Reviews: electro

Ten heroes of contemporary electronic music pay tribute to the sounds which enchanted their tormented childhood: death metal anthems, black metal mayhem, grindcore purulence and other riffs from hell.

A self-released cd-r with ten tracks by a so far unknown project called Hidden Place from Italy. On Weather station they demonstrate a cold atmospheric electronic sound.

8 bit game console sounds are hot, especially for producers of lo-fi electro pop. Since five years the duo Desert Planet produces such sounds. Desert Planet turns cheap electronic sounds into catchy dance tunes.

For the real connaisseurs of 80’s minimal electronics this record is a feast. It contains five tracks of authentic minimal and playful electronic music.

This is one of the best Kernkrach records yet! Guyer’s Connection is a Swiss 80’s elektro act with a sound that still has a modern feeling.

Hertz is the 90’s and now side of the Kernkrach label. Closedunruh has a history that goes back into the 1980’s. The material on this record is all from the 1990’s, except for one track from 2005.

Bene Gesserit hopefully doesn’t need much introduction. It is one of the more famous minimal
electronics/experimental pop bands from Belgium from the 1980’s.

Das Drehmoment is a specialized record shop and label (mainly focusing on elektro/electronic music) from Berlin. They exist for five years now and celebrate that with their third compilation album.

Where the two members of Contrast (now a trio) that founded the band originate from Malochia, the music of Contrast is hardly comparable with Malochia. Instead it is best described as dark-electro with loads of variation.

Psychotron is a legendary electronic music album from 1980. As with many electronic music from the past there is now a re-release of this record on cd with some extra tracks.

If the music on this record displays the future of elektro-wave and the future of Invasion Planète I am happy, and so should you be.

This time Kernkrach packed their new release in sandpaper. It has to be said that they know how to surprise their fans every time with some new crazy sleeve.

Naked Ape is a Swedish elektro act. Their music is danceable with a lot of bleepy sounds and typical analogue elements in it. Most outstanding is their use of the Swedish language. This gives the music an unusual touch as it is unlike most of the music produced in this genre. English seems to dominate all music, everywhere…

Last year the self titled compilation cd by The Rorschach Garden was released. It was a nice collection of many hard to find songs, mostly released before on limited 7” records and tapes. Now only one year later there is this real debut album with 16 (!) tracks in the same typical minimal elektro pop style. It seems The Rorschach Garden has produced this record too quick…

The Actor is back in business since a few years. Following the compilation “Trumpett Sounds”, on which three songs by The Actor were included, Enfant Terrible now has an EP out completely devoted to The Actor…

Sphere Lazza is one of those bands who had a little fame in the underground scene of the 1990’s. They released 2 albums and split up in the making of the third album, that thus is still unreleased. These years also saw them grow from a two-piece to a quartet. Now they are back, just the two people who started Sphere Lazza at the start, Tony Spazz and [dt]…

Most contemporary synthpop is very slick mainstream music. Appareil on the other hand has a sound of its own, with many references to the past but still modern. ‘Glory’ opens the record with a pounding beat, somewhat like old EBM or the contemporary minimal body music of Bastards of Love. The vocals call to mind an angry version of Robert Smith…

I don’t think it will ever stop. This is yet another release in the endless stream of 80’s tape music re-issues on vinyl. It seems there was an enormous active scene in the early 80’s for minimal electronics. Now Was Soll Das Schallplatten is one of the labels reminding us of the music that was made in that era. Gorilla Aktiv is not be missed if you are a fan of this genre…

Dino Martini is an obscure minimal artist from the 80’s. Ferien is the last tape he recorded and is now re-released on vinyl by WSDP (formerly known as Was Soll Das Schallplatten). It is a collection of extremely minimal and very crazy tunes. Most of he songs are uptempo with very fast repetitive rhythms, nice simple melodies (one finger work) and weird singing…

This band is the new discovery of the Swedish Lobotom Records label. I need to say they did a great job signing this band. The A-side (‘He-Man’) is an extremely catchy pop/rock song, which is mixed with 8 bit elektro sounds. But, even better are the two tracks on the B-side. These songs are more typical 8 bit elektro but have some strange elements…