Episode 3: Reviews of Astrophysics' "Vanilla Deathwish," "Borga Revolution Vol 1," Dam Swindle's "Open," and Lindstrom's "Sirius Syntoms."

MusicWeek: A Roundtable Review of the Latest Electronic Music Albums

Monty Luke and critics Peter Kirn and Sasha Zakrevska discuss and give analysis of this week’s latest Electronic Music album releases available now in most formats. 

Albums:

Astrophysics - Vanilla Deathwish (.Orphans)

Various Artists - Borga Revolution! Ghanaian Dance Music In The Digital Age, 1983 - 1992 (Vol. 1) (Kalita Records)

Dam Swindle - Open (Heist Recordings)

Lindstrøm - Sirius Syntoms (Feedelity)

Co-hosts: 

Peter Kirn, journalist and writer from Create Digital Music. @pkirn 

Sasha Zakrevska, Ukrainian artist and owner of Lightronics Records. @poly_chain

Genres: Experimental Pop, Ghanaian Dance, House, Disco, Deep House

Monty Luke is a Berlin-based DJ, Electronic Music Producer, Radio Host and owner of record label Black Catalogue. He has remixed and released music on labels like Rekids, Hypercolour, Planet-E, Ostgut Ton and many more.

MusicWeek comes to you live and direct from Berlin, featuring reviews of the latest and best album releases from the spectrum of Electronic Music.

For more information on the MusicWeek podcast:

Monty Luke on Instagram: @monty_luke

Black Catalogue on Bandcamp.

Transcript

Monty: 0:00

One was the rote käppchen, rosé, and

Peter: 0:03

then... It wasn't rote caption. It was a little better than that. It was the bio rosé, but kind of from your spate.

Monty: 0:15

Welcome back to Music Week. My name is Monty Luke, your host. This week... Joining me will be Peter Kern, journalist and writer from Create Digital Music, Sasha Zaklevska, Ukrainian artist and owner of Lightronix Records. Our first album for review this week will be Astrophysics, Vanilla Death Wish on the Orphans label. Sasha, let's start with you.

Sasha: 0:42

Yes, I was very suspicious about this proletarian, gothic and dark glitch wave thing, the way how astrophysics physics describes themselves, but let's try to be abstract from their political views and concentrate on the music first. What I really respect with this album is that it's 12 tracks, it's a lot of music, and it all sounds very like one album. There is a lot of sound design elements, which really make this work full In terms of sound design, I think Emotional Labor is my favorite track. But speaking of this proletarian thing, I did a little research on Twitter and Bandcamp, and I found this very weird, over-sexualized album cover with USSR kind of cosmic vibes and anime. And, you know, as all gothic... nice gothic kids in my school in back times when I was in school. They were all reading a lot of books. So, guys, please check what happened in Sondermoch in 1937 and how many Eastern European poets were killed by USSR before FAP on that kind of aesthetics.

Monty: 2:18

Peter.

Peter: 2:20

I'm still processing the political side of things. Sasha picked up the overly fetishized Soviet radar was more sensitive for you than for me. This wasn't just somebody like, maybe they have a picture of Laika the dog, but that's as deep as it goes. This is somebody really kind of also fetishizing the Soviet Union. There is a sense of, I mean, I did like the music. I'm happy to also cancel the artist over the politics, but the music is, I mean, this is one of the better examples at least of kind of vaporwave internet mishmash of aesthetics. The whole thing could easily be a YouTube playlist. It's at its best, I thought, when it's kind of weird and there's 10 things going on and it kind of launches you into some kind of cosmic in For me,

Monty: 3:23

this was Yves Tumor having an emotional mental crisis. It felt like Yves Tumor, but extreme. Like if Yves Tumor, like I said, was having some kind of mental breakdown.

Sasha: 3:36

Maybe teenager Yves Tumor.

Monty: 3:42

Continue.

Peter: 3:46

Yeah, I mean, well, but I appreciate it when it was most in the state of a breakdown. Some of the songs almost become a little more conventional rock songs, and then it loses me when that happens. But the weirder stuff, where there's that kind of hyperactive anime-influenced, lots of layers, that stuff's always really engaging and was always really... engaging from this artist. It was sort of what you would expect from this release, kind of continuing to develop. But yeah, I hope that they get to go a little deeper. Maybe that's where that kind of political element comes in, is that that kind of sense that can show a lack of emotional maturity right if the people who are kind of only dealing with a message on the surface that that does kind of come across in the music too so on reflection of kind of what what sasha found i think i think even if you didn't know that there is an element of that in the music there's a sense of this pastiche of lots of other styles um but the the message underneath them isn't quite there yet so i hope that with all those kind of production chops i hope that this hopefully this artist kind of

Monty: 5:09

explores that a little more. The name of the album is Vanilla Death Wish by Astrophysics. It is self-released on the Orphans label and it is out now on Bandcamp and streaming in all formats. Our next release is the various artist compilation with a very long title, Borger Revolution Ghanaian Dance Music in the Digital Age 1983-1992 Volume 1 on the Khalil Peter, let's start with you.

Peter: 5:41

This one's an essential listen. And I was surprised that I didn't know more about this music, especially since a lot of this was going on in Germany. This Berger High Life is this incredible kind of diaspora music creation where all of these rhythms find their way onto drum machines. They get mixed up with Western kind of production techniques and the stuff that was going on at the time. It's an incredible hybrid in that you don't feel a sense of here's somebody kind of layering rhythms from Ghana on top of something else. It's a perfect fusion. So they really treat the drum machine with this kind of comfort and ease like it is just the new instrumentation for the thing that they're doing. So it's really effortless. There's just some incredible music on here. If you like this there's even more compilations kind of uh along with this one there's another in this series a label called soundway records in a longer compilation that also gets into more diversity um but all of this stuff is uh incredible i was also kind of excited to read somewhere that uh wilson uh botang is working on a new album and we have to track him down and find out if that's still happening um but

Monty: 7:06

do you have a sense of where he is is he in ghana is he in germany is he in the uk

Peter: 7:11

So some of these artists are in Germany and some of them are in London. I don't think any of them have gone back to Ghana. I think they're all in the UK or

Monty: 7:20

Germany. I mean, I guess that's why the compilation happened. It's sort of like them leaving Ghana with sort of that knowledge and that music and sort of like using or allowing the German slash UK influence to sort of like wash over them. And then this music... That's right.

Peter: 7:37

Well, and some stuff comes full circle, right? Because they're adding these kind of disco and boogie elements. So... they're finding musical elements that had started, you know, have influences that have their roots in West Africa, come over to the US, do a full round trip back to Europe, here back to the true imperial core, and then like, you know, just mix it all together again because they're incredible musicians. And so a lot of them kept playing. I think that a lot of them are only now really getting kind of wider recognition, which is a shame. These releases are totally timeless. And, you know, I I would hope that people don't kind of exoticize them in some way, right? Like this was really incredible pop made in the 80s that just didn't find a commercial outlet. Maybe because it was a little, it was honestly, maybe it was like a little too fresh. It sounds more contemporary than a lot of stuff put out at the time. So a lot of them kept playing. I guess some of them are still making music. Some of them went and did other things. But yeah, I gather that they're hanging around London or Germany somewhere. Maybe somebody's in Berlin. We have to track them down. Sasha?

Sasha: 8:43

Yeah, this is an absolutely great discovery, this album. And as Peter mentioned, this genre, Burger High Life. So yeah, like a lot of Ghanians, right? Do I pronounce it right? Ghanaians. Ghanaians, yeah. They immigrated to Europe and the US. And I just wonder, maybe because they adopt the rhythm on the drum machines and synthesizers, which they found... in Europe and US. Maybe it was a little bit too extreme for 80s, fourth-of-the-floor standard Europeans, but it sounds absolutely incredible. I think I will come back to this album a few times this summer, for sure. Yeah, I think also my favorite track, which resonates with me somehow musically, it's Mada Me Hosó. Yeah, it's a very beautiful one.

Monty: 9:45

And I know you had said before that some of this type of music kind of reminds you of a certain time of your life.

Sasha: 9:53

Yeah, like actually a lot of diggers back in Warsaw, back when I used to live in Warsaw from 2015 till 2018, there was like this Philip Lech and Lou Tolento producers and the diggers who introduced me to Africa and music from 80s and 70s. So yeah.

Monty: 10:17

Nice. The name of the compilation is Borga Revolution Ghanaian Dance Music in the Digital Age 1983 to 1982 Volume 1. That's on the Kalita Records label that is available now on all formats including vinyl. Our next release for discussion is Dame Swindle's new album called Open that is on their Heist Recordings label. Sasha, let's start with you.

Sasha: 10:45

Yeah, so it's not really my kind of music, but it radiates this album, this work. It radiates this kind of ambassador of chill vacation vibes. It's like super down-tempo, sexy tunes with silly synthesizers. And yeah, this kind of... I don't want to say background, but just imagine yourself on the beach and you're like drinking some cocktail and chilling yeah this is this this atmosphere

Peter: 11:20

peter i have the same note i i said this is the the cheap rose of house music i don't i'm afraid to say this i'm afraid i'm gonna run into dam swindle or i mean they're in the netherlands or something so uh if i see them i have to run the other way but that i mean it's it's me it's there's nothing wrong with it it's music you could easily kind of put on in your bluetooth speaker and play in the background, and it's non-offensive. What I will say is that they're producers with a bunch of experience. They have a lot of chops, everything else. They also clearly had the resources to go out and get good collaborations. What I would say is the strong points of this album really come from the collaborators, and I actually think the collaborators are really worth checking out, maybe more worth checking out than the artists. But there's some... Haley Supreme, this neo-soul artist out of Brooklyn. Her track, I think, is incredible. As a standout, at least. It's this super smooth, super silky pop. Some of the R&B elements also, I think, work well. Faye Mayanna. This is a producer coming out of London, I think. But she's kind of listen to remote town listen to a bunch of other stuff does a bunch of diy productions worth checking out her productions to up-and-coming talent so it's if if you use this as kind of a rolodex for some hot artists to go check out it works pretty well other than that you leave it leave it on during your picnic

Monty: 13:01

i kind of felt like because i am familiar quite familiar with um dame swindle and um their label and the type of music that they produce i played many of their tracks over the years I do wonder if this album is not one of those things where an artist feels like, you know, they're doing an album and they need to step it up, quote unquote. And so, you know, so they feel like, or someone felt like we need to sort of, maybe this is our chance to do something more pop. And, you know, we need to, it felt like there is this, They're checking all the boxes of, you know, up and coming electronic music artists who wants to maybe cross over a little bit, like the things you would need to do, you know, in order to do that successfully, you know, curate a bunch of interesting collabs, sort of abandon your deep house, sort of underground sound and, you know, et cetera, et cetera. It, it, like that it felt like that's what they were trying to do and i it was actually i found it distracting yeah um and so that i mean the only reason why i'm chiming in on this is just because i felt like i feel really familiar with this this particular these these guys and um that was just my overwhelming sort of like overarching sort of like vibe that i was getting from this album it was like it's perfectly okay but it felt like they were trying too hard um yeah that's it

Peter: 14:41

yeah i mean it It just feels overly like it's trying too hard to be commercial. That was what I was getting as well. Is it Dam or Dame Swindle? I assume it's Dam. It's Dame Swindle. I assume Dam Swindle because they're Dutch.

Monty: 14:54

Maybe it is Dam Swindle. Like Amsterdam. Amsterdam Swindle, yeah. They used to be Detroit Swindle.

Peter: 14:59

Oh, okay.

Monty: 15:00

And they changed it.

Peter: 15:01

Well, so then maybe that's the answer. It needs to be more Detroit and less whatever Dam or Dame is meant to be. I apologize. I apologize. I want to apologize. I do like the up-and-coming artists that they coupled with. So whatever it was that they were trying to do, some of those hybrids for me were really working. So maybe in that way, I had the opposite take to you.

Monty: 15:25

Dam Swindle's full-length album, Open, is out now in all formats on the Heist recording label. Next up, Lindstrom's full-length album, Serious Symptoms, on his own Fidelity label. This is Lindstrom's first album in quite a few years. Peter, let's start

Peter: 15:44

with you. Well, this is the

Monty: 15:45

good

Peter: 15:45

rosé. This is the one that, yeah, I mean, well, I mean, that's a good point. You know, I mean, I don't want to be too critical of artists as I'm also a producer. Or

Sasha: 15:56

too critical to rosé?

Peter: 15:58

Well, no, but like, no, I'm not being critical at all of rosé, right? You've got the, like, really good, like, rosé that's kind of straightforward, but really has good flavor, and that's this one. Peter, that's orange wine. Cheap, spaty rosé that was just trying too hard to be kind of a crowd pleaser that then, you know, is not as much fun. So this is the good one.

Monty: 16:17

One was the rote caption rosé, and

Peter: 16:21

then... It wasn't rote caption. It was a little better than that. It was the bio rosé, but kind of from your späti. The expensive rosé from your späti. This one is the boutique natural...

Sasha: 16:32

It's from the Norwegian fancy bar.

Peter: 16:36

Yeah, yeah. This is a really top-notch Scandi natural unfiltered wine. Well, there's some music here that we should probably talk about. Hello,

Sasha: 16:47

I'm Sasha, and I'm an alcoholic.

Peter: 16:52

No, what Lindstrom did here, I thought, was genius. It's really kind of pure serotonin. It really felt like a return to form, some of the best stuff that he's done in the past. It's actually really hard to make music like this, right? To have something that's this stripped back and this kind of simple on the surface, but that keeps this kind of groove going. There's a lot of really intelligent kind of modal harmony, too. There's some kind of brain-tickling approach to harmony here, so it's deceptively simple in that way. I thought it was just a nice kind of antidepressant release, plus I love the track title, Sharing an Orange with Omar S. on the Train from Minehead to London. That sort of sums it up. You get that sort of simple experience, sort of forward motion of the train. Omar S is there. I don't know. There's some kind of funky roots somewhere underneath. That sums it up for me. Yeah, I like this one. Sasha.

Sasha: 17:53

So Lindstrom always brings this beautifully playful synth progressions, even though the sound of the synths are very familiar, but you immediately know that it's him by the way how he handles synths. And yeah, this this album is not an exception. I really wish I could hear some of these songs as an anthem of Panorama Bar this summer season. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. When I start playing it, when I start listening to it, I just start dancing immediately. So yeah, that's the overall vibe.

Monty: 18:35

I think what was immediately, for me anyways, immediately clear, you both mentioned the synth work that was done and I'm like 99% sure he's using the circlon sequencer especially in the very first track because I have one myself and I know how it works so I know what to listen for now so

Sasha: 18:57

you understand the logic

Monty: 18:59

I don't understand the logic of what he actually has done in terms of like the progressions he's using and stuff because I'm like that deep into music theory but it definitely sounds as though the way that the notes are flowing and the sort of The methods he was using really sounded like he was using the circle sequencer. Just an aside for you music nerds. So yeah, the name of the album is Serious Symptoms by Lindstrom. It is available now on the Fidelity label in all formats, including vinyl. Thank you, Sasha and Peter, for joining me this week on Music Week. Be sure to tune in next time for more weird albums, weird perspectives, and And weird sound problems.