1 – Koreless – Agor, Young
Agor – meaning “open” in welsh – is Koreless’ debut album, coming a decade after his first single. Over ten short tracks, many without drums, the British producer creates hypnotic loops, combining synthetic elements amid infinite possibilities. Using an opener sounds palette that includes many vocal samples and rich-in-pathos melodies, he reaches a pointillistic precision that reminds of OPN or Lorenzo Senni, even though there are some dancefloor-oriented tracks too, including the lead single “Joy Squad”. With Agor Koreless extends his production far beyond the post-dubstep experimentalism of his early career and the more recent pop collaborations, delivering one of the most interesting experimental albums of the year.
(Francesco Cellino)
2 – ABADIR – Pause/Stutter/Uh/Repeat,
Cairo-based producer ABADIR is back with an intense and dramatic, gravity-defying record. An elegant and minimalist succession of light-weight ambient sound design and heavy grimy textures, build-ups and releases give life to a constantly tense piece of music upon which distorted, alienating human voices emerge. All this is enriched by the stunning remixes by Genot Centre all-stars Ice Eyes and Fausto Mercier and Egyptian producers Zuli and FRKTL.
(Giovanni De Scisciolo)
3 – Water Wings – W_W, Soul Feeder
Take four long-time friends living in a small city in Southern Italy during the pandemic. Confined each in their own homes, they start making music, exchanging ideas, sharing tracks. Fast-forward a few months of solitary work and shared visions, and here comes their debut release under the collective moniker water wings. Drawing on musical influences ranging from hardcore punk to jazz and gabber, the resulting eight tracks (two for each producer) show a mastery of club sounds which lean on the more percussive and experimental end of the spectrum, while winking here and there at contemporary pop sensibility through distorted singing. Eventually, something good came out of this pandemic.
(Lorenzo Montefinese)
4 – Varg²™ – EXIT WOUNDS, Cease 2 Exist
On EXIT WOUNDS Varg²™ flirts with the more fleshy and ravey side of club music, such as trance, jungle and hard techno. However, he does so by always adding his grimy, emotional touch to it, making this five-track EP a refreshing listening experience for all the long-time fans of the Scandinavian producer.
(Michele Sinatti)
5 – Yves Tumor – The Asymptotical World EP, Warp Records
Surprise, surprise: Yves Tumor is back with an EP that follows the explicitly glam/shoegaze/goth/whatever rock paths taken with the 2020 LP “Heaven To A Tortured Mind”. But despite these apparently outdated musical references, Tumor’s songs once again delivers more than that, as continuous changes, raw disturbances and a terrific and unconventional production make them sound like an aware reminiscence of something for the future to come rather than a nostalgic attachment to the past.
(Francesco Cellino)
6 – Paraadiso – Unison, SVBKVLT
Italian producers TSVI and Seven Orbits team up as Paraadiso on the latest SVBKVLT release, Unison. Inspired by Italian ancient choral compositions, the album defines a form of ritual music for the near future made of glitches, grimy textures, unexpected broken beat and trancey atmospheres.
(Giovanni De Scisciolo)
7 – migu – Academy XI,unseelie
A letter of comfort to everybody who suffered from loneliness during these months of forced isolation, migu’s Academy XI creates an otherworldly, anime-like, romantic narrative with synthetic drums, piano arpeggios, strings and falsetto voices.
(Michele Sinatti)
8 – Nene H – Ali علي, Incienso
Ali علي is the debut album of the elegant and sophisticated Istanbul-born, Berlin & Copenhagen based artist Nene H. A touching work about loss and mourning, dark landscapes from the Middle East torn by a storm of hammering rhythms that explode in the gabba Gebet.
(Giovanni De Scisciolo)
9 – recovery girl – recovery girl & friends, self-released
Galen Tipton is an icon who needs no introduction and so is recovery girl, her fun and pop-based moniker born in 2020. In recovery girl & friends she is at her finest with these internet culture all-stars, such as umru, GFOTY, Lil Mariko and Rui Ho for a series of sick and glitched-out bangers that range from whatever goes under the term hyperpop to screamo.
(Giovanni De Scisciolo)
10 – Bonebrokk – The Astral Catalyst, Infinite Machine
Do you like your techno gritty, hyperkinetic, with an industrial patina and breakbeat splinters thrown into the mix? Well well well, here is something for your appetite. Athens-based Bonebrokk – self-declared ExoPunk ambassador – lands on Mexico City’s Infinite Machine delivering two heavy cuts of broken techno backed by two remixes perhaps even heavier provided by techno deity Surgeon and Infinite Machine aficionado Galtier. It doesn’t get rawer-yet-finely-sculpted than this.
(Lorenzo Montefinese)
ABADIR Apulia Avant-garde Bonebrokk Cease 2 Exist Club Deconstructed club egypt emo Experimental Fausto Mercier gabber Galen Tipton Genot Centre glam glitch goth hard techno hard trance Hyperpop Infinite Machine jungle Koreless Lil Mariko Maya Crux Migu Nene H old-school Paraadiso rave Recovery Girl romance RUI HO screamo Surgeon SVBKVLT techno TSVI and Seven Orbits umru unseelie Varg2™ warp records Water Wings Young Turks Yves Tumor ZULI
Last modified: August 17, 2021
