Gothic BC

Psyche

With Bruce off to the highlands and Alex recovering under a pile of coats in a hall closet somewhere, this week’s episode is a hastily recorded recap of this year’s Verboden Festival from right here in Vancouver. You can hear the strain in the quality of our voices at the time of this recording, as we did plenty of chatting with artists, attendees and assorted friends and well-wishers while taking in an excellent lineup of artists across two venues, representing for the past, present and future of darkwave, EBM, industrial and several related genres. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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E.T.
Full Anarchism
self-released
ID3 tagging their latest work as Egalitarianism Today (much like early Foetus records the literal name always changes even if the brand doesn’t), Minneapolis synthpunk duo E.T.’s new LP is a direct and refreshingly irony-free statement of irritation and rage at the current state of things from, as the title not-so-subtly hints, an anarchist perspective. Putting out records since 2018’s fantastically titled Phone Homo‘s given them a sense of confidence and purpose both thematically and musically which pays off well, with their rough and tumble production style takes precedence over specific sub-genres and styles here. The scrapy programming and muffled bass of “Bow Down” feel in-line with “Larva Leaks”‘ over-caffeinated kicks, even though the former is structured far more like a modern TBM banger than the latter’s more classic approach to jumped-up synthpunk. Most of the lyrics do a solid job of framing E.T.’s critique as a matter of personal feeling and larger historical truth, while “Someone Else” interrogates the ways in which capitalism makes each of us small cogs in its larger death engine. Those themes are bracketed with a mix of samples left as voice-mail styled bumpers; in addition to the usual suspects like The Fly, Aliens, and Terminator 2, you’ve also got BLM activists, Reservation Dogs and the immortal Ursula K LeGuin popping in to drop bombs. Solid stuff from the liminal edge between all our dystopic todays and tomorrows.
Full Anarchism by Egalitarianism Today

Nuxx
Bird Brain EP
Synthicide
As noted in the bandcamp liners, NYC electronic artist Nuxx’s new EP for Synthicide Bird Brain is all about reinvention. Aside from shortening the project’s name from Nuxx Vomica, the five whipsmart tracks here are louder and more compact than they’ve ever been before, and find Nuxx stepping out from the layers of reverb and disaffection in her delivery to stand directly in the spotlight. Musically the songs find a bracingly uneasy middle ground between rapidfire half-shouted, half-rapped delivery, raw electro and chopped up rave synths and breaks with results both hypnotic and menacing. The atonal groove of “Break Me” screeches and squelches but is instantly tamed by Nuxx’s bitten-off “I don’t care/I like it” vocal chant, while opener “Bad” finds her riding a raunchy bassline into the ground, acting as her own hypeman, tossing off distorted ad libs while sirens wail around her. The songs are short and sharp by design, allowing for “Done”‘s litany of sick-of-this-shit complaints to land at high impact speeds even before the distorted screeches crash into the mix – just like the refrain on the title track lets you know, Nuxx isn’t fucking around.
Bird Brain EP by Nuxx

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We’re talking about records by electronic pioneers who need little introduction in Gary Numan and Uwe Schmidt’s Lassigue Bendthaus, but while the latter’s Matter is an undisputed, hugely influential masterpiece, Numan’s Berserker has a more mixed legacy, hinting at the rough sledding ahead. We’re also chatting loads of festival news (real and hypothetical) on this week’s episode. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Ships In The Night
Protection Spells
Metropolis Records

There’s a sense of warmth to the music on Ships In The Night’s Metropolis debut Protection Spells, and a pleasing familiarity in its song-driven electropop and witchy darkwave. While Alethea Leventhal’s project has existed for a decade at this point, Protection Spells represents a level-up in the Virginia native’s material; the reverie and the hopeful melancholy of the preceding records and assorted singles is still here, but the actual songcraft and production feels tighter and more considered, bringing out the strength of the material and of Leventhal’s own performance as a vocalist.

The change is apparent from lead-off track and single “Blood Harmony”, with its helixes of synth arppegios and simple drum programming, leaving the spotlight Leventhal’s understated vocals. The retiring confidence in her voice grabs the ear, making the most of small changes in tone and mood, never showy, but also never shy or obscure; when she lifts her voice to a slightly higher register during the bridge to the final chorus, the whole song blossoms into a new form without a need for dramatics or vamping. It’s a record full of those kinds of subtle but impactful moves, such as the shifts in phrasing that usher in the chorus of “Inside”, or the choice to perform the lush “Wells of Pain” in a matter-of-fact delivery that still manages sweetness and succor. The trick is in making those canny choices sound natural, which Leventhal does with admirable skill, tasteful and playful in equal measure.

The other obvious change is in the nature of the songs themselves, which feel more solid that any point in the project’s history. Ships In The Night’s preceding releases often suffered from an excess of atmosphere, where despite having some nice melodies, the instrumentation was either too sparse or too wet with reverb to latch onto. Protection Spells keeps it simple and present, adding to the record’s appealing coziness. It does feel a bit strange to call a record this dependent on soft-edged pads and multi-tracked vocals, but the economy of the arrangements and especially the presence of the drums have a grounding effect; “Some of Those Dreams” pulses where it could have laid fallow, and sleeper highlight “No One is Coming” makes a total meal of its opening bassline and kick-snare rhythm track, squeezing every ounce of life out of it before switching to a double time shuffle that brings the song home.

Protection Spells‘ strength is apparent even in one of its few missteps: the wholly unnecessary cover of Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence” isn’t unpleasant by any means, but feels like the move of a less confident, less complete artist and ends up highlighting how instantly familiar Ships In The Night’s own material is. It’s an imminently listenable record with a broad pop appeal, brimming with a likeable and unshowy charisma.

Buy it.

Protection Spells by Ships In The Night

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Lana Del Rabies
Le Temps Viendra
self-released

An inscription in Anne Boleyn’s prayer book, and the figure of Boleyn herself, might sound like material suited for a meditative folk or neo-classical concept record rather than a blast of pure death industrial. But then again, Lana Del Rabies has never been a pro forma noise project. Building out from a pair of tracks released in the aftermath of 2023’s incredible Strega Beata, the Les Temps Viendra EP continues Sam An’s impressive exploration of gothic atmospheres and weighty themes of mortality which often reaches beyond the limits of familiar forms of noise.

Like the best LDR work, all five tracks here find equanimity between the sludging percussion and feedback which makes up the bulk of the instrumentation and Am’s vocals, with both halves of the equation expanding beyond the de facto extremity one might expect. “Anne Boleyn” begins things with a tremoring hesitancy, introducing the ambiguity of the queen consort as both innocent martyr and ambitious courtier. “Queen Of The Black Muses” swaddles a Swans-like machine beat in warm feedback and An’s circling vocals, praying to the deep for ascent. The wary but comparatively laidback “Incubus + Succubus” is as close as Am’s ever come to ’90s alt rock-cum-industrial territory, and acts as a breather before the slow sweep of “Tender Creatures”, which slowly builds from windswept drones to draw in churning dirges which sound as though they owe as much to the hurdy-gurdy as power electronics (not for the first time, the similarly historically minded noise of Menace Ruine seems one of the few accurate points of reference for LDR’s work). The titular closer finds Am seemingly occupying the roles of inquisitor and repentant confessor at once, with a shift from furnace blasts of noise to warm pads mirroring the resignation of one at peace with their own mortality, regardless of when the axe falls.

The phrase scrawled by Boleyn in her prayer book which gives Les Temps Viendra its name has fascinated historians, and certainly from a modern perspective can be read as either foreshadowing her sudden fall from favour and trumped-up trial and execution, or the larger historical judgment of her husband and killer, or both. That sort of morbid triple entendre is the sort of tesseract Lana Del Rabies thrives within, modulating between levels of resonance both sonic and emotional. Recommended.

Buy it.

Le Temps Viendra by Lana Del Rabies

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It’s Verboden Fest this weekend here in Vancouver, folks! As always we’re excited about seeing some festival fam we rarely get to hang out with on our home turf, see some familiar favourite acts, and to check out a few completely new to us acts, the latter of which are numerous on this year’s bill. As always, if you’re in town for Verboden, come and say hi to the two goofs introducing bands to the stage.

Our friend and yours, Caustic.

Camlann, “Worship Me”
Whoa, Camlann’s new one does the weird cross genre thing that the Indonesian darkwavers have had on lock for a while now, but this time it’s goth rock and like early 2000s pop-rock. It’s such an odd combination of sounds that aren’t actually totally disimilar (they both rely on big, broadly appealing hooks and fist pumping rhythms), done in the way that the duo only can, which is to say with a certain combination of deadpan sincerity and off-kilter weirdness. The band has had some real strong singles in the last six months or so, a new album in the not so distant future seems inevitable.
Worship Me by Camlann

Wicked Girls, “Big Dumb Banger”
A new collab between Louisahhh and kimifromtheinternet, Wicked Girls’ first teaser from their Good Dogs EP certainly does what it says on the tin in terms of offering up big doofy kicks and a slew of wormy acidic programming. But, as with all things Louisahhh has a hand in, there are certainly layers beneath the most obvious readings which we’re looking forward to gleaning once the full EP is out.
Good Dogs by Wicked Girls (Louisahhh & kimifromtheinternet)

Caustic, “Thirsty Dog”
It’s been a bunch of years since we had a new Caustic single, although Matt Fanale hasn’t ever been far from our speakers between his work as half of Klack, as Daddybear and various other musical endeavours. Enter “Thirsty Dog”, an unexpected Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds cover, remade as a manic electro body blowout, delivered in Caustic’s recognizable growl. And it’s frankly a cover that makes a lot of sense – setting aside the jump from bluesy garage howl to thudding industrial clamor, it’s the sort of self-excoriating screed that has informed some of both Cave and Fanale’s best work. With the B-side “Never Look At You Twice” going even further down the industrial punk road, it’s looking like July’s Fiend should be a real paint peeler.
Thirsty Dog by Caustic

SDH, “Lovers Wonder (Alen Skanner remix)”
Spain’s SDH team up with one of our favourite current remixers Alen Skanner for a new version of their December 2024 single “Lovers Wonder” and its absolutely tremendous. Now if you follow us, you know we’ve spent a lot of time talking about Alen Skanner’s capacity for high-speed Mortal Kombat style techno-body productions, but in this case the song is taken into a much slower, layered and triumphant direction, taking the lovely melancholy synthpop of the original and building it into an epic. For its bombast with the synth choral voices and thunderous drums, it shows a real subtle grasp of craft, ferreting out the melody of the original and recontextualizing it in big, bold, and imminently replayable fashion.
Lovers Wonder (Alen Skanner Remix) by SDH

WLDV, “Bewitched”
We mostly know Spanish producer WLDV for his uncanny ability for unlicensed remixes of dark classics which somehow dodge the jarring edits and levelling issues such projects usually fall prey to, but he’s just as adept at his own original productions. New EP Bewitched is effectively a sandwiching of this spiralling giallo number between an intro and outro, putting all the spotlight on its tightrope walking between classic, misty 70s analogue witchcraft and more modern Boy Harsher school styles.
WLDV – Bewitched EP by WLDV

Laughing Chance, “Champion’s Tear”
Uneremitting, circular, and entirely pure industrial noise. With that sort of description it should come as no surprise that new project Laughing Chance is the work of Chrondritic Sound honcho and all-around noise impresario Greh Holger. Somewhat different from his main noise project Pure Ground in terms of its use of whirring, monomaniacal loops, pieces like this are a reminder of the ear for detail Holger has in sampling and layering clattering field recordings like these (we’re also choosing to interpret the name as a reference to Ric Flair’s immortal 1992 Royal Rumble performance).
Dead Weight by Laughing Chance

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Lahorka
Demo
self-released
Oakland/Puerto Rico synthpunk duo Lahorka certainly don’t skimp on the punk in their 5-track 2025 demo, the liner notes of which indicate that all songs were recorded live. That matches up to the rough and ready sound of the songs, which jump between mid-tempo stompers, gabber speed rave-ups and trudging analogue industrial, keeping the arrangements lean and the vocals shouted. “Silencio + Suicidio” is a hyper-speed bit of manic electro, all hissing snares and rapidly rising and ascending 16th note sequences of beeps, a contrast to “Movimientos” which uses a slowed down version of the sound to more sinister effect thanks to its echoing vox and fuzzy synth bass. There’s certainly a sense of arch attitude in the delivery of “Diversión”, where the warbling synths match up to the sarcastically intoned verses, punctuated with yelps and glitches to the kick-snare drum patterns. The band’s wildest moment comes from “Desorden”, where an 18-wheeler’s worth of hardcore kicks eventually build to a buzzing crescendo, burning out seconds before it feels like the track is about to shake itself to pieces. If this is truly a record of what the band is like live, they’ll be one you’ll want to make a point of seeing.
Demo by LAHORKA

Anatoly Grinberg and Mark Spybey
crop-dusting
Ant-Zen
It’d be tempting to say that Mark Spybey has too many irons in the fire given the plethora of collaborations he’s involved with, not to mention mainline Dead Voices On Air material both new and archival, were it not for how handily the veteran experimentalist has been able to maintain the care and quality associated with his work both classic and recent. His latest record with frequent collaborator Anatoly Grinberg touches upon a range of the ambient moods and styles one associates with their preceding works, with an added focus on topography and landscape. The tropical jungle ambiance of “them-again” slowly and beautifully shifts into uplifting, near trance-like pads as the sun filters through canopies of trees, while the otherworldly, wildly pitched vocals (?) which wind through “echoes-sri” feel like a call to prayer on Mars. Dreamy and soupy yet earthy and grounded, these are the sort of moves that seem from the outside to come easily to Grinberg and Spybey yet also reflect mastery of the details of sound design.
crop-dusting by anatoly grinberg and mark spybey

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The Senior Staff: coming up on 20 years of yukking it up at North American festivals.

We love two things here at ID:UD – dark music festivals, and arbitrary competition. We’re combining those two passions with a mock draft of our own non-existent music fests, drawing from the line-ups of a handful of this year’s real-world parties. Which of our two line-ups seems the most tempting to you? Let us know here or on socials, or give us your own line-up from the same pool. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Crush Of Souls
Lézire
Avant! Records

Post-hardcore refugee Charles Rowell, previously of outfits ranging from The Plot To Blow Up The Eiffel Tower to Crocodiles, traded New York for Paris a few years back and was soon releasing work under the Crush Of Souls handle. Showing off an interest in classic synthpop and darkwave (and a healthy splash of saxgoth), Crush Of Souls’ second LP carries on with the mission of preceding release (A)Void Love in its testing of those styles to varying results.

Much ofLézire aims at a general middle ground between Crush Of Souls’ influences, and does a reasonable job thereof. Fragments of easy going new wave like lead single “Cult Of Two” coast by on bounce and affability, though its hooks and chorus never really elevate things beyond the interplay between rubbery synth bass and chiming pads. “Touch From A Heartbeat” similarly adorns its core beat with some crystalline ambience that’s certainly pretty enough, but doesn’t move the needle in a marketplace rife with Drab Majesty imitation.

The more rewarding moments on the record are ones which are perhaps more understated, but stake out positions rarely taken in today’s general post-punk landscape. Take a listen to the hushed, dramatic acoustic strum which threads through the atmospheric “Souls Apart”, with Rowell’s hushed vocal perfectly underscoring the drama. Sitting smack between any number of classic Echo and Mission singles, it’s the sort of move it’s hard to imagine many recent acts opting for, let alone pulling off. Not all of these forays pay dividends – the robotic reprogramming of a mid-period Simple Minds template on “The Pure Weapon” starts promisingly but hits diminishing returns – but they’re still distinct. The less-is-more neofolk of “You Rose Up” has just enough lilt and restraint to work, with veteran Harry Howard (These Immortal Souls, Crime & The City Solution) on tap for vocals.

Lézire isn’t a masterpiece, far from it. A number of tracks never really coalesce into anything memorable beyond their run time, and some of the leering excess common to Rowell’s original milieu (there’s a track named “Call Your Dealer” for god’s sake) can be off-putting. But, if you find yourself let down from time to time by the conservatism of a large number of current bands tapping into the mid-80s vein, you’ll find charm in some of Lézire‘s left-field manoeuvres.

Buy it.

Lézire by CRUSH OF SOULS

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V▲LH▲LL
Skymningsdjur
Artoffact Records

Swedish duo V▲LH▲LL originally emerged as part of a wave of post-witchhouse bands in the early 2010’s, taking the esoteric and atmospheric elements of that genre and crossing it with broader industrial and darkwave sounds. In the years since they’ve distinguished their aesthetic, leaning hard on the Nordic pagan motifs suggested by their name, becoming more graspable and earthy, rooting their ghostly textures into more solid and developed songs. Their latest LP Skymningsdjur finds them revisiting some of their earliest motifs and ideas, and integrating still more new sounds into the mix.

One of V▲LH▲LL’s great strengths has always been in finding the balance between their electronic palette and their occult and fantastical subject matter. A song like “Hunger” shows how canny they are in doing so; violins and paired folky vocals floating in and around chiming synth-bells, flowing pads and fluttering hi-hat programming, sounding both traditional and modern, proximal and ghostly. It’s a vibe they can port through different styles, as with the synthwave adjacent “En Tid Om Ett Tag”, where pulsing bass and a jagged lead cut through the fog of reverb and delays, or the pounding “Calling for Storms”, whose melody and arrangement could port over easily into dark electro.

Still, for the band’s expertise in executing their sound, Skymningsdjur doesn’t have many truly standout cuts. To their credit everything on the record is at a minimum good, and expertly produced and performed, but its hard not to compare these cuts to earlier V▲LH▲LL songs in a similar vein. “Yuki-Onna” revisits the creepy faerie tale feel of songs like “Down in the Woods”, tossing in some tasteful gated guitar-sounds and some modular synth warbles, nicely done but less novel in this iteration. Closer “Devoured” revisits their earliest incarnation, thick with analogue bass and voices both distant and eerily close, lacking only a fresh hook to really put it over the top.

Thus Skymningsdjur falls into the territory of those catalogue albums that bring some new things to the longtable, but nothing that makes it particularly standout against their preceding LPs. It’s a band with a very defined sense of identity doing what they do, and doing it well, and to that end it can be a fine and enjoyable listen. Those seeking more of V▲LH▲LL’s brand of pagan electronics should be well pleased by it.

Buy it.

Skymningsdjur by V▲LH▲LL

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It’s very difficult to know what to say in this post, as we are still reeling from the awful events that transpired in Vancouver this weekend. It’s a tragedy, and comes in a year that has not been short of those, and we are greatly saddened for our friends and neighbours in the Filipino community. Aside from making direct contributions to organizations that are providing aid to the community and those directly affected, we would encourage everyone in the city reading this to donate blood, as there are many injured people still undergoing treatment for serious injuries.

Aurat

Rhys Fulber, “The Abyss (feat. Qual)”
An absolute stormer from Rhys Fulber, who has been exercising his brutalist techno chops for a bunch of recent releases, but heads back towards more song-oriented composition on this collab with William Maybelline. It’s a solid match, as the latter’s solo work has always had a strong current of the kind of electro-industrial that Fulber helped pioneer, with Maybelline’s grave vocal delivery fitting in nicely with the thudding concrete kicks and the 16th note synthlines that wend their way through the song. A great taste of things to come in the hopefully near future.
The Abyss (feat. Qual) by Rhys Fulber

Aurat, “Kismet”
It’s been nearly four years since we had new music from California’s Aurat, but the cacaphonic and haunting post-punk/goth act’s stock has risen drastically in that interim with a slew of well received shows. If we’re to take this new track as a statement of things to come, they’re beginning to work a lot more industrial clatter into their already dense sound, while still keeping Azeka Kamal’s fantastic vocals at the centre.
KISMET by Aurat

House of Harm, “Fight the Feeling”
Bostonian post-punk act House of Harm have always had a knack for sad, dreamy melodies, and for positioning them within rock solid arrangements that display a lot of songwriting saavy. New cut “Fight the Feeling” shows the same maturity and compulsive listenability of their last full record Playground from 2023, and with still more smooth production, especially on the vocals of Michael Rocheford which have really become something special and distinctive. A really nice cut from a band who rarely deliver anything other than really nice cuts.
Can't Fight the Feeling by House of Harm

Invalid User, “Cyber Baiting”
We’ve long been touting the releases of Bogotá’s Pildoras Tapes for the label’s presentation of grimy yet utterly modern body music with a South American focus, offering a valuable aesthetic counterpoint to the near stranglehold on modern dancefloor focused EBM Berlin seemed to be tightening for several years. This track, from their recent comp celebrating five years of work, allows label honcho Jose Marulanda to show off a thudding but pleasantly dense and nuanced club smasher under his longstanding Invalid User handle.
Anatomía del Control I by Invalid User

Empusae, “Invocation (The Fractured Self)”
Boy howdy but Nicolas Van Meirhaeghe of Empusae’s been on a tear. Factoring in the forthcoming The Alchemist’s Rift LP on Arcane Dirge, we’re counting at least six LPs, collabs, and EPs released by Empusae since the beginning of last year, and we’re likely missing a couple of oddities here and there. Thankfully that release schedule hasn’t led to a drop in quality, and the massive, bombastically cinematic take on neo-classical and dark ambient we’ve come to associate with his latter era work is on full display on this sweeping album opener.
The Alchemist's Rift by Empusae

Pain Magazine, “Violent God”
Pain Magazine is a new band from some familiar names; the project is made up of Louisahhh and frequent collaborator Maelstrom, and French hardcore act Birds in a Row. Apparently the principles decided to randomly try to do something together, and then ended up recording a whole-ass record of some pretty gnarly industrialized electro, with some real nice lush guitars, are used much differently than you might be expecting given the harsh nature of the synths and drum programing. “Violent God” also features one of Louisahhh’s most tortured vocal performances to date, a match for the tormented sound of the instrumental for sure. The forthcoming LP is now right at the top of our hotly anticipated releases for 2025.
Violent God by Pain Magazine

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A landmark for minimal, aggressive EBM for decades to come, the debut LP from Swedish legends Pouppée Fabrikk is the subject of this month’s commentary podcast. A deceptively varied listen, Rage infused EBM with a unique punk ethos, and as we discuss here, hinted at the voluminous discography frontman Henrik Nordvargr Björkk was to embark upon. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Valisia Odell
Shadow Of A Dream
Detriti Records

Shadow Of A Dream is labelled as Greek singer Valisia Odell’s debut, but by the end of its breezy half hour run-time you could be forgiven for mistaking her for a stylist who’s been working in darkwave for decades. That’s actually half true, as Shadow Of A Dream is effectively a rebooting of the duo Strawberry Pills, who released a handful of singles and one LP in a minimal wave vein a few years back. The name change isn’t just marketing though, as the focus on Odell’s vocals gives the record a dramatic and engrossing throughline.

Odell’s vocal range and performance style has precious in common with, say, Lene Lovich or Rozz Williams, to grab a pair of grand dames of goth out of a hat, but like those veterans’ releases Shadow Of A Dream places Odell’s commanding vocals and personality right at the center, both in composition and production. That place in the limelight is something Odell makes a meal of, practically looming over the listener with swooping trills on “My Sin” and commanding Greek invective on “Makria” with authority.

Beyond the vocals, the core tunes on Shadow Of A Dream strike a nice balance between modern dancefloor cool and a more classic sense of darkwave harmonics. Handled by Aristomenis Theodoropoulos, who in addition to Strawberry Pills has served time in half a dozen post-punk, goth, and folks acts, tunes like “R.I.N.” and “An Arabian Tale” make the most of their stripped down synth instrumentation with less-is-more flourishes and harmonics. The stabby synth funk of “Breaths” recalls the too-briefly-with-us Animal Bodies more than more contemporaneous comparisons to Boy Harsher or Dark Chisme which I can anticipate others making. Late album highlight “The Light Shines Through” builds a fantastic dancefloor slowburn by juxtaposing shimmering bells against a simple kick and Odell’s untreated vocals against processed ones.

We’ve long held that atmosphere, however you’d care to define it, is darkwave’s defining feature. Of course, the means of producing that atmosphere doesn’t have to be limited to constant gauzy synth pads, and the way Odell’s vocals haunt this record are proof positive of that. Alternately vengeful, malevolent, and chiding, she draws deep from the wells of classic gothic drama and theatricality to thrilling effect here. Recommended.

Buy it.

Valisia Odell – Shadow of a Dream by Detriti Records

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We’re getting into the weeds of US industrial this week, discussing a record that captures a very specific early 90s moment, along with some formal experimentation in D.D.T.’s Discomedia, and one which consolidates the strength and range of cyberpunk stalwarts Cyanotic, The Trigger Effect. We’re also looking over the solid lineup and new location for this year’s Subtance Festival.  As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Nevada Hardware
Split Scene
Thinkbreak Records

Doug Jones’ Nevada Hardware has a small but mighty catalogue of work. The project’s debut LP No Future from 2018, and the occasional compilation track and remix (including the absolutely storming version of “Rhythm of the System” cooked up for Klack) have shown Jones’ excellent capacity for producing stomping, Big Beat influenced instrumental electronics, with a healthy dose of guitars and some touches of Mortal Kombat style techno. It’s been a long wait for new album, but nothing about Split Scene suggests that time was wasted: at seven tracks and 25 minutes, the record bangs harder and demands to be played louder than any other material Jones has released to date.
 
Nevada Hardware’s secret is in mashing together some proven dancefloor sounds with an ear towards heavy grooves that are both funky and headbang worthy. “The more things change, the more they stay the same” intones the sample that starts the record, and “World Code 666” bears that out with its breaks-driven rhythm, army of sampled and processed guitars and vocal snippets with a build to a big cinematic climax – these are all well-established sounds, but there are few acts are this adept at invoking peak-era Crystal Method, Freestylers and your choice of PS1 era racing game aesthetics into such a potent form. Jones can modulate that for variety as required, melding it with gnarly high-speed techno on “In the Dark” or balls-out synth-driven crossover thrash on “Letters of Sympathy” without ever repeating himself, a feat of smart execution in and of itself. 

For all that clamour, there’s also some pleasing subtle touches that tie individual songs together. “The Suburbs Dream of Violence” is rapid-fire vocal clips and rolling drums on its surface, but the menacing chord progression that sits behind its chorus, and the fuzzed out breakdown are what makes it into a proper song. Similarly, the mid-tempo bounce of “Overload” channels disco’s rhythm guitar and drum interplay, melting it down and moulding it into a cyberpunk dance jam that will play to rivetheads and synthwavers alike. The laidback soul that makes its way into “Fluoride Stare”, and the touches of EBM programming and choral voices that inform the title track are easy to miss in the sturm and drang of it all, but they’re crucial to making the record more than just a collection of bangers. 

Don’t get it wrong though, Split Scene has more than its share of absolute barn-burners, each one distinct enough from the rest to stand on its own. An informal survey of other DJs and reviewers who had the record as a promo before the street date revealed that everyone had selected a different song as their personal favourite, a testament to its overall quality and its depth. Certainly one of the most kinetic records of the first third of the year, and by virtue of its giant-size hooks and stompin’ beats, one of its most fun. Recommended. 

Buy it.

Split Scene by Nevada Hardware

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An Easter weekend which featured a papal death, a John Cena title win, and 4:20 is certainly one for the books. We’re hoping you’re navigating the day to day surreal nightmare that is 2025 as best as can be hoped, dear reader. We’re trying to stay grounded by looking forward not just to the festivals we’ve been discussing on the podcast, but a few high profile upcoming releases by the likes of Bootblacks, General Dynamics, and Lead Into Gold, all of which we’ll be discussing right here, alongside Tracks posts like this one.

Skren

Youth Code, “In Search of Tomorrow”
We’re thankful as fuck that Youth Code are back after a few years absence, and with the release of the second teaser for the forthcoming Yours With Malice, we’re equally thankful that the LA duo are doing something we’ve never heard them do before. There have been YC songs we found personally inspirational, invigorating, and even hopeful, but rarely has the band leaned in on that sound in a melodic fashion as on “In Search of Tomorrow”. And they pull it off without sacrificing the scathing anger and energy that has always been what set them apart from the rest. Hit play below, and see what we’re talking about.

Skren, “Fragment”Do you, dear reader, ever feel nostalgic for X-Fusion, Xotox, [X]-Rx, and a whole mess of other German acts beginning with X from a couple of decades back? Düsseldorf’s Skren certainly do from the sound of their new EP Fragment, and whether you call it aggro, cyber, or Pro Noize you know it when you hear it, and boy howdy do you ever hear it on the title cut. Timed and executed just right, a joint like this is almost strong enough to make one forget how much of a stranglehold stuff of this ilk used to have on clubs.
FRAGMENT by SKREN

Spire Circle, “Burning Alive”
The late 90s moment when a whole wave of goth rock bands began to drift from their pure trad roots and began embracing a range of electronics from the broader worlds of darkwave and industrial is a very, very specific time, but it’s one Manchester’s Spire Circle have honed in on quite nicely with their new single. Balancing a thudding goth nod with just enough shiny synth flash, there’s a great machine-rocking drive here…which might even have a whiff of the likes of Gravity Kills around the corners?
Burning Alive by Spire Circle

Ships in the Night, “Blood Harmony”
We admit to not having checked out recent Metropolis records signee Ships in the Night ’til now, and feel bad for not having done so. The low-key, but still engaging energy of the recent singles from Alethea Leventhal’s solo project hit a really nice sweet spot between classic and modern darkwave, with enough pop sensibility to appeal to witchy goths and casual dark synth fans alike. “Blood Harmony” is especially quite nice, on a 90’s soundtrack kinda tip.
Blood Harmony by Ships In The Night

INVA//ID, “Slug (Wetworks Mix)”
INVA//ID started the new year off with an everything and the kitchen sink industrial rock release, The Agony Index. As we noted upon its release, it was the sort of record which felt crammed to the gills with ideas and sketches, some of which simply didn’t have time to stretch out, so a couple of mixes (plus instrumentals) which stretch “Slug” out from its minute and a half LP incarnation makes a lot of sense. The pensive EBM crawl of this one is a reminder of the menace INVA//ID can hold even when not piling on the guitars.
.Slug. by INVA//ID

MMK, “Ilsandra in Ruin”
A tip of the IDUD ballcap to modebionics, who tipped us off to the video for “Ilsandra in Ruins”, from MMK’s EP of the same name that came out in the fall of last year. We generally don’t go this far back for a Tracks post, but we think you’re likely to enjoy this one; it sits right in the early dark electro pocket, where bands were taking influence from the Vancouver sound, but melding it with continental EBM amongst others. Just a great slowburn of a track, with an excellent video to boot! 

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Death And Horror Inc. live in Toronto circa 1995.

How does community lead to the discovery of new music? How do changes in the circles we run in or means through which we communicate lead to changes in our musical diets? How do modern algorithms interrupt or aid those musical flows? These are questions probably best left to serious sociological researchers, but instead you’ve got us two chuckleheads talking about the subject on this week’s podcast. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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The Birthday Massacre
Pathways
Metropolis Records

Since their debut in 2002 Canadian rock act The Birthday Massacre have stuck to the promise of their earliest recordings, maintaining their dreamy, popsmart sound across a catalogue that is now some ten albums deep. While the band, still centered around founding trio of Chibi Taylor, Michael Falcore and Michael Rainbow has modulated their sound in various ways over time, they’ve never abandoned their defining aesthetics of dark fantasy.

The question at the heart of The Birthday Massacre’s new LP Pathways is whether a band that has existed for more than a quarter of a century can still conjure the same sense of youthful wonderment and reverie. One the one hand, they sound as slick and neon-glossy as ever, pulling off radio-ready pop-rock cuts like “Wish” characteristic poise. Vintage TBM, its big chorus built up from the hook introduced in the opening moments, and is adorned with tasteful synths and Chibi’s always charismatic vocal presence. That number along with a few other cuts (the charging title track, and the melancholic closer “Cruel Love”) are the kind of easy, fun, and above all catchy songs that band has never lost a knack for.

On the other hand, there’s a sense that the band are casting around for something different to do with themselves, with some puzzling results. “Sleep Tonight” brings back the downtuned riffing of the mid-period records, but it mostly ends up weighing the song’s melody down, its hook lost in a sea of guitar. Elsewhere on “Whisper” Chibi uses a growling delivery in contrast with her normal clarion vocal style, a choice that isn’t out of step with the plodding alt rock of the song, but doesn’t really gel with TBM’s characteristic sparkle and shine. The band have always had one foot in heavier sounds, but most of the record’s harder tracks feel like they would have worked better without the chug.

Pathways is roughly on par with The Birthday Massacre’s contemporary records, and has a few gems that speak to the songwriting and presentation that have always been their strengths. For a band of their vintage to still be able to do that effectively is certainly nothing to scoff at, and longtime fans will no doubt find some new favorites for their playlists and live singalongs.

Buy it.

Pathways by The Birthday Massacre

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Solo Ansamblis
Scenos
Artoffact Records

The broader world of post-punk has undergone massive changes over the past ten years, both in terms of reach and sub-styles. After a lengthy run of North American bands cleaving perhaps too closely to Joy Division and similarly weighty elder gods, the surprising crossover success of Molchat Doma has led to a somewhat lighter but similarly monochromatic wave of acts from former Soviet states holding sway, drawing younger listeners to the style but often delivering a fairly conservative read on it. While Solo Ansamblis do indeed hail from Baltic territory and at times trade in of-the-moment chilly and languid sounds, their willingness to run riot through electronic, funk, and krautrock inspired sounds on new LP Scenos is a welcome reminder of just how colourful post-punk can be.

This is far from the Lithuanian act’s first rodeo. Indeed, our first point of contact with them, 2020’s “Baloje” was an indicator of their interest in robotic funk and their willingness to buck contemporary trends five years into their career. Now ten years in, that free-roaming approach still holds on Scenos, with the morose and minimal opening title track giving way to the more squared off and intrepid stomp of “Oda”. But it’s when the chorus pedal on the guitar of “Švelnūs jausmai” adds a sheen of lithe funk to its motorik beat that the record’s combination of freewheeling surrealism and solid grasp of Neue Deutsche Welle throwback sounds really kicks in.

That ability to pick up on the subtler sides of classic post-punk is something which keeps adding depth and dimension as Scenos unfolds. The funky synth lope that pokes and threads its way through “Meilės Mašina” has far more in common with left-field synth classics like Grauzone’s “Eisbar” than just about anything happening in the field today. On the flip side of that, the detuned and grimy acid synth scribbling of “Tendencija” finds Solo Ansamblis taking a page from much more recent electronics to bring their already solid rhythms to modern nightclubs, albeit with a stutter-step.

By the time the Neu!-indebted “Nuobodu” and its reprise close out the album with a rave-up which feels like Snowy Red going motorik, the sense that Scenos leaves the listener with is one of variety and, well, fun. That last notion is one which might not come to mind very often with post-punk these days, but Solo Ansamblis’ ability to send their rhythmic talents casting out towards so many touchstones from the past and present can’t help but feel like a welcome and infectious change of pace in the current post-punk landscape.

Buy it.

Scenos by Solo Ansamblis

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It’s almost Spring time for real here in Rain City, and with that comes the rush of live music that kicks off our Festival-attending year as Verboden Festival looms large in the near-future. In just a few weeks we’ll be watching (and doing some MC’ing) for a whole swatch of great bands, many of whom we’ve not had the opportunity to see before, or see in our own hometown. As always, if you’re in town and attending, we’d really love to chat with you and maybe share a drink or three, it’s a great social atmosphere and there’s never a shortage of memorable performances to discuss. On to Tracks!

Hallows

Rotersand, “Black Night”
Rotersand covered Deep Purple. Yeah no point buring the lede on that one, and they did quite a job of it. The German act have always had some decent rock energy in their sound, although never quite so explicitly as this; the boogey of the original is maintained here, but done over in their inimitable style, especially benefitting from Rascal raunching up his vocals, and the solo and organ breakdown being replaced by some detuned synthwork and rolling drum programming that feels weirdly natural. Butt rock rarely sounds quite this club-ready.

Creux Lies, “Apocalypto”
After the walloping, baroque strength of sophomore LP Wrong Divine, you can bet we’re very keen to track the next moves by Sacramento post-punks Creux Lies. Stripped down and deeply black-pilled, “Apocalypto” is a far cry from the freestyle brightness of “Frozen”, and instead drives straight into the most doomed corners of post-punk’s origins. There’s enough filigree around the corners of the production to let you know that it’s still Creux Lies, but the gap between these two recent songs suggests that Creux Lies’ next LP will be a varied beast.
Apocalypto by Creux Lies

Hallows, “Despite Those Times”
A nice new one from Los Angeles’ Hallows, working a much more old school version of darkwave than has been popular for a few years now. The metal clanks, stoic vocals, and smooth analogue synthwork (aided and abetted by Matia from Inhalt on the boards) bring to mind the goth-adjacent synthpop of early Propaganda and Anne Clark, that nice sweet spot between dancefloor appeal and mopey moods. We haven’t had an LP from the band in a few years, it’ll be interesting to see whether this and the previously released “Find A Way” are leading up to a full record.
Despite Those Times by HALLOWS

Organist, “Thank God We Die”
Shaped by Justin Hagberg’s well-known fascination with occult and hermetic traditions and his less-known fascination with Alphaville, the fist single from the 3 Inches Of Blood axeman’s new project has a graceful lilt and just the right amount of pomp, as reflected in this lush video (much of the symbolism of which is likely flying over our profane heads). Entirely removed both from 3IB and his more saturnine work in Ritual Dictates, it’s as unexpected of a synthpop slow-burn as you’ll hear this year.

bent, “Liquid Bells”
Remember the days when gloomy, drippy dark electro from Germany held sway over clubs and labels worldwide? Munich’s bent certainly does, and their new single “Liquid Bells” is an excellent homage to that style (think Lam-‘Bras-era Pitchfork rather than Absurd Minds’ tribute to the α Ω period). Replete with the titular sound, it’s a track which nails the harmonic and at times anthemic side of songs of this stripe while still delivering all of the shimmering atmospherics you’d hope for.
Liquid Bells EP by bent

Tham, “Heartcore”
A couple of years ago we discussed how French producer ROÜGE had reverse engineered that techno-body version of aggrotech Anti Hero EP by ROÜGE“>on some of their singles, an interesting development to be sure. The new mini-compilation on ROÜGE features a preview track from techno producer Tham that suggests the same only moreso; to wit this is basically a modern hardcore track, complete with MC’ing, but with some slick cybered up production and a healthy amount of distortion. It’s fun as hell, maybe a touch intense for the average dancefloor, but this should find a home in the crates of those who like it loud, fast and fearless.
Echoes by Tham

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