It’s a tricky thing to cram in all of the salient discussion one wants to have about an album as influential and revered as The Cure’s Pornography into 43 minutes of album concurrent commentary, but we’re pretty happy with the resulting podcast which came out yesterday. We hope folks got a kick out of it and will allow us the rare indulgence of discussing a release as high profile and canonical as that one; you can be assured we’ll be looking at something on the Masticated Existence spectrum next month. On with this week’s Tracks!
Dead Lights, “(The Edge of) Dusk”
Another taster from UK act Dead Lights’ forthcoming LP LASH, due in May. “(The Edge of) Dusk” does a fine job splitting the difference between low-key, seething and sexy synthpop with modern dance sounds, ending up with a track that has some motor in it, but takes its time before giving you some grandeur on it’s moaned chorus and finely articulated second verse, leading to a properly epic piano finale. A fine lil’ dark symphony of the type the band has been getting better and better at executing.
Give My Remains to Broadway, “Forever Awake”
Toronto’s Give My Remains to Broadway are hitting the spot for us with each successive release. They keep their songs tightly wound and executed, their bass and guitar locked in, and their vocals forceful without shouting, creating an inevitable push that gives them insistence and movement, “Forever Awake” is pretty much the perfect example thereof, and a good place to start with these still under the radar cats; it would not surprise us to see them blow up any day now.
Neon Electronics, “Nothing For Nothing (Patrick Codenys Remix)”
Dirk Da Davo, best known for his work with seminal Belgian act The Neon Judgment, is winding down his Neon Electronics project in style, with a slew of big names attached to its final EP. Radical G/Glenn Keteleer is in tow, Ancient Methods is on remixing duty, as is no less a luminary than 242’s Patrick Codenys. The links between the earliest codifications of new beat and EBM which Da Davo was a part of, along with the larger post-punk experimentalism The Neon Judgment traded in, can all still be heard in the latter’s version of this track.
bent, “Dogma”
The first full-length from recently reactivated German project bent is on deck, and between the various singles and EPs that’ve been released over the last couple of years, we’re pretty excited to hear what a full statement from Niko Martens will sound like. Tracks like this one deliver on a melodic, moody, and richly evocative style of dark electro which should bring to mind the golden age of Placebo Effect, Individual Totem, and early Pitchfork.
Ye Gods, “Darashim (Ghost Cop Remix)”
Ye Gods’ recent enveloping Equilibrium Trilogy might have had a very tight musical and thematic focus, but Antoni Maiovvi’s genre-hopping discography means his rolodex of remixers features a very broad range of names. You have everyone from Snowbeasts to Makeup & Vanity Set to Mogwai (!) bringing their styles to bear on Rebalanced, a forthcoming set of remixes of tracks from the three EPs. Brooklyn’s Ghost Cop do a bang up job of bringing some industrial thud and uneasy harmonics to “Darashim” while still preserving its ambience.
Centrifugal Force Machine, “Incinerate”
Portland’s Centrifugal Force Machine continues to find sounds between minimal synth, hard industrial techno and funky EBM on their new single for X-IMG. There’s something great about hearing a song that is simultaneously hard and biting, but not doesn’t abandon the highly danceable grooviness of genre classics. Fun and forceful, just how we like it.
