Midnight in Tokyo Vol.4
Tsunaki Kadowaki curates the fourth installment of Midnight in Tokyo, themed around Ambient Kayō. The Midnight in Tokyo series by Studio Mule focuses on Japanese music, serving as a soundtrack for Tokyo nights -- whether for home listening, club play, or as a driving BGM, transcending location and space. The fourth volume takes "Ambient Kayō" as its new perspective, compiling genre-defying tracks released between 1977 and 1999 to explore the intersection of Japanese ambient and pop music. The fo…
Midnight in Tokyo Vol.2
Midnight In Tokyo Vol. 2, the second installment to the compilation series that rounds up hidden gems by Japanese artists that's perfect for listening at night in Tokyo, is here. This time the collection brings together some tasty electric jazz fusion from the '80s, compiled by Dubby, the man behind the online record store Ondas. The compilation begins with "Hikobae", a dark and slow cosmic jazz by saxophonist Genji Sawai, followed by "Danza Lucumi", an odd Caribbean-style jam by Today's Latin P…
Midnight In Tokyo Vol. 1
Mule Musiq announce their new label, Studio Mule. Midnight In Tokyo Vol. 1 is a compilation of Japanese disco, boogie, and soul music. The compilation starts off with the Afro disco classic "Mi Mi Africa" by harmonica player Nobuo Yagi. "Silver Spot" is a jazzy fusion disco track taken from composer, arranger, and multi-instrumentalist Nobuyuki Shimizu's first album (1980), released when he was 19. The track features singer Epo. "Samba Night" is by vocalist Keisuke Yamamoto and his band Piper, f…
Haihara
Prolific Norwegian trumpeter and ECM veteran Arve Henriksen returns with Estonian guitarist/composer Robert Jürjendal in tow, matching his idiosyncratic shakuhachi-style melodic condensations with Jürjendal’s glassy electro-acoustic soundscapes and sonorous percussion. Fans of Jon Hassell & Brian Eno, Daniel Schmidt and Badalamenti, this one’s for you
Lucid Dreams
First Terrace are thrilled to present the new album Lucid Dreams from the prolific Japanese artist Chihei Hatakeyama on January 24th 2025. Renowned ambient composer Chihei Hatakeyama is set to release his latest album, Lucid Dreams, an evocative sonic exploration that invites listeners to drift between the waking world and the dreamscape, to experience “dreams you are aware that you are dreaming”. Known for his deep atmospheric textures and minimalist approach to sound, Hatakeyama’s new project …
Issue 123: Cluster (Magazine + 7" White)
You probably don't need us to translate ELEKTRONISCHES DEUTSCHLAND for you. But to expand on that a little, we're heading back to the 1970s and a country then known as West Germany for this month's Electronic Sound cover story. We're bundling the issue with an exclusive orange vinyl seven-inch by kosmische pioneers Cluster too.
Our cover image is based on the artwork of the debut album from Harmonia, krautrock's first supergroup, and you will find five connected articles inside the magazine, inc…
The Air Outside Feels Crazy Right Now
Perila returns with a contemplative spiritual successor to her album »7.37/2.11«, which was also released on Vaagner’s sister label A Sunken Mall back in 2022. Featuring a collection of 8 pieces produced between 2021 and 2023, the album carries a serene vulnerability that underpins each work, drawing the listener in while gently grounding them amidst a drifting, ephemeral motion of echoing voices, droning guitars and sonorous soundscapes. Like a whispered conversation in the quiet moments of the…
Celesta
Tip! 'Celesta’ marks Barbarelle first foray into composing and producing her own music; a debut that reveals the intimate, heartfelt territories of her creative universe. The culmination of years of composing for herself - ‘behind closed doors’ - ‘Celesta’ is a deeply personal, self-guided masterstroke of beguiling, free-flowing ambient soundscapes and DIY electronics. With ‘Celesta’, Barbarelle artfully transitions from ardent music aficionado to fully-fledged artist, unveiling an enchanting so…
La Didone Abbandonata I 5. Studie I Streichquartett I Umbau 2 I Tragicomedia
2012 release ** "Michael Hirsch began to work as a composer in 1976, with occasional interruptions for theatre engagements. In addition to instrumental music and music theatre, the genre of musique concrète is an important part of his compositional oeuvre as is illustrated impressively by the works recorded on this CD. “La Didone abbandonata” is based on the opera seria text of the same name by Pietro Metastasio from 1724. For his version Hirsch reduced the number of the dramatis personae to the…
Snake Island
2025 stock ** "Snake Island, the new album from Mona Mur, sees the Berlin-based artist building upon her dark electronic sound with a newfound interest in playing guitar. Collaborating with Ralf Goldkind, Mur balances abrasive elements with moodier atmospherics. Creative production and sound design throughout gives Snake Island an absolutely unique sound. Since emerging in the early 80s, Mur has released albums under her own name and been part of collaborations with such artists as En Esch and …
Blood To Blood
2008 release ** "DerDrakos, under which hides the Greek/Italian clan composed of Steve J. Drakos, father and Alex Drakos, son, authors of music, lyrics and vocal lines, whose musical proposal is an industrial techno music, strongly influenced, on a textual level, by the anarcho punk ideology, while on a musical level we are close to shores such as the techno music of the nineties and the more “raw” industrial of Einsturzende Neubauten, but also to the more politically engaged one of KMFDM. Wanti…
Antimother
2003 release ** ""Anti Mother is a follow-up from Czech ambient-industrial pioneers The Three, whose works foresaw and predestined the musical algorithms and the development the Czech industrial scene. After their last studio session in 1995, which resulted in seven compositions that blazed the trail later walked by such artists as Steve Roach or Yen Pox, Project the Three’s activity was frozen. After eight years of hibernation they have metamorphosized into Anti Mother.""
Complexed
2012 release ** "An abominable noise, perfect for those who don't love themselves. An authentic auditory disaster, a descent into the underworld of the most abject psychological dysfunctions, in an electronics made of surgical microsounds, ambulatory atmospheres, unidentified noises, patterns sent in loop until exhaustion. References? Well, think of the isolationist atmospheres of Mego (Pita in particular) or the extreme power electronics of an Atrax Morgue and you'll have a general idea of wh…
The Damnation Helix: Zeitgeist Movement Vol. 2
2006 release ** "Annihilvs Power Electronix proudly presents The Damnation Helix, from Wilt. With The Damnation Helix, James P. Keeler sinks to new depths of sonic necromancy. Hearken to the sound of black teeth grinding against the boundaries of the afterlife to send us a message of fear, as the voices of the damned cry out from beneath blankets of charred skin just beyond the threshold of a universe of pure madness. This material ranges from the familiar dark atmospheres of Wilt's previous wor…
Phlegmaticus
1999 release ** "Maurizio Pustianaz is the mentor of Gerstein a one-man sound project that from the mid-80s to the end of the 90s, was creating authentic underground electronic gems. Already in the new century, Pustianaz opted for the most bland and commercial electro, something that he has been doing until now, a real shame. This is his most experimental stage, where he took risks with dense atmospheres, dark electronic sounds, tape treatment, etc... Re-issue of his first cassette released by t…
Thinking Dust
2005 release ** "After a few CD-R releases, Wolfram's "first real album", released by the newly established Monotype label from Warsaw. "Thinking Dust" develops and exceeds the ideas from "Atol Drone" and "Mind Locations" released over the years - a very personal, calm, but also subconsciously disturbing variety of ambient. Wolfram never explored the sounds of "post-club" or naive el-music, so his work has always been free from rainbow idyll, instead it was disturbing (without evoking ghosts or …
Relic Radiation
Edition of 300. Of my first visit to Earth in 2024 I have only the fuzziest recollection, for here I must fall back on my own mnemonic resources. My chief impression seems to have been of sunlight, the authentic, inimitable sunlight of Earth. Organs that have evolved under particular conditions will naturally be most comfortable where those conditions obtain, and thus no substitute, however artful, can provide just those balances of colour and intensity, those alterations of night and day, summe…
Trumpetronics
2001 release ** "Kozo Ikeno is a trumpet and electronics player from Japan. He creates experimental jazz, abstract break beats and field recordings. He is out now with this new album produced in Italy by Braxtone Records. It is a real must for experimental music connoisseurs!!! All compositions by Kozo Ikeno, composed and recorded in 2001"
Knar
2008 release ** "Legendary album in remastered version,including two rare tracks, edition in new layout. 'Knar' is one of the most important releases in history of Different State. Many polish musician journalists announced 'Knar' as the album of the Year 1996. We recommend this release to elder fans of this group and to all of you who love unconventional type of sounds. For fans of Godflesh, Head of David, Coil, Scorn."
Tenebrae
2011 release ** "A collaboration album by two prominent Russian post-industrial projects Majdanek Waltz and Sal Solaris. The conceptual core of the record is the poetry of Paul Celan, one of the major German-language poets of the post-World War II era. His cryptic fractured lyrics spoken in a specific estranged way by Pavel Blumkin is enchased by a weird fusion of avant-garde neoclassic and dark ambient music. This record will seem unusual even for those who are already familiar with the works o…