*THUD* No, that wasn’t the entire nation of Canada collectively passing out due to second-hand election stress and exhaustion, that was the sound of an unfathomably large stack of new records landing on our desk this past Friday. We’re having trouble remember the last time a year’s fourth quarter brought so many heavy-hitting records which have year-end list potential; it certainly hasn’t been this heavy of a storm since we started I Die: You Die. We’ll be rolling up our sleeves, burning the midnight oil, and turning to all manner of other cliched phrases as we work to bring you the low-down on this glut of records which are coming down the pipe, and still bringing you a week’s worth of fresh Tracks all the while.

Hologram_ is made out of smoke apparently?

hologram_, “Thirteen Theorums”
The last time we heard from Martin Delisle, he was teaming up with Daniel Myer and Arco Trauma for the We Are Alchemists supergroup; truly a sound design fan’s wet dream if ever there was one. Back in the lab, Delisle’s just released the second record for his solo hologram_ project. Amen: Requiem for Heart Fragment looks to be a masterclass in the current edge of rattling bass sounds, and we’re digging the lead programming on this one; equal part throwbacks to aggrotech and darkwave with those stabby strings.

Orphx, “Sever The Signal”
Orphx are surely one of the rarer success stories in the world of rhythmic noise. While keeping one foot firmly in the roots of post-industrial, Rich Oddie and Christina Sealey have simultaneously pushed their sound in innumerable directions and have been rewarded with fans and plaudits stretching across the broader techno world. Pitch Black Mirror‘s the first full length in five years for the Hamilton duo, and it’s chockablock full of galvanized rubber, street-tested numbers like this.

SØLVE, “And the Wheel Turns”
It’s been a real good year for Brant Showers’ SØLVE. In addition to the release of the project’s first proper LP The Negative, Showers has been supplementing the record with a number of one-off releases direct via Bandcamp. Per Brant this Halloween jam is “just a sketch”, but damn if it doesn’t sound as good or better than a lot of other artists’ full-on finished productions.

Snog, “The Clockwork Man (Architect_RMX)”
We weren’t all that fussy about the last Snog LP, but hey, any excuse to get a new Architect remix is fine by us. Featuring that same futurestep sound Myer invoked on that Delerium mix a few weeks back, we’re wondering if maybe a slight shift in the style of the project is forthcoming. Considering how perfect the last Architect LP was (we’re still spinning it a lot), a change isn’t really necessary, but Daniel Myer’s production style is nothing if not dynamic.

[:SITD:], “Brother Death”
It’s been a minute since we got a full LP from Germany’s Shadows In The Dark, and it looks like it’ll be a minute more, what with them just dropping a fully-fleshed out EP. Brother Death looks to be a collection of new, stand-alone tracks, each squarely tossed down the dark dancefloor pipe, plus a handful of remixes of tunes from Dunkelziffer. It’d be easy to see if the EP format is something which more bands of traditionally club-styled ilk gravitate towards…

Inertia, “Stormfront (iVardensphere remix)”
Check out this pretty neat remix, wherein Scott Fox takes the industrial rock stylings of Inertia in a pretty different direction. Where the most noted traits of an iVs production are usually in the bass and percussion department (this being no exception), we like how this mix speaks to the project’s sense of economy in the mix. Making that grinding bass rhythm cohabitate with the original vocal and guitar tracks and still feeling like there’s space is no mean feet, strong work all ways round.