Tag: Information Society

Final Bandcamp Friday of the Year!

Featured By 1 Comment

So the final Bandcamp day of 2020 is upon us. This whole year feels like an absurd blur. I continue to beat the drum hard for all Bandcamp does to support artists all year round. This day each month has become something I cherish as it usually leads to several new releases. As usual I am up at midnight firing through whiskey and trying to share some of the new music that is filling my heart with fire. As the possibility of Facebook turning away from artists sharing their work I urge you to follow the page and comment below the review music that is inspiring you that I might put it in future reviews.

Codename: Lola – Lets start out with this badass cover of one of my favorite bands Ultravox in one of their more underrated songs. The single features fireball vocals from Gothzilla frontman Tim Jarvis. It’s got a glorious walking gansta style and a wailing guitar solo. Just blistering energy that never lets up and fills me with excitement for the future of this project. Currently it is free on bandcamp and is a must grab.

https://codenamelola.bandcamp.com/

Vlimmer: Alexander has done it again. His ability to crank out albums at the highest quality in record speed leaves me speechless. This latest release “XIIIIIIII” has his textured emotive stark imagery. Opening with an urgency and seamless blend of guitar slush with cascading keyboards. It’s gorgeous, immersive, and never disappoints. I am always shocked by how far from the previous concept each release leaps. This one highlights the vocals and has a brighter indie rock sensibility. I’m in awe, how does he have so many ideas that always sound so fresh.

https://blackjackilluministrecords.bandcamp.com/

The Funeral March of the Marionettes – New single from the Illinois post punk band called “Useless”. It’s brash and melodic with 80s Killing Joke feel. That driving bassline that never lets up and chanting devil may care vocals that add weight by floating on the wave of sound.

https://thefuneralmarch.bandcamp.com/album/useless-a-foolish-arrangement

Dissonance Feat: Kurt Larson: If there are three things I love it is 1) Kate Bush 2) Kurt Larson (Information Society) 3) The soulful smokey croon of Cat Hall. It’s a song that has seen covers before but this one is special for the vocal duet and digital downpour of sound falling on us while we are running up that hill. A special release from one of the most underrated voices in this scene. This single comes off an amazing compilation of cover songs by electronic artists called “Numbers Covered”. A great value here but if you have to check just one track it is this.

https://emergencyhearts.bandcamp.com/album/numbers-covered-a-benefit-album-for-numbers-night-club

Vertical Patrols – Another single from the San Diego synthwave artist. It’s warm and puts me in mind of catchy New Order Technique until the vocals drop with a unique accented feeling of frustration and loss. It grabs hold of your lapels and shakes you furiously searching for it’s own answers. It’s one of those bands where I hear what is coming, as much as what I am hearing. This single paves the way for something exciting in the future.

https://verticalpatrols.bandcamp.com/track/again-tonight?fbclid=IwAR3ah6WZyYPvZg5tTK9e6fh5BTTwaI5nWSuknlxN1F7tdSVoV2J5X8oUfNM

Damien Done : My fellow Michigan native has released 3 new demos songs in November. It’s always a great experience when you have an artists that you have followed the evolution of their sound. Moyal has had an impressive career with a wide range of styles. His voice really has so many tricks in the bag and shifts from album to album and even within single tracks. An impressive talent and lyrical storyteller that drenches each canvas with rich and immersive imagery. My favorite of the three tracks was “Always On Fire” with featured this beautiful harp sound. His voice takes on a rich Brendan Perry (Dead Can Dance) lilt. Then shifts into a powerful growl at just the right moment as a booming trip hop drum beat sinks in. A Master of the song writing craft Damien does not disappoint. The blistering guitar solo in the outro is a scorching flame on oil soaked waters. Powerful.

https://damiendone.bandcamp.com/album/demos-from-the-year-2020

Dead Astronauts: New release out of Seattle from Cold Transmission Music called “Silhouettes“. This one is a pre order not available until January but it already has me bubbling with excitement. First single is “Chauffer and the Flame” ok to start with I love that song title. This is hungry and sensual. It features a beautifully matched duet vocal that creates duality and tension. These drum beats come from within you and burst out of your chest. The sleek electronic style feels like I am in the Tron stadium racing in a light motorcycle with everything on the line. It’s hot, tantalizing, and leaves me hungry for more.

https://deadastronauts.bandcamp.com/album/silhouettes

Modal Citizan : New album Control Alter Deplete from chaos dark grunge out of Virginia Beach. So this was admittedly a little closer to metal edge than I generally venture. My first inclination was to kick it over to Collin or Adrian. However I found it growing on me as I played it more and more. The thick as fuck crunching guitars took me back to Bad Motorfinger from Soundgarden. The vocals while full of screech and growl, also found tones of gentle beauty which rode that razor edge never quite crossing over into something to hard for me to relate to. It was one of those records I kept expecting to want to get off the ride, but found myself clutching the bar and feeling myself pulled deeper. I always know something is impressive when it is obviously out of my wheelhouse but I keep coming back to it. Even now I am not sure how I feel, other than I was never bored or lost. I think this is a record I will find me daring myself into exploring again and again in the future.

https://modalcitizan.bandcamp.com/album/control-alter-deplete

Sapphira Vee: Ok there are a lot of reasons I am excited for this album “The Mask” due out 12/15/20. One of which are the bevy of awesome collaborators including Spankthenun, The Joy Thieves, Melodywhore, and yes Amaranth. I even do a bit of guest vocals on the track “World My Voice“. Sapphira has a voice and energy that fills a room. It’s dangerous and calls you like a siren from the rocks. These tracks are so personal and really tear her open as she holds out her heart in her hand. I love the throwback tone of dropped beat triphop. It really highlights the power of her controlled elegance. It’s music that gives you a shiver. A tension in the air. An inhaled breath with every roll of the dice. In a world of darkpop about escape, this album demands your focus. It’s hard pressed to pick a favorite track, but “Mask of Happy” is such a creeping and subtle jam you don’t realize has ahold of you until it is too late. A powerful release that belongs in your collection.

https://sapphiravee.bandcamp.com/

Grabyourface: French ultraviolet blade runner who has just signed with Negative Gain records will release an eagerly anticipated new album 12/18/20 called “Sea“. This record is gorgeous from the get. The spoken word poetry style is engaging and draws attention to the lyrics. It’s a drowning plea cutting through an ocean of depression, trying to break the water. The music is a slow electronic cascade weathering down the rocks. I really found myself getting lost in this. Sonically it’s like the other side of the same spectrum as Mr.Kitty. My pick for favorite track was “So”. The mixture of piano sound and florescent fog synths give a beautiful setting for the melody rap poetry. Overall this is an impressive offering and one I will definitely be getting preorder for.

grabyourface (bandcamp.com)

Caustic: Matt Fanale also of Klack released a new 5 song pandemic club massacre ep. Rhythmic robot signal beamed into your brain guiding your body as a marionette. My jam was Tu Madre. It was so hard to stop my feet from stomping and waking the house. The AI efficiency of the music is memorizing. There is so much movement with so few different sources carrying it. Around 2:50 the blasting toms start and kick the floor from under you. You also get Matts clever humor in songs like Stale Seman, Shame, and video games. The whispered secret, and old school dancedustrial beat are a delicious combination. Matt is really one of the leaders in the charge of current industrial/edm.

https://caustic.bandcamp.com/album/a-succession-of-repetitive-beats

Remember to drop your favorite new bands you got on bandcamp day for future reviews.

Review of Klack: Introducing The 1984 Renault LeCar

on By 1 Comment

Artist: Klack

Members: Matt Fanale, Eric Oehler

Hometown: Madison WI

Mixed and Mastered: Submersible Studios

https://klack.bandcamp.com/album/introducing-the-1984-renault-lecar

https://www.facebook.com/klackmusik/

This is an exciting review to do. It was actually released in Jan 2019 and somehow it slipped through the cracks of my reviews so I will rectify that today. Matt Fanale is fairly well known in the scene through his Industrial project Caustic. Eric Oehler of Null Device. I’m always really impressed when artists have the ability to work at a high level in multiple genres. This dancier , sample infused, Front 242 style aspect really captures something I love about all of Matt’s productions. 1) It is extremely well done 2) It doesn’t take itself overly seriously 3) It makes me want to shake my large hairy form all over a dance floor.

EDM isn’t always my cup of cocoa, so what does Klack do so well? Blending, keeping a driving vamp dance beat and flowing the proper elements in and out to hold your attention. Doing that is a tightrope walk on a razor wire. This record consistently finds that sweet spot. they use samples taken from Star wars to an advertisement from a 1984 Renault automobile. Then they are seamlessly integrated with thought provoking growled out vocals and intricate beat changes. I think a lot of dance music is about causing the listener to become lost in the texture of the beat. Klack achieves this but takes it one step further to keep your mind revolving while you shake that ass. I also really enjoy the variety of tone and speed they use on this EP. Each song has the feel of being made by a different artist so it never feels like repetition.

This album is also an homage. It isn’t just the cover art or concept. The feel of these songs have a wonderful Kraftwork ,retro computer, grainy screens flickering in a ground control station feel. I think that creates this wonderful underground revolutionary feel which i found entrancing.

Lets talk favorite tracks. The EP has 6 and they are all good. However here were my stand outs.

Flowers for Ravers – Incredible opening intro of a young lady talking about the culture of drugs and dance culture. A dark and slithering keyboard line. The layers build and the vocals have this dusky chant building to the chorus “Flowers for Ravers put them in their hair” I grew up in the 90’s rave scene in Detroit and this track is such a nostalgic memory trigger.

Le Car – First track is a burner out the gate. I love the use of the sample and concept of the relationship between humanity and machines. Rapier flick synth swipes and this wonderful trance style beat. Klack the Planet.

Lost Without You – This song really grabbed me for it’s contrast. It’s beautiful with an almost Information Society quality. Really highlighted the singers and shows the talent risen from the mud of electronics and striding to the front naked and unafraid. The melody is a hook that sinks in you deep. This was stuck in my head for days.

Overall this is a wonderfully done EP with a diverse feel, powerful concepts, and seamless transitions. I felt like it really hits on all the things I love most about dance music and inspired memories in my mind like a smell. Treat yourself to this record.

As an added bonus I got to do an interview with Matt about Klack and Eric and his process.

Ken: So you do several projects I love Caustic/Klack/daddybear. I’ve always thought it was cool that you have so many voices you want to express in different musical styles. So tell me how you started the project of Klack in particular and why it was a voice and style you needed to express?

Matt: Klack was really more of a fluke than anything.  My better half in Klack is Eric Oehler of (Null Device). We’d collaborated on things before, but he did a ND remix for the Gothsicles in an old school 242 style and asked me if I wanted to try out a track in that style.  I was totally down and he tossed me 3 or 4 short track ideas, I chose one, came up with some samples and some other sounds to add to it, and Synthesizer came out.  Eric mainly handles the music and production side and I handle samples, lyrics, and “other sounds” for it. It’s the quickest workflow for us, as we get to be “lazy” and only do stuff that’s easier (for lack of a better word) for us.

We honestly did it for our own amusement and knew some of our friends would get a kick out of it, but people really took to it so we started building on some of the other demos and the Do You Klack? EP was the result of that.

Our influences and “voice” were apparent from the get go, as we had the same references– Microchip League, early 242 and Depeche Mode, A Split Second, etc. Eric is ridiculously good at identifying sounds and how to build them, so we went from there and it’s been surprisingly successful.

Ken: : I find when a scene (especially in a smaller city) starts to really take on life it often has someone in a band who is working to drive that. I really see Madison as a place where you are helping something special happen. Tell me about why that city is special for this scene and what advice would you give to people who want to grow the scene in their cities?

Matt: Thanks. I appreciate that.  We had a lot more vibrant scene in the early to mid 2000s when I was booking shows and bands like Stromkern were big, but we’ve definitely been building up again. The club we used to hang out at closed a few years back but a new one, Crucible, opened on New Years Eve, and that’s been a really exciting place for us to all come together again. I like thinking I’m a helpful part of it, but I’m just one person trying to convince people to come out and support this stuff.  If it wasn’t for Stromkern and some of the other bands I wouldn’t have even thought my music could get heard elsewhere, so I hope I can inspire new artists the way Stromkern influenced me to make music

Ken:
What is the next step for Klack? What are you working on and will any French automobiles be advertised by you in the future?

Matt: We’re working on new music presently and will be debuting a new track at Cold Waves in September.  Then we’re opening for Boy Harsher in Madison on October 10th and playing Los Angeles at the Substance Festival (coincidentally with them as a co-headliner) in early November.

As for new stuff we hold our cards close on that, so you’ll know it when we announce it.  No more french car promotion though.  We’re loyal to the Renault LeCar through and through.  Screw Peugeot.

Ken: Q: The alarm rings, missiles are locked on your studio. You have 5 minutes to escape, enough time to get out with one armload of gear. What are you saving?

Matt: I’ll just grab my laptop and Novation Kontrol and Launchpad.  I keep it simple, as I’ve always been more DAW-centric and not a hardware guy.  I don’t have that kind of money to blow.

Ken: You have such quirky and outside the stream song concepts. Tell me about your song writing process, where do you find the ideas you write about and how do you turn that into music?

Matt: I work a few ways when it comes to Klack, since Eric is responsible for the music. Sometimes lyrics just jump into my head, a la DMF off our first EP.  I had the title (which was the name of a goth/industrial night on campus when Eric and I were at UW Madison) but the lyrics popped when I actually locked down on the demo.  Other times, like for With Precision off Le Car, I had a bunch of lyrics but was waiting for the right music.  It all depends.  I’m working off a few other demo ideas right now and lyrics for both came to me when listening to the tracks.

My pools of inspiration for lyrics are different for Klack than Caustic or any of my other projects.  I have very specific lyrical references for Klack, but for Caustic it’s what can fit for the song– I don’t have restraints for Caustic.  I can’t think of a track where I debated “is this a Caustic lyric or a Klack lyric?”  They’re very purposefully different, as the projects have different voices.  I like writing for as many voices as possible, whether that be for Erica in Beauty Queen Autopsy or Eric for Klack.  It’s fun pushing my creativity that way.

Ken: If you could do a music video for any of your Klack songs. You had an unlimited budget. What song would you pick and what would that video look like?

Matt: Oh hell, I’d just hire Anton Corbijn to do a video for Discipline, one of our new tracks. He’s done videos for 242 and Depeche Mode, so he’s hitting our major touchstones.  We might as well stop pretending to be those bands and just use their guy straight off.

Ken: Give me one piece of Klack “Industrial Gossip” which my reader don’t know about?

Matt: Eric has a pouch like a kangaroo and he hides beef jerky in it.  

Dissonance : Ascent

on By

Album: Ascent

Label: https://www.facebook.com/hakatakinternational/

Members: Cat Hall (FOUNDING MEMBER) David Sebrind (FOUNDING MEMBER) Jim Marcus GoFight/DieWarsaw (producer and co-writer of Dissonance EP) Kurt Larson Vocals on Poison Kiss
Mastered: Jim Marcus

https://www.facebook.com/CatHallDissonance/

https://dissonanceband.bandcamp.com/album/ascent

I find new music from a lot of sources. Sometimes someone in a band reaches out, or I hear a song on one of the wonderful Radio programs I listen too. What I am trying to say is that sometimes the word of who an artist associates themselves with can be the first thing that draws me to them. This was the case with the talented singer of Dissonance Cat Hall. No one short of Jim Marcus (Go Fight and Die Warzaw) heard something in Cat’s voice that made him want to write music and produce for her. The legend Kurt Larson (Information Society) was such a fan he wanted to sing on one of the tracks of this EP. If that isn’t a ringing enough endorsement to get your attention I don’t know what is. It certainly caused me to sit up and take notice and I am really glad I did. Cat Hall has a unique and haunting voice that shows amazing range of both pitch and style in a way that captivates and comforts at the same time. Marcus is the master of taking heavy dance beats and mainlining them with energy and life to create the perfect dark pop playground for Cat’s words and lyrics to tell her story. Her voice ranges from a sultry, rich jazzy cadence to a piercing powerful beauty of airy delight.

These are dance magic club hits with teeth and lyrics of accusation for relationships and boundaries. I found the lyrics refreshing in that it doesn’t get lost in imagery and pretension. It lends well to the pop sensibility of the music. The transitions are masterfully crafted and they keep the energy flowing through you while Cat builds and bends the melodies from one style to the next. Influences here as you might expect definitely have Information Society, Go Fight, even some 90s Susanne Vega. I think the other thing that left such an impression was that this was dark dance music but with soul. Just enough R & B to the vocal style to have a flavor that made it something new in the genre.

I had some standout tracks I felt really spoke to me:

Poison Kiss – I grew up enthralled with Information Society. This song could easily have been on one of their albums that was never made but should have been. Kurt Larson does what he does and the beats and keys are tightly crafted dark rainbow slime. I love it. Cat blends seamlessly and I think of this track almost like a wonderful bonus to an already strong EP.

Murder of Love – Ok this is the stand out bomb track for me. First off it’s a clever concept with the metaphor of a courtroom trial of charging someone with the crime of murdering your heart. It’s an interesting and relate-able concept with that wonderful “Pray for Mercy” lifted melody line. The beats on this are so tight and the transitions Jim Marcus does are a masterclass in pop sensibility.

Drive – This was Rachel’s favorite track. A strange and sultry trip hop feeling croon. Puts me in a place of driving through a dark and empty city street. The vocals take on a bit of Beth Gibbons (Portishead) and those buzzing and blinking keyboard waves creep over the landscape effortlessly.

Overall this album is a fun and polished offering that highlights Cat’s wonderful vocal range and flirts with a mixture of genres with top tier production and a supporting cast out of my dreams. Definitely something that would send me sprinting to any dance floor in my proximity.