For an act that took four years to follow up its debut, the past few months have represented a veritable purple patch of creativity for Lost Trax. The collective, who want to remain in the shadows and let their music talking – unlike those who wear masks, hand stamp their records and make a media-friendly nod towards being anonymous – have just issued their second record in six months. Flatliner arrives on Shipwrec, a Dutch label that has done more than most to further underground electro, but which also provides a platform for left of centre techno from artists like Drvg Cvltvre.
The Dutch artist will release a single for the electro label featuring an Acronym remix.
Ed Upton has been releasing electro as DMX Krew and other guises for over twenty years, but Shape Shifting Shaman, his fifteenth album, is his most cohesive. While the UK producer’s back catalogue runs the full gamut from fey vocal electro-pop – this writer’s favourites are Seedy Films and 17 Ways to Break My Heart – to the more esoteric sounds of his Collapse of the Wave Function series for Rephlex, DMX Krew has never settled in one sound long enough to make a truly benchmark release.
The latest album from the UK artist will arrive on Shipwrec next month.
On paper, the idea of maverick techno producer Neil Landstrumm getting together in the studio with Keith McIvor, better known as Optimo Espacio’s JD Twitch, seemed to throw up a number of potentially problematic issues for this writer. Would Landstrumm’s love of noisy techno and system-levelling basslines send McIvor running? Might Optimo’s wilfully eclectic side and the prospect of McIvor playing Hank Williams records non-stop drive Landstrumm mad?