cut oats served by a robot waitress at a diner that’s playing house music. It prepares you for a lot of dancing to come.
The bass drops on “Primitive,” immediately turning up the heat and your pulse. Put it on your workout playlist and proceed to shred your routine. “Steppe” builds with radar bleeps and simple, somewhat muted beats into an almost frantic track that leaves you a bit breathless.
The EP’s afterparty is the Raul Alvarez “360 Primitive Edit” of the title track, which takes on a slightly dangerous edge with beats and hooks that sound like something that emerges from the futuristic car full of cyborg hitmen from the year 3045 who’ve come to kill you so your ancestors won’t stop them from being created in the first place.
babychaos is the creation of 21-year-old model Lyzzie Larosa. Using influence from industrial, metal, rock, pop and club music, she hypnotizes with her words on her personal experiences and the world she creates through her music and expression. Born and raised in witch city Salem, Massachusetts, babychaos has now arrived.
Los Angeles-based independent record label Cleopatra and babychaos have now joined forces to present the creation and video for “Babylon”.
babychaos is learning to dance her way through the dark model and musician babychaos has released her fifth single ‘Babylon’, and the video has just arrived to the party.
“Post-apocalyptic Bratz doll from hell,” babychaos has carved out a unique space in music, which she dubs ‘industrial pop. ‘Combining the harsh electronic tones and distorted guitar of industrial metal with a vocal and songwriting sensibility that aims for big pop hooks, babychaos’s newest single ‘Babylon’ is her most accomplished musical statement to date. Check it out we are very excited to her what y’all think! She’s definitely an icon.” – Ken Tighe, Cleopatra Records
“‘Babylon’ is about the inevitable vilification of people living their authentic truth. I’ve found that no matter what, people will project their inner wounds and fears into others no matter how morally good you may think you are. My mom told me growing up that people are going to talk no matter what, so you may as well give them something to talk about. This is exactly what that song is about as it’s been such a prominent theme in my life. Learning to dance in your darkness, even at your loneliest is something that no one can take from you.” – babychaos
When it comes to 21-year-old babychaos, the alternative model turned solo musician is anything but predictable. With a multi-range of influences that extend from industrial, rock, classical, and club music genres to nostalgic 90s and 2000s rock/metal soundscapes, babychaos delivers an intense, heavy, electronic, eclectic experience that is refreshing to the music scene. babychaos is no stranger to being confident in her skin. Her journey of breaking away from spiritual ties and turning that religious repression into art is one of many undisguised lyrical subjects the multi-genre artist touches on within her music. While babychaos is just getting started in the music industry, she hopes to use her stories to connect with others. With the Salem/Florida-based artist’s first 2021 single, “Flesh”, approaching over 1 million streams and currently working on her first EP with Cleopatra Records, the future looksbright for the up-and-coming artist.
“I’ve built a community of my listeners who are simply visionaries, and I love how they
use my music and art in general to fuel their own visions and creative endeavors.” – babychaos
“Babylon” was produced by: Goodjohn Productions and mixed/mastered at Wolfe Studios. The “Babylon” video was shot by 4102 productions.
The palette and precision of prolific synthesizer composer Hector Carlos Ramirez aka Auragraph has heightened incrementally since the project’s conception in 2018, but Reflection Plane – his 8th full-length, and first for Dais Records – finds him streamlining his sound even further, to its gleaming chrome essence.
Moody pads and sequential circuits cycle through cybernetic galleries of marble, ferns, and flickering screens, at the threshold of film score, slow techno, and hard vapor. The album’s nine tracks deploy an array of 80’s tonalities, from night drive arpeggios to Art Of Noise sample stabs to Seinfeld slap bass, but fused into a hybrid landscape of lucid dreaming and hypnotic horizon lines.
Today, Auragraph shares the first look at Reflection Plane with its sleek, glossy first single, “Escapism.”
Born in the Texas border town of Laredo, Ramirez relocated to Austin for film school, where he became fascinated by the local electronic underground scene spearheaded by S U R V I V E and the Holodeck Records network. But it was only after moving to Los Angeles to work in the music department of a film trailer house that he crossed paths with Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein of S U R V I V E, who were in need of an assistant for multiple ongoing projects. After helping out on National Geographic’s Valley Of The Boom miniseries, Ramirez officially joined the Stranger Things soundtrack team as a Score Mixing Engineer.
This intuitive expertise for audio design infuses Auragraph with a unique sense of fluidity and finesse, able to shift gears and integrate contrasts: sleek yet strange, icy but emotive, minimal though rich. Shades of classic EBM, 90’s electronica, and Dreamcast-era video game music glimmer here and there on certain tracks, but the cumulative effect of Reflection Plane is of entering a place outside of time and space, post- human and pristine. These are songs of parallel realities and second lives, freed from friction and gravity, playing on loop in a skybox sculpture garden at the ends of the earth.
Reflection Planeis available on digital formats now from Dais Records. Order here.
NEU!, the legendary Krautrock duo of Michael Rother and the late Klaus Dinger, celebrate the 50th anniversary of their self-titled debut album with the NEU! 50! box set, out September 23rd via Grönland. NEU! 50! includes albums NEU! NEU! 2! and NEU! 75 plus the brand new NEU! Tribute Album, a NEU! stencil and booklet. The Tribute Album features reworkings by The National, Idles, Man Man, Mogwai, Alexis Taylor, and more. Today, Grönland presents two new tracks off the tribute album – “Weissensee (Fink Version)” and “Zum Herz,” a new, NEU!-inspired song by Guerilla Toss.
NEU!’s version of “Weissensee” evokes a majestic river, cascading, waves crashing. Fink honors the beautiful, lapping waterscape of the track. “I have walked around Weissensee many times – a little urban lake in a pretty rundown part of Berlin - particularly beautiful when it’s frozen over. I had to try this one. Stepping up to NEU! and the anniversary of their debut was an honor, a challenge and a joy.” Listen to “Weissensee (Fink Version)” Guerilla Toss’s “Zum Herz” is a salute from a band whose members were not yet born in NEU!’s heyday. “Zum Herz” draws heavily from the NEU! aesthetic, with an emphasis on the repetitive beat and multi-layer guitar production. The band explains: “NEU! is one of the most important bands of the 20th century, and a personal favorite of GT’s. Their influence on psych, rock, punk, and electronic music is enormous. The lineage of so many great bands can be traced back to NEU!. We are thrilled to be part of this compilation. I like to think that the U.S. / U.K created Rock music, but the Germans made it forever weird. Thanks, NEU!“ Listen to “Zum Herz” by Guerilla Toss NEU! are a product of Düsseldorf, Germany, home to Kraftwerk’s Klingklang studios, as well as galleries, graphic designers and advertising agencies. Rother and Dinger drew on all of this and their impeccable musical training to create the overall concept of NEU!. They intended to create a previously unheard new music, aping the processes of commodification while remaining resolutely hostile to the commerciality of the music industry. Like other experimental bands of the late 60s and early 70s gathered under the Krautrock banner, NEU! were driven by a mixture of political and artistic imperatives to reject the clichés and conventions of orthodox, blues-based Anglo-American rock and create a music that was, formally, West German in origin.
NEU! are one of the great, belated success stories of rock music. Their influence continues to be internationally widespread. Since paving their own road ahead, they’ve created a model of forward propulsion away from conventional rock clichés. The NEU! Tribute album shows how much there is for subsequent generations to unpack in NEU!, how much is buried, implied in their sound. Watch “Hallogallo (Stephen Morris and Gabe Gurnsey Remix)” Visualizer
NEU! Tribute Album Tracklist: 1. Im Glück (The National Remix) 2. Weissensee (Fink Version) 3. Super (Mogwai Remix) 4. 4+1=5 – Alexis Taylor 5. Hallogallo (Stephen Morris and Gabe Gurnsey Remix) 6. Lieber Honig (Yann Tiersen Remix) 7. Super (Man Man Remix) 8. Negativland (Idles Negative Space Rework) 9. Zum Herz – Guerilla Toss 10. After Eight (They Hate Change Cover)
Today, John Cale presents “Night Crawling,” his first new music since 2020 when he released the single, “Lazy Day,” and collaborated with Kelly Lee Owens on “Corner of My Sky.” “Night Crawling” is a taste of much more to come from Cale, and precedes his fall UK tour, which includes his first performances since pre-pandemic (more to come on the touring front in 2023, as well). Cale wrote “Night Crawling” with a nod to ’70s NYC pre-disco, recalling times when he and David Bowie would traverse the city at night. Throughout the track, Cale layers his inimitable vocals with a skipping beat and hovering bass. As it expands, it becomes nearly danceable with jockeying percussion and whirs of synth. Cale played nearly every instrument on the track, aside from additional drums by Deantoni Parks and backing vocals by Dustin Boyer, and it was mixed by Seven Davis, Jr.. The accompanying video, animated by Mickey Miles, visualizes the song’s vibrant sounds with colorful, retro animation.
Cale further explains: “It’s been a helluva past 2 years and I’m glad to finally share a glimpse of what’s coming ahead. There was this period around mid-late ’70s when David and I would run into each other in NY. There was plenty of talk about getting some work done but of course we’d end up running the streets, sometimes until we couldn’t keep a thought in our heads, let alone actually get a song together! One night we managed to meet up for a benefit concert where I taught him a viola part so we could perform together. When I wrote ‘Night Crawling,’ it was a reflective moment of particular times. That kind of NYC that held art in its grip, strong enough to keep it safe and dangerous enough to keep it interesting. I always figured we’d have another go at the two of us recording together, this time without the interference of being perpetually off our heads! The thing about creating music is the ability to divine a thought or feeling even when reality says it’s a logical impossibility.”
John Cale Tour Dates Sun. Oct. 23 – Edinburgh, UK @ The Queen’s Hall Mon. Oct. 24 – York, UK @ Barbican Fri. Oct. 28 – Cardiff, WLS @ Llais Festival * Mon. Oct. 31 – Whitley Bay, UK @ Playhouse Whitley Bay Thu. Nov. 3 – Birmingham, UK @ Birmingham Town Hall Mon. Nov. 7 – Bexhill on Sea, UK @ De La Warr Pavilion Wed. Nov. 9 – London, UK @ The London Palladium Thu. Nov. 10 – Cambridge, UK @ Cambridge Corn Exchange Fri. Nov. 11 – Liverpool, UK @ Liverpool Philharmonic Hall
* = John Cale + special guests, 80th Birthday Celebration
Keep your mind open.
[Crawl over to the subscription box while you’re here.]
Named after a 1981 Toyota Celica they bought on Craigslist, Brijean‘s lovely new EP, Angelo, is another lush, breezy, dreamy record from the duo that captivates you right away.
The EP starts by asking us “Which Way to the Club?” Just follow the sounds of Brijean’s great bass notes and playful drums, and they’ll take you straight into “Take a Trip” – which is delightfully trippy and bubbly, almost tickling you with its beats. The record was written during the pandemic, with the duo (Brijean Murphy on vocals and percussion, Doug Stuart on production and multiple instruments), like the rest of us, experiencing upheaval and loss. Writing and record Angelo became a way for them to escape the gloom by dreaming about what was and what could come after the pandemic.
“Shy Guy” encourages everyone to dance again, or even for the first time (“Show me how you like to move. I feel something, too.”). Their fun beats certainly help nudge you onto the dance floor. The title track tones down the dream-synths a bit to make room for more house beats. “Ooo La La” has some of the heftiest bass on the record.
The brief, dreamy “Colors” drifts into “Where Do We Go from Here?” – a song that has Murphy contemplating space-time and our place in it. “Caldwell’s Way” has Murphy and Stuart pining for a place they left behind when they moved away from Southern California. You can hear the yearning in Murphy’s voice, but also the conviction that she knows they might the right decision. The EP even closes with a short instrumental called “Nostalgia.”
It’s another winner from Brijean, and a record that will brighten a room.
Today, Girl Talk – aka Pittsburgh-based producer Gregg Gillis – announces a fall/winter 2022 North American tour. Tickets are on sale now. This announcement follows the release of Full Court Press, Girl Talk’s “timeless” (HYPEBEAST) collaborative album with Wiz Khalifa, Big K.R.I.T and Smoke DZA, released this past spring on Asylum/Taylor Gang. Gillis rose to prominence off his meticulous construction of genre-smashing sample-based music, and these breakneck-paced party jams are championed in his euphoric live shows. Girl Talk’s forthcoming tour will see him performing in Las Vegas, Houston, Sacramento and more, all cities he did not play on the spring 2022 tour. Full dates are listed below.
In conjunction with the tour announcement, Girl Talk releases a remix of Full Court Press’ “Ain’t No Fun,” which blends the vocals with elements of Harry Styles’ hit “As It Was.” Additionally, he’s released an acapella version of Full Court Press as a free download. This is an opportunity for other producers or music enthusiasts to be able to use the vocals from the album in their own remixes or DJ sets.
With each Girl Talk album, from his breakout Night Ripper (2006) to Feed The Animals (2008) and All Day(2010), Gillis’ work has become increasingly detailed and complex. The last several years have seen Gillis focusing on production work for some of his favorite rap artists, including Wiz Khalifa, T-Pain, Tory Lanez, Young Nudy, Bas, Cozz, Erick The Architect (from Flatbush Zombies), Smoke DZA, Don Q, and Freeway. This year’s Full Court Press was a culmination of friendships going back ten-plus years and a “unique intersection of all of our work,” says Gillis.
Girl Talk Tour Dates Fri. Sep. 16 – Las Vegas, NV @ Brooklyn Bowl Fri. Sep. 23 – Richmond, VA @ The National Sun. Sep. 25 – Dover, DE @ Firefly Music Festival Thu. Nov. 3 – Columbus, OH @ KEMBA Live! Fri. Nov. 4 – Detroit, MI @ St. Andrew’s Hall Sat. Nov. 5 – Indianapolis, IN @ The Vogue Thu. Nov. 10 – Tulsa, OK @ Cain’s Ballroom Fri. Nov. 11- Houston, TX @ White Oak Music Hall Thu. Nov. 17 – Santa Cruz, CA @ The Catalyst Fri. Nov. 18 – San Francisco, CA @ The Fillmore Sat. Nov. 19 – Sacramento, CA @ Ace of Spades Fri. Dec. 9 – St. Petersburg, FL @ Jannus Live Sat. Dec. 10 – Fort Lauderdale, FL @ Revolution Thu. Dec. 15 – Orlando, FL @ The Beacham Fri. Dec. 16 – Atlanta, GA @ Buckhead Theatre Sat. Dec. 17 – Nashville, TN @ Marathon Music Works
Renowned composer, producer and performer Nils Frahm releases a new single, “Lemon Day,” from his forthcoming album, Music For Animals, out September 23rd on LEITER. The track unfolds at an unhurried, meditative pace in a celebration of tone, timbre and texture, before building up itself in a complex atmospheric way of playing. While the beginning reveals a dark and thoughtful mood, the dynamic evolves into a warm and light tone.
Containing ten tracks and clocking in at over three hours long, Music For Animals is an ambitious and compelling set different to anything Frahm’s released to date. In fact, it finds the Piano Day founder declining to use a piano, but at the same time retains many of the qualities that have set the influential musician’s work apart over much of the last two decades. “My constant inspiration,” Frahm explains, “was something as mesmerizing as watching a great waterfall or the leaves on a tree in a storm. It’s good we have symphonies and music where there’s a development, but a waterfall doesn’t need an Act 1, 2, 3, then an outcome, and nor do the leaves on a tree in a storm. Some people like watching the leaves rustle and the branches move. This record is for them.”
As a title, Music For Animals is a tongue-in-cheek nod to the conceptual albums of the 1950s – like Raymond Scott’s Music For Babies – as well as to contemporary playlist habits. “I feel a certain frustration with the functional use of music these days, all these playlists with names like Music for Sleeping, Music for Focus, Music for Masturbation,” Frahm laughs. “Music always seems to need to do something useful. That’s a very client-driven logic: the client needs something, the music should deliver that, otherwise ‘You’re Fired!’ With this album, there was no specific audience in mind, and nor was it adapted to any particular purpose. But in fact, it seemed to please the animals I’ve spent a lot of time with these last months, so, you know: if you can’t beat them, join them…!”
At three hours long, Music For Animals might seem initially intimidating, but the truth is that this substantial collection encourages listeners to bask in its tranquility at their chosen depth, demanding only as much attention as they wish to contribute. As Frahm himself happily points out, “It all comes back to that waterfall. If you want to watch it, watch it. If you don’t, then you don’t have to. It will always be the same, yet never quite the same.” Indeed, that’s Music For Animals’ greatest strength. Instantly recognizable, it’s still like nothing else.
Following a European leg, Frahm will tour across North America in support of Music For Animals. A full list of dates can be found below and tickets for all shows are on sale now.
Los Angeles-based artist Rochelle Jordan announces Play With The Changes Remixed, a reimagination of her acclaimed 2021 album Play With The Changes, out September 16th on Young Art Records. In conjunction, Jordan unveils its lead single, “Love You Good (Remix)” ft. LSDXOXO and announces a fall North American tour supporting Channel Tres. A year after Play With The Changes and her recent sold-out headline tour, which also included select dates opening for Kaytranada, Jordan taps him along with Sango, Byron The Aquarius, Soul Clap, and more to expand on the album’s futuristic sonic landscape. “Love You Good (Remix)” finds Jordan and LSDXOXO’s vocals intertwining atop an irresistible beat, reiterating Jordan’s original thesis for Play With The Changes: without experimentation, innovation is impossible.
Defying categorization to create a project full of slinky, dancefloor-packing burners that channel her U.K. roots, Play With the Changes is reminiscent of Jordan’s childhood nights spent listening to her brother’s 2-step hymns from the other side of the wall. Garnering year end praise from Billboard, Bandcamp, and more, Play With The Changes presents Jordan as a modern heir in a lineage of powerhouse vocalists with style and imagination.
Play With The Changes Remixed Tracklist: 1. Situation (&Me Remix) 2. Dancing Elephants (DJ Minx Remix) 3. Got Em (Sango Remix) 4. Count It (KLSH Remix) 5. All Along (Kaytranada Remix) 6. Nothing Left (Kingdom Remix) 7. Lay (Machinedrum Remix) 8. Love You Good (Remix) ft. LSDXOXO 9. Next 2 You (Sinistarr Remix) 10. Already (Things You Say Remix) 11. Broken Steel (Soul Clap Remix) 12. Something (Byron The Aquarius Remix)
Rochelle Jordan Tour Dates: (all dates supporting Channel Tres) Tue. Sep. 27 – Phoenix, AZ @ Crescent Ballroom Wed. Sep. 28 – Albuquerque @ Electric Playhouse Fri. Sep. 30 – Austin, TX @ Emo’s Sat. Oct. 1- Dallas, TX @ The Echo Sun. Oct. 2 – Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live – Studio Tue. Oct. 4 – Atlanta, GA @ Variety Playhouse Thu. Oct. 6 – Detroit, MI @ Leland City Park Fri. Oct. 7 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Hall Sat. Oct. 8 – Montreal, QC @ S.A.T Tue. Oct. 11 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts Thu. Oct. 13 – Washington, DC @ Culture Fri. Oct. 14 – New York, NY @ Brooklyn Steel Tue. Dec. 6 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda Theater Wed. Dec. 7 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda Theater Sat. Dec. 10 – San Luis Obispo, CA @ The Fremont Theater Wed. Dec. 14 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom Thu. Dec. 15 – Seattle, WA @ The Showbox Fri. Dec. 16 – Vancouver, BC @ Celebrities Nightclub
Thanks to all who tuned in for my deep dive of Kraftwerk. It was a fun show. Here’s the set list from July 17, 2022.
Kraftwerk – The Robots
Organisation – Silver Forest
NEU! – Isi
Kraftwerk – First Techno (live)
Kraftwerk – Köln II (live)
Kraftwerk – Elektrischesroulette
MC5 – Kick Out the Jams (live)
Kraftwerk – Autobahn (single version)
Kraftwerk – Radioactivity
Kraftwerk – Trans Europa Express (original German language version)
Kraftwerk – Les Mannequins (original French language version)
Joy Division – Dead Souls
Kraftwerk – The Model
Kraftwerk – Computer Love
Kraftwerk – Pocket Calculator (live)
LCD Soundsystem – Disco Infiltrator (single version)
Kraftwerk – Electric Café
Kraftwerk – The Telephone Call
Siouxsie and the Banshees – Hall of Mirrors
Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark – Neon Lights
Kraftwerk – Elektro Kardiogramm
The next deep dive will be either July 24th or July 30th (depending on some travel plans I have for the weekend of the 24th) and will cover the music of Tom Jones.