Indie | NovaFuture Blog

out now: The Allegorist – Hybrid Dimension II [Awaken Chronicles]

Artist:
The Allegorist

Title:
Hybrid Dimension II

Label:
Awaken Chronicles

Cat#:
ACH001

Release Date:
07th May 2021

Format:
download & streaming

Tracklist:
01.
Collective Energies

02.
Desired Changes

03.
Imposed Rules

04.
Ocean Waves

05.
Disillusion Echoes

06.
Left Behind

07.
Dark Forces

08.
Shiny Material

09.
Unlimited Dedication

10.
New Beginning

11.
Risen Again

12.
Harvest Season

Press Info:
The love and dedication that Anna Jordan aka The Allegorist places in each project she pursues reflects an artist that thrives on creativity and creation itself, turning thoughts and narratives into a near-palpable reality. As an electronic music producer, singer, visual artist, sound designer or painter, she gathers in herself an ideal skill set that enables her to visualize a sonic reality, translatable into several artforms that comply with her futuristic, forward- thinking vision under her musical alias, The Allegorist.

With Hybrid Dimension I via Los Angeles’ Detroit Underground, Jordan created an extensive audiovisual experience, treading the realms of downtempo electronica, ambient and spatial exploration, having her track and video for ‘Humandroid Lovers’ featured at the Hong Kong Arthouse Film Festival in late 2018.

The Allegorist’s new album, Hybrid Dimensions II, gives continuity to the galactic journey initiated by the protagonist, a girl that overcame her fears to become the Dragon Rider. She now finds herself standing on the boat known as The Viking Thunder, facing a foreign land – the unknown. (see Storybook below)

Hybrid Dimension II comprises twelve-tracks of otherworldly soundscapes, electronic textures of grand embodiment, proportion, sounds of lament and dissociation. Hypnotic and fragile on the verge of desolation, Jordan’s ability to occupy the surrounding space with her technical performance is immersive, with it requiring detailed attention to connect the layers of dense, symbiotic melodies.

‘But there is a sort of light, so small that it can only be seen in the deepest darkness. It wasn’t there at the boat or ruins, where everybody was looking for it. It was inside of all of them. ‘

Aiming for solace, Hybrid Dimensions II’s journey conquers higher planes, achieving its goals of unification and closure, soundtracked with great depth, detail and made with an invaluable amount of passion and consistency by The Allegorist. For the protagonist, her story concludes after batting great distances, facing dark encounters, but in the end, she came, conquered and left, whole again.

The Allegorist sings in the fictional and majestic Mondoneoh language, to connect all nations.

Storybook: The Allegorist – HYBRID DIMENSION II
Standing on the boat, the sun was rising and she could feel the cold wind on her face. The ocean was peacefully moving, slowly in perfect harmony. Soon they would reach the island. With joyful anticipation they could already see it.

Weeks passed but the size of the island wouldn’t grow, it seemed that it didn’t matter what they did, they weren’t moving forward. Unnoticeably days were becoming shorter, the nights longer until everything was in complete darkness. Fights for the glowing stones and power started, and self-declared leaders established the wrong rules.

Suddenly everything was trembling and shaking with a loud noise. The boat had run aground. Under the rocks they discovered the ruins of a past empire. After a while, the stones weren’t glowing anymore. Everybody started to lose the sense of time and memories of faces faded until they became nothing but voices in the dark. They sounded more and more distressed and less human, some disappeared into the ocean forever.

She used to go back up to the boat, where in the cold darkness she would listen to the stories of the galaxy above. It was certainly a mistake that she was being trapped in a place, where she did not belong. But there is a sort of light, so small that it can only be seen in the deepest darkness. It wasn’t there at the boat or ruins, where everybody was looking for it. It was inside of all of them.

When she realized the light was in herself, standing on the rocks, she tore her chest apart. The ray of light from her chest lifted her body up, then crashed down into the waters and disappeared. Once again darkness engulfed everything. Soon little spots started to light up. All over the black ocean the hearts of the floating dead, people of the past millennium started to shine.

The ocean dried up and on its soil trees sprouted out of the wizened bodies. The ruins of the past empire broke open and seeds from the future were falling from the blue sky. The rivers were filled with fish and on their shores children were playing. And where once time seemed to have stopped, the present became one with the first dimension, which started with the hopeful excitement of new exotic expeditions.

Snippets:
soon

Full Track Streaming:
“Disillusion Echoes”

“Harvest Season”

“Desired Changes”

“Shiny Material”

“Unlimited Dedication”

“Ocean Waves”

“Collective Energies”

“New Beginning”

“Imposed Rules”

more soon

Video:
“Dark Forces”

Video made by Arsen Arzumanyan

Special:
“Live at Lumin Essence | 12.02.2021”

Buy Download:
The Allegorist @ Bandcamp
JunoDownload
iTunes
7Digital
Clone Digital
Amazon
more soon

Commercial Streaming Services:
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Youtube Music

Websites:
The Allegorist
Awaken Chronicles

out now: Schlammpeitziger – Ein Weltleck In Der Echokammer [Bureau B]

Artist:
Schlammpeitziger

Title:
Ein Weltleck In Der Echokammer

Label:
Bureau B

Cat#:
BB345

Release Date:
25th September 2020

Format:
CD, LP, download & streaming

Tracklist:
01.
Weltleck

02.
Wohlwegewerk

03.
Tanzfußfalle

04.
Handicapfalter

05.
Hüftgoldpolka

06.
Every Dayhey

07.
Wurfhalm Wiggo

08.
Rappelvolle Leere

Press Info (English):
Schlammpeitziger is the alias of musician, illustrator and performance artist Jo Zimmermann. He has been an integral figure in the evolving sound of Cologne since 1992, releasing his surrealist lo-fi krautronica on imprints such as A-Musik, Pingipung and Sonig.

“Ein Weltleck in der Echokammer” is the tenth Schlammpeitziger opus and his second album to appear on the Hamburg-based label Bureau B. The first notes of the opening title track Weltleck instantly confirm that this is no run-of-the-mill record. Jo Zimmermann confounds expectations as he wraps the art-electro sound of Schlammpeitziger in otherworldly dub echo loops –a surprising, yet perfectly coherent development.

Jo Zimmermann elaborates on the new Schlammpeitziger sound: “Reggae expert Bettina Lattak is a good friend of mine and she has been telling me for years that there are dub and reggae influences in my music. I had never really given it much thought, but when I began to introduce these elements more consciously into my music, everything clicked into place quite naturally. I found it fascinating, completely free of any religious context, simply following the sound.”

Not that these eight sun-drenched tracks are exclusively in the realm of dub rhythm; they are also sprinkled with disco beats, beguilingly low-flying bass and dreamy, sweeping melodic arcs – everything for which we have come to love Schlammpeitziger. He launches us into outer space before bringing us back down to the prosaic dancefloors of earth.

Another new aspect is that Jo Zimmermann sings on three of the tracks, translating the whimsical, curious nature of the music into an equally unique vernacular. His verbal expansion of the enraptured cosmos illuminates the brightly lit world outside the echo chamber on “Handicapfalter”, referencing Kraftwerk’s “Spiegelsaal” like a steel drum Absurdistan. Elsewhere, “Every Dayhey” floats like a weightless rainy Sunday dub, a dull sensation of gentle melancholy seeping into the morning after a long, long night.

Stefan Mohr, the producer from Cologne, mixed the album as he did its predecessor. Zimmermann and his congenial colleague Ulrike Göken have once again crafted the cover art and created a video in visual interpretations woven from the same fabric as Schlammpeitziger’s music.

“Ein Weltleck in der Echokammer” is an album which offers answers to questions that nobody is able to ask. Dancing feet caught in a trap, lost in crowded emptiness or sucked into space through a leak in the world – only Schlammpeitziger can do the lot.

– Andreas Dorau

Press Info (German):
Schlammpeitziger ist die Kunstfigur des Musikers, Zeichners und Performancekünstlers Jo Zimmermann. Bereits seit 1992 prägt er mit seinem surrealistischen Lo-Fi Krautronica und zahlreichen Veröffentlichungen bei A-Musik, Pingipung und Sonig den Sound of Cologne entscheidend mit.

“Ein Weltleck in der Echokammer” ist bereits das zehnte Schlammpeitziger Werk und zugleich das zweite Album, das beim Hamburger Label Bureau B erscheint, doch schon nach wenigen Sekunden im Eröffnungs- und Titeltrack “Weltleck” wird klar, dass Jo Zimmermann mit allem anderen als einer routinierten oder erwartbaren Platte aufwartet. Der eigenwillige Art-Electro-Sound von Schlammpeitziger trifft auf außerweltliche Dub-Echoschleifen. Eine Entwicklung, die ebenso überraschend als auch naheliegend scheint.

Jo Zimmermann über den neuen Schlammpeitziger-Sound: “Eine gute Freundin von mir, Reggae-Expertin Bettina Lattak sagte schon seit Jahren: Deine Musik hat Dub- und Reggae-Einflüsse. Ich selbst hab’s selber nie so wahrgenommen, es hat aber beim einfügen in meine Musik sofort funktioniert. Für mich sehr interessant, ganz frei von allen religiösen Kontexten, allein dem Klang nach”.

Doch auf den acht sonnendurchfluteten Stücken finden sich nicht nur Dub-Rhythmen; auch Disco-Beats, betörend tiefliegende Bässe und die verträumten, schwurbelnden Melodiebögen, für die man Schlammpeitziger so liebt, die einen weit ins All hinaus tragen und wieder auf den Tanzboden der Tatsachen zurückholen.

Auf drei Tracks erklingt Jo Zimmermann erstmals auch als Sänger und übersetzt die Verspieltheit und Kuriosität der Musik in eine ebensolche eigentümliche Sprache, die den entrückten Kosmos verbal erweitert. So erwartet einen in „Handicapfalter“ die lichtdurchflutete Welt außerhalb der Echokammer wie ein Steeldrum-Absurdistan von Kraftwerks „Spiegelsaal“ während „Every Dayhey“ wie ein schwereloser, von sanfter Melancholie verhangener Sonntagsregenwetterdub an den Morgen nach einer viel zu langen Nacht erinnert.

Gemischt wurde das Album wie auch der Vorgänger von dem Kölner Produzenten Stefan Mohr. Untrennbar verwoben mit der Musik von Schlammpeitziger ist zudem die optische Umsetzung von Cover und Videos, die einmal mehr von Zimmermann und seiner kongenialen Kollegin Ulrike Göken verwirklicht wurde.

“Ein Weltleck in der Echokammer” ist ein Album, das Antworten auf Fragen liefert, die niemand zu stellen vermag. Ob verfangen in der Tanzfußfalle, in rappelvoller Leere untergangen oder durch das Weltleck hinaus den Weltraum gesogen – das kann wirklich nur der Schlammpeitziger.

– Andreas Dorau

Full Track Streaming:

Videos:
“Weltleck”

“Every Dayhey”

“Wurfhalm Wiggo”

Recommendations:
Schlammpeitziger’s “Damenbartblick Auf Pregnant Hill” on Bureau B
Schlammpeitziger’s album “Vorausschauende Bebauung” on Sonig
Schlammpeitziger’s album “What’s Fruit?” on Pingipung Records
Schlammpeitziger’s EP “What’s Fruit? (Remixes)” on Pingipung Records

Special:
“NovaFuture Blog Exclusive Mix”

Buy CD:
Tapete Records
Schlammpeitziger @ Bandcamp
Amazon
WOM
Juno
Flight13
MediaMarkt
Boomkat
Rough Trade
more soon

Buy Vinyl:
Tapete Records
Schlammpeitziger @ Bandcamp
Deejay
Amazon
WOM
Juno
HHV
Flight13
MediaMarkt
Boomkat
Rough Trade
more soon

Buy Download:
Schlammpeitziger @ Bandcamp
Boomkat
Beatport
iTunes
Qobuz
more soon

Commercial Streaming Services:
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Qobuz
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Spotify
Youtube Music

Websites:
Schlammpeitziger
Bureau B

out for a while: Polly Scattergood – In This Moment (Remixes Part 1) [Future Paradise]

Artist:
Polly Scattergood

Title:
In This Moment(Remixes Part 1)

Label:
Future Paradise

Cat#:
FTRPAR6DD

Release Date:
08th May 2020

Format:
digital

Tracklist:
01.
Red
(Maps Remix Edit)

02.
After You
(Polly-phonic Remix Edit)

03.
Red
(Maps Remix)

04.
After You
(Polly-phonic Remix)

Press Info:
…

Snippets:
@ Amazon

Special:
“The Femme Fatales Mixtape”

Recommendation:
album “Arrows” on Mute

Buy Digital:
Amazon
iTunes
Boomkat
more soon

Commercial Streaming Services:
Spotify
Tidal
Deezer
Youtube Music

Websites:
Polly Scattergood

out for a while: Wrangler – A Situation [Bella Union]

Artist:
Wrangler

Title:
A Situation

Label:
Bella Union

Cat#:
BELLA984

Release Date:
28th February 2020

Format:
CD, vinyl & digital

Tracklist:
01.
Anthropocene

02.
How To Start A Revolution

03.
Machines Designed (To Eat You Up)

04.
Mess

05.
Knowledge Deficit

06.
Rhizomatic

07.
Anarchy Of Sound

08.
Slide

09.
A Situation

10.
White Noise

Press Info:
When Wrangler first formed like Voltron a decade ago, they had a very simple modus operandi. The clue was in their name. Ben ‘Benge’ Edwards (The Maths), Stephen ‘Mal’ Mallinder (Cabaret Voltaire) and Phil ‘Phil’ Winter (Tuung) would get together with a very select kit list of careworn analog synthesizers and vintage digital sequencers. Their task? To wrangle new music from the ancient equipment. These self-imposed restrictions helped produced two classic long players: LA Spark (2014) and White Glue (2016).

However the times have changed and so have Wrangler. The coming decade, which looks set to be dubbed the Terrible Twenties, may be the last time that bands actually get to release albums. Ecological collapse, climate crisis, food shortages and the disintegration of the fabric of society will mean that the slow devolution of the music industry isn’t even one of the main things that musicians (or anyone else) should be worrying about. So the trio have thrown everything into their third (but hopefully not their last) album. The result – A Situation out this month on Bella Union – is simultaneously their bleakest and funkiest release to date.

This collection of warm, reverberant, amped up tracks, that land somewhere between future music, synth pop, industrial dance, classic techno and rigid electro, captures the ambiguities of the group perfectly. Just as they use the ageing outmoded equipment that other people once chose to throw away in order to make tomorrow’s music, they are the paranoid group who (just about) dare to hope that things still might turn out OK. They cast a doleful eye across the hellscape of 2019 and state, if the end is truly nigh, then it’s never been more important to celebrate the little time we have left. And if a revolution to save ourselves is possible then we’re all in need of a revolutionary party, with a revolutionary soundtrack to match.

Even though their first two albums were released on Benge’s own MemeTune label he was unsure that he had the time and energy to release A Situation. The solution was staring them in the face however. In 2018 the members of Wrangler along with revered American musician, John Grant released Mr Dynamite on Bella Union, their debut as Creep Show. Label boss Simon Raymonde heard the tracks and loved them: Wrangler now had a new home. For Mal it almost feels like a family affair: “I was best friends with Robin [Guthrie] and Liz [Fraser] of Cocteau Twins and when Simon joined the group I got to know him really well. I was more from a club music background but I loved what the Cocteaus did.”

Phil adds that there’s no real need for them to define the difference between Wrangler and Creep Show, as the chemistry is completely different: “It’s not just John’s vocals but the way he plays synths and programmes rhythms is unique, so that music can’t help but have its own character. It’s the result of a four way democracy instead of a three way democracy.”

The album title A Situation is purposefully ambiguous perhaps referring to a job that needs doing or a nettle that needs to be grasped; perhaps referring to an unspecified event that is potentially either an opportunity or a threat. The mood is set by ‘Anthropocene’ which concerns the collapse and fall of human civilisation. As Mal points out: “If a future archaeologist digs down into the rocks they probably won’t find any human fossils, just a very thin layer of plastic and some rust patches. There’s an inevitability because the wheels have already been set in motion but that doesn’t mean we should ignore what’s going on, we should be taking care of things regardless. So this is about reaching out to other people before it’s too late rather than building walls.They’re the first fucking things that are going to fall down in the Anthropocene!”

‘How To Start A Revolution’ contains a different kind of warning. Mal says: “There was originally a little bit of irony in this track but if anything the world has become even scarier in the last two years. If you keep on pushing people there will come a tipping point and it will come back to bite you. There’s no irony left any more.” ‘Machines Designed (To Eat You Up)’ is about the fully-automated AI state surveillance that threatens us all. It looks like the future that Cabaret Voltaire warned us about over four decades ago is now finally here. Mal says: “It’s not my fault! I take no satisfaction at all in this stuff coming true. If it felt dystopian then, it feels more dystopian now. Wrangler are still questioning power but some of the tools of power have changed. I’m now fearful of Google in the same way I was fearful of Thatcher in the 80s.” Phill adds: “In the 70s and 80s if you wanted to have a go you could any weekend of the year but nowadays it’s harder to see who the enemy is and where they are. Come on out and have a go. Where are you hiding?” Benge concludes: “People are aware of the problems with Google, Facebook, 5g, social media, etc. but they’re woven into everything we do, so impossible to deal with.” Addressing the multiple failures of the internet ‘Mess’ originally had the more prosaic title ‘It’s A Fucking Mess’ which just about says it all. ‘White Noise’ is perhaps the bleakest track of all, based round a spoken word piece by Mal, inspired by a reflection on JG Ballard’s notorious and transgressive experimental novel The Atrocity Exhibition.

But Wrangler refuse to ignore the possibility of hope. The mirror image of ‘Mess’ comes in the shape of the copper-bottomed Kraftwerkian techno pop banger, ‘Rhizomatic’. In 1980, French philosophers Félix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze came up with the idea of complex connectivity between “nodes” which eerily predicted the way the internet would work. As Mal says: “It’s an uplifting song, simply because the decentralisation of technology is the one aspect of the internet that might save us.” On the track ‘Anarchy Of Sound’ the group call up perhaps their most unlikely influence to date: the ancient Greek mathematician Euclid Of Athens. Benge explains: “We’ve built weird things into this track called Euclid patterns.” Mal, who studied the history of rhythm for his PhD concludes: “They’ve been part of culture for millennia and explain African drumming as much as Elvis Presley.” But perhaps the most positive aspect of the album is hardwired into the DNA of the track ‘Slide’ simply because it stands on a continuum with the most uplifting of jacking Chicago house and the most utopian of New York garage.

Both sides of the coin – the dystopian and the utopian – are necessary for Wrangler to work. Phil sums it up the most succinctly when he says: “The heavier things get, the more I just want to jump around and have some fun.” John Doran, Wiltshire, 2019

Snippets:

Videos:
“Anthropocene”

“Machines Designed (To Eat You Up)”

Special:
Stephen Mallinder (Cabaret Voltaire, Wrangler) – “FBRGuestMix5”

Buy CD:
Bella Union Store
Wrangler @ Bandcamp
Rough Trade
Juno
Amazon
Bleep
more soon

Buy Vinyl:
Bella Union Store
Wrangler @ Bandcamp
Rough Trade
Juno
Amazon
Bleep
Deejay
more soon

Buy Digital:
Bella Union Store
Wrangler @ Bandcamp
JunoDownload
iTunes
Google Play
Beatport Classic
Bleep
Boomkat
TraxSource
more soon

Commercial Streaming Services:
Spotify
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Tidal
Youtube Music

Websites:
Wrangler
Bella Union

out for a while: Kreidler – Flood [Bureau B]

Artist:
Kreidler

Title:
Flood

Label:
Bureau B

Cat#:
BB321

Release Date:
25th October 2019

Format:
CD, vinyl & digital

Tracklist:
01.
Eurydike

02.
Celeration

03.
Nesindano

04.
Flood I

05.
Flood II

06.
Flood III

07.
Flood IV

08.
Flood V

Press Info:
EURYDIKE – CELERATION – NESINDANO – FLOOD I – IV – FLOOD V – the song titles of the new KREIDLER album.

FLOOD is the frame, though it is a permeable one. ANDERS CLAUSEN and HENRIK OLESEN have placed a feather on the cover and written A SHIP OF NO PORT on the inner sleeve. Movement frozen in luminescent yellow. Green-grey liquefaction. Nature and construct, fluttering. A ship of no ports, not wanting to dock anywhere. Or everywhere: a ship of many ports – openings, open access, outstretched arms. Welcome! This dance is yours!

THOMAS KLEIN, ALEXANDER PAULICK, ANDREAS REIHSE and DETLEF WEINRICH assembled in Düsseldorf in winter of 2018 for recordings, and then continued with further sessions in Berlin. Starting with around a dozen sketches, the band produced eight pieces, including FLOOD I – IV and FLOOD V, an ensemble of five songs that – in LP terms – fills the entire second side of the album.

But let’s start from the beginning. Side One – still speaking in LP terms – begins pleasantly enough with the gentle roll and slight murmur of EURYDIKE. Borrowed from Greek mythology, the title refers to the pretense of affection as a means of abandonment. Painting scars onto the skin, using self-deception and lies, walking over corpses to flatter stones. We don’t need to mention HIS name here, and anyway, the gender is variable. The song is called EURYDIKE: the wistful saxophone, the bass notes, the slight trembling in the sound all speak of her awakening from dis–illusion –from grief that the backward look is no assurance of striding forward together, but only a vis–a–vìs intent to put the other out of the picture then fill it with his own poisonous glory. The song depaints how EURYDIKE transforms her enforced departure into victory, with the quiet certainty that she will never be forgotten.

»Hvis man mildner hjertet i rette tid/ Og ikke vil dæmme op for den rasende strøm med vold«
(A&W, Prometheus.nu, Okeanos Scene, Betty Nansen Teatret, Copenhagen)

CELERATION, the second piece, seems to accelerate. But if we listen closely, the pace of EURYDIKE is actually maintained. The tone becomes sharper, the rhythm creaky, the rolling more energetic, the sequence calls for a sacrifice. Wind breaks off, snare strikes, a melody rises out of a dark rumbling, ghosts circle over the city, a heavy yellow freight train rumbles past

»You can’t stop running water«
(The Neville Brothers, Sons & Daughters)

A shimmy, a scuttle, a quarter step: NESINDANO. The voice we hear is KHOES, alias Nesindano Namises; the language we hear is Khoekhoe / Damara. A gong, a CR-78 joins, a clicking, a flicker, words flutter, a bass booms, the voice rises up to the hookline, an FM synthesizer picks up the pieces and carries them along, percussion rattles. Agit-Pop! a pronunciamento to dance with the powers, a dance against power: »sida huada, ti a, sa « = all of it is ours, mine and yours! A shimmy, a scuttle, a quarter step, a bow. FLOOD.

“I won’t be entertaining guests / When my house is flooded mess”
(Mashrou’ Leila, Falyakon)

Shall we speak of floods where the river overflows in abundance, while one person’s shortage becomes another’s surplus. FLOOD I – IV is not about modesty or humility. It calls for always demanding the maximum – of oneself and for oneself – which also means to give, and that each may set their own limits while respecting others, accepting them and helping where help is needed.

»Wir sitzen alle im selben Boot«
(D.J.)

RICARDO DOMENECK takes on FLOOD II while looking out over the sea in Brazil, his feet in the sand for a few minutes, recalling a conversation with a geologist: how every single grain spans a space of millions of years. Crushed from stone, purged of rock, washed down by mountains, times and tides. The language we hear is Portuguese. FLOOD I – IV Synthesizers, strings, rusty percussion, guitars enter into dialogue, a collaborative negotiation, a swelling and descending, a showering in transparent layers, banging on shore, heads are rolling, liquefying hierarchies not structures. FLOOD IV is a dance that flows into FLOOD V, taking with it its instrumentation and mood, and moving it into a state between an easy-elegiac thoughtfulness and a concentrated contemplation. In appearance, FLOOD V bends back toward EURYDIKE, but this circle is not closed, it expands, opening wide in all directions, and offers opportunities to dock, to keep going.

KREIDLER, this four-headed hydra of a continental pop music that captures Bach, Disco, Postpunk, Club and Krautrock in varying proportions with an elegant lightness. On FLOOD the band playfully expands its approach with two renowned voices. We hear language, information. And even though we may not understand them at first, we sense that these are words of weight. An emphasis on what KREIDLER has always been about: the movement of the body – hand in hand with that of the mind.

V. Luxemburgo

Full Track Streaming:

Video:
“Eurydike”