Tags: Disco Not Disco

Review: Dark Entries is back with Back Up Dos: Mexican Tecno Pop 1982-1989, which is a much-warranted follow-up to 2021's Back Up. This compilation features ten tracks of synth-pop and New Beat with seven previously unreleased on wax. It highlights the evolution of Mexico's DIY music scene as it moves from post-punk and new wave to aggressive EBM and cyberpunk. Reflecting the political turbulence of the era which was marked by rising drug cartels and conservative shifts, these tracks showcase how bands used home recording and drew inspiration from the Human League and Wax Trax Records while also including pop anthems by Casino Shanghai and Los Agentes Secretos, alongside rarities from Ford Proco and Maria Bonita.

Review: A compelling selection of unreleased tracks from influential Italian artists and producers who continue to shape the underground electronic scene. The project features a mix of electro, synth-pop and new wave, each track pushing boundaries and exploring new sonic frontiers. Rimini Metafisica, led by Paolo Gozzetti (known for Sigma Tibet and Italoconnection), presents a fresh exploration of sound, while TenGramsione of the Piatto brothers' aliasesidelivers dark, minimal synth with an essential edge. Diego Montinaro, aka Sandiego, contributes a cybernetic ballad, while Mono Han, another Piatto project, shines with bright, authentic synth-pop, powered by a Linn Drum and Roland Jupiter 8.Other standout contributions include Deep Field, a synth-pop venture from Danilo Carnevale and Castelli's new-wave disco track. Fogli and Ventura's collaboration brings isolationist minimal synth, while Through Twelve offers a post-punk-synth-pop blend with contemporary flair. Body System, a collaboration between Enrico Colombo and Ventura, aims to revive the EBM sound and Italoconnection, with Francesca Gastaldi, presents a "lost" track reinterpreted by TenGrams in a Kraftwerkian style. Spittle Italy continues to bring out some excellent compilations for their followers.

Review: A fascinating new slice of neue Deutsche welle from the artist Eine Welt. The track romanticizes the traditional Middle Eastern dish, Knafeh, through the lens of post-punkish electronics, German rawism, and myriad layering and production. The fact that an artist would go to such great pains to record, master, press and distribute a song with such a niche subject matter truly shows the power of Turkish cuisine. Clearly, even in back the '80s, there was mutual cultural appreciation between the Germans and the Turkish.

Review: The overdetermination of many sources of inspiration fed the making of this new EP by Asymmetrical (Giovanni Inglese), whose regular top-ups for the label have earned him his very own catalogue number reservation, this one coming as no exception. Said inspirations include: the digit 7, elevated to the status of Jim Carrey's number 23; a sticker glimpsed in a bathroom in a north-west Rome nightclub; and a long gestation of studio sessions, committed to between 2018 and 2020. The result was a slurrying EBM release of the coldest affect, consisting largely of all-consuming licky bass, mussitating monologues ('Estetica Della Notte' tells the tale of assuming nocturnal form while under the domed hoardings of Rome's famous Pantheon) and subtly vampiric overtones ('Porno Incubo').

Review: Moderna's arresting debut album on her own Brave New Rave has been in the works for seven years and was written across sessions in Berlin and Mexico City. It is an exploration of Berlin's influence on techno, dark disco and queer culture that takes in a diverse array of influences and inspirations from the music of Prince to a collaboration with post-punk artist Skelesys via electro, dark wave and more. The tracks are all raw, dancefloor-focussed cuts with rugged basslines, layered and well-treated vocals and a futuristic sense of sound that draws you in deep and keeps you locked.

Review: Berlin-based synthwave and dark disco band Dina Summer return with a sanguine new seven-track record, continuing their reputation for making 80s nostalgist music fans ever more ravenous for their distinct take on EBM and its adjacent styles. Following 2022's acclaimed Rimini LP, this freak zone of a record brings gravely detuned, yet DJ-ready instrumental backings and stiffly but passionately delivered vocal recitations to a modern production palate. This approach reaches its ultimate conclusion on the natural midpoint 'Alien', a track perhaps best describable as a hi-NRG number made in a cryoponic chamber and lent an extraterrestrial theme.

Review: Karolina BNV is not to be messed with, putting it lightly. The Berlin-based producer has garnered a loyal following among fans of EBM, New Beat, industrial, electro-goth and robot sex droid fetish production scenes. The latter we just made up but hopefully you get what we're getting at. Descriptions aside, she follows her 'Lessons On Good Behaviour' release with four more tracks born from a terrifying future we're probably already living in, we just don't really know it yet. From the apocalyptic sludge and punch of 'Unforgivable Decisions', to the electro rave squelch and staccato percussion of 'Context Abuse', the two tracks roll out relentless grit and grime. Then you have '1988' and 'Germany Calling', with their retro futurism, acid house totems held high in the air for all to see that there is still some resistance to the robots.

Review: Berlin-based Dina Summer - a synth-loving trio fronted by the suitably sassy and no-holds barred singer Dina P - impressed with their Italo-disco and turn-of-the-millennium electroclash inspired debut album, Rimini. Three years in, they return with an arguably even stronger set - the notably darker, more stylish and more new wave-influenced Girl's Gang. Many of their trademark elements remain to the fore - Dina P's dead-eyed spoken word vocals, the use of vintage drum machine rhythms and sequenced basslines - but this time round come accompanied by black mascara-clad nods to post-punk, New Romantic, goth-rock and Depeche Mode style synth-pop sounds. As previously stated, it is genuinely stylish and impeccably observed stylistically, but what makes it stand out is the substance behind the sheen.