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Review: Non-binary Los Angeles-based artist Olive Ardizoni aka Green-House serves up gorgeously pure and innocent sounds on this debut ambient album. It is filled with awe and wonder that will clean your brain and sooth your soul. It was written during the pandemic and continues plenty of whimsical melodies, distant bird sounds and a comforting lo-fi hiss. Ardizoni says of the record, "I'm trying to hit that part of the brain that's affected by the emotional state that you're in when you perceive something as cute." Mission accomplished.

Review: Heaven In Hiding is the fourth studio album from Imminence, a Swedish metalcore band with an imposing presence in the modern day scene. They formed in 2009, and at this point their prominence can't be argued with. The album was foreshadowed by the title-track as the lead single, and it's a staggering track which flips between protracted moments of frosty balladry and blistering screamo explosions. The production is striking and modern, not least on album opener 'I Am Become A Name' and the composition reaches epic, orchestral heights. This deluxe edition comes as a box set with a necklace and feather included - one for the collectors.

Review: Loudest rock band in the world? Possibly. At one point? Definitely. Feel Good Now certainly proves the theory, with the second live album from Swans, recorded during their 1987 Children of God tour, capturing some of the zeitgeist of seeing them in the flesh. The fact all this was captured using a Sony Professional Walkman only emphasises just how much zeitgeist there was to capture. Remastered for this edition, fans of the grit and heaving atmosphere that came with the original will be glad to know that all the 21st Century bells, whistles, and high tech restoration couldn't make this one sound clean. And we mean that in the best possible way. Running through monstrous track after monstrous track, even heard through the other side of 25 years and without a massive venue rig, it's impossible not to pick up on the sense of immersion that has always defined Swans.

Review: Known for their cover versions - having re-read Sly Stone, Plastic Bertrand, Les Chats Sauvages, and many more over the years - Telex managed to tread a fine line between comedy and innovation. Focusing heavily on a lo-fi synthesised sound, the Belgian alt-poppers would use plenty of humour in their work, but never allowed this to outshine or overshadow the musicality of it all. Released in 1980, Neurovision is a case in point. According to the band, this was their tongue-in-cheek entry to the Eurovision Song Contest, for which they were chosen as representatives for their home country in the same year. Deliberately banal lyrics, mostly referring to the competition itself, married to the glittering wonder of a proto-electronic soundtrack, mark it as a work of bold daring and a little genius. Sadly, it failed to secure them last place in the tournament, as they hoped, forcing them to settle for 17 out of 19.

Review: English alternative-garage psyche rockers (and that barely comes close) Spacemen 3 had a serious reputation for their live shows. Inducing the kind of trance-like states in their audiences we more commonly associate with the endless spirals of dance music, for some the trio are godfathers of shoegaze, writing the book on that epic guitar opera long before people really knew what to call it, helping set the tone for the more exploratory side of 1980s rock. Simply put, they were a group you'd feel lucky to have experienced live, and even this five track opus of mind-melting rhythms, discordance and pent up energy is a pretty incredible thing to behold. Recorded live at Melkweg, Amsterdam, and originally released in 1989, once you've lost a few minutes in the refrains, builds, and crescendos you'll understand the cult status of this release - thankfully now repressed.

Review: 'The Essential Radio Birdman' compiles the most integral, anthemic and hard hitting of the Sydney proto-punk n' roll heroes' definitive first three albums (long out of print and costly to accumulate), and delivers them on newly pressed wax.

Underrated and ahead of their time, the writing partnership of Michigan born guitarist Deniz Tek and vocalist Rob Younger, led to a spree of surf rock leaning cynical, witty barrages that not only still stand the test of time, but deserve a major reappraisal with regards to the extent of their influence.

Notes: Typically experimental stuff from Soma, the Enner is a five-voice synth with an array of filters, electro-acoustic noise options, analogue effects and huge creative potential.

Supplier's Notes:
ENNER is a very expressive sound tool that can generate bits, pads, FX, noises, clicks, glitches, but also function as a cool vocal mic with built-in analogue FX and much more! A musician with a rich imagination and who's experienced in playing ENNER can perform an entire exciting gig using just this synth.

As an instrument, ENNER is a unique analogue synthesizer with the key principle being that all signals that make sound pass through and are managed by your body. Your hands become the central part of the circuitry. Touching different contact pads with different parts of your fingers and palms with different amounts of pressure, letting signals pass through your body defines the mixing, volume, timbre, feedback and other parameters of synthesis. Human skin has much more complex electric properties than we think. The skin provides not just resistance but also some capacitive properties and even nonlinear dependence of conductivity from current, its direction and time during which the current was applied. All of this affects the sound, making you the key part of the synthesis process.

All pots of ENNER are metallic and also function as inputs or outputs. Touching a pot can change not only the parameters but also patch the audio signals.

ENNER consists of:

The array of filters with fixed frequency properties (the triangle in the centre): the stereo high pass filter (HPF), the stereo bandpass filter (high mid - BPFH), the stereo bandpass filter (low mid - BPFL), the stereo lowpass filter (LPF). Stereo means that the filters have separate inputs for left and right channels as well as separate outputs. Sliding on the filters' pads with your fingers you can create a rich stereo image where each channel may have not only individual volume properties but also timbral ones. The outputs of the filters are mixed together and connected to the main output. Also in the triangle, you have a stereo direct input (DIR) that lets you bypass the filters.

The modulated stereo delay. The input of the delay is the two pads on the top of the triangle (DLY blue). The output of the delay is mixed with filter output and connected to the main output. Also, you have delay output connected to the pads placed on the left and right sides from the top of the triangle (DLY orange) that lets you create feedback and other interesting effects. The delay has two separate lines (left and right) with individual TIME controls (BPEMR pots), common FEEDBACK and the common pot that defines the amount of self-modulation (BIZZARE). The BPEMR pots are also touch inputs for delay time modulation.

On the right side of ENNER, there is a five-voice synthesizer with individual adjustment of frequency for each voice (TUNE knobs) with the possibility to change the pitch of all voices simultaneously (PITCH knob). TUNE knobs are also the outputs of the voices, so by touching them you can patch the voices to the filter's inputs. The synthesizer has separate output pads for each voice (pads OUT 1-5), individual modulation inputs (MOD 1-5) and ring modulation outputs (the RING 12, 23, 34 numbers indicate which voices are sources for the ring modulation). Connecting MOD and OUT pads of one voice with your fingers will pitch it up. The fifth voice has an additional modulation pad MOD 5- which can shift the pitch of the fifth voice down (connect it to +12 pad or any pad that has some positive signal including the output of the fifth voice).

On the left side of ENNER, there is the second synth that has one master generator, the output of which is divided six times by two with individual outputs for each stage of division (PULSE 1-6). This synth is aimed at creating rhythmical clicks, basses and octave tones. The frequency of the master generator is defined by the TEMPO knob. The output pads &1,2,3 are logical multiplications of different PULSE outputs giving additional and more complex rhythm combinations.

ENNER is also an electro-acoustic noise instrument. It has a piezo pickup attached to the front panel that captures sound from the casing itself. There is metallic spring and you can attach rubber bands to the panel to create various acoustic sounds. The piezo mic can capture clicks and scratches you make with your fingers, and it also allows you to create filtered feedback. Not only that, it can even capture your voice singing over the panel! To get sound from the piezo you have to connect the PIEZO OUT pad with some filters or delay inputs. Applying filters and delay on the piezo out while the panel works as a mic, catching the audio signal from the speakers connected to the ENNER output lets you create very cool acoustic feedback-based effects. PIEZO GAIN adjusts the piezo sensitivity.

The bottom of the triangle (NOISE pad) is the output of static pink noise.

External in (EXT socket and EXT pad) lets you send an external audio signal to ENNER and process it through the array of filters, delay and other ENNER stuff.

All of these features make ENNER a simple yet powerful kit of sound sources and FX that give you a rich and diverse sound palette with many possible playing techniques that you can change very fast as there is no other control over the sound other than your touches.

Specs

Array of filters

Pads DIR - direct input (no filters)
Pads HPF - highpass filter in
Pads BPFH - bandpass filter high mid in
Pads BPFL - bandpass filter low mid in
Pads LPF - lowpass filter in
(L - left channel, R - right channel)

Pink noise generator

NOISE - noise output

Delay

Pads DLY(blue) - delay in
Pads DLY(orange) - delay out
(L - left channel, R - right channel)
Pots BPEMR - delay time (L and R) also time modulation inputs
The UROBOROS pot - feedback (both channels)
Pot BIZZARE - delay self-modulation

Piezo

Pad PIEZO OUT - the output
Pot PIEZO GAIN - piezo amplification (also piezo output)

The five-voice synth

Pads OUT 1-5 - outputs of the voices
Pads MOD 1-5 - modulation inputs of the voices (try to connect them with OUT)
Pads RING 12, 23, 34 - outputs of ring modulators that multiply outputs of different voices
Pad MOD 5- - an additional modulation input for the fifth voice (try to connect it with +12)
Pots TUNE 1-5 - frequency of the voices (also voices outputs)
Pot PITCH - transposing all voices at once.

Rhythm\Bass synth

Pads PULSE 1-6 - output of binary dividers
Pads &1, 2, 3 - additional outputs that are logical AND of different PULSE outputs.
Pot TEMPO - the frequency of the source generator

External

Socket EXT - external in
Pad EXT - connected to EXT socket tip

Power

+12V center + 0.2A. ENNER requires a good stabilized and filtered PSU. We recommend contemporary switching mode PSUs with a wide input range. The PSU is included.

Grounding

In order that when playing on ENNER there would be no hum from the electricity grid interferences, the device must be properly grounded! A normal grounding connection at the electric socket, which is carried through the power cord to your audio equipment to which the ENNER is connected, is sufficient.

What's in the kit:

ENNER
12V center plus PSU
Several rubber bands

Review: To mark what would have been Desmond Dekker's 80th birthday, Trojan Records is serving up a variety of celebratory releases. The King of Ska takes us back to the formative years of the Jamaican superstar's career between 1963-67, when he was an aspiring young singer signed to producer Leslie Kong's Beverley's Records imprint. Loosely chronologically arranged, disc one begins with Dekker's celebrated debut single, 'Honour Your Mother & Father', and continues to chart his efforts in the first couple of years of his career - both alongside unnamed studio bands and with the backing of The Cherry Pies and The Four Aces. On CD2, we hear a more confident Dekker belting out the singles that would turn him into an international star, including rude boy anthem - and his first UK top 50 smash - '007'.

Review: Norwegian progressive death metal auteurs, Diskord, make their discordant (geddit?) return on the ferocious 'Degenerations.' This third full-length, and follow up to 2014's dizzying, 'Oscillations EP', serves as an intimidating insight into the cosmic grandiosity such an extreme and niche genre can conjure. Over a seven-year writing/recording process, enlisting the help of Colin Marston of genre legends, Gorguts, as well as imbuing the material with a plethora of unlikely instrumentation from electric upright bass and cello to theremin, has resulted in a work so seemingly impenetrable, yet vastly rewarding with each subsequent delve into the psychosphere.

Review: CWPT will play home to Palms Trax's original productions. His latest offering is 'Petu', a new single featuring South African vocalist, Nonku Phiri. Originally debuting in dub form (featured for your convenience over on the flip) during his appearance on The Music Locker as part of Grand Theft Auto Online, it is an absolutely emotive number reaching near spiritual moments and complemented by Phiris' wonderful vocal. Masalos' remix takes the track into neon-lit disco territory and is equally worthy of your attention.

Review: You've always been able to hear the West Coast in Monocoastal, but it's particularly present when you shut your eyes after 12 months of lockdown stopping you from visiting the region. Less active L.A., and more observing in Oregon, Fischer's career didn't end with this in 2011 and the multi-disciplinary artist has produced great things since, but the album is certainly one of turning points in terms of reputation and note.

The idea of slowly watching time unfold in un-rushed places is also highly appropriate. Among the washes of tape and the waves of refrain that make up this beautiful, meditative outing, you'll hear takes and half-harmonies from found instruments including a piano and xylophone. Overall, it feels like a place removed from linearity. A liminal masterpiece, if you are that way inclined.

Review: Cesare vs Disorder has long been at the very heart of the minimal scene. His abstract sounds and lush synthesis never fails to seduce us no matter the mood or groove he takes. This EP for the small but well formed Rockets label opens with some peak tripped-out sound design, where dancing chords, detuned keys and wonky pins are layered up over a loopy and skeletal rhythm on 'Amoreteca.' 'Sao Paulo Concrete Jungle' is dubber house all aswarm with pads, hits, percussive clatter, 'Holy Bee' gets unsettling in its eerie melodies and 'Time For Your Eyes' is a lovely deep house gem with a jostling beat and lounge chords.

Review: Smoked-out Texan psych troupe Khruangbin have picked a pretty apt moment to release this recording of their live show at Villain, Brooklyn. For starters, it's summer 2020, and if it weren't for a global pandemic there's a good chance a few of us would be recovering from the night before to a late-afternoon, or better yet early-evening performance from this lot at some festival or other. Secondly, because of said health crisis, we're all starved of the unique qualities that come from a band playing in the flesh. Dinner is definitely served here, then, via generous helpings of Laura Lee's bass-laden grooves and gorgeous, intoxicatingly airy vocal delivery. First laid down in 2018, when Khruangbin were touring in support of their second album, while 'Con Todo El Mundo' provides the majority of musical moments here, really 'Live At Villain' is a self-contained record - an hour or so of the band's typically magical and engrossing stage stuff, captured for keeps.