Genre/Influences: Industrial-rave, dark-techno.
Background/Info: Kolja Trelle aka Soman is back! After his last album “Noistyle” (2010) we didn’t hear that much from this German visionary artist. But as a phoenix rising from the ashes, Soman struck back in 2018 with the three singles (cf. “Growler”, “New Lead” and “Blue Flame”) announcing this new opus. “Nox” is the fourth full length in the artist’s discography.
Content: The sound formula of Soman hasn’t really changed and hasn’t been affected by the weight of time. The tracks are all instrumental versions, mixing techno, industrial and EBM. The techno input became more important than ever before and even moves into pure and rather classical dance leads. From raw industrial sound treatments to dance leads, this album is a heavy and danceable melting pot.
+ + + : I especially like the raw, industrial sound treatments and alluring bass lines this album has been made of. It’s pure underground! It sounds aggressive while some of the leads have a real elevating effect. “New Lead” is a phenomenal track illustrating the sound –and genius of Soman. The sound production is just perfect revealing a high tech approach. Soman doesn’t really innovate, but appears to be the ultimate artist for avant-garde techno fests. It also is interesting to observe this artist released his work on 3 leading labels from the German underground scene; the debut album on Out Of Line, two albums on Infacted Recordings and this new opus on Trisol. I think it just confirms the huge respect for this artist and especially when you know it’s a rather unusual artist for the Trisol label.
– – – : I’m not convinced by some of the dance leads, which are sometimes a bit cliché and cheap. It creates a surprising duality with the harder and unpolished industrial sound treatments, but I think Kolja Trelle can do much better.
Conclusion: This is without a shadow of a doubt one of the most noticeable comebacks from the past few months. Soman is back and I think the scene needs such an artist.
Best songs: “New Lead”, “Growler”, “Blue Flame”, “Milda”.
Rate: (8).
Artist: www.facebook.com/SOMAN.Musik
Label: www.trisol.de / www.facebook.com/pages/Trisol–Music–Group/104166526285471
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