Orphan Swords- Risk In A New Age

Brussels-based Orphan Swords is a duo between Yannick Franck aka Räum, sound experimentalist & founder of Idiosyncratics label and Maze, producer & Bozar Electronic Arts Festival curator. Previously described as “industrial-slanted techno” or “new school industrial” by XLR8R or The Quietus, Orphan Swords’ music results of the collision between Räum & Maze’s widely different influences, including techno, noise or cold wave.

Orphan Swords has been recently remixed by SHXCXCHCXSH, Dwellings, Paul Purgas (Emptyset) and Exoteric Continent and collaborated with Ike Yard’s Stuart Argabright.

Listen and order here.

Posted on July 8th, 2014 under Releases, ,

NUN LP

One of the most powerful bands Melbourne has ever produced, presents their dark-yet-somehow-vibrant vision of electronic pop with their debut self-titled album.

Employing the weight of gnarling basslines, shimmering analogue synthesiser, punishing drum machine and the scathing lyrical vision of Jenny Branagan, Nun’s sound flows from sinister drone-orgy and hyperkinetic synth-punk to saturated new wave worship.

An unrelenting aesthetic sense penetrates every aspect of this record, resulting in a remarkably cohesive work of art. Song structures are simple, considered and direct – everything is fine-tuned to ensure maximum sonic devastation. The music is danceable and poppy, it’s sad and incisive, it’s fun, aggressive and heavy as hell. Most impressive of all is its immense force; the effortless delivery belying an overwhelming sense of something very heavy and unpleasant looming just beneath the scintillating pop surface.

Co-released with Aarght Records from Australia, LP comes in printed innersleeve housed in thick, reversed jackets.

Listen and order here.

Posted on July 5th, 2014 under Releases, ,

Contrepoison- I Keep On Searching

Long due vinyl press of Contrepoison second EP.

We have been glad and proud to debut Pierre-Marc Tremblay’s electronic solo project back in 2011 with his first …Until Next Morning EP. Since then Contrepoison has shared an ace split with Vatican Shadow and put out a couple of tape releases on his own Sans Issue record label.
Digitally released in 2012 by Hospital Productions and Heartworm Press, I Keep On Searching finally sees the light on April 15, 2014 via Avant! Records and Sans Issue.

The closest comparison we could make is early Cold Cave again, but there’s more here: something dead-eyed and drugged proper to this sound.
Make sure to check the sludgy bass thrust and distant, dingy vox of I Keep On Searching and the bleak, tormented coldwave pop of Nectar Of Destiny.

One-time pressing of 500 on 45rpm black vinyl 12″. Comes with thick insert sheet with lyrics and credits.

Long due vinyl press of Contrepoison second EP.

Listen and order here.

Posted on July 3rd, 2014 under Releases, ,

After their EP, Les mécanismes de la culpabilité, released in 2013, POLICE DES MOEURS is back on Atelier Ciseaux with a 33rpm flirt. A romance shared with fellow Montreal-based duet ESSAIE PAS (with Marie Davidson).

POLICE DES MOEURS plays cold, melodic and nostalgic music for broken hearts and dark minds. Police Des Moeurs is the soundtrack for the nuclear night, a transition moment between the end of utopia and the final ecological disaster. The world after the future. They released their debut LP, last year, on Mannequin Records.

ESSAIE PAS is a prism to the sensual world. Essaie Pas has troubled sleep. Essaie Pas is both a rift and a revelation. Essaie pas is our running blood. Essaie pas & The Acid-Melted Egos. Essaie Pas has released a really nice EP at the end of 2013, on Teenage Menopause and Malditos. ESSAIE PAS/ don’t try.

A night in Montreal, a synth-pop dream. The urge not to see daylight again.

Listen and order here.

Posted on June 30th, 2014 under Releases, , ,

Holy Strays- Pathless March x Seance

Holy Strays’ new single for Atelier Ciseaux reveals a different side of the young producer’s approach. Having privileged complex patterns and layers of drums and percussions on his debut EP ‘Chasm’ for Demand Vinyl last fall, ‘Pathless March’ x ‘Seance’ find the Paris-based musician experimenting with a more classical instrumentation, including guitar and piano, and more straight-forward structures revealing a growing desire to refine his sound.

After sharing stages with artists as diverse as Braids, Robedoor, Forest Swords and Lapalux, and remixing Dublin-based rising rapper Rejjie Snow and Canadian minimal rock outfit SUUNS within a few months, Sebastien Forrester (aka Holy Strays) seems to have been seeking for a balance between epic beat-driven tracks and subtle environmental soundscapes. This new attempt highlights his pursuit of a new kind of folkloric music that would reflect his own environment.

‘Pathless March’ and ‘Seance’ were born on a recent trip to southern Brittany. The ‘visual single’ that follows is based on the context the songs were created in, after a trip to the old submarine base in St Nazaire. From this very particular moment arose the idea to constitute a testimony and share it with the listener to create a common experience.

Listen and download here.

Posted on June 28th, 2014 under Releases, ,