electronic

Are you ready for a bleeping blooping analogue party? Of course you are. What can I even say about this? AFX is nothing short of legendary and this second entry into the Analord series is entirely a reason as to why that is the case. Press play, marvel at the genius at work.

What a journey this took me on. I can’t remember exactly where I picked up on Cluster’s music, but the idea of two men more-or-less battling with analogue synthesizers was right up my alley. This self titled record from 1971 is an incredibly forward thinking journey; a textual treat for those electronically-inclined. The tracks are long and sprawling, possibly even improvised, and I enjoyed every last second (admittedly with a good book and a cigar…

On Jesu’s debut we are faced with 8 monumental tracks of shoegazy goodness. Granted, this self-titled record is not as astral as records that would quickly follow, but Jesu instead relies on the intense weight and pressure of the riffs, coupled with the dark, drab and dare I say somewhat depressing nature of the songs themselves. On Jesu it seems that all hope is gone, and the morose synths gilding the tracks accentuates this feel….

Analord is another one of those series that I have given up hope on ever owning in a physical format. Thank heavens then, for the internet and for the lovely people who upload rare and hard to find gems for the rest of us to get a listen to. AFX is one of my favourite electronic producers in the world. I think I may even prefer it to Aphex Twin, but we are splitting hairs…

Well then, its been a good year or so for pure LDOH-worship goregrind. However, please do not write off First Days Of Humanity – they aren’t as typical sounding as you would expect. Yes, of course, it is heavy Last Days Of Humanity worship, but there is so much grinding goodness here. People (read: experts) on the internet profess that Pixel Death is far from the project’s best release. Considering how much I love this,…

Random Access Memories is absolutely deserving of its Grammy win – not that I put much stock in such accolades, but it does show that “the system” sat up and clapped its collective hands. There was also a small backlash from certain long time Daft Punk fans at the time due to the direction of the record. This week marks the first time I’ve actually sat down and listened to the whole thing in one…

The whole concept of Caretaker’s Everywhere At The End Of Time series was something I found incredibly interesting. The six parts of this series are supposed to document the mind’s decline into the unknowing hell and fear of being consumed by dementia. Stage 1 here, gets things off to an eery but jaunty start; swinging tunes that I’m led to believe are original compositions of The Caretaker himself, but easily sound pre-WW2. Things loop around…

To my knowledge, this 12″ is where it all began for The Berzerker. Heavily pre-dating the grinding mush of the Earache days, this record is pure speedcore armageddon, and I have to admit that Luke Kenny has serious chops in that department. Some of the sampling is a bit silly but this isn’t a genre that takes itself too seriously afterall. The beats however are sick as fuck and are absolutely pumping. Top notch stuff….

Archie Campbell is an oddly-titled early offering from The Berzerker, back when the project was one man with a penchant for gabber techno. It appears to be available online only, and was never released on a physical format, to my knowledge. Its a puzzling release, if your experience lies with the full band death metal Berzerker, but what we have on display here is some head-splitting hardcore gabber, which can be just what the doctor…

When I threw this on, I was expecting the usual low-brow pornogrind bedroom-grade electronic mush. That was what I was signing up for, of course – a brief spell in perversion to send me back to the MySpace days. However, PxOxRxNxOx does things a little differently, at least on this release here. Guitars are virtually nonexistent. The music instead focuses entirely on an electronic aspect, which is entirely typical of this kinda stuff but at…

This is so awful that in some ways it is rather genius, if I can say so myself. Recorded all the way back in 2014 and put out online by noise label Red Venice, the aim of Panties was to create a pornogrind imitation that was entirely synthetic. Electrotribalistic Pornitorium, for better or worse, achieves this, being an entirely synthetic record that I recorded on my Sony Xperia Z1 phone. Vocals? Nah fam, that’s just…

Metal Pussy is a 20-minute or so EP from French (I think?) techno project Popof. I wouldn’t say that the record is particularly ground breaking, but the warm sound of the vinyl press works well with the project’s slightly distorted and over-driven (unintentional, I’d say) techno beats. Don’t ask me what that artwork and name is about, though. 

God is a fucking mad trip, mate. Kevin Martin (The Bug), JK Broadrick (Godflesh, Jesu) team up with a whole host of other musicians (I’m sorry for not listing them all!) to create an absolute mindfuck of a record. Possession was my first brush with God (what a sentence), after meaning to check them out for donkey’s years. On first impressions it comes across like a blend of earlier, dubbed-out industrial Scorn records and something…

Didgeridoo was one of the first Aphex Twin records I ever heard when downloading his stuff off Limewire or Kazaa (as damaging as record labels saw file sharing to be, it absolutely opened my world a thousand fold in my earlier teenage years). When I was younger I remember the title track of this release to be seemingly endless. In my old age (lol) that’s not quite the case, and the record seems to fly…

Early Aphex Twin 12”s have a youthful immaturity to them, in such a way that if anything invokes a further charm from these gems of the electronic genre. Songs about tampons aside, Xylem Tube is a stunning window in the mind of one of music’s most innovative creators. 

I caught these guys supporting Mortiis all the way back in – I think – 2004. It was whenever he was touring The Grudge. Anyway, I remember absolutely nothing of the set as I was 14 and mainly there to have a goose at Mortiis’ show, but I stumbled upon the band’s only full length recently so decided to give it a spin. Expect angry industrial. And when I say industrial, expect the NIN-vein of…

Merciless is a stunning record from the almost flawless Godflesh project. Nearly every part of me wishes that this EP was a bit longer and more of a full length experience. I love the feelings that Merciless invokes; deep melancholic passages are underpinned by guttural bass and clanking industrial rhythms. Imagine the fragility of what would come later with Jesu but set to a glowing apocalyptic rumble. A stunning EP and a true vision of…

I’ve seen so much! Indeed. This little release was a companion of sorts to the Selfless record. Back when Godflesh was on Columbia (through Earache) it seemed like they attempted to release some singles commercially, so this and “Crush My Soul” got the single treatment, which included some edits or dub remixes but not much else. The dub is a decent listen and is worth the goosey alone if you’re a massive Godflesh fan. 

Where does one begin with a record that is as life changing for me as Streetcleaner? Sandwiched in somewhere between my obsessions with grindcore and early Swans, Streetcleaner took me to places I didn’t know exist. I’m trying to remember where I first heard this album. I think I downloaded it off some dodgy Russian mp3 site, after my sixth form teacher mentioned Godflesh multiple times in class. I liked it, but I didn’t really…

Today I stumbled upon an old UK-based industrial metal band that blends “crust punk” into the sound. If by “blend” they simply mean “have Phil Vane from ENT on vocals”, then they have achieved something, at least. Not wanting to diss underground music unless absolutely necessary, it is with a heavy heart that I must inform you, dear reader, that this fucking blows. It wheels out every tired trope of the industrial genre (or what…

Us And Them is probably the least popular of the original run of Godflesh full-length records. When I first bought this (from the Earache stall at Damnation Deathfest festival 2009) it was before I was on Discogs or anything like that, so I thought it was some sort of weird bootleg or remix album. I remember finding the heavy drum and bass parts infuriating, before turning it off and throwing it into a pile. It…

It was only with the release of Godflesh’s new full-length album A World Lit Only By Fire that I realised that I hadn’t even done a post for their comeback EP, Decline & Fall. I suppose it’s because it dropped when Lines In Wax was taking a bit of a break earlier in the year, and I did most of my listening for Decline & fall lying on beaches on exotic Thai islands (a strange…

More Blooping, bleeping electronic goodness from everyone’s favourite king of the new flesh. New Horizon sees the JK Flesh project move even further away from its dirtier roots, this time even eschewing a lot of the more noisier elements of the music. Granted, the tracks on New Horizon are still hypnotic and dark variations of techno beats repeating into your skull, but gone are the claustrophobic, distorted bad acid trip vibes. New Horizon is just…

SIMM plays big moody beats in the vein of dark wobble pioneers and fellow collaborator: Scorn. Sinister, dirty synth works and samples mangle in alongside stonking beats, creating an incredible vibe. This is my first run in with the project of SIMM, and I will be on the lookout for more.

Lull is another project of Scorn / Napalm Death mad genius Mick Harris, focusing this time on dense ambient passages and atmospherics. I am reminded immediately of Lustmord, but push that aside to instead focus on the single, hour-plus unfolding track. Honestly, it’s fucking great. It’s not as dread-inducing as some of the shorter Scorn ambient pieces (see Deliverance or the arse-end of Vae Solis) but instead meanders through thick, all-encompassing clouds of atmospheric blackness….

This early Jesu release is a daunting one to approach, knowing how crushingly heavy the songs are and of course how long there are. Couple that with the fact that the whole thing is quite depressing and you’ve got a brief description of the Jesu self titled in a nutshell. Only, once you finally crack open this beast, you can lose yourself inside a  shuddering, monstrously heavy beast. Morose synths soar, Justin groans and the…

My first taste of Tzusing began with 東方不敗 (Invincible East in English). At first I wasn’t sure if this was for me, but a few tracks in, and the true unique style of production has completely unwoven around me. Yes, it’s techno – dark, heavy techno – with eastern influences and sounds, but don’t write this off like some cheap psytrance bullshit. The tracks here are meticulously designed, and are a refreshing ride. 

Wellity wellity wellity, this just fucking came out of nowhere didn’t it? There is always room in the world for more Godflesh so thank the heavens that Justin & Mr. Green have decided to bleed more of that sweet, sweet crushing goodness out into the world. Post Self might be one of the best Godflesh records ever. That is a sweepingly bold statement I know, but the band have expanded on their previous release with…

Godflesh’s return was one of the most exciting things ever. I traveled to France in 2010 to catch their first ever live appearance since splitting up years before, and then I fanged it over to Roadburn the following year in order to catch them slamming out Streetcleaner in it’s entirety. I unfortunately missed the performance of Pure live at Roadburn two years later but after catching a few more live appearances around the UK I…

I was not familair with the Fret project until I stumbled upon this release, but hey, guess what – I now have even more Mick Harris stuff to go back through and listen to! What more could you possibly want? A quick note: Fret originally surfaced in the 90s but has gone largely unused until recently. This dropped in 2017, two years before the Scorn comeback record. Nearly all of Mick’s projects draw parallels with…

This is another promotional vinyl that came out around the time of Ellipsis, which follows after the Earache pressing of “Silver Rain Fell” and its subsequent remix onto a DJ-usable 12″. This particular disc however was put out by Mick’s own Scorn Recordings (a short-lived label he seemed to run with “marketing” done by Earache), containing the Ellipsis remixes of Falling and The End. Check out the full Ellipsis review on Lines In Wax!

This is a promotional DJ-only 12″ from Earache, pairing both the original version of the track from the Evanescence record, and the Meat Beat Manifesto remix of it from the Ellipsis record. As both those releases have been reviewed already on Lines In Wax, I’ll keep it brief here. I’ve included this as I want to be a completist and review the entire Scorn discography. 

With 500 pressed on clear wax, this was a fairly limited run on Record Label Records in 2009. It is only 12 minutes long, but contains two of the best Scorn tracks; the title track and the absolute floorshaker that is “Pin Down”. “Pin Down” is up there as a contender for my favourite Scorn track from this era. All in all, this is probably the best place to start with later Scorn stuff. Phenomenal…

If Super Mantis is a powerful shotgun blast, then Gravel Bed is a lurching mechnical monster come to life, heaving into industrial motion, in order to fire said shotgun. It’s a shambler, dragging and stumbling. A corker. The Bracket (RIP) remix on the flipside is just as good, providing an alternative window into the mind of this dark, twisted dub beast. Gravel Bed by Scorn, Bracket

Combat records did a whole series of remixes off the back of Super Mantis. The two on this 12″ are from Elemental and Threnody. Threnody provides a more sprawling, soaring remix, with sharp, sparkling leads pulling the heavy weight of the Scorn beat through a 7 minuter of electro genius. Elemental’s mix is fucking glorious. All that seems to remain from the Scorn original is the bass growler, reworked into a trippy, busy breakbeat shuffle….

Super Mantis (I think) was the first Scorn record I ever bought on vinyl, back in 2010 or 2011. It absolutely blew me away how massive this thing sounded. It felt like it was a hundred times louder than the next 12″, and “Super Mantis” was the perfect track to showcase such power. On the flipside, the Blackmass Plastics remix draws the the track out to a crawl, allowing the bass to growl like a…

UGH! (BASS COMMENCES!) – Governor, whilst probably not my favourite, is definitely my most played Scorn release. I had this on my iPod when I was back working kitchens, and would often fart this out through the horrible aux connection we had to the stereo kept on top of the microwave. It was released on Germany’s Hymen label in 2002 as the EP which came around the same time as the Plan B record. It’s…

Plan B was the follow-up record to the Greetings… early 2000s era, where big beats and bigger, dirtier bass was the order of the day. In such terms, Plan B does absolutely not fuck around. Whatever Plan A was, well I’m simply not interested my friend, this will do very nicely right here. Words can only do later Scorn releases so much justice. For something that is so “less is more” when it comes to…

List Of Takers is a strange one, in that it presents a bunch of his tracks as one new hour and ten minute mix. It melds these all together into one big flowing experimental dub session. It’s an interesting variation and an interesting choice to release as a full length, originally being broadcast by the Break FM station, but it seems to be a canonical Scorn record. It’s great to chuck this on and leave…

Whistle For It is a one-off 10″ picture disc released in France back in 2007, featuring the title track and the weirdly titled “Born A Fielda Die A Fielda” on the flipside. The record is pretty rare, being a pressing of 500 and coming with a bunch of stickers and shit. It clocks in about £20 on Discogs and admittedly I don’t actually own it at the moment. As for the tracks, they are, of…

Leave It Out was a sneaky little four track 12″ EP dropped by Mick’s Possible Records in 1996. I suppose it could be seen as a companion piece to Logghi, as it has that same dirty beats-to-the-wall focus, where the ambient low-key beatwork of the Gyral era is smashed up to 11 on the beat-o-meter. Leave It Out isn’t particularly easy to get a hold of, but its going for about £13 on Discogs at…

Lick Forever Dog was a little single (?) / EP that came out in 1991. It had a crappy edit of the full-length track off of Vae Solis, but was accompanied by some stunning re-dubalubs of “On Ice” and “Heavy Blood”, which are some of my favourite tunes off the accompanying Vae Solis record.  The original 12″ version isn’t worth hunting down unless you are a collector of Scorn records, as all the tracks here…

Quiot is another (phew!) alias of Mick Harris, known primarily of course from drumming for Napalm Death and the dubby Scorn project. Quoit’s Lounge record sees more of those awkward, unsettling synth atmospherics from Scorn meet a more drum and bass inspired beatwork. There are breakbeats and busy drumming aplenty, and enough going on here to keep even the most ants-in-your-pants electronics fan busy for quite some time. Maybe you always appreciated Scorn but found…

I believe the duo here collaborated somewhat also on Eraldo’s SIMM project which is more in line with Mick’s Scorn sounds, but the second record in the line of this particular collab series expands on the d’n’b / breakbeat (kinda?) template of the first record and brings in more atmospheric or moody soundscapes. Couple that with the addition of Eraldo’s guitar work on a few tracks and this is a nice mix of styles and…

A cracking little collaboration, showcasing a more drum and bass style than what I’ve heard  so far from Mick Harris. The rhythms and tracks in general are erratic and constantly moving, but not to the point where it would be considered “fast” or chaotic. I’m not much in the know about Eraldo Bernocchi, but this has been a great little introduction.

Boom! This particular release that I’m looking at is a reissue of two tapes released originally on Hospital Recordings. It brings JK Flesh deeper into techno territory, far from the guitar-laden chugfests which began the project. Each release has been kept fresh and interesting, and Suicide Estate is not different. If you like dark, heavy beats that get inside your head and never leave, then I would recommend you give this a go.

Well this is a noisy little badger. A completists item though, most definitely. “Lament” is a disturbing wall of noise recorded in Italy, and “Soliel Noire” is some sort of live or early version of “Black Sun Rising” (I should have seen it coming, with that song title) or one of its seemingly endless Deliverance variants. All in all, nothing new, but it’s nice to hear these tracks all noisy and grimy.

Ah son, this is fucking class. Greetings From Birmingham, Governor, Plan B etc. etc. leading up to Stealth was a fucking stonking time for Scorn. Man, these beats, THAT BASS! It’s enough to make you lose your mind. It is so simple, yet so genius and perfect. The brooding may be dialed back a bit on this release, but the bass; that fat, greasy, wobbly STONK is dialed right up. Fantastic stuff. 

Like an upbeat, punch-packing version of Greetings From Birmingham. Some of the beats here are surprisingly quick, which is a rarity for Scorn. Being the associated EP for the Greetings… era though, Imaginaria Award has fucking moosive woppity woppity bass wobbles and stonking beats. It seems almost derivative for me to describe a Scorn EP in such a way yet again, but it is what it is! BIG BEATS GET HIGH ALL THE TIME! imaginaria…

Zander is fucking great, to put it simply. It’s the little things that count: digging deep and paying attention will bring this album to a whole new level. There is a meticulous level of detail beneath the seemingly repetitive bass and beats; variations and fills and… fake outs? Whatever the technical term is, Zander keeps you thinking, keeps you on your toes, and keeps you stimulated. Another brilliant record from a timeless project. 

Whine is a live album covering the Zander era of the Scorn project. Imagine tracks from that era (Zander is brilliant) but mashed up a little; the beats holding together a structure for additional sampling, noise forms and synth moods to unfold. Not an essential album, but one for the Scorn deep divers. 

Gyral was Scorn’s first studio album without Mr. Bullen on bass and vocals. If you are listening chronologically, it becomes wholly apparent that he is missing; there is a vocal-shaped hole in the music after a while. Scorn have never been lyrically dense, but those washed out, tired, effect-laden bars were just as much a part of the early works as the big beats. That doesn’t make Gyral boring however. The record is sparse and…

This was one of the first pieces of Scorn vinyl I picked up way back in either 2011 or 2012. It is the special release of “Stairway” I think for the Gyral release party. It’s a nice collector’s edition, but is just the one track on the one side of the record. It’s cool to own. A quick note however – the picture above is not my own. Mine is carefully stored away in the…

Ellipsis sees some of Scorn’s peers come into the fold to remix a few of their tracks. The result is a bit hit and miss, but there are stand-out contributions from Coil, Bill Laswell, and Autechre. If you’re into vinyl, there is a box set of this available, which looks absolutely glorious. You could say Scorn belongs on vinyl. 

Evanescence is probably the most popular and well received of the early Scorn records. It featured James Plotkin on guitar duties, and was to be the last album to feature Nicholas Bullen on bass and vocals. From the opener you’ll notice a few things are different here. Hip hop or drum n bass style beats are now starting to trickle into the band’s full lengths, but be fooled not; Evanescence is still a dark, moody,…

Colossus is a trip. In only a year since their debut, this record showcases the sheer progression that Scorn was making as a project. It would perhaps be lazy of me to say that Colossus continues in the vien of the moody, dubby second half of Vae Solis, but truly it is something much more sparse, harrowing and desperate. The songs are length trips, spaced-out and drums are drenched often in reverb. The feel is…

This EP has all of the infernal noise fuckery that I’ve come to know and love from earlier Venetian Snares records. Is it rude? Yes. Is it loud? Yes. Is it like Aphex Twin on methamphetamine? Double yes. It is hard to pick a stand out track per se, but the mind-melting beats are in abundance here. Groovy!  SHITFUCKERS!!! by Venetian Snares

After the release of their album Vae Solis earlier in 1992, Scorn quickly followed up with the Deliverance…. EP? I mean, I call it an EP but its long as fuck. I see the Deliverance sessions as one long sprawling track, more than individual segments. The way the the song titles flow kinda encourage this too; “Deliverance Through Dub”, “Delivered”, “To High Heaven”. At first it seems repetitive and annoying, but you eventually get used…

White Irises Blind has the same kinda lifespan as Deliverance. It started life as a (once again, very long) EP before a reissue by Earache several years later turned it into a ten-track compilation of dubs and remixes. The title track is a bizarre mix of haunting and groovy. The minimal mix that follows only serves to cement this feeling. “Black Ash Dub” and “Drained” are more abstract, and “Host Of Scorpions” is just terrifying,…

Vae Solis the record that introduced me to the Scorn project. It took a few years, but Scorn became one of my favourite musical ventures, and was a massive influence on myself and my own musical production (not that it really matters), whether that was from the older, industrial full-band records like Vae Solis or the beat-led solo stuff that would come later. Vae Solis sees the Side A line up of Napalm Death’s Scum…

After being drawn in by the lush album art and the slowly building intro, I am unfortunately having to report that I found this Forest Of Yore record to be incredibly disappointing. Why, you ask? The synths, if not a little slow (which is usually fine, if building such a dense and incredible atmosphere), are jarring horribly alongside sounds of nature. I can’t tell if its sampled or looped or genuine bird song, but Jesus…

Now this is more like it! Four tracks of…. of…. what exactly? Breakbeat / breakcore nonsense meets narcotic-fuelled experimentation. If you can hunt down the CD version, there’s a whole bunch of additional remixes thrown on from various peers of the speedy breaky game, my favourite of which has to be the project named Duran Duran Duran.

This has been on my to-do list for donkey’s years. Bong-Ra has a long and rich musical history (lol) so going back and taking a sniff at the earlier records has been something I’ve been meaning to do for some time. There’s a series of mixed vibes here. A heavy junglist theme carries the majority of the tracks, some more chaotic than others with veins of breakbeat and drum and bass stylings. There’s a bunch…

This is a mixed bag for me, as far as Bong-Ra is concerned. Monolith generally seems to be critically well received, but I am more of a fan of the breakbeat stuff than I am of the dubstep with rapping over it. This rap stuff isn’t a million miles away from what Esham is doing on the Venus Flytrap or DMT records, and the stuff here (featuring Sole mainly) isn’t awful, it’s just when the…

There is something relaxing about earlier Burial recordings, despite the morose atmosphere and melodies which are obscured beneath a layer of urban grit. South London Burroughs is not a long record, but it’s 20 minutes or so of fantastic beat work and atmospherics.

Part of what made Blade Runner such a magical experience for me was how all the visuals and audio meld together to create the (almost) perfect dystopian sci fi feast. A large part of that is, of course, the musical soundtrack – a glorious, epic yet electronic and futuristic exploration by the severely underrated composer Vangelis. Nothing quite conjures the mass industrial, uber-capitalist wastelands that we call cities now like this score does. For when…

Pulsing, gorgeous, ethereal soundscapes are the order of the day. I’d barely say that this even fits into the genre of vaporwave, having more in common with ambient or even the trippier side of the psytrance movement. A million miles from invoking nostalgia, Building A Better World instead seems to look forward to the future in all its dreamy, hazy synth meandering. A fantastic collaboration and recommended to any fan of electronic music.

With a name like PrismCorp (is that a Watchmen reference maybe?) Virtual Enterprises, and of course the artwork displayed above, one surely could not be accused too harshly of heavily assuming what kind of tunes that are in store on Home(TM)? Think 80s television mixed with The Sims or that weird upbeat music you’d get over porno on VHS, and you’re on the right track. Home(TM) meanders in its own way, sometimes to jazz, sometimes…

Just look at that art! Despite the heavy nostalgic tones, Diskette Park instead wallows in oceanic waves of moody, melancholic synth work, rather than your more [ t y p i c a l ] vaporwave. In fact, as time goes on, and whilst I agree that the genre does have its own solid base, I find that these days it is more of a marker for a starting point; a pointer as to the…

I suppose this could be categorised as true industrial music? I am instantly reminded of the group called Stomp that we used to watch videos of as a kid. All sorts of machinery and noises are utilised to create bizarre mechanical soundscapes. Fireworks (I think? Ha!) and the scrape of metal on metal is the order of the day, resulting in the beauteous song of the furnace at work. Good stuff. 

Odyssey is… well… a near 50 minute odyssey (I can only apologise) through vaporwave style and gorgeous electronic production. HOME doesn’t seem to fall as hard into the trappings of the genre, for better or worse, and the music just sounds more original and inspired, rather than “hey, this is just slowed down 80s infomercials!”. I was building my home work rig (an overstatement if I ever wrote one) whilst listening to this and I…

The Hellraiser movie is more than disturbing enough without having to think about all the juicy goodies that were scrapped before the final product was released. Among many changes made to Hellraiser as it went along was possibly the greatest casualty of the lot – the original score by Coil. There seems to be a confusing array of formats and releases for these tunes, which thankfully saw the light of day eventually. But, I’m pretty…

Lush, gorgeous, unfolding electronics and ambient soundscapes driven forward by pulsing and catchy beats. Oh, and you’ve got the Salad Fingers music in there too, just to shit you up out of the blue if you associate that tune with Dai Firth’s menacing creations. I’ve never been one for the hipster hype train of Boards Of Canada but it is hard to deny their genius, and Geodaddi cements that.

When Covenant became Kovenant, I’m not sure if the world became a better or worse place. I love some of the Kovenant albums, but this kind of music hasn’t really aged well and is for me rather corny, and a product of the 90s. Imagine my surprise then, when I finally, after like 18 years or whatever, got around to listening to this re-recording. Immediately there is an industrial hue to it, like when an…

Creeping, brooding, claustrophobic. Yet, somehow beautiful, delicate and sprawling. Perdition City came earlier in the band’s discography, as they veered away from black metal to making these contemporary and what I can only describe as urban soundscapes. Glorious stuff.

I think if there is one album in the world that I could describe as being “just lovely”, then Air’s Moon Safari would be it. I’m probably being a pleb here, but it invokes feelings in such a way that it makes electronic music sound new, fresh and exciting. I get a heavy “we can go anywhere” vibe off this, for all its 90s cliches.

More Aphex Twin is always a welcome. Collapse is a compact EP featuring several fresh new cuts of ticking, bleeping, blopping electronic goodness, blown along with wispy, dreamy synths. I’ve recently got myself some Tin T2 IEMs and this kind of music just absolutely melts my head on that kind of stereo stage. Glorious.

I’m unsure of what to really make of this one. It seems to pre-date all the awful cyber grind of the 2000s, instead being a product of the 90s where hip hop and nu metal douchebaggery bled into the extreme music worlds. That being said, Cybergore has some decent riffs, and some interesting variations on the theme of techno shit mixed with metal. This sounds like a soundtrack to a long lost 90s shoot ‘em…

Vespertine is another classic in the original run of stunning Björk albums, and a welcome return to form after the miss that was Selmasongs (unsure if that counts as canon, being a soundtrack album). Vespertine is looser, much more abstract and flowing than Homogenic that came before it, and I suppose you could say that initially it suffers, lacking direction, however this formula turns out to really work well for Björk, and many of the…

Well, this was just lovely. Imagine something like a game soundtrack come alive. Reminded me a bit of Carpenter Brut, if only more driven and less sparkly. The Perturbator wasn’t high on my list of listens, but I’m glad I gave this a go.

And just like that, it’s like the last 8 years never happened. Mr. Harris low key returned in 2019 with the Scorn project, something that has been consistently solid for a while now. Feather brings more of that paranoid soundscape / slo mo beatwork that we all love so much. Keep your eyes peeled for the LIW post for the new full album following this EP/single. Glad to have Scorn back, mate! 

I can’t believe it’s been 9 years since Scorn released Refuse: Start Fires. As someone who never thought I would hear new Scorn material, with it being one of my favourite low key projects ever, I absolutely shit the bed when I found out the project had returned last year. I’ll admit, this doesn’t really push the boat forward, instead wallowing in the mire of its own claustrophobic density, but yeah, I don’t fucking care…

When I saw the prog asf cover art I geared myself up for a meandering journey through various mental states and experimental genres of jazz, perhaps at the same time. However, The Comet Is Coming play in a much more refined and chilled out vibe than I expected. Spacey, vivid and glorious in so many ways.

Dark brooding 80s electronica with a refreshing and unique melodic edge. A little out of my usual comfort zone, definitely, but I enjoyed the vibes here. I think I’ll give it a few more play throughs. 

Witching hour slowed down dance tunes time! VVvvVvVvvvVibrate if you’re up! From The Blackhole brings a stunning few moments of deep house, followed by mesmerising ambient keyboard synthscapes. Epic. Please accept my apologies for the quality on the image for this post, I cannot find this record sleeve anywhere! 

I love how this project has continued evolving over the years. Like, what is this freakery? Its like some kind of primal body music. Deep down, it captures your mind and your body, and you just want to move, like some sort of lucid nightmare that is also rather purifying. Fucking banging, mate.

Glass Swords is an exercise in lush, fathomless digital euphoria. Combining elements of pop with the slickest electronic music, Rustie really hits the nail on the head when it comes to all things big, shiny, and glossy.

Well isn’t this just delightful? Saint Pepsi got that fantastic chilled out vapor vibe to their sound, where Luxury Elite brings a bit more of a stomp to the 90s infomercial style. This split album was recently banned from YouTube over some shit about the album cover, but I’m glad to see its back, as its a fucking great piece of work. 

Hi everyone and welcome to the 1000th Lines In Wax post! It’s only taken me over 8 years of inconsistent posting (haha), but we got there in the end. I’m nowhere near completing the list on the A-Z page, and the site has gone through various identity crisis’ in its time, but we are still here, and we are still posting. Nowadays, Lines In Wax is basically a nice archive of the stuff that I’ve…

I love all this fucking mental vaporwave / nostalgia stuff. If I was a billionaire I’d buy a townhouse in Amsterdam and spend my days building a library of rare vinyl pressings of stuff like this, along with a sub-basement full of dodgy goregrind tapes. One Hundred Mornings is glorious, chilled-out, laid-back, takes-you-way-back brilliance. I’ll be running out of ways to describe vaporwave soon, but this shit is fantastic. Sold out as fuck on vinyl,…

If Skyrim met Stranger Things. Dragonborn by Lisette

Playing heavily on nostalgia (both of 2002’s Bethesda Softworks epic, TES III: Morrowind, and that of the vaporwave style of music), Young Scrolls dropped this absolute banger. Not as silly as “Dagoth Wave” or Sheogorath’s rap record, “Neon Vivec” instead showcases the project’s serious musical chops. Neon Vivec by young scrolls

Haunting, mesmerising astral soundscapes are the order of the day. Striving to take you places alien yet familiar, close yet distant, tangible yet effervescent, Seven Movements for M.R.M. is a masterwork in emotional evocation through audio. Words can only say so much, please press play to ascend.

As I am sure many of you are aware, Earache Records went through a puzzling phase in the 90s, signing all sorts of rave, dance, gabba and electronic music to the label. One such short-lived act was Adrenalin Junkies. There isn’t much to say about this bog-standard dance record, other than I got it for next to nothing one day when I was buying a whole bunch of shit from Earache. I’m not even sure…

Homogenic is possibly the most consistent of all Björk records (perhaps the clue is in the name). After the meandering madness of styles on Post, our formidable musical heroine sticks to a classic electronic backbone for her songs on this album. The beats in particular are absolutely outstanding. The synth lines are stunning. The production possesses a clarity that could bring you to tears. I don’t have to tell you about Björk’s vocal performances. Every…

I broke this out after the news of Keith Flint’s death began to trick into the media. The Prodigy, or more specifically “Firestarter”, was one of the first things I ever truly remember hearing or enjoying as a child. I never fully immersed myself in their music, but once this “best of” came out in 2005 it entered into a regular rotation. I regrettably never got to see The Prodigy live. 

There is something unusually uplifting about the rock band / synthesizer combination this record. I guess this is also what makes the album so enduring; the physical – or analog – world meeting the clinical and mechanical world of computers. Couple this with Numan’s bizarre but now trademark delivery and you have an all-round winning combination, that in all realities and existences, needs no introduction.  

So, Korn invented dubstep. Oh, didn’t you hear? I wasn’t informed either, but its okay, there hasn’t been any great cultural upheaval; the only thing that the world has missed out on is several more crappy albums like this, where straight-outta-the-box Native Instruments Massive oscillating bass riffs jar awkwardly with mediocre Korn tracks. Y’know what, sometimes…. just sometimes…. it works, but most of the time it really, really doesn’t. Fieldy’s low-hanging bass strings clank horribly…

Imagine Meshuggah meeting Venetian Snares on a shit virtual reality show. Yeah. I don’t really know where that last bit came from, but I’ve written it now so it is staying in. Quality journalism*, folks! Cut up metal samples meet batshit song structures and a farmyard of vocals. I would expect no less from something found on Grindcore Karaoke. *I use the term very loosely.

The Bug is fuckin’ great. I can think of few artists who jump from style to style so seamlessly and pull it all off – with fireworks – at every turn. This record, as with the previous one, could just have easily been a jarring, unstructured mess, but its just a searing work of bloody genius. The jungle / garage kinda vibes are kinda dialled back compared to London Zoo, but this allows the sonic…