Juno Recommends Experimental: April 2023

Review: After his superlative and rather unexpected foray into Afro and Latin fusion with his Sol Set project, John Beltran returns to more familiar territory with a rendition of his classic mid-90s album 'Ten Days of Blue' recorded at this year's Dekmantel in Amsterdam. We get a real feel for the whole gig experience, from the sound of murmured anticipation and intro tape to the resolution at the outro and the main meat of the music itself - lively, optimistic, groovy but understated and chilled at the same time - sits somewhere between his ambient and harder techno work. Among Beltran's very finest output.

Review: Adding to the seemingly endless pile of reissues/retrospectives that focus on anything remotely related to COUM Transmissions or Throbbing Gristle, here comes 'Dreams Less Suite', which is a compilation album made up entirely of Hafler Trio and Genesis P-Orridge's unused film soundtracks, live shows and versions. Describable perhaps as 'dream noise', this album somehow straddles both the grating and the serene, quickly hopping between everything from industrial techno to glassy hell sounsdcapes.

Review: CS + Kreem have a hard job on their hands to follow up the magnificent Snoopy but they do it admirably with Orange. This is another intriguing album on The Trilogy Tapes that pairs suspenseful emptiness with fresh instrumental interjections, creepy spoken words with atmospheric found sounds to make for an album that is part sound collage, part experimental rhythms and part ambient storytelling. Acoustic guitars, nervy cellos, tentative xylophones, woozy flutes and lazy drum sounds all colour the airwaves in this most deep, compelling and pensive of records.

Review: Emotional Response has described soFa's fourth compilation for the label as "internationalism for the adventurous DJ", full of club music for the open-minded. It's basically an eclectic, esoteric musical travelogue that serves of intriguing, entertaining and admirable electronic music for those of a leftfield persuasion. There's much to enjoy, from the undulating melodies, off-kilter beats and mind-soothing chords of Infuso Giallo's 'Torus', and the moody techno-not-techno wave minimalism of Puma & The Dolphin ('Grass Drum'), to the analogue-heavy cold-wave dystopia of Houschyar ('Intercontinental'), the dark ambient techno of Lamusa II ('Artificial') and the tribal tinged electronic psychedelia of Bolva ('Rite II').

Review: Jeff Mills has long been inspired by Fritz Lang's 1927 science fiction movie 'Metropolis' (as was Giorgio Moroder, whose work also influenced many Motor City techno producers of Mills' era) and first created his own truncated alternative soundtrack for it 23 years ago. 'Metropolis Metropolis' sees him revisit the idea, creating a brand-new, elongated soundtrack more befitting extended versions of the film (which famously was heavily edited on in its initial release). As you'd expect, the triple-vinyl album, which is made up of six side-length suites, mixes electronic and acoustic instrumentation, with ambient synth sounds and neo-classical orchestration sitting side by side. Throw in a healthy dollop of Mills' inherent Afro-futurism and some hypnotic, soft-touch grooves, and you have an inspired and far-sighted new soundtrack to an age-old classic.

Review: Kerala Dust are an indietronica trio hailing from Berlin, and their upcoming album 'Violet Drive' is rightly described by them as a 'pan-European dream'. Recorded between Berlin and a remote Swiss Alpine studio, this is a funky, dark and sumptuous vocal dance project, replete with an overarching nighttime swing and glossy shimmer. Rather than one for twangy, sunburnt all-American road trips, we imagine this one is far better suited for drives across milder Scandi landscapes at night.

Review: Dylan Brady and Laura Les are 100 Gecs and 10000 is their much anticipated second album. It comes four years after their 2019 breakout debut includes previously released tunes 'mememe' which is a colourful mix of ska-inflected verses, thrash guitars and wonky synths and 'Doritos & Fritos', a more 90s styled alt rock anthem unlike anything else the band has done. A world tour is to follow the release of this album and is the natural next step for this artfully unhinged and impossible-to-predict collective who make some of the most outsider pop sounds around right now.

Review: Oof. Talk about tempting offers. Having made anyone with even the slightest penchant for electroclash, mutated synthdom, EBM and techno-punk swoon with output to date, London's Not Waving seem intent on making you fall even deeper in love by partnering with one of the most important artists of our time. From Screaming Trees to Mark Lanegan Band to the wealth of innovative and interesting collaborations he's been involved with, Lanegan - here as Dark Mark - is always essential.

Never more so than on this outing. Downwelling is a tear-inducing masterpiece of strange but beautiful. Melancholic, almost blues-like lyrics and words come up against blissful synthesised loops, arpeggios and harmonies, a juxtaposition which, at times, almost feels like you've got two separate but complementary things happening. Rich, hypnotic ambient textures. Distorted, semi-industrial chuggers. Serene, orchestral-like movements. Essential from start to finish.

Review: While there's no doubt the Middle East has stepped into the electronic music limelight in recent years, catalysed by good (a rebalancing of media focus within dance culture) and bad (controversy surrounding events like MDL Beast and the media's desperation to keep 'breaking new territory' in a world growing smaller by the day), Fatima Al Qadri is not part of this wave. A Senegal-born Kuwaiti, the US-based artist has been doing very good things for well over a decade (2010's 'Muslim Trance' mix is a must hear), creating everything from music exploring meeting points between Arabic traditions and contemporary synth work, to sound installations for renowned galleries. No stranger to Kode 9's Hyperdub, her third outing on the imprint since 2014 puts dark, atmospheric ambient out on the streets of Dakar after dark. Or something like that.

Review: Hauntologic '80s nostalgia-propagandizers Ghost Box return once again with a new one from Eric Zann, 'Ouroborindra'. Ghostly vocals mesh with a wide range of acoustic and electronic instrumentation here to produce an inspired album that draws on early 20th century cosmic horror fiction, resulting in some dastardly thematic combination of Lovecraft, BBC Christmas Horror stories, and Scarfolk. Radio-static noise and cavernous intakes of breath on tracks like 'Threshold' and 'Dols' blend with long ambient progressions and string sequences, recalling mock-'80s film influences such as the latest haunter 'Enys Men'. As ever with Ghost Box, a patented corecore sound is captured.

Review: A late, deluxe splattered vinyl edition of Iglooghost's 'Neo Wax Bloom' is now on the cards, cementing the rather fast and trailblazy legacy of this glossy IDM groundbreaker. Furthering the cute alternative world that the producer has built around his own music, we're once more reminded of the infinite portals, top-hatted worms and strange gnomelike beasts that inhabited Gloo's first album, which sonically spans motifs from glitch, trap and drill n' bass.

Review: There is a ton of sonic scuzz and frosty electronic texture to both cuts on this new limited 12" from Natural Sciences. And that is frankly to be expected when you are dealing with these two artists - the long-time LIEs associate Beau Wanzer goes first with the fucked up drums and gnarly synths, wiry electronics and dark vocal mutterings of 'The Table Scrap'. On the flip is Chicago noise specialist Hieroglyphic Being with 'This Is The Right Time In Human History 2 Be Stupid.' It's a lo-fi and fuzzy world of busted drum loops and anxious synths.

Review: By the time Faith In Strangers came about, Manchester underground electronic doyen Andy Stott already had an enviable reputation as producer of intelligent synthesised sounds that defy easy categorisation. Describing his process as akin to a scientist creating compounds by working out their formulas, the best way to define his music is simply 'futurism', although that in itself is reductive and vague.
At various points working in and around disfigured interpretations of techno, house, industrial, ambient, and grime, he simultaneously reflects the unpolished concrete of his hometown, and its seemingly limitless ability to keep pushing forward. On Faith, his celebrated fourth studio album, he's on exceptional form, delivering tracks that are emotional, haunting, moody, sophisticated, immersive, and incredibly complex.

Review: Royal Wavetable Mellodies & Old TDKs by Mexico baed artist Brainwaltzera is a perfect coming totters of the symphonic, the synthetic, the organic and the electronic. It's a record that could be a lost 70s classic as much as a new school homage to minimalism, experimental ambient and vintage synths. In fact, this is a selection of archive recordings in the artist's characteristically idiosyncratic style that we cannot get enough of. The collection of tracks are gorgeously native and innocent, with wispy melodies and retro keys all smeared and smudged into moving pieces of ambient that are beatless but dynamic.

Review: 0 is back on their own 0 label with 02, a second offering of experimental electronic music. Both sides of this 12" are taken up by one long and winding track each. The first is all dubbed out, with gassy sounds bringing a little light and sharpness to the murky pads, grainy effects and lo-fi aesthetic all around. It's a heady back room cut for in-the-know crowds at 5AM. The flip side is a little fuller, with skittish rhythms, busted sine waves and watery synths all coalescing around a haunting groove that is awash with real-world noise.

Review: Platform 23's latest release sees them offer up a partial reissue of 'Music For Hippies', an impossible-to-find 1988 cassette from Dutch experimentalists De Febriek. What's an offer is a mix of original tracks and fresh remixes. In the former category you'll find 'Lullabye', a spacey, dubbed-out chunk of new wave/post-punk/cosmic funk fusion full of intergalactic synth sounds, rubbery bass, bluesy guitar solos and trippy vocals, and an edited version of the epic 'Come Down', a more atmospheric, but no less dubbed-out affair that combines layered ambient noise, rocket-launch sonics and a hushed, hypnotic groove. Bahnstag 23 contributor Dunkeltier provides two takes on 'Lullabye', a throbbing, druggy new wave mix and a total re-make. Completing the package is a fiendishly low-slung, dark and mind-altering '5am Mix' of 'Come Down' courtesy of Khidja.

Review: Serenades continues its split release adventures with this exquisite five tracker from Dolphins and Odopt. If musicality, and a musical experience, are what you're after then consider this just what you've been looking for. Opening with the somewhat surprisingly dancefloor-friendly 'Kombination', a slow mo breaks number with retro futurist dressing, and although things sound quite leftfield it doesn't quite prepare you for how deep the rabbit hole goes.

From thereon in it's a question of being sucked further down into strange but incredible places. 'Commander' could almost be unreleased Sabres of Paradise stuff, 'Fear' hangs us on a knife-edge of warbles and broken beats, heads down and tense, 'Syntagma' cuts to the fours with a heavy, atmospheric chugger. We could go on, but you should be convinced already.