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with ontological mysterium , horrendous have built a towering death-metal thrill ride. the sheer size and scope of their new album is massive. riffs twist and turn through labyrinthine arrangements, busting out into soaring melodic leads. their fifth album ontological mysterium captures the true spirit of the halcyon days of extreme metal. it sounds timeless but marks a bold step forward for this rising band.

shapednoise’s new album “absurd matter” is a labyrinthine sonic conundrum that spirals around the two poles of extreme noise and hiphop.

fabrizio rat starts his own techno label la machina. the label will be the platform for music oriented to the dancefloor as well as to the mind. the first release, the double bind ep, includes 4 tracks of uncompromising analog techno, labyrinthine sequences, hypnotic textures and banging beats mixing modular synths melodies, drum machines and acoustic piano sounds. on the b side, a phenakistoscope completes the experience, as the artwork animates when the record turns. hand and mechanism, oscillator and string, man and machine have rarely been so close.

dark star safari, a newly formed group featuring samuel rohrer, jan bang, erik honoré and eivind aarset, present its eponymous recording debut, an evocative song-driven album.

vinyl only. modern minimal house from a studio in the foothills of sintra. berllioz s labyrinthine modular setup and epic live sessions are legendary in portugal, and here carpet & snares bring us three compositions stemming from those hardware improvisations, plus a remix by playhouse veteran losoul.

an ardent heart is a focused techno mini album that brings forward stefan goldmann’s most dancefloor-centered material in a decade. the tracks push and pull relentlessly. despite their linear appeal, there is an intricately balanced interplay between the heavy-handed kicks, the bouncy bass accents and the sizzling, yet clear-cut details whipped up by the rallying drums. the peculiar, seemingly “vocalised” mode of synthesis is maybe the most unifying sonic characteristic of the six tracks and one coda. formant shaping, vowel filters and airstream perturbations let a wide range of sounding elements speak in the tongues of a cybernetic babylon. layered polymetric patterns perforate the aural plane with alien scripts. clearly structured, yet opaque messages that seem to have traveled for aeons emanate from the red-hot circuitry. they spill into a network of delays, channeled down into labyrinthine corridors, enveloped in electrostatic noise. most tracks build on chance patterns evoked with hardware sequencers and freeform modulation sources. the resulting synthetic systems are as cohesive as they exhibit vast internal variation and range. thus balancing simplicity and complexity right in the middle, the results are just as immediately gripping as they can feed sustained attention. a wide palette of distortion and overtones mark the contours of individual elements that seem to have near-physical qualities – as if there were metallic strings, thick membranes, a resonating sphere, all struck by electric mallets, caused to vibrate by mechanical bows and sung by silicone lips.

montreal’s minimal techno veteran pheek offers up a milestone vinyl release for the onset of this spring season. lumo ep offers four vibrant dance-floor compositions, each delving into its own labyrinthine mindscape, leaving no stones unturned in an ethereal garden of listening. lumo invites us into exotic, sprawling atmospheres- crafted with excessive care and the unmistakable studio-finesse that pheek has become known for. lovers of drums will be assured troves of bass-heavy, broken-beats and skittering, jazz-infused patterns which delicately tease and tantalize as they appear and flicker out. seasoned prowess in sound-design allows pheek to convey eerie, forgotten landscapes with periodic, lushly rising elements to bath the listener in unexpected lightness and thrilling serenity. lumo will surely tantalize even seasoned listeners as it melts heavily saturated layers of depth over unexpected arrangements. the result is a stunning interaction at the crossroads of minimal house and techno, nudging the listener toward sturdy grooves while simultaneously introducing new pathways on the way to ever-increasing depth.

crowd of one - formed in a bare, airless back room, lost in a labyrinthine warehouse in hackney, east london 2014. blissfully engulfed in a haze of cigarette smoke, music instruments and computer cables... there came, the improvised yet haunting, fused melodies that cascaded down the corridors, leading to the creation of this solo project. crowd of one debuts on resopal with five tracks and his mesmerizing dove ep. somewhere inbetween deepest electronics and mindblowin composing. check for yourself

the great metaphorical river has been lending itself to wise sayings for ages, usually as a manifestation of time, or in relation to how we see instances pass. it exists only as current, neither in the past nor the future, the present. rarely though do we look for guidance from the bodies of water that rest beyond a current’s reach: backwaters seen as stagnant and turbid. that they are, yet by nature they also collect, capable of shaping labyrinthine networks of canals and inlets with ecosystems all their own. backwaters let the present settle into the past, they’re a place apart from the flow where moments compile and mature.
kllo, an electronic pop collaboration between melbourne cousins chloe kaul and simon lam, waded in figurative backwater for much of 2016, amidst an extensive world tour. these were exciting times, the duo’s well worn ep furthered the promise of 2014 ep cusp, receiving millions of streams and landing kllo on festival stages as well as artists-to-watch lists. nonetheless, the stretch kept them far from home, isolated and vulnerable, treading through perpetual uncharted territory while yearning for the comforts of the familiar.
as a result, kllo’s full-length debut depicts inner adjustment to outer change. songs were written partially on the road and developed back at lam’s bungalow, a haven that harbors creative spontaneity and catharsis.
the double vinyl release includes a download code.

don t confuse radio silence with inactivity. the music might not have been flowing, but the plans were at schrodinger s box hq. and finally, after a shedload of work, we re back to the music. anton maiovvi is well known in the right circles. this bristol born soundtrack virtuoso, italo disco savant and all round electronic guru has travelled labels far and wide with his smorgasbord sound. and that variety is plain to hear on will to powder. from the epic opener of -clocks-, maiovvi leads you through his labyrinthine hall of shapes and sounds. expect warming melodies, cold beats, shimmering synthwork, brazen experimentation, a decent dollop of slasher scores and a pinch new wave romance in this. undoubtedly his most diverse album to date.

rotten city records welcomes a new citizen, but not a newcomer tothe scene. he is luca rocca atagliati, best known as dj rocca, a veteran dj and producer from italy, half ajello, half supersonic lovers, half from crimea, a third of electric tree and regular contributor with legendary dj’s like daniele baldelli or dimitri from paris. after his multiple releases on labels like is it balearic?, nang or futureboogie, luca joins to our beloved rotten city with two original tracks showing his darker, narcotic and narrative side, concocting a bizarre and labyrinthine disco, which develops a spiral shaped staircase from the inside.

four labyrinthine excursions in psychedelic techno, from antonio marini. take a step back... move to the side, just a touch... there... acid, dub and free jazz, focalising like heat blisters, then healed in a flash. wayward flow, for example, with the ghosts of double bass and bongos swirling in from the margins. entheogenic freak-outs, with the left profile of robert hood, the right profile of vangelis. pressing on 180 gram vinyl.

constantly turning around itself, the winding melody of vertere turns outward and inward at the same time, bringing the listener on a journey outward while mirroring a simultaneous labyrinthine journey inward. like the word itself, vertere, with its roots in the latin word verto (which itself takes its roots in the earlier sanskrit word, vartayati) it signifies the very nature of change itself. it means both to turn and reflect inward and yet also move forward — a call to action for setting in motion new things. a paradox at first glance but also perhaps a surprisingly accurate description of the destructive and reconstructive nature of creation. an apt metaphor for this bright new collaboration between established life and death artists mind against and the new artist project of federico maccherone, aka somne. on remix duties, when you have an artist of the caliber of tobias freund, you don t need to ask for anything more and with his outstanding remix of vertere he very clearly shows why. this long time mainstay of the electronic music scene has managed to stay not just relevant but on the cutting edge longer than most with respected releases on some of the most seminal imprints to be putting out music in the world of underground dance music. with vertere he takes what s already top quality material and somehow manages to turn it inward and in his own unique way elevate it to another level entirely. with a relentless beat and a sonic force that is hard to describe with mere words the tobias. remix of vertere comes out of the gate like a runaway machine rapturously drunk on its own self awareness. it marches ever forward, full of fervor, and will surely be driving dance floors both large and small to the euphoric edge of the ecstatic state.

tip! isolee strikes back a new anthem called dennis. one of our favorit german producers who has been delivering some groundbreaking tracks since his first releases on playhouse in the late nineties. dennis is another fine track and comes with remixes by ripperton and baikal. berliners baikal does a labyrinthine bassy version and ripperton rides on the guitars samples to deliver a groovy 8 wheels dub. excellent release!

vaetxhs inaugural release libet tones for detroit underground draws on both musical themes - electronic idm and musique concrete - and non-musical themes from mathematics, resulting in four labyrinthine tracks that are studies in free association, a state in which ideas float from the unconscious to the conscious. record sleeve design by dmas3. pressing on brown, multicolour-marbled vinyl.