Depeche Mode – SIDE-LINE

Depeche Mode’s ‘Music for the Masses’ turns 39 on 28 September

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 10:00:00 +0000

Depeche Mode’s sixth studio album, “Music for the Masses,” turns 39 this year. The English synth-pop group released the record on 28 September 1987 through Mute Records in the United Kingdom, with Sire Records handling the United States and Intercord releasing it in West Germany.

“Music for the Masses” was recorded between September 1986 and July 1987 at Studio Guillaume Tell outside Paris and Konk Studios in London, then mixed at Puk Recording Studios in Denmark. Depeche Mode co-produced the album with David Bascombe, marking the first time since 1981’s “Speak & Spell” that longtime producer Daniel Miller was not directly involved in a Depeche Mode album’s production. Band member Alan Wilder took on a larger production role on this record, arranging the songs at his home studio before the group recorded final versions together.

The album runs ten tracks: “Never Let Me Down Again,” “The Things You Said,” “Strangelove,” “Sacred,” “Little 15,” “Behind the Wheel,” “I Want You Now,” “To Have and to Hold,” “Nothing” and the closing instrumental “Pimpf.” Four singles were pulled from the record: “Strangelove” (27 April 1987), “Never Let Me Down Again” (24 August 1987), “Behind the Wheel” (28 December 1987) and “Little 15” (May 1988), all reaching the top 10 in various national charts.

“Music for the Masses” reached number 10 in the UK, number 2 in West Germany and number 35 in the US. It was certified platinum by the RIAA in February 1991, and an estimated 5.5 million copies had sold worldwide as of 2023, making it the band’s second best-selling album. The record was supported by the seven-leg Music for the Masses Tour, which ran from October 1987 through June 1988 and closed with a sold-out show at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, later released as the live album “101” (1989).

The album is available to stream on Spotify.

Side-Line spoke with producer Dave Bascombe about “Music for the Masses” in 2023.

About Depeche Mode

Depeche Mode formed in Basildon, Essex, England, in 1980. The original line-up consisted of Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Andy Fletcher and singer Dave Gahan. Clarke wrote most of the band’s debut, “Speak & Spell,” released in 1981 on Mute Records, before leaving the group to form Yazoo and later Erasure. Gore became the band’s main songwriter, and Alan Wilder joined as keyboardist in time for the group’s second album, “A Broken Frame” (1982).

“Construction Time Again” followed in 1983, the first album to feature Wilder as a full member and the first built heavily around field-recorded samples, produced with Gareth Jones. “Some Great Reward” (1984) and “Black Celebration” (1986) continued the band’s move toward darker, more industrial-tinged electronic pop, with Wilder taking on a growing production role alongside Miller and Jones.

For “Music for the Masses” (1987), the band brought in outside producer David Bascombe while Wilder took direct control of arranging and shaping the songs, a shift that also coincided with Anton Corbijn’s arrival as the group’s principal visual director for music videos and artwork. The album’s US chart performance and the Music for the Masses Tour, capped by the Rose Bowl concert filmed for “101” (1989), established Depeche Mode’s audience in America for the first time. The band went on to release “Violator” (1990) and “Songs of Faith and Devotion” (1993) before Wilder’s 1995 departure, and has continued recording and touring since, most recently supporting the 2023 album “Memento Mori” and the concert film “M.”

Side-Line has previously covered Depeche Mode’s back catalog in this anniversary series, including “Construction Time Again” turning 43, “Some Great Reward” turning 42 and “A Broken Frame” turning 44. “Music for the Masses” turning 39 this year marks the next entry in that chronology.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

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Depeche Mode’s ‘A Broken Frame’ turns 44 on 27 September

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sun, 27 Sep 2026 08:00:00 +0000

Depeche Mode recorded their second album as a three-piece, and it is the only one in their catalogue made that way. Mute Records issued “A Broken Frame” on 27 September 1982, with Sire handling the United States. The English synth-pop band from Basildon, Essex, had lost founding songwriter Vince Clarke the previous December. The record turns 44 this year.

Clarke left after the “Speak & Spell” tour finished in early December 1981 and formed Yazoo with Alison Moyet. Martin Gore took over the writing and wrote every track here. Alan Wilder had already answered a Melody Maker advertisement and played his first show with the band at Croc’s in Rayleigh, Essex, on 20 January 1982, but he was on a touring wage and did not play on the album. He became a full member in October 1982, the month after it came out. Gore addressed the arrangement in ZigZag No. 131 in November 1982, saying the band wanted the record to stand on its own before Wilder joined the studio line-up: “Alan started playing with us, but we wanted to make certain that any change in direction in our music wasn’t attributable to Alan joining. We needed to show we were capable of musical alteration by ourselves.” Wilder has given the other side of it: “I’d done my bit and I thought I warranted involvement. I had something to contribute. They said no.”

Sessions ran from December 1981 to July 1982 at Blackwing Studios in London, where the room had moved up to a 16-track desk. Depeche Mode produced with Daniel Miller, and John Fryer and Eric Radcliffe engineered. Gore bought a PPG Wave 2 with his royalties and used it first on “See You”. Depeche Mode built the drums from an ARP 2600 for the bass drum and snares from a Roland TR-808 and a Korg KR-55. They also made their first attempt at sampling: Blancmange occupied the same building at the time and marched in front of microphones to supply the boots on “Shouldn’t Have Done That”. Miller described the change in method to Electronic Beats on 26 March 2013: “It was almost like a blank sheet of paper, the songs were recorded in a different way because Vince had a very specific idea of what the song was going to end up sounding like, and Martin didn’t really have that.”

The ten tracks run 40 minutes and 52 seconds: “Leave in Silence”, “My Secret Garden”, “Monument”, “Nothing to Fear”, “See You”, “Satellite”, “The Meaning of Love”, “A Photograph of You”, “Shouldn’t Have Done That” and “The Sun & the Rainfall”. Dave Gahan sang lead throughout except on “Shouldn’t Have Done That”, a duet with Gore, and “Nothing to Fear” is an instrumental. The American edition used the longer 12-inch version of “Leave in Silence” and added a second instrumental, “Further Excerpts From: My Secret Garden”, making eleven tracks. Mute had put out three singles ahead of the album: “See You” on 29 January 1982, “The Meaning of Love” on 26 April 1982 and “Leave in Silence” on 16 August 1982, reaching numbers 6, 12 and 20 on the UK singles chart. The album reached number 8 on the UK albums chart, topped the UK independent albums chart, peaked at 22 in Sweden, 43 in New Zealand and 56 in Germany, and stalled at 177 on the Billboard 200. The BPI certified it gold on 30 August 1983.

Brian Griffin photographed the sleeve, having also shot “Speak & Spell” and the band’s press images. Griffin cited Soviet socialist realism, Kazimir Malevich in particular, and German Romanticism as his references. Martyn Atkins designed the sleeve and Ching Ching Lee supplied the calligraphy. The band agreed to stay off the front cover; a solo picture of Andy Fletcher appeared on the back of the first pressing. In 1990 Life magazine placed the photograph on its list of the World’s Best Photographs 1980-1990.

Reviews at the time were mixed. Steve Sutherland, writing in Melody Maker on 25 September 1982, called the album “ambitious and bold” while judging the band “essentially vacuous”. Smash Hits gave it 8 out of 10 in its 30 September to 13 October 1982 issue, with Peter Silverton writing that it showed “a lack of purpose”. Depeche Mode have been harder on it since. Gore told NME on 17 February 1990 that “musically A Broken Frame was a mish-mash”, and in a 2006 interview called it “probably our worst album”. Miller has kept a different line, describing it as “a transitional record and while it’s not their best record, it’s hugely important in terms of how it was made and how it gave everybody confidence.” Greek synth-pop duo Marsheaux recorded the album in full for Undo Records in 2015, later expanded to a 2CD with 12 bonus tracks.

About Depeche Mode

Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Dave Gahan and Andy Fletcher formed Depeche Mode in Basildon, Essex, in 1980, taking the name from a French fashion magazine. Daniel Miller signed them to his independent label Mute Records and the synth-pop debut “Speak & Spell” followed in 1981, with Clarke writing most of it. His departure that December left Gore as the band’s writer for everything after it.

“A Broken Frame” was the result, and the tour behind it ran through the UK and Europe with Wilder on stage from the start. He joined the studio line-up for “Construction Time Again” in 1983, the album on which Gareth Jones and sampled industrial sounds entered the band’s productions, as covered in Depeche Mode’s ‘Construction Time Again’. The Berlin sessions that followed produced “Some Great Reward” in 1984, then “Black Celebration” in 1986, “Music for the Masses” in 1987 and “Violator” in 1990, which carried “Personal Jesus” and “Enjoy the Silence”.

Wilder left in 1995, after “Songs of Faith and Devotion” and the tour that followed it. The remaining trio issued “Ultra” in 1997, “Exciter” in 2001, “Playing the Angel” in 2005, “Sounds of the Universe” in 2009, “Delta Machine” in 2013 and “Spirit” in 2017. Fletcher died in May 2022. Gahan and Gore continued as a duo, releasing “Memento Mori” in 2023 and touring it, with the Mexico City shows becoming the concert film “M”. Forty-four years after Mute pressed it, “A Broken Frame” remains the record made in the gap between the two writers who shaped the band.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode’s ‘Some Great Reward’ turns 42 on 24 September

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 08:00:00 +0000

Depeche Mode, the English electronic band from Basildon, Essex, released “Some Great Reward” on 24 September 1984 through Mute Records. The album turns 42 this year. It was the band’s fourth studio album, and it reached number 5 on the UK Albums Chart and number 3 in West Germany.

Most of the record was made in West Berlin. Sessions began at London’s Music Works studio and moved to Hansa Mischraum, where the band also mixed the album. Daniel Miller produced it with Depeche Mode and Gareth Jones, who had engineered the previous record and was promoted to co-producer here. The band carried over the sampling approach it had started on Depeche Mode’s ‘Construction Time Again’, building rhythms from struck metal and concrete rather than drum machines alone. Martin Gore wrote eight of the nine songs; Alan Wilder contributed “If You Want”, the last song he wrote for a Depeche Mode album. Dave Gahan sang lead throughout, with Gore taking the vocal on “Somebody”, recorded live with Wilder on piano.

The nine-track album runs “Something to Do”, “Lie to Me”, “People Are People”, “It Doesn’t Matter”, “Stories of Old”, “Somebody”, “Master and Servant”, “If You Want” and “Blasphemous Rumours”. Mute had issued “People Are People” as the lead single on 12 March 1984, six months ahead of the album, followed by “Master and Servant” on 20 August 1984 and the “Blasphemous Rumours” / “Somebody” double A-side on 29 October 1984. Both later singles drew objections over their sexual and religious subject matter, and some radio stations declined to play “Master and Servant”.

Brian Griffin photographed the sleeve at Round Oak Steelworks near Stourbridge, continuing the industrial imagery he and designer Martin Atkyns had used on the previous cover. The album title is a line from “Lie to Me”.

The Some Great Reward Tour opened three days after release and ran to the end of July 1985, taking the band through the UK, Europe, North America and two shows behind the Iron Curtain, in Budapest on 23 July and Warsaw on 30 July 1985. The 14 December 1984 concert in Hamburg was filmed and issued as the band’s first live video, “The World We Live In and Live in Hamburg”.

About Depeche Mode

Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Dave Gahan and Andy Fletcher formed Depeche Mode in Basildon, Essex, in 1980, taking their name from a French fashion magazine. The band signed to Daniel Miller’s independent label Mute Records and released the synth-pop debut “Speak & Spell” in 1981. Clarke left after that album to form Yazoo with Alison Moyet, and Gore became the band’s main songwriter. Depeche Mode continued as a trio for “A Broken Frame” (1982), then expanded to a four-piece when Alan Wilder joined for “Construction Time Again” (1983), the album that brought sampled industrial sounds and Gareth Jones into the band’s productions.

“Some Great Reward” extended that partnership and gave the band its first US chart single, “People Are People”, which reached number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1985 after a delayed run there. Mute followed the album with the compilation “The Singles 81>85” in October 1985, then “Black Celebration” (1986), “Music for the Masses” (1987) and “Violator” (1990), which produced “Personal Jesus” and “Enjoy the Silence”. Wilder left in 1995 after “Songs of Faith and Devotion” (1993), and the remaining trio released “Ultra” (1997), “Exciter” (2001), “Playing the Angel” (2005), “Sounds of the Universe” (2009), “Delta Machine” (2013) and “Spirit” (2017). Fletcher died in May 2022. Gahan and Gore released “Memento Mori” as a duo in 2023 and toured behind it, documenting the Mexico City dates in the concert film “M”. Forty-two years on, “Some Great Reward” remains the point at which the Berlin sessions, the sampling and the leather-and-steel visual language settled into the form the band carried through the rest of the decade.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Our AI search tool invented a new 2026 Depeche Mode album that does not exist

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 16 Sep 2026 17:05:31 +0000

During Side-Line’s own AI-assisted research today, September 16, 2026, an AI web-search tool returned a fabricated claim: that Depeche Mode was releasing a new studio album titled “Come This Madness” on September 25, 2026. No such album exists, of course. It was another AI agent — one we developed to check the claims made by other AI tools — that prevented the article from landing in our editorial flow for further work.

Since many of you reading this work with AI professionally, we just wanted to give you a technical account of how that specific kind of error happens. It also shows why all publications need to invest in verification when working with AI. And as an extra, here’s a very suitable Depeche Mode video to go along with this article :).

The tool searches, then writes a very short summary for us to work on

The AI search tool in question does not work like a traditional search engine that returns a ranked list of links. It runs a query, retrieves a set of web pages or snippets that match it, and then uses a large language model to generate a written summary of what those results say. This two-step process, retrieval followed by generation, is standard for AI-assisted search and is usually described as retrieval-augmented generation.

The retrieval step worked correctly in this case. The underlying search returned real, relevant results, including a legitimate Mojo magazine feature on Depeche Mode’s Berlin period and coverage of the band’s 40th-anniversary “Black Celebration” material. The failure happened in the second step, when the language model converted those results into prose.

Why a language model can state a false fact with confidence

Here it gets interesting, of course. A large language model generates text one token at a time by predicting the statistically likely continuation of the text so far, based on patterns learned from its training data. When it is asked to summarize search results, in this case on Depeche Mode, it is not running a database query that returns exact matches; it is composing a new sentence that resembles the kind of sentence that would plausibly follow from the material it has been shown, blended with patterns from unrelated text it saw during training.

For a band with a five-decade recording history, dozens of studio albums, tours, and reissues, and a large body of fan and press writing, the model has an enormous internal store of patterns for what a Depeche Mode album announcement looks like: a title, a release date roughly a few weeks out, a label. When the retrieved search results did not contain a clean, direct answer to “Depeche Mode news September 2026,” the model filled the gap with a statistically plausible-sounding invention rather than stating that no such album was found.

This behavior is commonly called a hallucination or, more precisely, a confabulation: fluent, well-formed text that is not grounded in any specific retrieved source, generated because the model’s training optimizes for producing plausible continuations, not for flagging uncertainty.

No per-sentence source attribution

A second technical factor made the error harder to catch at the point of generation. The summary presented several genuine facts, drawn from real search results, alongside the fabricated album claim, in the same paragraph and the same tone, with no inline citation marking which sentence came from which source. When a retrieval-augmented system does not attach a verifiable source link to every individual claim in its output, a fabricated sentence is indistinguishable, on the page, from a verified one. Some AI search tools address this by forcing every sentence to carry a citation and refusing to generate sentences that cannot be tied to a specific retrieved passage; the tool used here did not do that consistently for this query.

How the Depeche Mode error was caught

Our editorial workflow treats AI-generated claims as unverified until checked against a primary or otherwise reliable source. The AI agent we use for this directly checked official Depeche Mode sources, and none mentioned any album by that title. A separate search of Bing (as a double check for Google) for the same underlying query surfaced no matching result anywhere on the public web, confirming that the claim had no traceable origin.

Because it could not be sourced, it was discarded and the Depeche Mode article pitch never ended up in our flow. We found it while routinely checking the results of the AI agents at work to see if the agents were doing their work properly. You have to do this as an AI operator, or you end up with some pretty weird results, as this example shows.

Also, you might want to know that we run various AI agents (each specialized in certain data) to catch factual errors in promo copy that we get (you would be surprised how many press texts sent by labels and bands have factual errors) before we start working on the articles themselves.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode’s ‘Construction Time Again’ turns 43 on 22 August

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sat, 22 Aug 2026 10:00:00 +0000

Depeche Mode, the English electronic band from Basildon, Essex, released “Construction Time Again” on 22 August 1983 through Mute Records. The album turns 43 this year. It was the band’s third studio album and reached number 6 on the UK Albums Chart.

Daniel Miller produced the album together with Depeche Mode, with Gareth Jones engineering. Recording took place at the Garden studio in London, mixing at Hansa Mischraum in Berlin, and mastering at CBS Studios in London. The band built much of the album around sampled found sounds, recorded on a Synclavier and an Emulator, including metal being struck and other industrial noises. “Construction Time Again” was the first Depeche Mode studio album to feature Alan Wilder as a full member; he co-wrote two of the album’s songs. The nine-track album runs “Love, in Itself,” “More Than a Party,” “Pipeline,” “Everything Counts,” “Two Minute Warning,” “Shame,” “The Landscape Is Changing,” “Told You So” and “And Then…”

Mute released “Everything Counts” as the lead single on 11 July 1983, ahead of the album; it reached number 6 on the UK Singles Chart. “Love, in Itself” followed as the second single on 19 September 1983 and peaked at number 21. “Construction Time Again” followed “A Broken Frame” (1982) and preceded “Some Great Reward” (1984), the album that produced “People Are People.”

About Depeche Mode

Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Dave Gahan and Andy Fletcher formed Depeche Mode in Basildon, Essex, in 1980, taking their name from a French fashion magazine. The band signed to Daniel Miller’s independent label Mute Records and released the synth-pop debut album “Speak & Spell” in 1981. Clarke left the band after that album to form Yazoo with Alison Moyet, and Gore took over as the band’s main songwriter. Depeche Mode continued as a trio for “A Broken Frame” (1982), then expanded to a four-piece with the addition of Alan Wilder for “Construction Time Again” (1983), the album that introduced sampled industrial sounds and engineer Gareth Jones to the band’s productions.

The Miller and Jones production team continued with Depeche Mode through “Some Great Reward” (1984), “Black Celebration” (1986), “Music for the Masses” (1987) and “Violator” (1990), the album that produced “Personal Jesus” and “Enjoy the Silence.” Wilder left the band in 1995 after “Songs of Faith and Devotion” (1993); Depeche Mode continued as a trio of Gahan, Gore and Fletcher, releasing “Ultra” (1997), “Exciter” (2001), “Playing the Angel” (2005), “Sounds of the Universe” (2009), “Delta Machine” (2013) and “Spirit” (2017). Fletcher died in May 2022, and Gahan and Gore released “Memento Mori” as a duo in 2023, touring behind a Mexico City concert film titled “M.” “Construction Time Again,” released 22 August 1983, marked the start of the band’s move from straightforward synth-pop toward the denser, sample-driven productions of its subsequent albums.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Diesel Christ: the German synthpop project behind the ‘Diesel Mode’ Depeche Mode tributes

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 10:00:00 +0000

Diesel Christ was a German synthpop project built around songwriter and vocalist Tom Berger and a shifting circle of contributors including Klaus Gratzel, Thomas Harder, Chris Karagianidis, Chris Block, and executive producer Alex Sacher. The project released three main records: the Depeche Mode tribute album “Diesel Mode (A Tribute To The Masses)” – and the 4-track single “Walking In My Shoes (I Feel Different)” – in 1993 on Pop Factory!, the original-material CD EP “Gas Food Lodging” in November 1993 on SPV Records, and a second Depeche Mode tribute, “Diesel Mode 97”, in 1997 on Fun Factory!. Half of the project’s original recordings were ironically enough produced by John Fryer, the engineer who had worked on Depeche Mode’s first two albums at Blackwing Studios.

John Fryer

The tribute album appeared only two or three weeks after the original Depeche Mode release. “Songs Of Faith And Devotion” was released on March 22, 1993, while “Diesel Mode” was already in shops around early-to-mid April 1993. The chronology of the covered songs is telling. Of the five Depeche Mode tracks, only “I Feel You” had been publicly available before the album, released as a single in February 1993. “Walking In My Shoes“, “Rush”, “In Your Room”, and “Higher Love” were album tracks that had not yet been released.

Since recording at Principal Studios, mixing, glass mastering at DADC Austria, pressing, and distribution cannot be compressed into the two-to-three-week window , the Diesel Christ recordings were made quite before the original Depeche Mode album reached shops. How the project obtained the material ahead of release is not known, but it is believed they did obtain an early copy of the album ahead of the official release, either via the local Mute office or via befriended press people. Funny enough, Depeche Mode released “Walking In My Shoes” as the album’s second single on April 26, 1993. By that date, the Diesel Christ cover of the song was already recorded and pressed.

How the Diesel Christ synthpop project started

Diesel Christ grew out of Diesel, a German duo consisting of Klaus Gratzel and Thomas Berger. Diesel released one maxi-single, “Nowhereland”, in 1990 on Fun Factory! Records (FUNFAC M-3928), issued on 12″ vinyl and CD in several mixes. The song “Nowhereland” later reappeared on the 1993 Diesel Christ album “Gas Food Lodging”. To make it even more complicated, the project also recorded under the abbreviation D.C.

Diesel Christ would have seven members across the project’s lifespan: Tom Berger, Klaus Gratzel, Thomas Harder, Chris Karagianidis, Chris Block, Alex Sacher, and Robert Enforsen. The 1993 recordings featured Berger (vocals, guitar, main songwriter), Harder (bass, keyboards), and Karagianidis (drums), with Block on guitar and Gratzel contributing as co-writer. Sacher served as executive producer in 1993 and moved into the producer role for the 1997 album with Robert Enforsen on vocals.

‘Diesel Mode (A Tribute To The Masses)’: covering Depeche Mode in real time

“Diesel Mode (A Tribute To The Masses)” was issued in 1993 as a six-track CD album on Pop Factory!, distributed by SPV. The tracklist was as follows:

“Walking In My Shoes” (4:22)
“Rush” (2:23)
“In Your Room” (4:47)
“I Feel You” (4:05)
“Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?” (3:20)
“Higher Love” (4:26)

Five tracks are Martin L. Gore compositions from Depeche Mode’s 1993 album “Songs Of Faith And Devotion”. The sixth, “Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?”, is a Diesel Christ original written by Tom Berger, produced by John Fryer and remixed by Len Davies. The Depeche Mode covers were produced and mixed by Diesel Christ and Len Davies at Principal Studios.

A 12″ white label EP version appeared on Pop Factory! in Germany, and a Spanish 12″ edition was issued by BOL Records the same year.

The 4-track single “Walking In My Shoes (I Feel Different)” held 4 tracks:

Walking In My Shoes (Sex Mix) (5:02)
Walking In My Shoes (Andy F. Mix) (5:34)
Blue Rain (2:37)
Walking In My Shoes (7″ Version) (3:19)

‘Gas Food Lodging’: the original Diesel Christ material

“Gas Food Lodging” followed later that year, in November 1993 as an eight-track CD on SPV Records, licensed from Fun Factory!. The tracklist was this one:

“America” (3:06)
“Dinosaur” (3:38)
“Gimme Your Gasoline” (3:32)
“Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?” (3:19)
“Nirvana” (3:16)
“Nowhereland” (4:02)
“Dust” (4:08)
“Dangerous” (4:36)

Tom Berger was the songwriter and vocalist across the album, with Klaus Gratzel holding co-writing credits on “Nirvana” and “Nowhereland”, and Chris Block on “Gimme Your Gasoline”. John Fryer produced four tracks on this album: “America”, “Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?”, “Dust”, and “Dangerous”. The remaining tracks were produced by Diesel Christ themselves with Len Davies. The EP was again recorded and mixed at Principal Studios in Ottmarsbocholt, Germany, and its front cover used James Rosenquist’s 1961 painting “I Love You With My Ford”, licensed from Moderna Museet in Stockholm.

The EP tied the project’s threads together. “Nowhereland” carried the 1990 Diesel single into the Diesel Christ catalogue, and “Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?” repeated the original track first placed on the tribute album.

In 1995, Diesel Christ also contributed a cover of the Simple Minds track “20th Century Promised Land” to “To Cut A Long Story Short (A Tribute To The Pioneers Of Electronic Pop)”, a compilation on the Swedish label Energy Rekords. And that apparently laid the foundation of the 1997 Swedisch turn of the project.

‘Diesel Mode 97’: new lineup, new Depeche Mode album

Robert Enforsen (Elegant Machinery)

Diesel Christ returned with yet another tribute in 1997 with “Diesel Mode 97”, a nine-track CD album on Fun Factory!, with this time a Swedish edition on Energy Rekords. The tracklist:

“Sister Of Night” (4:37)
“Freestate” (4:42)
“Hallelujah” (3:01)
“Useless” (4:33)
“Useless Link” (2:33)
“It’s No Good” (9:21)
“Barrel Of A Gun” (4:29)
“The Love Thieves” (2:00)
“Home” (4:31)

The personnel for this new Diesel Christ album had in the meantime changed almost entirely. Alex Sacher stayed on board and produced the album, Andreas Küchenmeister handled programming, and Robert Enforsen, vocalist of the Swedish synthpop band Elegant Machinery, sang lead. MCP mixed the album, Chazz Harper mastered it at Battery Studios in New York, and Swen Roters painted the cover. Note that an unofficial Russian cassette edition titled “Diesel Mode ’98” appeared on Always Records in 1998.

From Diesel Christ to Rotoskop

Klaus Gratzel, co-founder of Diesel and co-writer on two “Gas Food Lodging” tracks, then started Rotoskop.

Gratzel sent tracks to other artists, who added their voices and helped complete the songs. This process resulted in the 2003 album “Revolution: Lost”. The following years were marked by setbacks, doubts and poor decisions, but Rotoskop still delivered remixes for Apoptygma Berzerk, Sono, De/Vision, Torul and Sea of Sin, among others. In 2021 Rotoskop returned as a recording artist, releasing three EPs with six songs each. The newer material focused on the artist’s own music, voice and personal approach.

Rotoskop debuted on Infacted Recordings with the album “Undo/Redo” on March 8, 2024, followed by “Passive/Aggressive“, also on Infacted.

You can check out the video report we did as well.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Rule of Two release a cover of Depeche Mode’s ‘It’s No Good’ on June 4, with official video

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 08:00:00 +0000

Norwegian darkwave and cyberpunk duo Rule of Two have released a cover of Depeche Mode’s “It’s No Good“. The Rule of Two “It’s No Good” version is accompanied by an official music video directed by band member Kristian Liljan.

The cover is Rule of Two’s fifth single of 2026, following “Afterlife” via Polypiel Records on May 7 and “All Time Low” in February.

‘It’s No Good’: the original

“It’s No Good” was released on March 31, 1997, as the second single from Depeche Mode’s ninth studio album “Ultra” (Mute Records, April 14, 1997). The track was written by Martin Gore and produced by Tim Simenon, recorded at Eastcote Studios in London and Larrabee West in Los Angeles, and mixed at Abbey Road Studios. It reached number five in the United Kingdom and number one in Denmark, Spain, Sweden and on the US Billboard Dance Club Play chart.

About Rule of Two

Rule of Two is a darkwave and cyberpunk duo formed in Oslo, Norway, in 2023 by Ronny Flissundet and Kristian Liljan, both from the Oslo metal and alternative rock underground with prior activity in Damokles, Dunderbeist and Kite.

The project blends eerie synthesizers, mechanical rhythms and glitch textures into a sound the duo describes as taking a darker, more industrial direction with each release. Their debut album “Aiming for the Sun” was announced by Side-Line in November 2025. The “It’s No Good” cover, out June 4, 2026, is their first cover of a Depeche Mode track.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘s ’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Chris Wicked releases a cover of Depeche Mode’s ‘Enjoy the Silence’ via Raven Black Productions

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Tue, 02 Jun 2026 18:47:52 +0000

Norwegian solo artist Chris Wicked releases a gothic rock and dark synthpop cover of Depeche Mode‘s “Enjoy the Silence” on June 2, 2026, via Raven Black Productions. The Bergen-based artist here mixes gothic, cinematic and alternative rock. This is the third single from his forthcoming EP “Black Horns & Black Hooves.”

Chris Wicked explains his reasons for choosing the song: “Enjoy the Silence has always been a song that resonated with me. The atmosphere, the sense of longing and the timeless darkness within the melody have inspired me since I was young. We didn’t want to copy the original — we wanted to reinterpret it through our own musical universe.”

The cover arrives as the third single from the upcoming EP “Black Horns & Black Hooves” on Raven Black Productions. It follows “Utan Dina Andetag,” a cover of a Kent track released in December 2024 as the first single from the project, and “Wicked Game,” a cover of the Chris Isaak song released in September 2025 as the second single.

About Chris Wicked

Chris Wicked is a solo artist from Bergen, Norway. He came to wider attention as the founder and vocalist of Malice In Wonderland, a Norwegian rock band formed in the late 1990s before releasing a debut album and single “Lucifer’s Town” in 2005. Musically Malice In Wonderland’s sound combines glam, goth and hard rock elements. The band toured across Europe and Asia, sharing stages with acts including Def Leppard, and appeared in television productions.

Their final album, “The Royal Brigade,” was released in December 2013, mixed by John Fryer, known for his work with Depeche Mode and Nine Inch Nails. In August 2015, Malice In Wonderland announced their break-up and completed a series of farewell shows in Norway and abroad.

Chris Wicked subsequently announced a solo career, recording under his own name. His debut solo album, “Aleine,” was released in 2021 via Apollon Records and featured guest appearances from Gaahl (Gorgoroth), Hoest (Taake), Niklas Kvarforth (Shining) and V’gandr (Helheim). In 2024, he released the dark Nordic folk single “Northern Heart” on Raven Black Productions.

Malice In Wonderland returned in 2025 to mark the 20th anniversary of their 2005 debut, releasing new and reimagined material including “I’ve Chosen Darkness (Over You)” and a revisited edition of “Lucifer’s Town” in 2025, followed by the single “Dying Breed” in 2026.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘s ’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Ben Watkins and Alan Wilder were once part of the same band: The Hitmen

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 20 Apr 2026 12:47:25 +0000

Here’s some history which few people remember but since Ben Watkins (Juno Reactor) mentioned it on his Facebook page – and since many think it’s an April Fools joke – we are going to unearth some old history also including Alan Wilder (ex-Depeche Mode, Recoil) and a band called The Hitmen.

The Hitmen were an English new wave band formed in 1979. They released seven singles and two albums on the Columbia label. Members of the band would later go on to have successful careers in other notable bands and in music production.

The band was formed in 1979 and consisted of members Ben Watkins (vocals, guitar), Pete Glenister (guitar), Stan Shaw (keyboards), Neil Brockbank (bass) and Mike Gaffey (drums). Shaw and Brockbank were later replaced by Alan Wilder (indeed) and John Jay (of Ian Mitchell Band) respectively. Alan Wilder had ended up with the band after playing in the bands The Dragons, Daphne & The Tenderspots, Real to Real and The Flatbackers.

In Australia, the band were known as The London Hitmen due to a naming conflict with the local band of the same name.

The band released two studio albums; “Aim for the Feet” in 1980 and “Torn Together” in 1981. The 1981 single “Bates Motel” became a minor hit, being played widely on UK radio and having its video featured on the newly-launched MTV channel in the United States.

After The Hitmen Ben Watkins went on to join Brilliant then later form the electronic bands the Flowerpot Men and Juno Reactor, as well as working with Killing Joke’s Martin ‘Youth’ Glover in the duo The Empty Quarter. Pete Glenister went on to play guitar, write and produce for other artists such as Kirsty MacColl, Alison Moyet, Terence Trent D’Arby, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Bruce Foxton, Fischer-Z and Bryan Ferry, among many others. Alan Wilder became the keyboardist for Depeche Mode in 1982, produced Nitzer Ebb and then continued his solo project Recoil (which he had started in 1986) after leaving the band in 1995. Neil Brockbank became an audio engineer and producer for many artists including Nick Lowe, Mary Coughlan, Alison Moyet, Tanita Tikaram, Bryan Ferry and Ocean Colour Scene. He died in 2017 of cancer.

Here are two tracks featuring Alan Wilder and Ben Watkins.

Further production work and collaborations from Alan Wilder

Throughout his career, Alan Wilder has been involved in numerous collaborations. In 1989, he produced the Euro-Tech Version of Toni Halliday’s “Time Turns Around”. Two years later, in 1991, Wilder created the Wilder Mix Full Version of Nitzer Ebb’s “I Give to You” and mixed Nitzer Ebb’s “Come Alive” for their “As Is” EP. That same year, Wilder and Flood joined forces to produce Nitzer Ebb’s “Ebbhead” album.

Fast forward to 2001, Wilder contributed strings and ambient sounds to the song “Polaroid” from the album “Gift” by Curve. A couple of years later, in 2003, he provided strings and sounds for The Digital Intervention’s track “Coma Idyllique” from the album “Capture”. One of its members is ‘PK’, a longtime collaborator of Recoil, which also includes Olivia Louvel.

In 2010, he produced a remix for Nitzer Ebb’s “I Am Undone”. Following that, in 2011, he revisited his Depeche Mode roots by remixing their song “In Chains”, which became an instant fan favourite. That same year, he also created the Expansion Mix for Sonoio’s “Minutes.”

In 2012, Wilder took part in covering two tracks for a Talk Talk tribute album (double) CD/book set called “Spirit of Talk Talk”. The tracks were “Inheritance” featuring Linton Kwesi Johnson & Paul Marshall and “Dum Dum Girl” featuring Shara Worden. Additionally, he became the executive music producer for the album.

In 2016, Wilder provided music and arrangements for “Calling the Clock” by Dede, featuring his contributions as well.

About Ben Watkins

In 1979 Ben Watkins fronted the London new wave band The Hitmen, singing and playing guitar. The group released the albums “Aim for the Feet” in 1980 and “Torn Together” in 1981, while the single “Bates Motel” became their best-known release. After The Hitmen, Watkins moved briefly into Brilliant, the band formed by Martin “Youth” Glover after leaving Killing Joke.

That period led directly into Watkins’ first fully electronic work. He met Youth in 1982, joined Brilliant for a short spell, toured the UK and Spain, and then recorded with him as The Youth & Ben Watkins on “The Empty Quarter”. That 1984 release was issued as the soundtrack to Jonathan Moore’s stage play “Street Captives”. A second album, “Delirium”, followed under the name The Empty Quarter and musically went further into a rhythm-led electronic direction.

Watkins then formed The Flowerpot Men with Adam Peters. That project produced the singles and EPs “Jo’s So Mean”, “Walk On Gilded Splinters”, “Alligator Bait”, and “Watching the Pharoahs”. The duo toured with Dead Or Alive and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Not surprisingly Steven Severin produced their debut single. The Flowerpot Men also recorded “Beat City”, which was used in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. When Watkins and Peters signed to Polydor, they continued as Sunsonic and released the album “Melting Down On Motor Angel” in 1990.

Juno Reactor began in 1990 as Watkins’ art-driven project, with the first single “Laughing Gas” arriving in 1993 followed by the albums “Transmissions” (1993), “Luciana” (1994), “Beyond the Infinite” (1995), “Bible of Dreams” (1997), “Shango” (2000), “Labyrinth” (2004), “Gods & Monsters” (2008), “The Golden Sun of the Great East” (2013), and “The Mutant Theatre” (2018). Across that period, Juno Reactor released material through NovaMute, Inter-Modo, Blue Room Released, and later Metropolis Records.

Watkins’ work with Juno Reactor later entered film on a larger scale through “The Matrix Reloaded” and “The Matrix Revolutions”, which is why “Mona Lisa Overdrive” remains one of the key titles in his catalogue.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode issue new track ‘Universal Soldier’ on War Child’s ‘Help(2)’ charity album

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 11:06:04 +0000

The English electronic band Depeche Mode has just released the brand new track “Universal Soldier” via War Child Records. The track is out now as part of the charity compilation “HELP(2)“, released on March 6, 2026, and is included alongside contributions from Anna Calvi, Arctic Monkeys, Arlo Parks, Arooj Aftab, Bat For Lashes, Beabadoobee, Beck, Beth Gibbons, Big Thief, Black Country, New Road, Cameron Winter, Damon Albarn, Dove Ellis, Ellie Rowsell, English Teacher, Ezra Collective, Foals, Fontaines D.C., Graham Coxon, Greentea Peng, Grian Chatten, Kae Tempest, King Krule, Nilüfer Yanya, Oasis, Olivia Rodrigo, Pulp, Sampha, The Last Dinner Party, Wet Leg and Young Fathers.

Musically the new Depeche Mode track sounds like a (slower) cousin of or the continuation of “Oh Well”.

“Help(2)” was recorded during a week of sessions in November 2025 at Abbey Road Studios under executive producer James Ford. War Child says every purchase or stream of the album supports its work with children affected by conflict.

The compilation is available from War Child in double-CD and gatefold double-vinyl editions, with the official store also listing a bonus Oasis live recording on physical editions.

HELP(2) by War Child Records

About Depeche Mode

Depeche Mode emerged in Basildon, Essex, in 1980 with Dave Gahan, Martin Gore, Andy Fletcher and Vince Clarke; the band’s official archives list that four-piece line-up on its 1980 live dates. Their debut album “Speak and Spell” followed on October 5, 1981. After Clarke’s exit, the group moved into “A Broken Frame”, released on September 27, 1982, and “Construction Time Again”, released on August 22, 1983.

Later releases included “Violator” on March 19, 1990 and “Songs of Faith and Devotion” on March 22, 1993. After Alan Wilder’s departure, the band continued with Gahan, Gore and Fletcher, and since 2022 Depeche Mode has consisted of Gahan and Gore after the passing of Fletcher. They released “Memento Mori” on March 24, 2023, then issued the live album “Memento Mori: Mexico City” on December 5, 2025.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘s ’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode bring Mexico City concert film ‘M’ to Netflix this Friday January 9

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 20:58:21 +0000

Depeche Mode’s 2025 concert documentary “Depeche Mode: M” will join Netflix’s catalogue on Friday, January 9, 2026, bringing the band’s 2023 “Memento Mori” tour shows in Mexico City to the streaming platform’s global audience. The 100-minute film documents three sold-out nights at Mexico City’s Foro Sol / Estadio GNP Seguros in September 2023, performed in front of nearly 200,000 fans.

Directed by Mexican filmmaker Fernando Frías de la Parra and produced with Sony Music Vision, Columbia Records, Anonymous Content and Redrum, “Depeche Mode: M” blends live footage, archival material and street-level vignettes from Mexico City.

Thematically the documentary links themes from the fifteenth studio album “Memento Mori” to Mexico’s cultural relationship with death. Netflix itself describes the film as an exploration of Mexico’s relationship with music, mortality and tradition.

When to watch and stream Depeche Mode concert film ‘M’ on Netflix

“Depeche Mode: M” is scheduled to stream on Netflix from Friday, January 9, 2026 for the US and key European territories. Regional availability on Netflix can vary, but the title already appears in the service’s catalogue pages for multiple markets, including Germany and Japan, as a 2025 music documentary.

The concert film remains available in physical formats as well which combines the documentary and full concert across CD/DVD, CD/Blu-ray, 2xCD and 4xLP editions.

For those wanting a preview, check the “Depeche Mode: M (Official Trailer)“.

‘Depeche Mode: M’ – From Tribeca premiere to Netflix

“Depeche Mode: M” premiered in June 2025 at the Tribeca Festival in New York as part of the Spotlight+ programme, followed by an on-stage Q&A with Dave Gahan, Martin Gore and Fernando Frías.

After Tribeca, the film rolled out worldwide via Trafalgar Releasing with a limited cinema and IMAX engagement starting on October 28, 2025.

On December 5, 2025, the band released the combined live album and film package “Memento Mori: Mexico City”, pairing “Depeche Mode: M” with a 24-track live audio set and four studio outtakes from the original Memento Mori sessions: “Survive”, “Life 2.0”, “Give Yourself to Me” and “In the End”. All 4 originated from the Memento Mori recording sessions.

Netflix’s acquisition of streaming rights now closes this release arc, moving the Mexico City concert documentary from festival and cinema audiences to the broader M Netflix streaming audience in early 2026.

About Depeche Mode

Depeche Mode are an English electronic band from Basildon, Essex, formed in 1980 by Dave Gahan, Martin Gore, Andrew Fletcher and Vince Clarke under the earlier name Composition of Sound. Following the release of their synth-pop debut album “Speak & Spell” in 1981, Clarke left and later formed Yazoo and Erasure, while Gore took over as principal songwriter. Alan Wilder joined as a full member in 1982, helping shape the group’s increasingly dark, sample-driven sound until his departure in 1995. Since 2022, after Fletcher’s death, Depeche Mode have continued as a duo of Gahan (vocals) and Gore (guitar, keyboards, vocals).

Across 15 studio albums, Depeche Mode have moved from early new wave and synth-pop towards a blend of electronic rock, industrial-tinged pop and atmospheric ballads. Their run of 1980s albums – “A Broken Frame” (1982), “Construction Time Again” (1983), “Some Great Reward” (1984), “Black Celebration” (1986) and “Music for the Masses” (1987) – pushed the band towards darker textures. With the 1990 album “Violator” and its singles “Personal Jesus” and “Enjoy the Silence”, followed by “Songs of Faith and Devotion” in 1993, Depeche Mode consolidated a large international audience and entered the US mainstream charts.

Later releases followed such as “Ultra” (1997), “Exciter” (2001), “Playing the Angel” (2005), “Sounds of the Universe” (2009), “Delta Machine” (2013) and “Spirit” (2017). “Memento Mori”, released in 2023, introduced new material shaped by themes of mortality and loss and became the starting point for the Memento Mori World Tour and the Mexico City performances now documented in “Depeche Mode: M”.

Depeche Mode’s visual and live output has been documented in numerous concert films and video albums, including “101”, “Devotional”, “One Night in Paris”, “Touring the Angel: Live in Milan”, “Tour of the Universe: Live in Barcelona”, “Live in Berlin” and “Spirits in the Forest”.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘Universal Soldier’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode film ‘M’ review – Under the Spell of the Letter M

János Janurik — Sun, 16 Nov 2025 17:16:47 +0000

(By János Janurik) It has been almost three years since Depeche Mode released their latest album, Memento Mori-a record dedicated both to a painful loss, the sudden passing of Andy Fletcher, and to the fragile transience of life. Since then, Depeche Mode – and its fanbase – have lived under the spell of the letter M. And with good reason: the now-duo has delivered what may well be their strongest album of the past twenty years, placing it confidently on the table – right next to the skull.

Despite its mournful, philosophical title, the album and the accompanying tour never turned into a travelling requiem. While Fletcher’s memory was honoured, Memento Mori became the proof that, diminished but unbroken, Depeche Mode is alive and very much celebrating life. Death may cast its shadow – like the giant M looming over the stage – but the fire still burns, to quote a beloved line from “Insight.”

Now we receive all of this in image and sound. The former comes courtesy of the 46-year-old Mexican director Fernando Frias, whose film I’m No Longer Here was once pushed toward the Oscars by supporters like Guillermo del Toro. The latter is shaped by Marta Salogni, who also mixed the Memento Mori album.

The title Memento Mori practically predestined the idea that if a concert film were to be made, it should be filmed in a place where honouring the dead and celebrating mortality has ancient roots. And where Depeche Mode, too, is revered. Skull-shaped sugar candies, bread decorated with bones, José Guadalupe Posada’s skeletal figures, and the literary tradition of the calavera – all express a smiling confrontation with the inevitable, the celebration of the passage between life and death. Mexico hears something familiar in this tone – something Europeans might not immediately associate with synth-driven gloom.

Yet Depeche Mode concerts have always been communal rituals, capable of lifting even their darkest songs. When thousands sing their sorrows together with Dave and Martin, the experience is incomparable – nothing like listening alone at home, wrestling with melancholy. Once the vibe catches you, it never lets go.

Mexico has welcomed Depeche Mode with open arms since their first visit in December 1993, when they played two sold-out shows at the Sports Palace. After a brief hiatus, they returned regularly from the Touring The Angel era onwards, becoming fixtures at the Foro Sol stadium. Such devotion deserved to be immortalised. The theme was lying on the ground – all they had to do was pick it up. Where else would a Memento Mori concert film be made, if not in a country where skull motifs have been part of the culture for three millennia?

M for Mode; M for Mexico City; M for movie; M for “music till we die.”

This is what M, the film, is about: Mexico, Mode, Memento Mori, and the stage shaped around all of them.

Many agree that Depeche Mode’s concert films – The World We Live In…, 101, Devotional – never truly found worthy successors. Anton Corbijn’s One Night in Paris came close, but the rest always lacked that elusive something. Fernando Frias seems ready to join this canon, at least when it comes to capturing the visual essence of three sold-out Mexican nights.

The camera work is striking: intimate close-ups showing every wrinkle and silver hair – reminders that time leaves its mark even on icons – and artistic montages and collages. What the film shows of Mexico, its death-culture, and the fan obsession is intriguing but could have gone deeper. We see fans – some looking as though they might be heading to a Marilyn Manson or death-metal show – but we rarely hear what binds them to this very European sound.

The fans in 101 – sometimes annoying, but authentically American – represented a generation rebelling by making a pilgrimage to an electronic band in the heartland of country music. A similar deep-dive into Mexican devotion could have been even more fascinating. Instead, we hear only that the word once spread via VHS tapes – something every Eastern European fan nods at knowingly, united by a shared cultural déjà vu across continents.

The passion of Latin and South American fans, however, would have easily warranted a deeper dive – especially since several other synth- and dark-pop icons have experienced the same devotion, from Erasure to the Pet Shop Boys to The Cure.

And it would have been great to hear Mr. Martin L. and Mr. Gahan speak about this leg of the tour: how they see their Mexican fanbase, what this intensity means to them – ideally accompanied by a few backstage or on-the-road moments. Instead – aside from a stylised closing scene in which the “M” becomes one with Madrid’s train station – we only get their on-stage presence.

Still, none of this diminishes the film’s impact. The goosebump moments are all there: the touching tribute to Andy Fletcher during “World In My Eyes”; Dave Gahan spinning and posing like an energy bomb, as if even his Pilates instructor would applaud; and Martin Gore cheekily tapping out the main motif of “Everything Counts” with one finger, fully aware that this simple melody has been electrifying audiences for forty years. “Speak To Me” still hits straight to the heart, “Wrong” clenches the fists with its helpless rage, and during “Stripped” we watch a forest of mobile phones with a blasé stare as Dave sings: “Let me hear you make decisions / Without your television…” – and the crowd, naturally, misses the point. Not so during the “Never Let Me Down Again” arm-wave – but that’s been a sacred ritual for more than thirty-five years.

The camera doesn’t overlook Christian Eigner and Peter Gordeno either: the director subtly emphasises that they too are crucial parts of this musical machine – even if the core of Depeche Mode remains Dave and Martin.

Depeche Mode’s ‘M’ is about remembering mortality

All in all, Depeche Mode’s “M” turned out well. And now that the new track “In the end,” previously heard only during the end credits, has officially arrived as a teaser for the upcoming Depeche Mode M / Memento Mori Mexico City release on December 5, fans like me are anticipating the chance to relive the ritual – in sound and vision – and to experience the Mexican concert in full.

Remembering mortality, yet trusting that Depeche Mode is still driven by the same impulse: music till we die.

And the good news is: with the wide range of audio and video formats on the horizon, everyone will find the edition that suits them best. Pre-orders are already open across the usual online music retailers.

For more on Depeche Mode, see Depeche Mode bring Mexico City concert film ‘M’ to Netflix this… on Side-Line.

About Depeche Mode

Depeche Mode formed in Basildon, Essex, England, in 1980, initially under the name Composition of Sound. The lineup that became Depeche Mode came together that year around Vince Clarke (keyboards, guitars), Andy Fletcher (keyboards, bass) and Martin Gore (guitars, keyboards), with Dave Gahan joining shortly after as lead vocalist. The band adopted the name Depeche Mode at a gig at the Bridge House in Canning Town on 24 September 1980, where Mute Records founder Daniel Miller saw them and signed the group.

Depeche Mode’s debut single, “Dreaming of Me,” was recorded in December 1980 and released on Mute in February 1981, followed that October by the debut album “Speak & Spell.” Vince Clarke left the band that November, going on to form Yazoo and later Erasure; Alan Wilder joined on keyboards in 1982 and became an official member from the 1983 single “Get the Balance Right!” The band’s catalog through the 1980s includes “A Broken Frame” (1982), “Construction Time Again” (1983), “Some Great Reward” (1984), “Black Celebration” (1986) and “Music for the Masses” (1987), the latter turning the band into arena headliners in the US off the back of their Rose Bowl concert, later documented in the film “101.”

“Violator” (1990) and “Songs of Faith and Devotion” (1993) marked the band’s commercial peak, but Wilder departed in June 1995, continuing his own project Recoil, leaving Gahan, Gore and Fletcher as a trio. The band released “Ultra” (1997), “Exciter” (2001), “Playing the Angel” (2005), “Sounds of the Universe” (2009), “Delta Machine” (2013) and “Spirit” (2017) as a three-piece, touring with long-serving live members Christian Eigner (drums, keyboards, since 1997) and Peter Gordeno (keyboards, bass, since 1998). Alongside the band, Gahan released solo albums “Paper Monsters” (2003) and “Hourglass” (2007), and Gore released “Counterfeit²” (2003).

Depeche Mode was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 7 November 2020. Andy Fletcher died on 26 May 2022, and Gahan and Gore continued as a duo, releasing “Memento Mori” in 2023 with Eigner and Gordeno again on the road. The band has sold more than 100 million records and placed 54 singles on the UK charts. “M” documents the band’s 2023 concerts in Mexico City on the “Memento Mori” world tour.

János Janurik

I began my career in online music journalism in 2001, writing about artists I had followed since the late ’80s and early ’90s, including Depeche Mode, Erasure and The Cure. I later edited the Hungarian Mute microsite for EMI Music Hungary. This led to interviews with Erasure, Nitzer Ebb and Alan Wilder, and some of those collaborations developed into lasting friendships. Since 2014, I have been part of the editorial team of depechemode.de. I also contribute interviews to Reflections of Darkness, Peek-A-Boo Magazine and Kaput Mag. I maintain a close connection to Mute Records artists and have also supported releases on Very Records. I am proud to collaborate with Side-Line Magazine, where I regularly publish interviews and features.

Depeche Mode announce ‘M’ CD/DVD & CD/Blu-ray and ‘Memento Mori: Mexico City’ live album for December 5

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 22 Oct 2025 17:40:27 +0000

Depeche Mode will release “Depeche Mode: M” on CD/DVD and CD/Blu-ray, plus the companion live album “Memento Mori: Mexico City,” on December 5 via Columbia Records, Sony Music Vision and Trafalgar Releasing. A previously unreleased studio outtake from the Memento Mori sessions, “In The End,” arrives on October 24. The news was announced via the band’s website.

The physical release of “Depeche Mode: M” pairs the feature film on 2 DVDs or Blu-rays with 2 CDs documenting the band’s three 2023 shows at Mexico City’s Foro Sol. Directed by Fernando Frías, the film mixes live performance with cultural vignettes reflecting Mexico’s traditions around mortality, echoing themes from the 2023 studio album “Memento Mori” as we reported before

A second feature, “Memento Mori: Mexico City,” presents the full-length concert film from the Foro Sol run, also directed by Frías. The concerts drew more than 200,000 fans across three nights in 2023. The concert program will be released alongside a stand-alone live album available as 2×CD and 4×LP vinyl editions. All formats include four previously unreleased tracks from the Memento Mori sessions: “Survive,” “Life 2.0,” “Give Yourself To Me,” and “In The End.”

“In The End” first appeared over the end credits at the Tribeca world premiere of “Depeche Mode: M” in June 2025 and will be issued digitally on Friday, October 24.

So, in short here is what is coming up:

Film bundles: CD/DVD or CD/Blu-ray, each including the feature “Depeche Mode: M”, the full concert film “Memento Mori: Mexico City,” and 2×CD audio
Live album: 2×CD and 4×LP vinyl, over two hours of audio from Mexico City, with four studio outtakes from the Memento Mori sessions
Digital single: “In The End,” out October 24

Tracklist Depeche Mode – “Memento Mori: Mexico City” (film / CD / vinyl)

Intro
My Cosmos Is Mine
Wagging Tongue
Walking In My Shoes
It’s No Good
Sister Of Night
In Your Room
Everything Counts
Precious
Speak To Me
Home
Soul With Me
Ghosts Again
I Feel You
A Pain That I’m Used To
World In My Eyes
Wrong
Stripped
John The Revelator
Enjoy The Silence
Waiting For The Night
Just Can’t Get Enough
Never Let Me Down Again
Personal Jesus

Bonus tracks from the Memento Mori Sessions:

Survive
Life 2.0
Give Yourself To Me
In The End

Following its Tribeca premiere, “Depeche Mode: M” screens worldwide in cinemas and IMAX for a limited run beginning October 28.

For more on Depeche Mode, see Depeche Mode film ‘M’ review – Under the Spell of the Letter M on Side-Line.

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‘101 Hang – Depeche Mode – Special Tribute’ announced for Budapest’s MVM Dome on 27 November 2025

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 18 Aug 2025 17:40:49 +0000

Hungarian artists will stage a large–scale Depeche Mode tribute under the title “101 Hang – Depeche Mode – Special Tribute” at the MVM Dome in Budapest on 27 November 2025.

The concert reimagines songs by the English electronic/synth-pop band with a 50-piece symphony orchestra and the 45-member Hungarian National Men’s Choir. The show is presented as the first stop of a planned international run.

About ‘101 Hang – Depeche Mode – Special Tribute’

The production features Anna Pásztor, Szabi Papp, Tamás Molnár, Gigi Radics, Balázs Fehér, Lotfi Begi, the Hungarian Studio Symphony Orchestra, and the Hungarian National Men’s Choir, with additional contributions from Lili Fehér and Timi Arany. The set includes “Enjoy the Silence”, “Wrong”, “Strangelove” and “Walking in My Shoes” among many other tracks arranged for orchestra, choir, soloists, and live electronics.

The concert will have more than 100 performers on stage and alternating musical approaches across the program. Producer Krisztián Szakos oversees musical direction, with conductor-composer Richárd Riederauer leading the orchestra and choir.

Doors open at 18:30; the main performance runs 20:00–22:00, followed by a Depeche Mode party until midnight.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘ CD/DVD & CD/Blu-ray and ’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode fans urge hometown tribute in Basildon

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sat, 02 Aug 2025 20:21:31 +0000

Fans of Depeche Mode are calling on Basildon, Essex – the town where the band was formed in 1980 – to officially honour its legacy as the birthplace of one of the world’s best-selling electronic acts.

The group began as a four-piece under the name Composition of Sound before evolving into Depeche Mode. Members Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, and the late Andy Fletcher all attended local schools in Laindon. Dave Gahan, who later joined as frontman, attended Barstable School.

Despite global success, there is currently limited recognition of the band in their hometown. Barclay Quarton, frontman of Depeche Mode tribute band The Devout, expressed his disappointment in a BBC interview, saying: “In Basildon, there should be some sort of mural or something that draws in tourism from around the globe to say magic was created here.”

The BBC Radio 4 documentary, “Depeche Mode: Reach Out and Touch Faith“, recently explored the band’s working-class roots and the early musical environment in the town. However, the Council has not issued a comment regarding the call for local recognition.

Visible tributes to Depeche Mode remain scarce in Basildon

A small plaque at James Hornsby School, formerly Nicholas School, marks the site of the band’s first gig. But aside from portraits in the Towngate Theatre, visible tributes to Depeche Mode remain scarce.

Deb Danahay, who helped run the early Depeche Mode Information Service and dated Vince Clarke in the band’s early days, now leads guided tours for fans – many of whom travel from countries such as Germany and Argentina expecting to see statues or other public displays. “Most of them think they’re going to come to the town centre and there’s going to be statues of the band – they’re really shocked [that there isn’t],” she said in the same BBC interview.

Danahay, based in Canvey Island, has led groups to school sites, plaques, and display boards that also include images of fellow Basildon-born artists such as Alison Moyet, The Cure’s Perry Bamonte, and Bob the Builder creator Keith Chapman. However, she notes the experience is limited in comparison to what fans hope for.

Not that some of the band’s own comments on the town in past interviews really were encouraging, Gore once said, “I really hated Basildon. I wanted to get out as quickly as I could,” while Gahan described the town as “awful”.

Despite this, fans continue to make pilgrimages. Danahay explained that the new town’s post-war character played a role in the band’s rise: “There weren’t people saying you shouldn’t be doing this or that. We had so much freedom and didn’t appreciate it.”

Below is an overview of some of the performances and interviews the band gave for the BBC.

About Basildon

Basildon is a town located in the county of Essex, in the East of England, approximately 25 miles (40 km) east of London. It is part of the Basildon Borough, which includes other nearby settlements such as Pitsea, Laindon, and Wickford.

It was officially designated a “new town” in 1949 under the New Towns Act, designed to alleviate housing shortages in post-war London. It was built to accommodate Londoners relocated from bombed-out areas. It was planned with a modernist approach, featuring a large pedestrianised town centre, green spaces, and a road network intended to separate traffic from residential zones.

As of the 2021 census, the population of the town was around 115,000, while the broader borough exceeds 180,000.

The town has a mixed economy with strengths in manufacturing, logistics, and services. It has hosted companies like Ford Motor Company, New Holland Agriculture, and various electronics firms.

The town has several secondary schools and colleges, including South Essex College. Culturally, Basildon has theatres such as the Towngate Theatre, and public artworks including the well-known Mother and Child sculpture in the town square.

Despite its role in post-war housing development and economic rebuilding, the town has received mixed opinions. Some residents and cultural figures have been critical of its aesthetics and social challenges, while others note its unique identity shaped by working-class roots and musical legacy.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘101 Hang – Depeche Mode – Special Tribute’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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What if Depeche Mode recorded ‘Violator’ in the 50s? Check it out!

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 09 Jul 2025 18:17:08 +0000

YouTube creator @marceve76 has too much time on his hands so it seems. A few days ago he released a YouTube video in which he reimagined Depeche Mode’s 1990 album Violator as if it were recorded in the 1950s by The Depeche Modes. He also created a very suitable band picture featuring Depeche Mode in its 1990 line-up featuring Dave Gahan, Martin Gore, Alan Wilder, and Andy Fletcher.

The 28-minute, 12-second video was uploaded on July 7, and while the vocal line isn’t really that of Dave Gahan or Martin Gore, you really get an idea how it could have been.

This project probably relied heavily on cutting-edge artificial intelligence tools. While the process isn’t detailed in the video description, the techniques likely involve a combination of AI music generation, audio manipulation, and style transfer, based on industry-standard practices for such projects.

The creator is no exactly a stranger to this retro-AI alchemy, to put it mildly, having built a YouTube channel around reimagining albums as 1950s recordings. The catalog spans a diverse range of artists and genres, each transformed with the same meticulous care as “Violator”.

So far he upped these videos:

Black Sabbath – Heaven and Hell (June 30, 2025, 1.7K views, 26:52)
Genesis – Invisible Touch (June 23, 2025, 4.9K views, 31:30)
Billy Idol – Rebel Yell (June 16, 2025, 3.2K views, 28:42)
U2 – The Joshua Tree (June 9, 2025, 3.1K views, 34:40)
Twisted Sister – Stay Hungry (June 2, 2025, 2.1K views, 32:49)
Sepultura – Beneath the Remains (May 26, 2025, 1.4K views, 23:21)
Def Leppard – Pyromania (May 19, 2025, 4.6K views, 33:35)
Europe – The Final Countdown (May 12, 2025, 4.8K views, 32:17)
Ozzy Osbourne – Blizzard of Ozz (May 5, 2025, 8.9K views, 29:49)
Motörhead – Ace of Spades (April 28, 2025, 11K views, 26:38)
Mötley Crüe – Dr. Feelgood (April 21, 2025, 5.3K views, 32:27)

About Depeche Mode’s ‘Violator’ album

Violator, released on March 19, 1990, is the seventh studio album by English electronic music band Depeche Mode. Often hailed as their magnum opus, it marked a pivotal moment in their career, propelling them to international stardom with a darker, more polished sound that fused synth-pop, gothic rock, and alternative dance.

The album was recorded in 1989 across studios in London, Milan, and Denmark, with producer Flood and mixer François Kevorkian introducing a fresh, collaborative approach that broke from the band’s earlier formulaic methods.

Standout singles include “Personal Jesus”, with its bluesy guitar riff and provocative lyrics, and “Enjoy the Silence” that became a global hit. Other singles, “Policy of Truth” and “World in My Eyes”, further showcased the album’s dynamic range.

The album’s production was a turning point, with the band embracing a less structured creative process. Tracks like “Halo” and “Clean” (inspired by Pink Floyd’s “One of These Days”) were created using an innovative mix of electronic and rock elements. Violator went on to sell over 7 million copies worldwide.

Supported by the World Violation Tour, the album’s release sparked massive fan fervor, notably causing a near-riot at a Los Angeles record store signing when 17,000 fans showed up.

For more on Depeche Mode, see Depeche Mode fans urge hometown tribute in Basildon on Side-Line.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode documentary ‘M’ premieres at Tribeca, new song ‘In The End’ reported in credits

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 06 Jun 2025 10:41:18 +0000

A new Depeche Mode track is featured in the closing credits of their latest documentary, “Depeche Mode: M”, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival yesterday evening. The film captures the band’s performances in Mexico City during their 2023 Memento Mori tour.

The unreleased song titled “In The End” plays during the end credits of the film. The track is one of four outtakes recorded during the Memento Mori sessions but not included in the final album tracklist. While Depeche Mode or Columbia Records have not issued an official statement confirming the track’s title, speculation is of course that it could accompany the documentary’s eventual soundtrack release.

“Depeche Mode: M” was directed by Mexican filmmaker Fernando Frias. The film captures Depeche Mode’s three sold-out performances at Mexico City’s Foro Sol Stadium on September 21, 23, and 25, 2023, during their ‘Memento Mori’ world tour, which drew an estimated 200,000 fans in Mexico City alone. It is set for a theatrical release in late 2025, with a world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York on June 5, 2025, yesterday that was.

Below is some more footage from yesterday.

Depeche Mode’s Memento Mori, released in March 2023, was the band’s fifteenth studio album and the first since the death of founding member Andy Fletcher in 2022. It was supported by a global tour throughout 2023 and 2024.

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘Violator’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Depeche Mode announces concert film ‘M’ live in Mexico 2023 – More details available now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 07 May 2025 08:24:26 +0000

(Updated with first visuals and extra details) – Depeche Mode is set to release a new feature-length concert film, “Depeche Mode: M”, directed by Mexican filmmaker Fernando Frias. Known for “I’m No Longer Here” and “I Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me”, Frias blends live performance with cultural storytelling. As such it won’t just be another tour documentary but rather a layered, visual journey exploring mortality, grief, and musical transcendence.

The film documents Depeche Mode’s three sold-out performances at Mexico City’s Foro Sol Stadium on September 21, 23, and 25, 2023, during their ‘Memento Mori’ world tour, which drew an estimated 200,000 fans in Mexico City alone. It is set for a theatrical release in late 2025, with a world premiere scheduled at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York on June 5, 2025. The Tribeca premiere will include a post-screening conversation with Depeche Mode and Frías.

95 minutes long full length feature film

More than just a venue, Mexico City becomes a character in the film. The region’s cultural intimacy with death – expressed in Día de los Muertos traditions and national art – resonates deeply with the album’s title and theme (Memento Mori, Latin for “remember that you must die”) after the passing of founding member Andy Fletcher in 2022.

While the film is directed by Fernando Frías, the cinematography was in the hands of Damián García, with editing by Yibrán Asuad, Melisa Enríquez San Vincente, and Liora Spilk. Producers include Stacy Perskie Kaniss, Nina Soriano, and Saul Levitz. The project is a collaboration between the band’s label and film producers – and is produced by Columbia Records, Anonymous Content, and Mexico’s Redrum, with Sony Music Vision handling distribution. This U.S./Mexico co-production has a final runtime of ~95 minutes.

“Depeche Mode: M” is said to “weave together high-energy stage moments, fan interactions, archival footage, and symbolic interstitials to build an immersive atmosphere.” And also: “It doesn’t just document performances; it aims to create an emotional narrative. Expect a story about transformation, legacy, and the silent dialogue between artist and audience.”

The 2023 ‘Memento Mori’ tour saw Depeche Mode performing 112 shows, with over 3 million attendees.

Scheduled for theatrical release in late 2025, “Depeche Mode: M” will act as “a love letter to fans, a farewell to Fletcher, and a vivid testament to the band’s ability to remain emotionally relevant across decades”, so the press release reads.

Here’s a fan shot video from one of these concerts.

About Fernando Frias

Fernando Frías de la Parra, born on October 27, 1979, in Mexico City, is a Mexican director, screenwriter, and producer. He studied communications and photography in Mexico City before earning a Fulbright scholarship to pursue a Master of Fine Arts in directing and screenwriting at Columbia University.

Frías’s directorial debut, “Rezeta” (2012), tells the story of a foreign model living in Mexico City. The film received the Jury Award for Best Narrative Feature at the 2014 Slamdance Film Festival and earned Frías the Best Director award at the Milan International Film Festival.

In 2019, Frías wrote and directed “I’m No Longer Here” (Ya no estoy aquí), a drama exploring the life of Ulises, a teenager from Monterrey immersed in the “Kolombia” counterculture. The film delves into themes of identity, migration, and belonging. It won ten Ariel Awards from the Mexican Academy of Film Arts and Sciences, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. Additionally, it was Mexico’s official submission for Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards and was shortlisted in that category.

Frías has also directed episodes for television series such as HBO’s “Los Espookys” and “Our Flag Means Death”. In 2023, he completed filming “No voy a pedirle a nadie que me crea”.

Other Depeche Mode films

Side-Line also covered Depeche Mode’s ‘ premieres at Tribeca, new song ’.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Bérèche You drops ‘The Price of Love’ album – Out now

Jan Ronald Stange — Sat, 15 Feb 2025 10:09:32 +0000

(By our Norwegian correspondent Jan Ronald Stange / Bérèche You press release) The new Bérèche You album ‘The Price of Love’ is a summary of the work with Cassiel Agrippa, with new definitive versions of the previously released songs. The album also includes new tracks, such as the new single ‘Adore Me’.

The Bérèche You music project released its singles and subsequent first album on Spotify in early summer last year. However, the concept was conceived half a year earlier. After many years working with the Electro Spectre project, releasing multiple albums and compilations, Isak was turning a page to start something new. As he has previously stated, he wanted to start a new project, something new.

S-L: What ignited this project?

Isak: I wanted to do something a little different, yet still electronica, obviously, but a new approach. The idea was to invite different artists to collaborate. That was the concept and idea. At a party, Thomas responded to this by suggesting that he would like to try and contribute. Well, time would tell, so I sent him a couple of instrumentals to work on the next day.

At a later party, Thomas had proven his creativity and presented several demos that impressed the guests. That’s how the collaboration came about, and two of the songs on the debut album feature Cassiel Agrippa, which is his artist moniker.

S-L: After the album release, the project followed up with several single releases and an EP. Now, a year later, with multiple releases under your belt, how would you sum up the project and the interest in it so far?

Isak: This project has been, and is, a lot of fun. It was the new perspective I needed, a slightly different direction and sound. We are steadily building a fan base, with a few old ES fans carried over. Several great DJs here in Oslo have featured our songs and continue to do so, I hope. We have also been on the chart of a well-known German electronica/indie net radio (https://klangwald-charts.de/) and generally been well received. Now that we are releasing a new album, ‘The Price Of Love’, featuring Cassiel Agrippa exclusively. Paired with our live performance in Oslo, we are certainly hoping to keep expanding our fan base.

S-L: Thomas, this has been your first major music project, where you’ve both written lyrics and sung—how do you see your development so far? What challenges have you faced?

Thomas Brevik/Cassiel Agrippa: Well, there are always certain challenges when writing music. Fun challenges. Initially it’s coming up with a melody – a catchy chorus and verse. A little behind-the-scenes fact is that the very first lyrics are just placeholder text to work out the melody. Then I replace that nonsense with actual lyrics. The other challenge is the vocals. I have taken singing lessons, and practiced a lot. And I can clearly see improvement in myself, which is quite rewarding. So you might say there is a constant development in all the aspects of music making. Not unlike anything else you do. You get better the more you do it. I am curious about our next releases, what they will be.

The one thing that really surprised me as a novice musician, however, was that although music has always been very important to me, I have never had a hand in actually making music until this project. It only proves that my creativity could be channelled into music as well. And I love it.

S-L: Isak, what has it been like working with Thomas and following his development?

Isak: Bérèche You was going to be a project where I would invite many different artists to collaborate, which the first album demonstrated well. However, the collaboration with Thomas developed into something much more because he has a really good flair for catchy lyrics and melodies. He has definitely had a sharp learning curve, which is rather impressive.
We believe that every synthpop lover around the globe will strongly welcome this collection of well-crafted synthpop tracks.

S-L: The album title—any connection to the release date, Valentine’s Day?

Isak: The album title The Price Of Love is actually a little homage to an old Depeche Mode cover from when they were called Composition of Sound. The original was a song by Everly Brothers, but almost nobody knows about that any longer. That is our nod to DM. About Valentine’s Day… You could say love always exacts a price, but you can never tell exactly what. The price of love could be so many things, but the rewards are always worth it. Almost always. February 14^th is forever a day dedicated to love, so it seemed a perfect opportunity to release a new album with this title on that day. We believe in love in itself.

The band are doing their debut live show alongside Henric de la Cour in Oslo on February 21^st 2025.

About Bérèche You

Isak Rypdal has had an extensive musical career since the early 90s with bands such as Doctor No, Freeloader and Electro Spectre. Music from Doctor No and Freeloader has topped the charts in Norway and received heavy rotattion on international radio such as BBC Radio 1 in the UK. His live performances have included playing at ‘We Love The 90’s’ and over 100 live shows around the world. With Electro Spectre Isak has been so fortunate to be able to support bands such as OMD, Marsheaux, Zeromancer, Covenant, Melotron and Mesh, to mention a few.

On the new album Isak has collaborated with his good friend, -the talented songwriter Cassiel Agrippa, who has a brilliant ear for good melodies. Cassiel Agrippa has been involved in Electro Spectre and other previous work from Crab Key Studio for a long time, -creating visual media such as artwork in addition to live photography for the bands.

‘The Price of Love’ is due to be released on February 14^th 2025.

Jan Ronald Stange

Sometimes – when I’m not cooking, biking, listening to music or attending concerts, I write stuff for Side-Line.com. Mostly about Norwegian bands, but it’s been some Swedish, English, American, Danish, German and others too… 😉

www.facebook.com/jrstange

Ronny Moorings (Clan Of Xymox), an exclusive retrospective interview

Inferno Sound Diaries — Tue, 24 Dec 2024 18:00:00 +0000

It all began in 1983 under the name Xymox, a musical project founded and spearheaded by Ronny Moorings. Shortly after, the project evolved into Clan Of Xymox, marking the birth of a band destined to leave an indelible mark on the Dark-Wave scene. Signed by the legendary British label 4AD, the band released two seminal albums that would become classics in the genre. While they briefly returned to the original name, since 1997, they have been known exclusively as Clan Of Xymox. What makes Clan Of Xymox truly special is not only their pioneering role in the New/Dark-Wave movement but their unwavering ability to create valuable and impactful music over the decades.

Unlike many of their contemporaries, who often rely on the nostalgia of 80s hits, Clan Of Xymox has consistently released strong, fresh material, proving that their creative spirit remains as vibrant as ever. With a career spanning over 40 years, Clan Of Xymox has firmly established themselves as one of the most influential forces in Dark-Wave. Ronny Moorings has remained true to the essence of his sound while allowing it to evolve, ensuring a timeless yet contemporary edge. Their latest and 18th studio album, “Exodus”, released via Trisol (Germany) and Metropolis (USA), is a testament to this balance. Featuring a collection of masterful tracks, the album combines melancholic, dark, atmospheres with Pop-infused arrangements that are both haunting and danceable.

I felt it was the perfect time to take a retrospective look at Clan Of Xymox’s incredible journey. In this interview, Ronny Moorings graciously shared his insights, reflecting on the band’s beginnings, their evolution, and their current work. I am deeply thankful for his enthusiastic cooperation and for taking the time to answer in such detail. His dedication to crafting inspired music over such a long period is remarkable, as is the man behind the artist. Respect! (Courtesy by Inferno Sound Diaries)

‘I Wanted To Be A Part Of Things Which Were Happening In Front Of My Eyes’

Q: Getting back to the early 1980s which marked the rise of New-Wave music and subgenres like Dark-Wave, Cold-Wave, and Post-Punk. How do you reflect on those formative years and what do you recall from the very beginning of your career? Specifically, what events or circumstances led to the formation of Xymox and, later, Clan Of Xymox and what was your original dream when you first started making music?

Ronny: I will make this a short story because there is so much to say about how it came to be. I was in bands from on my childhood in my birth town Roosendaal (NL) where I already played live at the age of 11 with older 15 year old friends. When it was time for me to study, I first moved to The Hague, deciding after a year of Social Academy that I’d rather do a Sociology study in Nijmegen.

In the early 80’s there was a lot going on. Musically we had the Deutsche Welle and from the U.K. came New-Wave. This appealed a lot to me and DJed (what I also already did in Roosendaal as a teenager) this type of music in the local venue Doornroosje. It was volunteers work, but I got to see all the cool bands coming in.
The alternative scene was thriving in the whole of The Netherlands. Naturally many British bands were on the fore front of innovation. The Goth / Wave movement came also to Doornroosje. I remember especially Bauhaus and The Virgin Prunes making a big impression on me because they sounded and looked visually stunning. The Virgin Prunes making a complete theatre out of their show; it looked like genuine madness with a lot of stuff flying about on stage. With Bauhaus, Peter Murphy just looked the ideal part, a new ‘thin white duke’ with white light shining under his chin and the rest of the band in fluorescent colours, exposed with a black light.

Every week there was a brilliant band to be seen in Paradiso (Amsterdam) or in Doornroosje, like Echo And The Bunnymen In an army outfit with camouflage nets hanging over the stage, The Sound, Dance Society, The Birthday Party with Nick Cave swinging like a monkey from left to right from the light supports, giving it a high energetic performance, Siouxie And The Banshees, The Cure ( they played in a circus tent) and later seeing Robert Smith playing guitar with Siouxie in Rotterdam , Theatre Of Hate, Eyeless In Gaza, Black Flag, The Comsat Angels, Sisters Of Mercy, in the Milkyway Amsterdam, of course with Wayne Hussey, Further The Slits, Liaison Dangereuses, U2 ( played in Arnhem for 400 people) who was pretty unknown still etc. Too many to mention!

All bands not jet known by the majority of people but making a big impact on everyone alternative seeing them live. New-Wave, Deutsche Welle, Punk, Synth-Pop and New-Romantics was now a major alternative movement perfectly fitting the times we were living in.

Also the Netherlands produced influential bands who made quite an impression on me, like I already mentioned Mecano & Minimal Compact from Amsterdam, Nasmak from Eindhoven, Coitus Interruptus from Utrecht, and ‘famous’ local bands from Nijmegen like Mechanic Commando and Vice.

By seeing all these brilliant international and national bands I knew there and then that I had to start something new and interesting too. I wanted to make music like these bands. I was totally inspired. I wanted to be a part of things which were happening in front of my eyes. I wanted a band instead of just making things late at night on my own on a 4 track for no one else to hear.I wasn’t the only one feeling this way. It seemed that nearly anyone in the local scene started a band. In every squat people started a band and rehearsing was no problem in these industrial buildings we all occupied. Music was becoming a way of life, a means to express your views. There were enough opportunities for bands to play. There were always some old factories freshly squatted. One of the first shows I did was on a festival in De Plu Fabriek, a desolate disused umbrella factory. The festival had a social awareness theme about ‘Acid Rain’ of which maybe a handful had heard about. It was not taken very serious yet by the general public. It was the first ever show of Xymox there.

Round the same time at the University we had to do a video project. We had to film something about a socially significant social subject, so I started filming and interviewing the squatters local bands I knew. I still have the V2000 video tape but because of its backdated discontinued format, I haven’t been able to see it since the presentation at the University of Nijmegen.

In the beginning of 1980 in Nijmegen I had no real serious relationship with anyone. I was fairly new in town and most people I found quite uninteresting. The typical jeans and long hair student types, freshly coming from their cosy parental homes, with only one aim in life and that is to study, graduate and getting a job. Also most people were just coming out of the seventies and their clothes reflected that, very colourful shirts, a lot of blue jeans and mostly having long hair. In Rotterdam long hair in the back and short in the front was accompanied by a little moustache was the local fashion there.

Anyway, just after my initiation weeks of the University back in Nijmegen, one night I went out, going to a bar where I would normally not come with my fellow student friends. I was standing there drinking beer with my mates until I spotted this girl in the distance. She had the same kind of image as me. Out of place I thought. I simply had to talk to her and soon we were engaged in conversation and ended up spending the night together in her basement flat.. She told me she came from Nuenen, a small village close to Eindhoven but very famous for the house of Vincent Van Gogh. Her name was Anke.

In this period I wanted to start a Live band with the name I already had: Xymox. One day I showed her my songs I had recorded and asked if she would want to be in my ‘band’ which was just me at the time 😉 I said it would not matter that it was only the two of us because a lot of bands played with a drum machine and it would be a cool thing to do; she agreed. The songs were most of the time two or three chords so it was not too difficult for her to learn the tracks. I released this tape at the time, sold it for cheap (some people still have it). She liked the songs and decided to learn and play the bass guitar so she could play live. We started rehearsing together in 1982. I started sending my old Xymox demos to various venues and to my surprise a dozen clubs or so liked it.

Soon we played live with the two of us in various alternative clubs. I was singing, playing guitar and the synth plus operating the rhythm box. She played the bass by now and did some backing vocals . The songs were all mine, if you could call them songs 😉 For transportation I had my old cheap orange Renault 4 with a shift stick. All the equipment fitted in beautifully. Because we were just with the two of us and the fuel was very cheap, the money earned was very reasonable for those days.

Later we got asked by the locally known band Vice to support them. We did so and managed to play quite a bit of shows in the South of the Netherlands again. We felt we were getting somewhere.

Later a few friends to join our ‘band’ live. They were hitting metal pieces or doing backing vocals etc. Inspired of course by Einstürtzenden Neubauten. We started rehearsing in the empty vaults of a squatted bank building. Soundproof and safe it luckily was 😉

Anke wanted to move to Amsterdam in 1983, when she changed her study. She wanted to study Psychology and since I finished my Sociology ‘Candidates’ phase holding an official diploma. I was looking for a relevant Masters study so I decided to go to Amsterdam as well, I chose for ‘Media Studies’ at the ‘University of Amsterdam’. Apparently you would have a lot of freedom with this study as well.

In Amsterdam I was asked by a friend in 1983, if I wanted to DJ for a local pirate radio station WHS. The show; ‘De Lege Huls’, translated ‘The Empty Shell’, would be late at night which of course I gladly accepted. I did this for quite some time well into 1985 until I got too busy with Clan Of Xymox and its many obligations.

As I already said I saved for a while every penny in order to buy my much desired object, a Teac 4 track multi tape recorder. I bought it in Antwerp, Belgium, November 1982. After many recordings of songs and ideas in Nijmegen I started a new In April 1983, frantically starting to record some new songs; the old ones were already more than a year old and I wanted to have new ones. With the help of the Teac 4 track recorder I could be more creative with writing and recording, bouncing previous recordings and build on that.

The instruments I had access to were: a Yamaha synth, Korg Poly 6 Synthesiser, Korg MS10 and MS 20, a rhythm box K500 , an electric Framus guitar, Welson Keyboard, a standard Shure 58 mike of course, my fantastic vintage space echo, melodica, guitar pedal effects and a bass guitar. A later valuable asset was later a Solina Strings but this one was borrowed once and a while.

All instruments were played in real time on tape. No sequencer used. That was too expensive.
These were the days computers were only academic and hardly used by anyone at all. Computers were just those big main frames standing in a government building or only portrayed in science fiction. Today our ears are completely trained to sequenced patterns, then it was something new, the ear was untrained to these sounds and pattern uses.

Soon things were ready. I asked Anke if she wanted to sing one song on the track I already prepared for her. It ended up with the title “Call It Weird “, so now all tracks were done and everything was set up to bring these recordings to a mastering plant near Amsterdam called Dureco. This was a vinyl factory specialised in producing Dutch product, the type like ‘Dutch Schlager’ like Vader Abraham known internationally for his “Smurf” songs. He was prominent on the wall everywhere in the factory offices. The main earner. Newer versions of this first EP exist: “Muscoviet Musquito” ( deliberately spelled this way) and “Going Round”. Both have various versions over the years.

‘I Felt That The Xymox Days Were Not The Right Way To Go’

Q: Xymox became Clan Of Xymox when you signed to 4AD, but later you reverted to Xymox before ultimately returning to Clan Of Xymox in the late ’90s. How do you view these shifts in retrospect? What, in your opinion, distinguishes Xymox from Clan Of Xymox?

Ronny: I started with the name Xymox and released my first EP “Subsequent Pleasures“ under this name. When Xymox got signed by 4 AD and the first debut album was called “Clan Of Xymox” I decided it was a slightly better name also because I had found people to play the songs live, so hence the ‘Clan’. I considered Xymox as my Pseudonym.

When Clan Of Xymox got signed by Wing / PolyGram USA I felt this was a significant change and wanted to underline this with shortening the name and perhaps with the reasoning that it would be easier for people in general to remember our name when it was shorter.

After 4 albums under the name Xymox, with the album “Phoenix” it had gotten too commercial in my opinion. With the 2 UK releases “Metamorphosis“ and “Headclouds” which were too Experimental and nothing much to do with the early material on 4 AD I decided in 1997 it was time to reintroduce Clan Of Xymox again with the same approach and attitude as in the earl 80’s. I felt that the Xymox days were not the right way to go and that it was better to stick to my own opinion instead of letting people influence me in one way or the other.

The result was the album “Hidden Faces” released worldwide on Tess Records and Pandaimonium Records in Germany in 1997. This was the start of Clan Of Xymox again. Since Phoenix I didn’t tour anymore. Had actually no live band anymore. I started to find again people who could play live with me and soon I had a live band ready to start promoting “Hidden Faces” and the older works on 4AD. Mojca my partner was there already since 1991 with me learning to play an instrument, keys and bass. She already designed the artwork from on 1992. In 1995 I decided to play in The Netherlands and promote “Metamorphosis” and “Headclouds”. The old live members from the 80’s Frank Weyzig and Will Anvers joined me on stage together with Mojca on Keyboards. This tour made me realise I missed playing live and soon since 1997 Clan Of Xymox played live each and every year till now and will keep on playing live.

I have a steady crew for more than a decade now with Mojca from on 1991 (of course), Mario ( more than 20 years), Sean and Daniel. I stay with the labels Metropolis (USA ) and Trisol (Germany ) as well as I run my own label Xymox Control now for decades a steady course with Clan Of Xymox, only expanding with my band, slowly but gradually. It manifests in the vast amount of sold out shows we are having each year.

‘We Were In Our Extravaganza’

Q: You were closely associated with 4AD, one of the most groundbreaking labels of the early New-Wave era. How did an unknown band from the Netherlands find its way onto such an iconic label? And how did your time with 4AD influence your evolution as an artist?

Ronny: Back in 1983 I felt that my former town Nijmegen ‘deserved’ a few copies of “Subsequent Pleasures” too. I was doing all the distribution myself. I sold 150 through Rough Trade UK, 150 in New Waves France and 150 export to Essen in Germany. Anyway, so I went to Nijmegen the night of the ‘Day of the Dead’, 1st of November.
I decided to visit a friend but he was not at home so not knowing what was going on that evening I soon found out The Cocteau Twins were playing in Doornroosje that night, so I had to see them. There was still plenty of time left so I decided to have something to eat in my favourite eating cafe De Plak. Whilst having dinner I heard English was spoken on another table, so my interest was aroused. Maybe this couple were The Cocteau Twins? Had to be! An English male and female. Without any hesitation I went to their table and asked them all sorts of questions about their band The Cocteau Twins. They informed me politely that they were not The Cocteau Twins but were their supporting act called Dead Can Dance and if I wanted they could put me on the guest list; which I naturally did not decline since I was no longer active in Doornroosje anymore. In return I gave them a copy of “Subsequent Pleasures” for them to listen to.

Having seen Dead Can Dance they blew me away, just like of course The Cocteau Twins. After the show I went boldly to the dressing room and drank some beer with both the bands as they were sharing the dressing room and already established that we were all like-minded, talking to each other, or trying to, because Robin Guthrie of the Cocteau’s had a very heavy Scottish accent. Difficult to understand for a Dutchman who knew and spoke only ‘school’ English. That night I learned then that Brendan was Irish, lived in New-Zealand, moved to Australia, met Lisa in Melbourne and moved to London to work on their musical career. A similar story was true for The Cocteau Twins who moved from Scotland to London to work on their career. All was very interesting and at the end of the night we swore to keep in contact and said our goodbyes.

During that time I kept in contact with Brendan and Lisa who lived together on the Isle Of Dogs. They invited me to their London home and I stayed at their place quite a few times. In those days I had to travel by ferry to the UK, a long journey. They lived on the 11th floor with a fantastic view over London. The flats were those typical council flats, ashen grey and reeking of urine in the elevators. They had a staggering amount of locks installed on their front door. With all their equipment at home I could understand their mistrust of their surroundings. It was all very depressing but very exciting for me. Brendan worked the same way as I did. We ended up with almost the same equipment in 1986. Brendan and Lisa were then still living together and were really dedicated to music. Every day they recorded or rehearsed. Lisa mainly singing and playing the Yang Ching. I slept in the living room and later on some visits they had a closet, like the one of “Harry Potter”. I slept there and was pretty cosy;)

Xymox started playing live in 1984 again. One day Brendan Perry called me up and asked me if we wanted to support them on a tour in the UK. Without any hesitation I agreed to do it and almost a week later we were in London. Unfortunately when we arrived nearly all the dates of Dead Can Dance got cancelled and there were only three dates left: one in London, Huddersfield and one in Dudley. We stayed with Brendan and Lisa, sleeping all on the floor in the living room, which I knew already too well.

During our first concert In London I nearly disappeared through the hole in the stage, I had to walk very carefully because they did not manage to cover all the holes under the stained carpet. The father of Brendan was I believe the tour manager and his mother made sandwiches for Dead Can Dance when we went on the road to Dudley. The town looked nothing much and the bar we had to play likewise.. our dressing room was between beer barrels and if we wanted to have a drink we had to buy it at the bar said the promoter resembling “Dell Boy” of “Only Fools And Horses”. Still we had a great time hanging out with Brendan and Lisa, who were very generous to give us some money for covering our ferry expenses, which I know for sure they were paying out of their own pockets. After that we did more shows all over The Netherlands till summer.

Brendan Perry was the first one who told me about 4AD. Before that I only paid attention to bands and not too much to record labels strangely enough. He said he gave “Subsequent Pleasures” to Ivo Watts Russell , the label boss of 4AD, and so I followed up with sending a demo to 4AD with some newer additional tracks in July 1984, recorded in the Amsterdam Octopus 8 track studio. The demo I had sent 4AD after our shows in Paris’ old theatre La Seballe Club, several Dutch and the 2 UK dates. I was getting impatient as always. I gave Ivo Watts Russell a phone call. I was complaining about how the Dutch music industry sucked and that his label was the only independent label appealing to me. A week before that, I had a meeting with the Dutch division label EMI but this meeting reminded me of all the cliches I ever heard about Major labels. To my absolute delight and surprise Ivo told me he liked what he had heard from the demo so far and wanted to meet, to see us in person and talk about it.

Ivo wanted to meet the band, so arriving in London, me and Anke were heading to the private home of Ivo Watts Russell and his girlfriend Debby who also worked for 4AD as their press agent. They lived together in a residential SW12 London area. We stayed in their house for a week.

Anke and I had placed these long extra hair extensions in our hair so we looked a bit like ‘Uber Goths’ with a lot of make-up and special clothing we had designed for us by a friend who was handy with the sewing machine and wanted to become a fashion designer. I saw the surprise on Ivo’s face when he saw us for the first time. We were obviously not looking the way he expected us to look. Most of his bands on the label looked actually quite normal with no real image to speak of; so here we were in our extravaganza.

Luckily Ivo and Debby liked us or the music enough to offer Xymox a record deal and with that great news we went back home. The news had spread that we were the first band 4AD signed since two years of their last signing of Dead Can Dance. After this published fact my phone started to ring frequently and offers for radio and new Dutch live shows offers came in by the plenty.

When the self-titled album “Clan Of Xymox”’ was released funny enough nearly all the journalist thought we were Scottish by origin judging by their reviews. An Englishman is always very sensitive to accents. I saw it as a compliment though. Of course ‘Clan Of’ was suggestive enough 😉 . Most reviews were ecstatic, full of praise with five star ratings, the highest you could get. I guess we got lucky with my intention not to advertise we were Dutch. Having no names on the artwork and let the album speak for itself.

The British can be real chauvinists regarding their music industry, they didn’t take foreigners making music too seriously in those days. Of course the weekly music magazines Sounds, Melody Maker, New Music Express etcetera made up their ‘mistake’ in the eye to eye interviews, clearly pointing out us being Dutch and using the usual stereotype references, with headlines like ‘Dutch Bake’, ‘Dutch Courage’, ‘Going Dutch’, ‘Hollandaise Sauce’ and any phrase relating to the war between the Dutch and the Brits a few centuries ago. Anyway it did not matter anymore because we got the attention; had a proper selling debut album. We did a lot of photo shoots with an English photographer using drapes in the back ground giving us a more Gothic image. This was used as our promo picture.The Music Maker and Sounds were giving us regular features and interviews afterwards, which gave us finally an international standing. Soon 4AD set up a few shows in Croydon and the University of London plus a John Peel session, which was very important to establish up and coming bands.

‘We Had To Prove Ourselves Time And Time Again’

Q: You’ve already mentioned several legendary British bands that were prominent in the 1980s and shared strong connections and camaraderie. What was your experience of the Dutch music scene during that time? How do you reflect on it now?

Ronny: I only had French, British and Scottish bands as friends. I could not get along with any band in The Netherlands in the mid-eighties. In the Netherlands there was a very strong Rock culture with no space for bands like us. We had to prove ourselves time and time again. I didn’t understand the provincial attitude towards synths coming from the Dutch critics. In a very first review the national music magazine Oor reviewed synths as magic boxes which made them nervous listening to them. When our first album came out we finally got greeted by the more alternative media which just got a foot in the door and were played on radio and TV, MTV and the like. Suddenly we were part of a movement to be reckoned with. Sometimes we even played live twice on a day in The Netherlands.

‘The Only Disappointment For Me Was That I Actually Never Got To Meet John Peel’

Q: During that period, you worked with or crossed paths with notable figures like the aforementioned Brendan Perry. But what about John Fryer, David M. Allen and John Peel? What can you share about those interactions and their impact on your journey?

Ronny: Our first John Peel session was in the beginning of November 1985. It was pretty stressful for me. We had to record 4 to 5 songs with the live band in one working ‘BBC’ day of 6 hours or so. It didn’t occur to me that I should have taken adaptors for English power plugs with me. Because it is the BBC, no one is allowed to change a power plug without the assistance of a fully qualified engineer, so it took them already one hour to find such a person as labour union regulations dictated that the technician supposed to have his tea break of an hour. We were already losing valuable time! We didn’t have computers in those days. My first Commodore computer with TV monitor I got in 1988 when I wrote the “ Twist Of Shadows“ album. The Macintosh 128K a normal mortal could not afford. Clan Of Xymox did however use an 8 track recorder for the backing tracks, like Depeche Mode or The Cocteau Twins used as well. It consisted of individual drum tracks, sequenced bass triggers and strings. This made life a bit easier. We could thanks to the ‘eight track’ finish within the timeframe of the BBC.

The only disappointment for me was that I actually never got to meet John Peel. Even then he was a legend, especially to me, because it was the best program for discovering new exciting bands. I only got to call him from the 4AD office, thanking him for the opportunity he gave us. He declared in his program that we were the pioneers of Dark-Wave. That was a huge compliment and recognition for Clan Of Xymox. Soon Dutch radios started to follow suit. We got to record a live show for Radio Veronica in Hilversum. Several TV shows invited us for music programs like the VARA. MTV picked us up too. We felt we were on a roll!

John Fryer I instantly liked as a person and sound engineer. He was the in house sound engineer of 4AD and knew what he was doing. He was not afraid to experiment with sampling sounds and replacing them. The AMS delay was his secret weapon. I remember sitting evenings together with John mixing tracks by hand. So I had to pull and push knobs on my side and he on his side. It was a lot of fun and very educational. Later in live John made me a remix for “Big Brother“ from the album “Limbo” (2021).

I worked with David M. Allen on tracks like “Out Of The Rain” and “Sing A Song” together with Jools of Nitzer Ebb. It was in Leamington Spa in John Rivers’s studio. I worked with John Rivers already on the “Blind Hearts”-EP for 4AD and several B-sides for later PolyGram. Now I was working with John on the “Hidden Faces”-album (1997) and we thought it would be very cool to have Dave M. Allen involved. This certainly worked. I wished we had the budget to work on all the songs but I was already glad these two songs worked out fantastically. Dave is a very likeable person with an air of mystique around him. He gives suggestions for you to try and they always make sense. He taught me to delve deeper when needed.

‘Without Me There Is No Clan Of Xymox’

Q: Both Xymox and Clan Of Xymox included founding members Anke Wolbert and Pieter Nooten. What role did they play in shaping the band’s identity, and how do you reflect on the line-up changes over the years?

Ronny: They were both not founding members. They joined me in the beginning of the Xymox period. First Anke as I told you and later in 1985 Pieter. Because they were the first ones joining they are seen as founding members but I am sorry to say; it was always my thing. I was and still am the driving force behind the band and it’s musical direction. No one else. They concentrated mainly on their own songs like “Masquerade” or “Stumble” and “Fall” back in the days. The bulk I wrote. I participated also on their songs as well.

Regarding the songs it is true we worked more together like a band should. In the beginning we rehearsed the songs for live shows and many got changed during this process. This was only sustainable for a short while as nobody liked to rehearse together.

We ended up as 3 individuals writers with different taste and musical directions so it was inevitable it wouldn’t work out long because we were all to egocentric to begin with. When I officially broke up with Anke it was also the end of working together as a collective. We all went our own way.

Indeed we had many changes but maybe the irony is in the word ‘Clan’, a group of close knitted people. So in the end there were many LIVE musicians joining the band for a short or longer period. Joining ‘the Clan’. The red line was and is simple: without me there is no Clan Of Xymox.

All happened really fast in those days. It was a learning process for all involved. Books about the music industry and bands hardly existed. Everyone was left to do whatever with their experiences, positive or negative.
I never knew or expected that just making music could make me enemies but also gaining a lot of friends of course. Jalousie and spite can make people really vicious and vindictive and yet equally so many fans or friends treat you with the utmost respect or even adoration. To me it is just music but soon you realise it is something more than that.

Former friends or partners turning into your personal enemy. It is the worst thing that can happen, because they know your weaknesses and irritation points and will not shy away from using this against you if they have no pride, dignity or integrity.

Thinking back on this short period between 1985 and 1989 stir more negative emotions then positive ones in me. It wasn’t all bad of course but I can’t remember real long good periods. I realise looking back that I am only happy with the band since the beginning of the mid 90’s to now, at least 33 years so far:)

Q: How does the young Ronny Moorings compare to the musician you are today? What traits have endured, and which aspects of your younger self do you miss in your music or approach to life?

Ronny: I was definitely very naive in the beginning. When I wrote a song for example I just split the rights between the band members because I thought it would motivate my band to pull more their weight in the band and…. after all I was a socialist and not a capitalist 😉

Soon I discovered that when people sense they don’t have to do too much and can simply lay back whilst I do the heavy lifting because they get paid anyway.

I started to get annoyed with this uneven situation and learned from this that I should not give away my rights that easily just to please band members or partner. So I ended this naive approach and never looked back.
Equally I used to work with bigger crews, managers, tour managers, lawyers and all the professional people they told you would need to have in order to make it as a band.

After many annoyances about the enormous bills I decided I could do most jobs way better. I know I am a control freak. You have to be. You have to understand the way things work. Now I have a lean machine and I like it a lot. Later I also learned to delegate things and that is also very rewarding. I guess ‘live and learn’ is true in my opinion.

‘Dark-Wave Has A Strong Hold All Over The World Like In The 80’s’

Q: Many legendary New/Dark-Wave bands achieved their greatest success in the ’80s. Why do you think those years were so special and unique for the genre? How do you see the evolution of New/Dark-Wave music from its origins to today, particularly in terms of its spirit and cultural significance?

Ronny: Yes, it was a new style taking over with fashion unseen before, It was against the Hippy culture, the jeans wearing long haired pot smokers. It was a clean break from all of this, plus the ‘no future’ feeling with all the political turmoil and nuclear threats hanging over our heads. Remember Thatchers England. Ronald Reagan as president.

These bands made the sound track of our lives and guess what? It is happening again. Dark-Wave has a strong hold all over the world like in the 80’s. Yes, it’s not on the dying radio or TV stations as we know it but streaming like crazy, this time on internet radios, YouTube, Spotify It feels a bit like maybe the pirates in the 80’s.

It feels the same to me and also we have the same nuclear threats back again. In a way it feels coming ‘full circle’.

Q: Over the decades, the music industry has undergone tremendous changes -rising social media, streaming platforms, declining physical album sales, advances in technology, and shifts in performance venues from intimate gigs to massive festivals. How have you navigated these transformations, and what are your thoughts on the (r)evolution of the industry?

Ronny: I navigate these changes just fine I think. I always welcomed change and will ever do. We need to improve. We need to move forward and not backward. When for the very first time in the 80’s I could get my hands on a computer I embraced it as a big help with sequencing and programming. It made endless rehearsing patterns on keyboards so much easier. Later it became my entire virtual studio platform. Streaming is now the most important thing now in the music industry and some artists do not like it, but remember when music was pirated and artists would get nothing from it financially and no insight how many like to listen to your music etc. I love Spotify and as an artist you have access to all date regarding what your fans are listening to.
Most music I listen to these days is from platforms, on my phone with airpods. This gives me more time to listen to music when I am on the move or outside. Everything in one device is just brilliant I think. Of course I have at home all old media devices still in place. I do play vinyl as well when I am in the mood. I still love vinyl and the looks of it. The best format for the artwork to shine.

Q: While it’s difficult for any musician to choose a single album or song as their best, is there a particular piece in your discography that holds special significance for you? Or do you believe that your most recent work is always your finest?

Ronny: I have to agree with my fellow musicians. My recent is indeed the best so far as I can see and feel 😉 It is simply because new songs are for the one who wrote and recorded it the most exciting, the most fresh and recent to your current experiences. You have to play them live which you haven’t done before and in the end they will sound different then when it came out. If you don’t have that feeling the artist should not release the album in the first place 😉

‘I Let The Listener Feel What I Feel’

Q: Your lyrics often feel deeply expressive, sometimes addressing social and political themes, other times delving into introspection. Do you see your lyrics as a reflection of your true self? What value and purpose do they hold for you?

Ronny: Sometimes yes and sometimes no. It’s complicated 😉 I definitely sing about emotions I feel or felt. Say I sing about Evelyn, Louise or Michelle. That doesn’t mean I know a person with that name or sing about a real person. All these names are fictional but the feelings and thoughts what went into these songs are real. Sometimes more than one person I think about finds its place into a song lyric. It all depends. Political themes are the ones which affected me like in the Lockdown periods in the early 20’s. It comes home, becomes personal and I describe more the situation than anything else. I let the listener feel what I feel.
Sometimes I write a song to blow off steam and feel good afterwards. Most of the time it’s about a person who doesn’t want to leave me alone almost my entire life 😉 I can keep going on like that. I always delve the lyrics out of the depths of my mind where it lay buried until I get it out through some type of instrumentation deciding for me what the topic is going to be. A new to be written song has most of the time its own will and direction.

Q: Clan Of Xymox has consistently attracted new fans over the years. What do your fans mean to you, and how does it feel to have a lasting influence on the Dark-Wave scene?

Ronny: Fans are the most important to me. Without a doubt. We meet so many dedicated fans, traveling to all of our shows they can reach within reason. We always talk to anyone after the show who’s interested, have selfies taken, give autographs, give something a fan would like to experience, a closeness you can’t give onstage. A hand shake, a look in the eye.

I am honoured to contribute to the Dark-Wave scene as it is today. All bands who are now big I met when they were still beginning and were our support one time or the other. I know that we had an influence on them but now they are an influence on me the same. So it works in the end both ways. To me this scene is the best scene ever for me.

Q: Looking back on your career, what do you consider to be your biggest milestones? And what were the most significant disappointments?

Ronny: I am still working on my biggest milestone 🙂 My quest is to see how long I can still play live with the band. That is my ultimate quest in life. Disappointments enough, especially in people, but to me that is also an inspiration to write songs about so in the end all turns out for the best. I am lucky I have many good friends in my life to compensate for the negative. Unfortunately I am a person who has to be on the darker side of things in order to feel inspired. So I don’t mind 😉

Q: How have you managed to keep finding fresh ideas and challenges over the years? Were there periods where inspiration waned, and if so, how did you overcome those creative blocks?

Ronny: I think in the beginning it was harder to write as it is now. To me writing comes very natural I think. Maybe because I have more to say now than when I was in my twenties. In that time I read a lot of books in order to get lyrically inspired. For a long time now I just write from what comes up in my mind and put it into lyrics. Way easier I think and less time consuming 😉 The music was never a problem. Finding words to it is a harder nut to crack sometimes.

A creative block I handle very easy: I put the song away and start with something else. Sometimes its years later that I have a look at it again, if I can do something with it and often that’s the case. So for me I don’t like to force a song if it doesn’t present it by itself.

‘Joy Division, The Sisters Of Mercy And The Cure Were Very Important To Me’

Q: One of the most surprising entries in your discography is “Kindred Spirits” (2012), a cover album featuring renowned songs and artists. How did you choose the tracks, and what connection do you have to those songs? Would you consider them key sources of inspiration?

Ronny: When I was young, the only means of getting to know music was the radio or “Top of the Pops” later in the 70s. In the Netherlands we had bands like Shocking Blue, Brainbox, Earth And Fire, Focus, The Golden Earring and such, which appealed to me a lot. These were the bands I was interested in. On TV we grew up with The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and of course The Monkees especially grouped for US TV. These bands made me want to play an instrument at a very young age. After that I always stayed on the alternative side of music. On my album “Kindred Spirits“ you can see and hear which artist influenced me in the direction I was going. Bands for example like Joy Division, The Sisters Of Mercy and The Cure were very important to me.

I gave or restricted myself to make a choice for ten songs of bands who had in one way or the other an impact on my musical taste. I wanted to give an ode to these bands and revive these songs in my memory to keep and make them as my own. In the end I did 11 tracks of my all-time favourite bands or songs.

Too many bands like to hide their influences or deny them. I decided to give them my own pedestal.

Q: This year marks the release of Clan Of Xymox’s 18th album, “Exodus”. What does this album represent within your extensive discography? Can you share insights into its creation?

Ronny: I finished and released the album “Limbo” in 2021 and I wrote the “Exodus” album after writing “Save Our Souls” in 2022 in 2023. The last song I wrote for this album was in January 2024 and here we are. In a way keeping the tradition of one album release in every two or three years.

We toured an awful lot so the little time I had, I spend in the studio taking my mind of things. The late general developments in the world I felt writing about. Instead of introspective lyrics I felt more like describing our current times we live in. After “Save Our Souls” I wrote “Fear For A World At War”, especially after all the rhetoric of Putin threatening Europe or the world with nuclear strikes. Because the world is massively gearing up for war.

When I was born there was the biggest world crisis between the Soviet Union and the USA about the missiles in Cuba.

It is ironic that now we are living with almost the exact conditions but this time closer to home, having a nuclear missile threat. History repeats itself . I certainly hope this is not getting out of hand but the signs are that we seem to step up our war talk more and more. SOS indeed. The world is at turmoil and nothing good will come out of this. Exodus for me as well when it gets out of hand. Anyway, this is the back ground for writing all these songs for “Exodus”.

Q: Talking about “Save Our Souls”, there clearly is a sense of commentary on the state of the world. Do you see music and this album as a unifying force in troubled times? How do you perceive its broader impact on society?

Ronny: “Save Our Souls” was specific about the invasion of the Russians into the Ukraine. It was a shocker for me. Especially after just having toured there in September 2021. I see music in troubled times more as a safety blanket you can wrap yourself in. It gives comfort and soothes your mind and well-being. An escape as it were from the daily sorrows we get bombarded with each and every minute. So far music can change or influence politics when masses cry out for social change. I don’t see that happen with this album or any of my albums;) Never intended for it either.

Q: Authenticity seems to be a hallmark of your music. Many fans describe a sense of genuine emotion and connection in your work. How do you experience this dynamic and interaction with your audience? How powerful or influential do you think music can be in bridging gaps and inspiring change?

Ronny: Wow, if you talk about the grand scale of things you might have a chance to do so but in the cult circuit we are maybe just the inspiring factor. That which might work on a small scale. I should certainly hope that our fans and other listeners get the music of Clan Of Xymox and feel the emotions I feel when I perform these songs with my band. Live you notice this the best. During the show I always look at people and there are so many various expressions on people faces, you feel that you are almost privileged to see an expression of someone when they sink into the song with mind and body. I love it!

‘Contrast Works Always The Best In A Way’

Q: Your music often combines dark, melancholic themes with an energy that makes people dance and feel alive. How do you reconcile these contrasting elements?

Ronny: Contrast works always the best in a way. I defines, it outlines. I have a lot of slow songs with equally dark lyrics but playing live I want to entertain people, want to make them move inside and out. I have luckily lots and lots of songs to choose from and during the years it taught me a lot about which songs people like to hear when they go to our concert. That means the classics are always included and never ignored.

Q: Finally, let’s end with a few rapid-fire questions:

• ‘Sex, Drugs, and Rock ‘N’ Roll’: does this resonate with you?

Ronny: During my long career all certainly resonates at one time or the other. Experimenting with drugs I steered away long time ago. It was perhaps hip in the 80’s or attractive to experiment but the same goes for smoking or anything else unhealthy. I value a healthy life style with perhaps an alternativee: Sex, Wine and Wave 😉

• Is there a band or artist you would have loved to collaborate with?

Ronny: It’s a shame I never got to work with David Bowie. I met him once in LA when he came to see our concert in the Palace. I was too starstruck to even think of asking him. What a missed chance !

• Do you feel a spiritual connection with any particular artist or band?

Ronny: Yes, plenty! I have got so many great friends in the current scene who make great music. Backstage is always fun when we meet.

• In a world without music, what do you think you’d be doing?

Ronny: Not breathe.

• Which Clan Of Xymox song would you recommend to someone who has never heard your music before?

Ronny: “A Day”, “She” or “Loneliness” as a starter.

• How many albums has Clan Of Xymox sold, and which remains the most successful?

Ronny: Wouldn’t you like to know 😉 “Twist Of Shadows” was still the most successful in terms of hard record-CD/Cassettes sales because it was at the time people could only buy that and did. There was no piracy then, apart from the classic copying on a blank cassette. In terms of streaming and overall impact I have to point to my later works.

• What is the ultimate dream for Clan Of Xymox?

Ronny: To carry on like the last two years.

• What would you want written on your epitaph and that of Clan Of Xymox?

Ronny:

See you on the other side.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the gentle autumn rain.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am not there, I didn’t go.

I didn’t die, so you know.

See you on the other side.

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

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Sunroof (Daniel Miller & Gareth Jones) launch new track, ‘Brotherly’, ahead of new album ‘Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 08:43:29 +0000

Sunroof (Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones) have shared a new track, “Brotherly”, from their forthcoming album, “Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3”, set for release on vinyl, CD and digitally via the Parallel Series of Mute on 29 November 2024.

“Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3” is a collection of nine improvised tracks, recorded using the duo’s Eurorack modular systems, and builds upon the self-imposed parameters laid out on their 2021 debut. With nothing pre-planned or rehearsed, each of the nine tracks were recorded using four channels (two each) with no overdubs. Explaining that “Our practice is more abstract than thematic. Every time we meet, we attempt a fresh start” the Miller and Jones arrived to each recording session with the spirit, energy and discipline of improvisation and recorded the tracks as live performances, with very little post-production work done once the tracks are recorded.

One exception is on “Ensnare”. The original, where glassy percussion works alongside submerged rhythmic beats, has been given two separate remixes by Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones.

About Sunroof

Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones have been collaborating for four decades. Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones’ collaboration began in 1982 when Miller asked Jones to work with him on what became Depeche Mode’s “Construction Time Again”. After Depeche Mode had gone home for the day, the two would stay on to work on their own sessions. By the mid-nineties Sunroof had become a remix project, reworking the likes of Can, MGMT, To Rococo Rot, Kreidler and Goldfrapp, amongst others.

In 2019, Miller and Jones were heading to a György Ligeti concert at the Barbican and beforehand the pair spent a couple of hours improvising with modular systems. Unusually, this time they decided to record the session and over a pre-concert meal, Gareth asked, “Are we actually going to make a record together before we die?”

The resulting album, “Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 1” (2021) was followed by “Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 2” (2023), and since 2021, Sunroof have been performing select live shows allowing their live performance to feed back into their recordings. Some of these recordings were released last year as a Bandcamp exclusive, “Electronic Music Improvisations Live in London and Frankfurt“.

Electronic Music Improvisations Live in London and Frankfurt by Sunroof

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

side-line.com

C-Lekktor – 2.0 Bonus Version (Digital/CD Album – Alfa Matrix)

Inferno Sound Diaries — Sat, 26 Oct 2024 07:00:00 +0000

C-Lekktor is undoubtedly part of the crème de la crème of the Mexican Dark-Electro scene, and holds a prominent status within the international scene as well. It’s been 20 years since Markko B released his first self-produced album -a milestone worth celebrating with a collection of reworked ‘master tracks’ that C-Lekktor has released over the years. Older songs have been polished and revitalized alongside more recent tracks that evoke the sound of Noisuf-X. Additionally, the album features an unreleased song and a Depeche Mode cover. C-Lekktor consistently delivers solid, hard-hitting Dark-Electro, characterized by powerful bass lines, cold leads, heavy, danceable rhythms, Spanish samples, and Markko B’s intense, commanding vocals. This album offers a fantastic opportunity to reflect on the artist’s rich and successful career. (Rate:8½).

Listen to “Are You Ready For The Bass?”:

Are You Ready For The Bass? by C-Lekktor

Read the news on ‘2.0’.

About C-Lekktor

C-Lekktor, spearheaded by Marco Antonio Barrientos (Markko B.), has been an important force in the dark elektro scene for over two decades. Emerging from the vibrant Mexican electro scene of the 1990s, C-Lekktor made its first appearance with the demo CD “Re-a-Gression”.

Known for its aggressive and energetic sound, characterized by harsh vocals, pounding beats, and dark, atmospheric melodies, the project gained widespread recognition with performances across Mexico and internationally.

In 2005, the project released the maxi-CD “Words of Evil” and participated in the “Electro Map-Latam Compilation”. The following years saw C-Lekktor performing extensively, including concerts in Peru and Chile, and performances on major events like the “Necropolis Fest”.

In October 2024, Markko B. also looked back on two decades of the project in an interview with Side-Line. “2.0 Bonus Version”, issued on digital and CD via Alfa Matrix, extends that 20th-anniversary celebration with reworked tracks from across the project’s catalog.

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Horror & Opera debuts immersive multimedia experience with ‘The Lost Opera’ – Check first track now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Thu, 17 Oct 2024 13:19:26 +0000

Horror & Opera, brainchild of Siberian-born classically trained operatic singer, multi-instrumentalist, experimental electronic musician, and multi-disciplinary mixed-media artist, Alia Synesthesia, premieres the track “Incantation”, launching the new immersive multimedia release, “The Lost Opera“.

An immersive, multimedia storytelling event, “The Lost Opera” by Horror & Opera is a ‘Haunted Box’ project, combining audio drama and an operatic composition, “Mortuus Messis”, with both physical artifacts and digital media. “The Lost Opera” tells the story of a mysterious opera known as “Mortuus Messis”, thought to have been lost forever, and the research of the passionate PhD student determined to uncover its secrets.

UTM Music Group · Horror & Opera – 'Incantation', from The Lost Opera (Mortuus Messis)

Project mastermind, Alia Synesthesia of Horror & Opera, says: “There’s something captivating about uncovering lost histories, hidden stories, and forgotten art. For the past year, I’ve been immersed in half composition, half research project that taps into a myriad of exciting for me themes, blends fact and fiction, myth and reality. Today, I’m excited to share the culmination of that journey: The Lost Opera Project – an exploration into the hauntingly beautiful and enigmatic world of Mortuus Messis, an opera that was performed just once in 1916 in Blackwater, Massachusetts, before vanishing into obscurity.”

The Lost Opera ‘Haunted Box’ is made available in both fully virtual (digital) and physical forms. The digital version includes audio downloads of both the opera itself, and the protagonist’s dissertation tapes, along with digital artifacts. The physical version of the box includes everything available in digital form, as well as physical cassette tapes, photographs, letters, and other ephemera.

About Alia Synesthesia aka Horror & Opera

Alia Synesthesia live with Attrition

The Lost Opera by Horror & Opera is composed, performed, produced, mixed and mastered by Siberian-born artist Alia Synesthesia; a classically-trained operatic singer, multi-instrumentalist, experimental electronic musician, and multi-disciplinary mixed-media artist, now based in Toronto, Canada.

Alia was born in Yakutsk (Sakha Republic), where she began her formal musical education at the age of 6. Alia started making electronic music in 2011, inspired and influenced by acts like Skinny Puppy, Depeche Mode, Chelsea Wolfe, and others.

Her music blends elements from classical music to musique concrète; from blackmetal to progressive rock; from synthpop to darkwave; from industrial to dark ambience.

Since 2017, Alia has toured from Hawaii to New Zealand and Japan, and as a live touring member Attrition. She is about to join this UK act as they embark on their first ever tour of Australia, and a return trip to New Zealand, from 24 October – 9 November 2024.

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Alessandro Cortini (Nine Inch Nails) has all new LP out now: ‘Nati Infiniti’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 11 Oct 2024 20:59:09 +0000

(Photo by Emilie Elizabeth) Italian musician Alessandro Cortini has released his latest work, “Nati Infiniti”. This 40-minute piece, divided into five movements, is based on an immersive audio installation that took place across four floors of the Museu de Lisboa’s Fábrica da Moagem, a disused flour mill.

Commissioned by Sónar Lisboa 2022, “Nati Infiniti” captures the ambiance of the original installation. Each floor of the mill evoked different states through Cortini’s sound design, creating a different experience as listeners moved through the building. The album tries to reflects this movement.

Using the Strega instrument, co-designed by Cortini with Make Noise, the piece evolves across 40 minutes. Marta Salogni, known for her work with Björk and Depeche Mode, mixed and mastered the album into five movements. “Nati Infiniti” is available now, in various formats including vinyl, CD, and digital.

Cortini debuted the live audio-visual performance of “Nati Infiniti” at Berlin’s Atonal Festival. After a series of sold-out shows, he will tour North America and Europe throughout 2024 and 2025, with additional dates to be announced.

Cortini, a longstanding member of Nine Inch Nails, has released a steady stream of his own music on labels such as Mute, Hospital, and Important Records. His collaborations include work with Lawrence English, Daniel Avery, and Merzbow. He is also the only Italian musician inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. His creations, like the Strega and the forthcoming Bruxa module, kinda show his innovative approach to music. He has composed for fashion shows by Alexander McQueen, Dior, and Fendi, and soundtracked Disney/Hulu’s hit show “The Bear”. His remixes include tracks for Depeche Mode, Mogwai, Death Cab for Cutie, Yann Tiersen, and Vatican Shadow.

Here’s a live impression of Cortini.

Alessandro Cortini tour dates

10/11/2024 – Seattle, WA, Age Of Reflections at Seattle First Baptist, US
10/12/2024 – Portland, OR, Age Of Reflections at Trinity Cathedral, US
10/13/2024 – Los Angeles, CA, Teragram Ballroom, US
11/20/2024 – Brussels, Bozar, BE
12/6/2024 – Berlin, Silent Green, DE
1/17/2025 – Paris, Trabendo, FR

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C-Lekktor interview : 20 years of elite dark elektro mastery that blast you away!

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 09 Oct 2024 11:45:55 +0000

We talked with mastermind Markko B., head of the Mexican dark elektro act C-Lekktor who is celebrating 20 years of aggressive sonic warfare with this cult project with the release of “2.0”, a very special anniversary double-CD release with 12 fully rerecorded favourite tracks, plus unreleased material and classic club hits…

The album can be ordered via Bandcamp as download or as a 2CD via the Alfa Matrix webstore.

2.0 (Bonus Version) by C-LEKKTOR

SL. First off, congratulations on 20 years of dark elektro mastery! Looking back over the past two decades, what would you say are the key moments that have defined C-LEKKTOR’s journey? Any standout memories from your early years that helped shape the band?

M. GRACIAS! Definitely constancy, hard work and sacrifices, I’ve been working on the project in a serious way now for the last 20 years, at that moment back in time it was just hobby for me, and an experiment to prove to myself that i could do my own music, but thanx to the people this was not only for me! I’m very thankful to all people who listen to my music,,. they show me that i must keep on trying things… I think i own this to them at least.

SL. This special 2.0 release celebrates your career with re-recorded versions of some of your most iconic tracks. How did you approach revamping these songs? Were there any particular tracks that presented a challenge in terms of updating their sound for today’s technology and production standards?

M. Actually all the 2.0 versions were a challenge, with no exception! Lots of these old files were lost long time ago, they each come from different times of production and of course with that difference in sound from that era, it was quite complicated to give a second life to these songs, most of these old songs were initially done with limited knowledge and hardware,,. so bringing them 20 years into the future was a real challenge indeed! So i tried to do my best with all i had at disposal, it took me months creating and updating these new versions,,. And I hope you can hear it… And I’m personally really satisfied with the final results.

SL. Fans have their favorite C-LEKKTOR classics like “An Empty Soul” and “Paralisis.” How do you feel about these songs now that you’ve had the chance to reimagine them? Did you discover anything new or surprising about them during the re-recording process?

M. I think it is more like a double edge weapon, in one hand you can spend on these new versions exactly the same time you need for creating new songs, but on the other hand the nostalgia of reinventing something you did back in the days, but better this time, is something special. So i think it has its pros and cons! A lot of old songs were dismissed cause I couldn’t find a way to update them but honestly i believe it was also kind of necessary updating them for me. Ghis means that some people will like these new versions and some other won’t! But hey that’s the magic you can get back in time at any time and replay the original releases of you prefer them.

SL. Your 20th-anniversary release includes a previously unreleased track, “I Don’t,” from “The Silence Procession” era. Can you tell us more about this track and why you felt now was the right time to share it with fans?

M. I totally forgot about this song, as simple as that! I was on my quest in searching all the old files on my old pc´s, drives and even backup cd´s when i i just found this song again! We actually played live this song a couple of times in the early years. So i said hey why not let’s put this song on the anniversary release… I must say i found a few more unreleased songs. maybe one day I will find the right place to release these… time will tell!

SL. Over the years, you’ve developed a distinctive sound within the dark elektro genre. How do you think C-LEKKTOR’s sound has evolved since the early days, and how do you see it continuing to evolve in the future?

M. Well i like to keep listening to new music instead of just staying on the old school songs and stuff… I’m a curious person and I’m always searching for comtemporary music. This means that sounds and techniques come to my mind while I’m composing in a rather unconscious way, and i think it works good to me.

SL. This double-CD also features your cover of Depeche Mode’s “Always You,” which is a bit of a departure from your usual style. What inspired you to choose this song, and how did you go about making it your own?

M. I’m a huge fan of DEPECHE MODE since i was very young! I have been following their career through the years and when they released MEMENTO MORI, i just remembered why I have been a fan of them! I really enjoy that new album, I swear it has actually become one of my favs from their discography, and the selection was because this song it so much touching me… But also because not so many songs can be adapted to my sound with C-LEKKTOR, and i knew since the first time I listened to “ALWAYS YOU” that it would be the perfect track to pay tribute to this legendary band. I eventually covered it!

SL. As you celebrate 20 years with this special release, what’s next for C-LEKKTOR?

M. I must be honest, with time life changes and your needs too. Music has been an important part of my life, but i think i already spent so much time in front of a pc screen, writing music. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying im quitting, but i feel I also need new challenges for my own life, starting different things, and unfortunately too the music business has changed a lot! It takes lot of effort and time also to support and promote my own music. I suppose you must know about these hard times for musicians like me… I will definitely try to keep the dream alive but sometimes I wonder for how long? I can’t tell you today but one thing is sure already: I already started working on the new C-LEKKTOR album!! But maybe that would be the last one or not… but yeah it will happen!

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Cathedral In Flames release 3rd gothic rock album, ‘Count to Nine’ – Out now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 09 Oct 2024 08:38:09 +0000

The Prague-based gothic rock band Cathedral In Flames has released their third album “Count to Nine”, offering a blend of dark and gothic influences. Known for their fusion of traditional gothic rock with a “cowboy” flair, the band delves into contemporary psychological issues, Lovecraftian mysticism, addictions, and magical sexual practices.

The title itself is symbolic, referring to the mystical number 9, representing fulfillment, closure, and the connection between different dimensions and stages of life.

The material was mixed by producer John Fryer, who has worked with influential bands like Nine Inch Nails and Depeche Mode.

Lead vocalist Phil Lee Fall says that the album represents their deepest creative journey yet, taking nearly three years to complete. His bandmate Gatsby emphasized that each track reflects the mood in which it was written, a catharsis for the emotions stirred by modern life’s confusion and darkness.

Count to Nine is available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify and Bandcamp, and includes the standout single “Dreaming in the Witch House”, for which they’ve also released a music video.

You can download the album below on Bandcamp or order it on CD.

count to nine by Cathedral In Flames

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Dark Minimal Project, reissues extended edition debut album – Out now on VUZ

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Tue, 08 Oct 2024 17:45:43 +0000

(Photo by Erik Jarrigeon) Out now on the VUZ label is an extended reissue of the debut album from Dark Minimal Project, “Cold Black Room”. The release comes out in a deluxe edition digipak with additional tracks and artwork.

Dark Minimal Project was formed in 2022 by the Lille (France) based duo Guillaume Vanderosieren and Ange Vesper. Their first material was produced by the French producer and musician Peter Rainman (People Theatre) and released as a collection which soon sold out.

Their music is influenced by Depeche Mode, Psyche and other darker synth bands. The band recently released a 10-track strong remix album featuring tracks from their 2023 album “Ghost Of Modern Times”. This remix album features remixes by People Theatre, Krieg-B, Front 242 / Patrick Codenys, Ruined Conflict, Dominatrix, XMS, Fatherless Child, Dark State, Ethan Wood and Résilience.

Check out the tracklist of this deluxe edition of their debut album below on Bandcamp where you can download the album or buy the CD version.

Cold Black Room (Deluxe Edition) (VUZ 030) by Dark Minimal Project

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Red Lorry Yellow Lorry share ‘Driving Black (Ding’s Remix)’ – their first new single in 33 years

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 07 Oct 2024 06:05:00 +0000

The Leeds-based post-punk act Red Lorry Yellow Lorry have just released “Driving Black (Ding’s Remix)” – their first new single since “Talking Back” which was released in 1991.

“Driving Black (Ding’s Remix)” is an exclusive mix by the band’s bassist and producer, Simon ‘Ding’ Archer (The Fall, Pixies, PJ Harvey, 1919, etc.). The new track is out now and comes hand in hand with the presales for Red Lorry Yellow Lorry’s forthcoming EP, “Driving Black”.

Driving Black by Red Lorry Yellow Lorry

About this single the band says: “We never wrote songs with singles in mind. To us they are just songs that we thought good enough to release. Some songs seem better suited as singles. I think when everything is ready you pick what seems suitable. For a single, you want the maximum impact in a short space of time, and to get people curious about the other stuff.”

The Driving Black EP will be out 6 December via COP International, in 12” vinyl and digital download formats. The EP also announces the band’s new album, “Strange Kind of Paradise”, due out February 2025.

The six-track “Driving Black” EP offers three exclusive, non-album tracks (“Safe as Houses”, “Living with Spiders”, and “Piece of My Mind”) alongside three mixes of songs from the forthcoming album. The lead single “Driving Black” receives two exclusive mixes for the EP: one from Ding, and the other from producer John Fryer (Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails, and Cocteau Twins). “Chickenfeed” gets the remix treatment from German dark indie rock outfit The Halo Trees.

Featuring a cover painting by Wolfie, the “Driving Black” EP has been pressed as a limited-edition coloured vinyl 12” EP – only 1,000 copies available worldwide.

Driving Black by Red Lorry Yellow Lorry

About Red Lorry Yellow Lorry

Red Lorry Yellow Lorry formed in 1981 and soon got known for their dark, minimalist sound, mixing punk, post-punk, and industrial influences. The band is led by founding member and vocalist Chris Reed and longtime guitarist and cowriter Dave ‘Wolfie’ Wolfenden.

The band released such albums like “Talk About the Weather” (1985), “Paint Your Wagon” (1986), “Nothing Wrong” (1988), and “Blow” (1989), before calling it a day with fifth album, “Blasting Off” (1992).

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Cathedral In Flames present brand new album ‘Count To Nine’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 30 Sep 2024 11:52:52 +0000

The new album from Prague gothic cowboys, Cathedral In Flames titled “Count To Nine”, is out now on the Musicraft label. It’s the follow-up to the 2021 released “Hang Me High And Bury Me Deep”. On this album the two key members, Phil Lee Fall and Gatsby, are accompanied by the voice of Ambra von Bernstein and guitarist Billac deVille.

Thematically the album covers contemporary psychological problems and addictions, mysticism and magical sexual practices. The nine tracks were mixed by John Fryer (Fields of the Nephilim, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, Paradise Lost, Cradle Of Filth and more).

Vocalist Phil Lee Fall says this of the album: “On Count To Nine we tried to cross boundaries. We ventured further and deeper than ever before. Musically, lyrically and sonically. It took us almost three years, but we are extremely happy with the result. Dark, mystical and monumental gothic rock for the 21st century.”

Gatsby adds: “Each track is heavily influenced by the mood and situations in which it was created. That’s why I make music, to get the emotion out. So the fact that it’s dark is probably natural. In a way, it’s a catharsis of the disgust and confusion we live in.”

Count To Nine is available on all major digital outlets worldwide including Spotify and Bandcamp.

count to nine by Cathedral In Flames

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Sunroof (Daniel Miller & Gareth Jones) launch remixes of ‘Ensnare’ – Out now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 25 Sep 2024 11:01:35 +0000

(Photo by Marta Ruly) Sunroof (Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones) have announced details of a new album, “Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3”, set for release on vinyl, CD and digitally via the Parallel Series of Mute on 29 November 2024.

“Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3” holds nine improvised tracks, recorded using the duo’s Eurorack modular systems, and builds upon the self-imposed parameters laid out on their 2021 debut. With nothing pre-planned or rehearsed, each of the nine tracks were recorded using four channels (two each) with no overdubs.

Note that “Splendid” was recorded using the original 4-track TEAC that Miller picked up second hand in the late 70s and used to record The Normal’s “Warm Leatherette” 7”.

Out now are two remixes of the track “Ensnare” by Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones. You can check out the original and the two remixes below.

This is the original version of “Ensnare”.

This is the Daniel Miller remix of “Ensnare”.

And here is the ElectroGenetic remix by Gareth Jones of “Ensnare”.

Daniel Miller and Gareth Jones have been collaborating for four decades. Their collaboration began in 1982 when Miller asked Jones to work with him on what became Depeche Mode’s “Construction Time Again”. After Depeche Mode had gone home for the day, the two would stay on to work on their own sessions, a practise that continues to this day. By the mid-nineties Sunroof had become a remix project, reworking the likes of Can, MGMT, To Rococo Rot, Kreidler and Goldfrapp, amongst others, and their first recordings appeared on a compilation paying tribute to Neu!

Sunroof album discography

Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 1 (2021)
Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 2 (2023)
Electronic Music Improvisations Live in London and Frankfurt (2023)
Electronic Music Improvisations Volume 3 (2024)

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Mesh drop 25th anniversary reissue of ‘The Point at Which It Falls Apart’ – Full details available now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 20 Sep 2024 11:54:22 +0000

For its 25th anniversary, Mesh make their long-time out of print second album “The Point at Which It Falls Apart” available again via Dependent Records. For the occasion the full-length has been remastered by German producer Olaf Wollschläger. The album reissue comes in a art book format with extensive bonus materials and extra tracks on a second CD.

The art book comes as a 48-page hardcover book (ca. 18x18cm) with 2 CDs: the original album (remastered 2024), an 11-track bonus CD with remixes and rare B-Sides, plus liner notes by Mark Wybrew (Electronic Cafe) & Jan Winterfeld (Pluswelt).

Mesh Mark Hockings says: “I am very proud and excited to see this album re-released with its stunning new (and yet familiar) artwork, and the pristine sound of the new remaster. This has been a long time coming. For those that heard the album the first time around, I hope it brings back some powerful memories as it has for me. For those that are hearing it for the first time, I wish I could share that experience with you.”

Richard Silverthron adds: “For me, ‘The Point at Which It Falls Apart’ marks a period in time where we found that sound that is immediately identifiable as ‘Mesh’. We were deeply into using sampling technology, creating and recording drum loops, ambient atmospheres, and guitars parts. Our pick for the first advance single, ‘Needle in a Bruise’ is an excellent example of this. This song sits comfortably between being an emotional electronic piece through the verses and then opens up with layered guitars in the chorus that turns it into an anthemic rock track.”

The recording line-up of this album consisted of Mark Hockings, Richard Silverthorn and Neil Taylor.

To introduce the sound of this remastered album, the single track “Needle in a Bruise” is available now for preview. Mark Hockings and Richard Silverthorn are currently in the process of writing the next Mesh studio album.

The Point at Which It Falls Apart (25th Anniversary Edition – Deluxe Edition) by Mesh

Tracklist bonus CD

People Like Me (With this Gun) (Alt.MESH.Mix)
It Scareas Me (Mesh Remix)
Not Prepared (Radio Version)
The Damage You Do (Perfect Porno Remix)
Safe WIth Me (Snare’s Epic Edit)
People Like Me (With this Gun) (Extended Shotgun)
It Scares Me (Mesh Locarno Mix)
Not Prepared (Mesh Club Mix)
This Without You (Fallen Mix)
It Scares Me (Fearful)
Not Prepared (Blowhole Mix)

About Mesh

Mesh was formed in 1991 when lead singer and guitarist Mark Hockings and keyboardist and vocalist Richard Silverthorn met, leading to the formation of the band. Richard Silverthorn composed the music, while Mark Hockings penned the lyrics. The duo was soon joined by Neil Taylor on keyboards, who had already been playing in another band with Silverthorn.

The band debuted with the “Fragile” EP in 1994 followed by the full-length debut “In this Place Forever” two years later in 1996. In 1999 came the next milestone with the sophomore album “The Point At Which It Falls Apart”.

The major label release of “Who Watches over Me” in 2002, propelled Mesh further into the limelight and marked a turning point. A surge of popularity across Europe, particularly in Germany let the UK band climb higher up the festival billings.

What followed was a collaboration with former Depeche Mode producer Gareth Jones for “We Collide” (2006). Adapting to lineup changes, Mesh continued their musical journey with the core-duo, augmenting live performances with drummer Sean Suleman and additional live keyboardists.

“Automation Baby” (2013) and “Looking Skyward” (2016) followed. Mesh also collaborated with a classical orchestra at the ‘Gothic meets Klassik’ festival in 2015.

By 2023 the band was joined by Vaughn George for their live lineup in April 2023.

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Midgardsblot 2024: Viking metal festival with a touch of synth and goth too

Jan Ronald Stange — Wed, 11 Sep 2024 16:13:33 +0000

The Midgardsblot festival, held at Borrehaugene (old viking grave mounds), outside the city of Horten, Norway, is mostly known for hosting acts within the metal genre in addition to some folk and viking inspired music.

This year, the festival first caught our attention with the announcement of Bel Canto as one of the headliners, followed by Gåte, Seigmen, Karin Park, Ledfoot, and others—definitely worth reporting on for Side-Line Magazine. And who knows, we might even discover some new bands. We headed there in mid-August to check it out!

(By our Norwegian correspondent, Jan Ronald Stange. Photos by Einar Låker and Jan Ronald Stange. Additional Dwaal photos by Jon Julius Sandal @ helvetesindrekretser and Birgit Fostervold @ knipselyst)

Side-Line’s chief editor, Bernard Van Isacker, was supposed to join me for the festival, but couldn’t make it due to a family emergency. His replacement, Einar Låker, brought his cameras and joined me instead. Since we had to attend meetings and handle some work during the day, we skipped the tenting area and set up base at a nearby campsite in a mobile home borrowed from my parents (thanks, Sigrid and Carl Edvard!).

After settling in, it was time to head to the festival grounds, which required a short hike through historic Viking graves. We collected our passes and entered the blót, an ancient Norwegian/Norse sacrificial feast.

The first act we saw was Kalandra, a UK/Norwegian band blending Celtic and Norse folk with modern arrangements. They’ve been around for over a decade, gaining recognition with their cover of Wardruna’s “Helvegen”. Since then, they’ve released several albums and composed scores for TV shows and video games.

After Kalandra, we explored the rest of the area, visiting the trade section Kaupanger, the Viking tent area Folkvangr, and the indoor stage Gildehallen (the “Feast Hall”). It was a sight to see people fully embracing the chance to step back in time.

We wrapped up the first day by watching the Swedish Viking rockers Amon Amarth, who had their fans completely enthralled—even getting hundreds to sit down and row in the middle of a song! 😊

Thursday was a rainy day, so boots and jackets were a must. We caught a bit of the Norwegian thrash band Inculter and the Polish death metal band Vader before heading inside Gildehallen for something entirely different: Trio Oro, a Norwegian world-folk fusion group featuring flutes, guitars, and percussion. They delivered a diverse set with tunes from Irish, Bulgarian, Norwegian, and other traditions. It was original and unexpectedly entertaining!

One of the main attractions, Gåte, had to cancel due to a band member’s illness and was quickly replaced by Hindarfjäll & Peter Franzen, a Swedish project that uses modern instruments to recreate the ancient sounds and atmospheres of Scandinavian/Nordic folk music.

Next, we escaped the rain by heading back into Gildehallen, catching the last few songs from local thrash band Mortal Fear—three teenagers with the drummer’s father on vocals. It was very entertaining!

The day ended with thrash metal titans Testament from California, USA, closing out the main stage at Heiheim.

Day 3 was special, with two bands from my hometown, Tønsberg, performing. Seigmen headlined the Helheim stage, while newcomers Fabbrica 82 were about to play their first-ever show in Gildehallen. We spent an hour there beforehand, chatting with the band members, Knut Ove Hansen and Lars Anders Berg, before their soundcheck and concert.

S-L: How did you come up with the band name?

Knut Ove Hansen: We started high school in 1982, and we chose Fabbrica because we wanted a name that could be associated with new wave. We went with the Italian version because “factory” was already overused in English, and I have a personal connection to Italy.

S-L: What were your first attempts at releasing music?

KOH: One of my early bands made our first demo tape at the local radio station in Tønsberg in 1985—it was actually the first synth-related demo recorded in Tønsberg! We played three gigs the following year as the band Some Bizzare, named after the famous compilation album where Depeche Mode, among others, had their first track on vinyl. We also had a third member, Bjørn Arnesen, who now lives in Peru. Lars reached out to me several times, in 2020 and again in 2023, asking if we should give it another try. I was hesitant at first, but then we made “Darkness,” and we were back at it.

Lars Anders Berg: Over the years, I’ve composed hundreds of songs, and I always wanted someone to sing to my tunes. After years of talking about it, we finally made it happen. It’s been a lot of fun, and we’ve quickly released several singles!

S-L: Any album in the making?

KOH: Yes, it’s what we’re working on. We also got another gig in October in Tønsberg. This is not where we thought we would be just six months after our first release – feels quite surreal! All because of the word of mouth in Tønsberg’s small “synth underground”, and it also spread to Oslo where we’ve gotten good feedback.

S-L: What’s your inspiration?

Lars Anders Berg: I listen to a lot of music, not just old synth, but many electronic genres. So, the process of creating themes, melodies, and tweaking knobs is an inspiration in itself.

As the hall filled with people, we noticed at least a dozen audience members already wearing fan T-shirts, and the band was thrilled after their first show.

As we left Gildehallen, we caught a few songs from Nytt Land on the Valhalla stage—a Siberian shamanic act that blends the vocal traditions of Northern Europe with traditional Siberian throat singing. It was a stark contrast after a synth gig and truly highlighted the diversity of the festival!

The last show we attended on Thursday was Seigmen at the Helheim stage. It was a fantastic performance, featuring a new song with guest Espen Winther from the medieval/folk band Eldrim, playing his harp. It was magical—a gig that later received well-deserved praise in reviews!

Snifferdog reworks Don Juan Dracula comeback single 'Burn'

The last day of the festival started off relaxed, with a stroll around, soaking in the sights and atmosphere under the sun. Then Ledfoot (Tim Scott McConnell) took the Valhalla stage. This goth-blues phenomenon was someone I’d been wanting to see live for a while, and he didn’t disappoint. He delivered a set full of raw emotion—soreness, anger, longing—and impressive guitar playing.

I had been in touch with him before the festival, and we agreed to try for an interview. However, due to his soundman’s tight schedule, they had to leave the area minutes after the show, so we exchanged a few words via Messenger a few days later instead.

S-L: How was your gig at Midgardsblot?

Ledfoot: The audience was great, and there was such a good vibe there 🙏

S-L: Did the show or audience differ much from your solo gigs?

Ledfoot: No, it’s the same everywhere—I do my best and hope the audience appreciates it.

S-L: More music in the works?

Ledfoot: I’ve started on my new record, and hopefully it’ll be out by the end of the year.
And I’d like to say a big thank you to the audience and all the people working behind the scenes.
Hugs!

Next, we went to see Bel Canto, the pioneering Norwegian electronica band, performing a set that spanned their entire career, including a few new tracks from their latest album Radiant Green. As always, they delivered a top-notch performance, and Anneli’s voice remains as impressive as ever!

Making Bernard envious by sending him live photos was an obligatory part of attending Bel Canto 😉

I also managed to spend a few minutes in Gildehallen to check out another band with a Tønsberg connection, though mostly from Oslo—the doom-sludge-ultra-heavy Dwaal. The hall was packed, with a queue outside, clearly hitting their target audience perfectly. I later caught up with lead singer Bjørnar Kristansen to ask about their experience.

S-L: How did Midgardsblot treat you?

Bjørnar Kristansen: Midgardsblot was amazing. Right after the show, we said it was one of our favorite gigs, if not our favorite. The crowd’s energy from the first riff to the last deeply affected us. I asked for a ritual, and we got a ritual for sure. A true catharsis, both on and off stage.

S-L: How does playing at a festival like this compare to club gigs?

BK: Festivals are different from club gigs because the crowd is a more varied mix of people—those who already know Dwaal and those giving us a chance for the first time. Not to say anything bad about the Norwegian audience, but it seems like international music lovers are more open to discovering new music. They come from far away and want to engage with as much as they can, even if they’ve never heard us before. It makes for an intense experience in the best way.

S-L: Did you explore the festival area, try the Viking activities or food?

BK: Our drummer Anders went on Friday and had a great time at the Blot. The rest of Dwaal arrived on Saturday, and we had some time to explore the festival. It’s an incredible event. Everyone makes you feel so welcome and included. A huge recommendation from Dwaal!

S-L: Any upcoming releases, albums, gigs, or other news?

BK: As 2024 winds down, we’re hard at work on new music, with some exciting projects that push us out of our comfort zone, which we love. Our last regular concert of the year will be at Apollon Tønsberg on October 11th, with Uaar as support. On December 14th, we’re playing the Caliban Sessions, a yearly mini-festival hosted by Ole Petter Andreassen of Black Debbath, Thulsa Doom, and Cumshots fame. It will be a fantastic end to a great year for Dwaal, marking our tenth year as a band. There are plans for a gig in Oslo in 2025, so stay tuned for that announcement.

We’re also in talks for more live shows in Europe, though nothing we can confirm just yet. And of course, if Midgardsblot invites us back, we’d love to play again!

The last show in Gildehallen this time around was the one that probably impressed me the most—Karin Park from Sweden. Alone on stage, standing between two tables covered with synths, computers, and modular gear, she sounded and performed like a full band, delivering an incredibly energetic set. Crown her the Queen of Synth already! (go to https://www.facebook.com/748210539/videos/1540166493571503/ for videos, several in the comments!)

The Norwegian band Emperor, regarded as pioneers of extreme black metal, closed the festival on the main stage, Helheim, in front of a devoted audience.

To sum it all up: a festival well worth visiting! As they’ve expanded the musical genres in their lineup, there’s now something for everyone without losing their core purpose or audience. This approach also increases the chance to discover something new, which is always a plus!

A big shoutout to Runa Strindin, the driving force behind the festival, and her entire crew for making it such a success! Hopefully, they’ll continue for years to come, and perhaps the 10th anniversary next year will be even more special?!

PS: As a food enthusiast, I must mention the excellent variety of food, ranging from handmade hot dogs to Thai, Mexican, elk burgers, and elk kebabs! Most impressive was the food from the Norwegian Chefs National Association, Vestfold branch (Norske kokkers Landsforening, avdeling Vestfold)—their hot-smoked halibut dish was to die for! 😊

Jan Ronald Stange

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Dero Goi (ex-OOMPH!) offers video single ‘Whistleblower’ ahead new album

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Tue, 10 Sep 2024 12:48:07 +0000

Former OOMPH! frontman Dero Goi has released the video single for his latest track “Whistleblower”, a tribute to whistleblowers who risk their lives and freedom to expose serious crimes. This track is from his forthcoming debut double album, “1984”, scheduled for release on November 29, 2024.

“The lyrics of ‘Whistleblower’ and the theme of the video are directly related to the title of the track,” Dero Goi explains. “Julian Assange’s release was a surprise and a relief, but there are still many whistleblowers who continue to suffer in silence. It’s shameful that the German government remains indifferent to Edward Snowden’s situation, a critical voice in our fight for truth and transparency.”

“1984” marks GOI’s first major project since his departure from OOMPH! in 2021. Known for pioneering the Neue Deutsche Härte genre with his former band, GOI has since taken a different creative path, embracing electronic influences. His vast array of inspirations, ranging from industrial legends like Front 242 to icons like Depeche Mode and ABBA.

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C-Lekktor celebrates 20 years of dark elektro with ‘2.0’ 2CD – Out now

Eldrina Mich — Mon, 09 Sep 2024 13:15:03 +0000

C-Lekktor, a leading name in the dark elektro scene alongside Hocico, Rabia Sorda, and Amduscia, celebrates its 20 years anniversary. Markko B. has now released a special “2.0” double-CD deluxe digipak on Alfa Matrix. This release includes fan-favorite club hits and revamped versions of 12 classic tracks.

This 2CD version is available now via the Alfa Matrix website, the download version via Bandcamp. The album is also available in a special combi pack along the new releases from AD:keY and Miseria Ultima.

On this new album Markko B. has breathed new life into frequently requested songs performed at concerts. Updated tracks such as “An Empty Soul”, “Infected”, “Paralisis”, “See My Hate”, “El Comienzo De La Muerte”, and “Our Dark Side” are reimagined and rearranged, while classics like “World Of Fantasy”, “Juicio Final”, “Hellektro Convulsion Therapy”, “Solo En La Oscuridad”, and “Silence Remains” have received powerful makeovers.

The release also features harsh elektro tracks in their original form from recent albums, including fresh tracks like “God Killer” and “Are You Ready For The Bass?” alongside dancefloor cuts “Out Of My Way”, “Cyborgs”, and the track “Animals”.

Additionally, the double-CD set includes the exclusive unreleased track “I Don’t”, originally written during “The Silence Procession” era, and a cover of Depeche Mode’s “Always You”.

You can listen to all of the tracks below.

2.0 (Bonus Version) by C-LEKKTOR

Fans of dark hellektro music, especially those who enjoy Suicide Commando, Hocico, Alien Vampires, or Noisuf-X, will find this double-CD essential.

About C-Lekktor

Eldrina Mich

As Eldrina Mich I work as a go-between and a devil’s advocate when it comes to Side-Line. If our own staff needs to be interviewed then ask the questions no one else dares to ask.

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Alessandro Cortini (Nine Inch Nails) launches very first track from new album ‘Nati Infiniti’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Tue, 03 Sep 2024 17:50:03 +0000

(Photo by Emilie Elizabeth) Out 4 October on Mute, followed by UK, European and American tour dates, is the brand new album from Nine Inch Nails member Alessandro Cortini, “Nati Infiniti”. Today the Italian musician releases a first track, “IV”.

Watch the video for “‘”IV” with imagery by Marco Ciceri.

The 40-minutes album “Nati Infiniti” is composed of five movements and debuted as an audio installation commissioned by Sónar Lisboa 2022 that ran across four floors of the Museu de Lisboa’s Fábrica da Moagem, a disused flour mill.

The work – which utilises the Strega instrument that Cortini co-designed with Make Noise – was mixed and mastered by Marta Salogni (Björk, Depeche Mode, Lucrecia Dalt). The album will be out on vinyl (featuring an embossed silver mirror board sleeve), CD (with a clear varnished gatefold mirror board sleeve), and digitally.

About Alessandro Cortini

Alessandro Cortini is best known as a longstanding member of Nine Inch Nails (from 2005 to the present day), He has been releasing a steady stream of his own music on labels including Mute, Hospital, and Important Records for the past decade.

Throughout his career he has collaborated with the likes of Lawrence English, Daniel Avery, and Merzbow and found time to create the Strega (used on his previous album, “Scuro Chiaro”) and the forthcoming module, Bruxa, with Make Noise.

Additionally, he has remixed tracks for Depeche Mode, Mogwai, Death Cab For Cutie, Yann Tiersen, and Vatican Shadow.

Alessandro Cortini on tour

Cortini will embark on a tour of North America and Europe throughout ’24 and into ‘25 – with more dates to be added.

5 Sept 2024 – Reykjavik, Extreme Chill IS
19 Sept 2024 – Glasgow, Sonica Festival UK
3 Oct 2024 – Albany, NY, Empire State Plaza Performing Arts Center, “The Egg” US
4 Oct 2024 – Queens, NY, Knockdown Center US
6 Oct 2024 – Boston, MA, Sonia US
7 Oct 2024 – Minneapolis, MN, The Cedar US
9 Oct 2024 – Chicago, IL, Empty Bottle US
10 Oct 2024 – Austin, TX, Central Presbyterian Church US
11 Oct 2024 – Seattle, WA, Age of Reflections at Seattle First Baptist US
12 Oct 2024 – Portland, OR, Age of Reflections at Trinity Cathedral US
13 Oct 2024 – Los Angeles, CA, Teragram Ballroom US
20 Nov 2024 – Brussels, Bozar BE
6 Dec 2024 – Berlin, Silent Green DE
17 Jan 2025 – Paris, Trabendo FR

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Sjöblom releases new single ‘Dead For Years’ ahead of upcoming album

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 30 Aug 2024 08:41:04 +0000

Out on September 6, is the newest single from the Swedish electro-pop duo Sjöblom, “Dead For Years”. “Dead For Years” is the lead single from their forthcoming album “Dead Of Night”. The single is available for pre-order now, and the upcoming album is set to be released later in the year on COP International.

The single also features two remixes: the “Apparition mix” by Fracture Foyer and the “Rapid Eye Movement mix” by Operation Blue Eyes.

Sjöblom, comprised of Johan Sjöblom Eliot and Robert Eklind, drew inspiration from iconic bands like Depeche Mode and Apoptygma Berzerk for the sound on this new single. “It’s funny how perception works,” says Robert. “I always intended for this track to have a darkwave or even gothic sound, but a friend mentioned it reminded him of Depeche Mode, which is a huge compliment.”

The lyrics are based on a text by Johnny Nattsjö (DJ Batcat). The production was handled by Jon Bordon and Sjöblom at Joniverse Studios.

Dead For Years by SJÖBLOM

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Logiq & Olivia – Channel Two (Part Two) (EP – Digital – Infacted Recordings)

Inferno Sound Diaries — Thu, 08 Aug 2024 19:00:00 +0000

Logiq & Olivia have returned with a new EP released a few months ago. The sound stays true to the Electro-Pop style that the German band developed in their earlier works. The EP is melodic, tinged with a touch of melancholy, yet remains danceable. While the cover of Depeche Mode’s “World In My Eyes” might not have been essential, it adds an interesting twist. Additionally, you’ll find two ‘harder’ remixes of the new songs. Overall, it’s a solid record from a project with the potential to be even better. (Rating: 8)

Listen to “Song Of The Old Man”:

Song Of The Old Man by Logiq & Olivia

About Logiq & Olivia

Logiq & Olivia is a German electro-pop project releasing through Infacted Recordings. Their sound is melodic and dance-oriented, carried over from earlier releases into the EP “Channel Two (Part Two),” which pairs new original tracks, a cover of Depeche Mode’s “World In My Eyes,” and two harder remixes.

Inferno Sound Diaries

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History Of Guns release brand new single and video: ‘What’s Buried (Will Rise)’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 31 Jul 2024 16:46:49 +0000

The Hertfordshire-based industrial-postpunk band History Of Guns has released a new single, “What’s Buried (Will Rise)”, from their latest album “Half Light”. In the single the band continues to explore psychological themes, addressing the repression experienced by non-conformists and the resulting systematic amnesia. The single, inspired by Freud and Jung, features a video influenced by “The Talented Mr. Ripley” which you can see below.

“How well do we really know ourselves? The “introspection illusion” suggests that the way we view ourselves is probably inherently distorted. In terms of the conscious, the subconscious and the unconscious, how much of how we think and behave is driven by each aspect? Freud & Jung’s theories of repression say that the more you try to bury something that happened, or some aspect of your self the more it will come back in some form or other as “the return of the repressed’,” says producer and band member Max Rael.

“As for the video, I’ve always been obsessed with that kind of high contrast black white look ever since I fell in love with Orson Welles. I was watching the recent adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s Talented Mr Ripley books on Netflix, and there’s an episode where Tom and Dicky are out in this little two-man boat. Because the songs on ‘Half Light’ are aligned to the Greek Elements, I thought it’d be great to have this video in black and white, with shots of submerged objects floating to the surface. We had some help from ace director and VFX supremo Howard Gardner. I think the end result is intriguing, and a bit wrong, but hopefully wrong in a good way!”

The full album “Half Light” was mixed by Max Rael and Caden Clarkson, produced by Rael, and mastered by Pete Maher (known for his work with U2, Pixies, and Depeche Mode). On this album, founding members Del Alien (vocals) and Max Rael (keyboards, programming) are joined by guitarist Caden Clarkson (the newest member of History Of Guns). The album is available on Spotify, Apple Music, and Bandcamp.

The new album (released via the Liquid Len Recording Company) was previewed by the singles “No Longer Earthbound” and “When You Don’t Matter”.

Half Light by History Of Guns

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Uwe H. Schmidt faces huge backlash after playing Russian Outline festival

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sun, 28 Jul 2024 16:11:21 +0000

(The visual is AI generated) In July 2024, German composer, musician and producer of electronic music Uwe H. Schmidt (aka Lassigue Bendthaus, Atom™, Atom Heart, or Señor Coconut) headlined the Russian Outline festival, which returned after its last edition in 2016, and this amid the ongoing conflict with Ukraine.

Run by the team behind Moscow club Mutabor, the house, techno and experimental festival took place last week (18-24 July) in Taldom, a small town on the outskirts of the capital. Playing were international acts like Atom™, Margaret Dygas and Le Syndicat Electronique who joined local DJs and live acts including Tim Aminov, Denis Kaznacheev and Sofia Rodina.

Present at the festival also was a military recruitment tent and vehicles marked with the letter “Z”, symbols associated with the Russian military effort against Ukraine.

Moscow region July 2023. Outline festival. I pointed out that u should remember those artists in the lineup. Can we tell now that they are officially support genocide of Ukrainians and act as an entertainment at the points of recruiting (mobilization) of russians for the war? pic.twitter.com/gxi5G6SgJf
— Maya Baklanova (@mayabaklanova) July 7, 2023

It didn’t take long before critics, such as Ukrainian activist Maya Baklanova, said that Western artists performing in Russia were normalizing the war and supporting the Russian regime by their participation.

Schmidt responded to the criticism by calling it a “smear campaign” against him. He defended his performance, implying that the accusations were unfounded and intended to damage his reputation. And he added: “It is also painful that at this point in my career I have, for the first time, to make a non-musical public statement of that sort, yet it seems that times require this to be done. (…) I consider myself a profoundly non- or rather trans-political person. Many years ago I had decided to take the path of making true human bonds through music. Unlike politics, which is the mode of separation, I had chosen music, which is the mode of connection.”

Surprisingly Schmidt’s recent performance in Russia was backed by an official support letter, issued by the German Embassy in St. Petersburg.

Liebe deutsche Techno-Community, um @Atom_TM_news, liebes deutsches Generalkonsulat in Sankt Petersburg @germania_online, habt ihr sie noch alle? Im kriegführenden russland die kriegsbejahende Masse mit deutschen Techno-Acts belohnen und damit diesen Terrorstaat normalisieren? pic.twitter.com/8BdGFjA7z8
— Ukrainki_UA (@Ukrainki_UA) July 28, 2024

This letter was accompanied by a meeting with the general consul Mr. Schimandl of which an official post was made on VK by the German Embassy itself. We took a screenshot of said post below.

DJ Atom™ and the Consul General of Germany Milan Schimandl

Criticism continues as for instance even Russian techno producer Pavel Milyakov (aka Buttechno) accused the artists at the festival of attracting people to a war effort, stating that their performances indirectly supported the military budget used for the invasion of Ukraine.

Und wie wird sich versucht rauszureden? @Atom_TM_news will Verbindungen schaffen. Ich bezweifle, dass auf dem Festival Ukrainer sind. Zwischen wem werden also diese Verbindungen geschaffen? Zahlenden Kunden und einem deutschen DJ…? pic.twitter.com/9rfXdDRLaC
— Ukrainki_UA (@Ukrainki_UA) July 28, 2024

His official statements contains some disturbing clues, such as, “this link may be blocked in your free, democratic country,” “this situation, the one of being forced into political obedience,” and “(it) has poisoned music and other arts as it enslaves them to ideology.” He seems to suggest that condemning Russian aggression equates to political obedience.

And that is when, regrettably, we recognize a kind of responses that are typical among artists who support Russia, like for instance Simone Salvatori (Spiritual Front). It’s clear now that Uwe H. Schmidt decided to follow the Russian propaganda narrative instead of using is name and fame to condemn the Russian invasion. His defensive line as if music should be non-political is hereby completely destroyed. Rumor has it also that the DJs playing at the fest received exceptionally high fees.

Sad to see this happening from an artist we used to admire. Not anymore after this.

About Uwe H. Schmidt

Uwe H. Schmidt, born on August 27, 1968, in Frankfurt, Germany, began his musical journey in the early 1980s. Initially playing drums, he soon transitioned to programming a drum computer inspired by the sounds of the Linn Drum. In 1986, Schmidt co-founded the cassette label N.G. Medien, releasing works by international artists, including Frontline Assembly, and his own project Lassigue Bendthaus with “The Engineer’s Love”. His first official Lassigue Bendthaus album, “Matter”, was recorded over four years and released in 1991, establishing his early career.

Living in Frankfurt, Schmidt was influenced by the burgeoning house and acid house scenes. He adopted the alias Atom Heart and released several dance-oriented 12-inch vinyl records under various project names. In 1992, he produced tracks for DJs Pascal F.E.O.S., Ata, and Heiko M/S/O, contributing to the early trance movement. Collaborations with Tetsu Inoue led to the formation of the Datacide project in 1993. Despite challenges with record labels, Schmidt continued to innovate, founding his own label, Rather Interesting, in 1994 to explore diverse musical ideas.

In the mid-1990s, Schmidt collaborated with artists like Bill Laswell and Haruomi Hosono, producing albums under multiple aliases. He met Chilean musician Dandy Jack, and in 1997, they relocated to Santiago, Chile, where Schmidt completed the first Señor Coconut album, “El Gran Baile”. This period marked the creation of his “electrolatino” style, blending traditional Latin music with electronic elements. He continued to release a monthly album on Rather Interesting.

Schmidt’s last Lassigue Bendthaus album, “Pop Artificielle”, released in 1999 under the name LB included electronic cover versions of famous pop songs. His next major project, “El Baile Alemán” by Señor Coconut, featured cha-cha-cha versions of Kraftwerk songs and received approval from Kraftwerk themselves. The album’s success led to international tours, including Europe and an intended U.S. tour. During this time, Schmidt also released innovative works like Geeez ‘n’ Gosh and collaborated with Bernd Friedmann on the Flanger project.

Schmidt continued to remix prominent artists, including Depeche Mode and Air, while touring extensively with his 9-piece Señor Coconut orchestra. The album “Yellow Fever!”, featuring covers of Yellow Magic Orchestra songs, became a major hit in Japan. Schmidt also released the Señor Coconut album “Around the World”, collaborating with artists like Stephan Remmler and Louie Austen.

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The Children’s Crusade announce ‘Remixes Vol. 1’ 3-track EP to be released this Friday

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Wed, 24 Jul 2024 10:36:13 +0000

Chicago-based electronic rock band, The Children’s Crusade, announces the release of their new EP, “Remixes Vol. 1”, set to debut on Friday, July 26, 2024. The band which draws influences from groups such as Ministry, Skinny Puppy, Nine Inch Nails, and Depeche Mode, presents a fresh take on their sound through this collection of remixes.

The EP features three remixed tracks: “Mechanical Love”, “Confess”, and “For You”. The remix for “Confess” was crafted by Faulty Radiator, while Apothecurio handled the remix for “For You”.

The Children’s Crusade, led by vocalist Jason Schmal, is a one-man endeavor in the studio, but transforms into a full band featuring Oscar Peck-Dorr and Max Hatlem during live performances.

Below is the original version of “Mechanical Love”.

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Interview with Mat Smith (The Engineer) on pop music articles and sleevenotes

János Janurik — Sat, 20 Jul 2024 17:51:40 +0000

(Interview by Janos Janurik) Ever since I got into online music journalism, I’ve always been interested in the background characters around my favourite musicians’ releases that add something important to the product we, the fans end up with.

With this in mind, over the years I have interviewed personalities such as Anton Corbijn (photographer of Depeche Mode and many other music greats), Gareth Jones and Mark Saunders (producers and mixmasters of Depeche Mode and Erasure amongst others).

About eight years ago I had the honour of helping to promote Vince Clarke’s then newly founded mini-record label (VeryRecords) and his releases. In addition to the artists whose albums have been released there in recent years, I also got in contact with Mat Smith, who, like me, is a freelancer – readers of Electronic Sound and Clash know him well – and works as a publicist for VeryRecords as well as being commissioned by Erasure and Mute for a number of press pieces. He also wrote the sleevenotes in the booklet of the new “Cowboy” Deluxe-Edition.

In addition to his journalistic work, he also has his own project “Mortality Tables”, which has just released a new mini-album on cassette and as a digital download. Last November, at the premiere of Vince Clarke’s solo album in London, I had the pleasure of meeting Mat in person and we had a lively chat about our shared passion for music. Knowing how important this project is to him, I approached him and asked him a few questions about it.

But then life, or rather death, intervened. I didn’t mean this as a cheap shot, but it was indeed a sad event that forced me to make changes to the interview I had with my friend and colleague almost three weeks ago. Now that the aforementioned label is going on holiday, and before I do the same, I would like to bring this exciting musical venture (“The Engineer”) to your attention – and this interview with the man behind it.

SL: Tell us briefly about how you became interested in music. Have you had any musical training, have you learnt to play any instruments? Do you remember the first record you bought?

I grew up in a house where music seemed to always be playing, either on the radio or on my parent’s stereo. My mother listened to a lot of ABBA. Nothing about that was exceptional, particularly. When I used to go to friends’ houses, they always seemed to have the TV switched on, which felt strange to me. My family chose music, and I’ve surrounded myself with it ever since.

I tried to play the recorder, which was the instrument that most of us learned as kids. My parents gave me a blue one for Christmas one year. I couldn’t play a single note. I briefly learned the basics of notation at school but very quickly forgot all of it. In early high school music classes I was more interested in recording real-life sounds into the Casio keyboard and using those to make compositions. Not long after that, I started making sample-based electronic music on my Amiga 500.

The first album I owned was Nik Kershaw’s ‘Human Racing’. I was given for my birthday the year it was released, along with a Sanyo portable cassette player. I played that album constantly. I wore out the cassette player after two weeks but I still have the ‘Human Racing’ tape and it still sounds incredible to me.

SL: When did you discover electronic music? And who was the first electronic artist who introduced you to the world of electronic music?

My father is responsible for switching me on to electronic music. There were three pivotal events, and they all relate to times I was with my father.

The first was one evening when my mother was at her restaurant job, and my father was looking after me. I was playing with Lego in the lounge and Gary Numan was performing ‘Cars’ on TV. That performance completely captivated me.

The next was driving around in my father’s car while he did his second job as a debt collector. A friend at work had recorded two tracks from OMD’s ‘Architecture & Morality’ album onto a cassette for him. The songs were ‘Joan Of Arc’ and ‘Maid Of Orleans’, and we’d listen to them over and over.

The third was Soft Cell’s ‘Non-Stop Erotic Videotape’, which he brought home from work one day. That was pretty mind-blowing for a five-year old, and I can only imagine he didn’t realise what it was. It was definitely not suitable for a kid of my age, but, looking back, I don’t remember the imagery – I only recall the music.

So I owe my father a huge debt for how he shaped my music tastes at a very early age. He was also the one who brought home a cassette copy of ‘The Innocents’ by Erasure and gave it to me. He had no idea quite what he started that day.

SL: When did you start writing journalistic texts for Mute Records and its artists? What was your first article for Mute and about which artist, which release?

I began a blog called Documentary Evidence in 2003, which was focused on my personal Mute Records collection. I’d just write about the releases from a mostly non-musical perspective, explaining how they made me feel. I still write reviews like that today for Electronic Sound. I also got really interested in telling the stories of specific releases or artists, and that led me to interview people who released music through Mute, or were somehow connected to the label. I have a natural curiosity and inquisitiveness, and that seems to mean people like talking to me and opening up.

From there I started writing for Clash, and then Electronic Sound and some other places. In 2017 I got asked to chair a panel discussion with Anton Corbijn, Daniel Miller, Paul A. Taylor and Steve Claydon (Add N To (X)) at Rough Trade East in London, about the visual identity of Mute. The first written Mute commission I got was to write a press biography for Chris Carter’s ‘Chemistry Lessons Vol. 1’. I couldn’t believe they asked me to do that, and I couldn’t believe I was being paid to write for the label I loved so much. The team at Mute liked what I did and I’ve been given a few more things to do since then, as well as with the team at BMG who look after the Erasure reissue programme, and Erasure themselves.

SL: Did Vince Clarke’s VeryRecords label and the associated promotion give you any impetus for your own project, which you called “Mortality Tables”?

Indirectly, yes, but perhaps not in the way you might expect.

My task with VeryRecords was to assemble the press releases. It was the first time I’d worked behind the scenes of a release, where I’d often get involved before the album was even mastered, or before the artwork had even been considered. So I’d be talking to the artists – Reed & Caroline, Alka and Brook – at a very early stage, generally when Vince felt that the album was finished enough for me to listen and for me to start engaging the artists.

It took a while for me to realise this, but the process of working with the artists to write a press release became a collaboration – between all of us, and between my words and their music. I wasn’t just a writer but part of the collective effort to put this music out into the world. I did the same with Nick Hook’s Calm + Collect label, working on releases by Gareth Jones, Spiritual Friendship and others.

In 2019, when I began forming Mortality Tables, I envisaged it as a creative community of collaborators. You can definitely draw a line between that and the ideas that began to form as I worked with VeryRecords and its artists. I also took a lot of inspiration from Vince, who didn’t feel that he needed to only focus on the music that people would expect him to release. That sense of freedom, which Daniel Miller also brought to Mute, directly fed into what Mortality Tables has become. I wanted something where I could work with people making sound art as well as people making images. It had to have artistic breadth.

I wanted Mortality Tables to be like a gallery, with a portfolio of artists in vastly different disciplines. That’s why Neil Coe deigned the first sleeve image to look like the description of an artwork on the wall of a gallery.

SL: The name of the project refers to the work of actuaries who measure the statistical probability of life insurance payouts. You do something like this in your everyday working life, don’t you?

That’s right. I work with insurance companies all around the world, and have done for over twenty years. I find lots of parallels between the worlds of insurance and electronic music, and the kinds of people I engage with in both of my jobs.

The story goes that I was meeting a friend in a café in Bloomsbury in London one morning. He runs a record label, which is another big inspiration for Mortality Tables. He wishes to remain anonymous, but he is actively involved, in the sense that he must approve anything we decide to do. I call him the Creative Consultant.

So I was meeting him and he had an LP of one of his releases to give me. He asked me if I had a bag to put it in, and I reached into rucksack and retrieved a tote bag. It was from the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and had been given to me by an actuary a few years before. The Creative Consultant saw the bag with its logo and Latin inscription (‘e peritia ratio’ – ‘reason from experience’) and asked what it meant. I replied, “It’s all mortality tables and shit like that.” The name stuck.

We created our first Mortality Tables Product that morning. It’s called FORKTALK and is a conversation between two friends. We do not publish the details of our conversations. Its entry in the Mortality Tables Catalogue is MTP0.

SL: Dave Clarkson, who is mostly active in electronic and experimental music and Wonderful Beasts, a sound art/electronic music duo consisting of the anonymous Xqui and Carl Knott (boycalledcrow, Spacelab) were your first artists, right? How did you get in touch with them?

The release that moved Mortality Tables from something conceptual to something ‘real’ was ‘Two Meditations For Freya’ by Goodparley (whose name has now changed to Please Close Your Eyes). That was in 2022. It signalled what I wanted Mortality Tables to be: I would come up with ideas and hand them to someone to ‘respond’ to.

That concept has stayed consistent through the first two years of Mortality Tables. I’ll come up with an idea and pick someone to get involved. At the last count, there are at least fifty people who are collaborators. And it isn’t just sound projects – Mortality Tables encompasses sound, art, and words. And insurance.

However, all rules in creativity are there to be broken, and I broke my own rules in 2023 with the release of Dave Clarkson’s ‘Ghosts Of Christmas Past (Music From Vintage Toys)’. I had nothing to do with the concept of that album, so I guess that’s a bit like Mortality Tables acting like a traditional record label, which is a description I never want to use. The same is true of Andrew Brenza and Alka’s ‘pod’ and boycalledcrow’s ‘Kullu’. However, all these releases only existed because of an earlier collaboration, and that’s how I got myself comfortable with releasing these projects. You’ll see a few more of those types of projects from Mortality Tables over the next few years.

In answer to your question about how I find artist, it’s actually really straightforward. Anyone involved with Mortality Tables is someone whose music I’ve written about. As for how I choose an artist for a particular project, that’s mostly a case of matching a collaborator to an idea that feels aligned to what they would usually do. However, some of the most enjoyable projects are where the artist is working a long way outside of what they might normally do.

SL: After artists like Andrew Spackman, Rupert Lally, Simon Fisher Turner and Veryan, two years ago you released a strange and experimental piece called “On Mortality, Immortality & Charles Ives”. The piece is a spoken word piece in which you read out the Mortality Tables’ manifesto: “In life, our one true certainty is death.” This narration, recorded by Gareth Jones, was then sent to Vince Clarke who recorded a musical response to the text, which forms the soundtrack to the release. How did you come up with this, somewhat absurd, idea?

I had bought a copy of a book by Alex Danchev called ‘100 Artists’ Manifestos – From The Futurists To The Stuckists’ at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in 2021. I read each of the manifestos from groups like the Surrealists, Dadaists and Situationists as if they were short stories, and it became a really profound experience. On the back of ‘Two Meditations For Freya’, people had started to ask me what Mortality Tables was all about, so it seemed completely natural (and not absurd at all) to write a manifesto.

Mostly it was designed to help me understand why I was doing this, and then I decided to explain it to everyone else. That’s when I asked Gareth to record my narration. At the same time I approached Vince and an anonymous sound artist called venoztks to create sound pieces to accompany it.

The listener can judge whether it successfully explains what this is all about, or not. It does explain why the composer and actuary Charles Ives is so critical to the evolution of Mortality Tables. In fact, the second Mortality Tables Product to be made available was a postcard containing an illustration of Ives in front of a mortality table from 1874, the year of Ives’s birth. That piece was a collaboration with Savage Pencil who had illustrated a lot of the Blast First sleeves.

SL: Released on June 16th, the 40-copy limited edition cassette “The Engineer” is a charity project for Alzheimer’s disease featuring Vince Clarke, Penelope Trappes, Chris Illingworth, Barney Ashton-Bullock, Lara Jones, Simon Fisher Turner, Hattie Cooke, Gareth Jones, Veryan and others. The title character is your father, isn’t he? Is that why you chose Father’s Day as the release date? Tell us a bit about this project!

The title character, the engineer, is based on my father. This project dates back ten years, probably longer, a long time before Mortality Tables was an idea.

I wrote a short story that tried to deal with my feelings about my father as he approached retirement. He lived for work, had no hobbies or friends, and I envisaged him struggling to cope with the concept of stopping work. I was angry when I wrote it, but I was also scared for him. It’s fiction, but it’s rooted in his reality. His actual retirement was very different to what happens in the story. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2018, and that’s why we’ll donate all profits from ‘The Engineer’ to the Alzheimer’s Society. Sadly he passed away shortly after ‘The Engineer’ was released.

When I published the story on my blog, an electronic musician called Laica (Dave Fleet) offered to create some music inspired by the story. He composed a beautiful piece but the project never got completed. A few years later, I came up with a different idea, which involved someone narrating the story with a piece of music behind it. That version also never got off the ground at all, but I liked the idea of asking someone to narrate the story. That’s when I asked Barney Ashton-Bullock if he would do it. He has a brilliant speaking voice, and it was perfect for this story.

It was Gareth Jones who suggested the idea of having different artists respond to different sections of narration. He said it was a bit like the Surrealist game ‘Exquisite Corpse’. I think of Gareth as my spiritual guru. He has a way of unlocking ideas, and freeing you from obstacles that are only there because you’ve put them there. ‘The Engineer’ wouldn’t exist in this form if it wasn’t for Gareth.

From there, it was a case of picking the collaborators and asking them to respond to a specific 30-second section of narration. No one heard the full story, and no one asked to hear the whole thing. The order the artists agreed to say yes determined which section they got. The only rule I gave them was that their sound response needed to last exactly thirty seconds.

There are two editions of ‘The Engineer’. One is a digital file that combines the narration and sound responses. The other is a cassette that splits the narration and responses apart. That means the only place you can hear Vince Clarke’s sound response without Barney’s narration is on the cassette, which has now sold out.

SL: Barney Ashton-Bullock (the creator of Andy Bell’s “Torsten” projects), Vince Clarke, as well as Reed Hays, Alka and Gareth Jones will be familiar to most of our readers, but who are the other contributors?

Again, everyone involved is someone I’ve written about. When I came up with my collaborator list for this, it was important to me to achieve some sort of diversity. So a lot of the artists here are electronic, but you have artists covering everything from pop to sound art. That was deliberate.

I also wanted diversity of textures. That’s why I included Charlotte Keeffe, Chris Illingworth from GoGo Penguin and Luce Mawdsley. When you put all 29 sound responses together as a single piece, it sounds like a right fucking mess. As the responses were coming in over a 30-month period, I realised that the sprawling, messy quality was a lot like my father’s Alzheimer’s – ideas form, are quickly forgotten before they develop, and are then replaced by something else. That wasn’t planned, at all, but now I can see it was a subconscious idea that must have been there from the moment that Gareth suggested involving lots of artists.

SL: What plans and ideas are currently circulating in your head? Will it be something journalistic or another Mortality Tables release?

I’m always writing, and I’ve got a few big things underway right now, including something for a label I’ve done a few pieces for before.

In terms of Mortality Tables, now that ‘The Engineer’ has been released, all activities will he paused until later in the summer. We’ve released a huge number of Products in just over two years and I need a break. We’ll return later in the summer with Season 03 of LIFEFILES, which is an ongoing project where artists respond to my really basic field recordings.

We’ll also release a single from Please Close Your Eyes, an album from Andrew Spackman and the full version of Andrew Brenza and Alka’s ‘pod’ collaboration. I’ve been working on one of several projects inspired by Charles Ives, ‘Central Park: A Picture-In-Sounds’, which will be issued as a ‘score’ in October, along with some additional performances of the piece. We’ll begin work on another large-scale collaboration called ‘The Impermanence Project’.

Other things will happen. Other things will not.

More information on Mortality Tables releases.

Use code janos for a 10% discount off anything in the Mortality Tables Catalogue.

I would like to end this article with a personal message from Mat Smith, who asks the readers and the music listeners to support, if they can, the Alzheimer’s Society, which has received the proceeds of the tape release mentioned in the interview. If you feel able to, please donate to alzheimers.org.uk directly.

János Janurik

ETH reissues 2020 future pop solo debut ‘Somewhere But Here’ – Out now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Mon, 15 Jul 2024 07:08:12 +0000

Norwegian future pop artist ETH has re-released his first solo album, “Somewhere But Here”. Originally launched on CD in 2020, it’s now available on streaming services and Bandcamp.

Somewhere But Here by ETH (Egil Thomas Hansen)

About ETH

ETH is Egil Thomas Hansen from Supercraft. After nearly two decades in the progressive rock scene with bands like Texaco Stovner, Suspicious Minds, and Fjelltaake, Thomas co-founded the Norwegian future pop band Supercraft in 2007. Since 2009, Supercraft has released three albums, multiple EPs, and numerous singles.

In 2020, ETH debuted with “Somewhere But Here”. Since then, he has released a few singles and an EP. As 2024 unfolds, new ETH material is nearly finished, but the re-release of his 2020 album comes first.

The latest release from ETH is the three-track single “Cover Me,” featuring future pop versions of Depeche Mode classics “Puppets” and “Behind The Wheel,” and a piano rendition of “The Sun And The Rainfall”. Read the review of ‘Somewhere But Here’.

Cover Me by ETH (Egil Thomas Hansen)

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Permafrost return with post-punk single ‘Wrong Heart’ – Video out now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Thu, 04 Jul 2024 06:12:04 +0000

(Photo by Eiril Osen Waerdahl) To be released on 4th July is the newest single by the Nordic-British post-punk quartet Permafrost. “Wrong Heart” is the lead single for the band’s brand new album, “The Light Coming Through”, the follow-up to the “Come Back To Surprise” EP, and expected to be released in October.

In addition to the single, Mental Overdrive (aka Per Martinsen) has remixed the single, which will also be available on 4th July.

Out already is the music video for “Wrong Heart”. The video follows four young girls as they set out to create a music video. Of the video they said: “In another dimension Permafrost could be a girl band. In this reality they are planning to create a music video. They have to drag their equipment into the forest to get to the preferred spot, making it into a road movie with a lot of obstacles on the way – like grazing sheep and deer in the blossoming Norwegian nature. When they finally arrive at the spot and want to start playing, the song finishes. All that work for nothing.”

About Permafrost

Formed originally in Molde, Norway in 1982 by school friends Frode Heggdal Larsen and Kåre Steinsbu, Permafrost has undergone numerous transformations over the years. Now joined by fellow Norwegian Robert Heggdal and Daryl Bamonte from the UK (who worked very closely with Depeche Mode and The Cure for several years), they deliver post-punk of the early ’80s.

Permafrost debuted with the “Godtment” EP in 1983, released on a limited edition of 50 numbered cassettes. In 2019, they followed up with the “Permafrost” EP on vinyl, later making it available digitally in 2021. Throughout 2021, the band dropped three singles. : “Femme Fatale”, “Closed Eyes” and “Restore Us”.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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History Of Guns present all new (8th) album ‘Half Light’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 10:09:14 +0000

History Of Guns comes from the 1990s UK EDM / electronic scene and became famous thanks to their ‘meta-modernist’ industrial sound. Their new (and eighth) album “Half Light” out via the Liquid Len Recording Company follows the singles “No Longer Earthbound” and “When You Don’t Matter”. Mixed by Max Rael and Caden Clarkson, this album was mastered by Pete Maher (U2, Pixies, Nick Cave, Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails).

On this album, founding members Del Alien (vocals) and Max Rael (keyboards, programming) are joined by guitarist Caden Clarkson (the newest member of History Of Guns). We also hear Andy Webster and Marnie from Spucktute on vocals on “Never Give it Up”, Amon Ásentir and Mark Eris from Xykogen on vocals on “Arcadia” joined by the Arcadia Choir (Emma Mills, Priyanka O’Neill, Sohm O’Neill and Ninotschka G.) and finally Nykky Spectre on vocals on “An Invitation”.

“When we came back from hiatus in 2022, we wanted a completely fresh start so we wrote the industrial rock / metal album ‘Forever Dying in Your Eyes’ from scratch. We had half of ‘Half Light’ at least sketched out as an electronic album back in 2008/2009,” explains Max Rael.

“Fortunately, people seem much more comfortable with us being genre-fluid these days and it’s less cause for criticism. Back in the day, certain camps seemed to have a definite need for bands to fit neatly into particular genres and not stray too far outside of it, which meant some of our early stuff was maybe a bit misunderstood because people didn’t know where to put it. We’ve been genuinely amazed by the reaction to the first two singles and are in nervous anticipation for what people will make of the album”.

Half Light by History Of Guns

Formed in Cheshunt, Hertfordshire in 1996, the duo became frontrunners of the Wasp Factory / FuturePunk scene of the early 2000s. The band went on hiatus in 2012, returning with 2022’s album “Forever Dying In Your Eyes” before setting about finishing an electronic project they’d begun in 2008 – resulting in “Half Light”. The starting point for this album lays in Robert Anton Wilson’s words “The future is up for grabs; it belongs to any and all who will take the risk and accept the responsibility of consciously creating the future they want.” The release contains elements of a story currently being written as a novel by Max Rael, with these 10 tracks exploring inner and outer space.

Below is the video for the single “When You Don’t Matter”.

And this is the video for “No Longer Earthbound”.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Cubic interview: ‘Electro, techno and EBM into one package!’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 08:59:30 +0000

Relying solely on hardware synths, drum machines, and fx, the sound of Cubic is made of relentless basslines, vocoder voices, and 4/4 kicks. An explosive fusion of 808 drums, KRAFTWERK percussions, and nostalgic 80’s computer vibes. For the occasion of the release of his new studio album “Back To Basic”, we talked with Belgian electronic artist Franky Deblomme about synths, computers and floppy disks…

The new album is available from Bandcamp and from the Alfa Matrix webstore on CD.

Back To Basic by CUBIC

SL. “Back To Basic” pays homage to the iconic Commodore computers with its title and previous EP releases “c64” and “c128”. Can you tell us more about how these influences shaped the concept and sound of the album?

F. I estimate that I must have got my first computer ( an Atari 800 XL ) sometime around 1986/1988 . Shortly afterwards it was traded in for a Commodore 64. At that time (I was around 14 years old) I was already very into electronic music . With these computers, I naturally thought that I would now be able to handle everything (which was not the case of course). But the familiar sound of the SID chip (in the 64) and the simple programming of a melody (in BASIC) formed the basis of my further musical path. So it seemed appropriate to release a limited floppy disk together with the new CD, containing a few samples that could be used freely. In addition to the floppy disc, the ‘fan pack ‘ also includes 2 postcards and a CUBIC business card

SL. The album promises an explosive fusion of 808 drums, KRAFTWERK percussions, and nostalgic 80’s computer vibes. How did you balance incorporating these retro elements while still creating something fresh and relevant for modern listeners?

F. In my opinion, it is impossible to make really “new” music, everything has been tried before. Over the years you start (under) consciously storing things you like in the back of your mind, which then come back to the surface when you start making music. So the new album definitely contains a lot of ‘classic’ sounds and structures. It is probably not innovative, but I do try to take these classical sounds to a higher level using modern technologies.

SL. “Computer Alphabet”, the opening track, features vocals by the iconic Speak and Spell computer. What inspired this choice, and how does it set the tone for the rest of the album? I see it also as a bridge with the previous album’s concept?

F. Indeed, the first track forms the bridge between the previous album and the new path I have taken with this new album. The previous album was all about the “alphabet”, so it seemed appropriate to repeat this theme one more time. I think I first got to know the Speak and Spell computer sound through the sample in the track LFO by LFO on the Warp label in 1990, which had a big impact on me. The name ‘speak and spell ‘ is of course even more important in my musical influence : the iconic (and best) Depeche Mode album! And yes, I have an original Speak and Spell computer in the studio (but I think you could already guess that).

SL. You mentioned influences from classic electro artists like Anthony Rother and Dopplereffect. How do you pay homage to these pioneers while also infusing your own unique style and modern twists into tracks like ‘ART INN’ or yet ‘Pleasure Machine’?

F. It has to be said that it is mainly because of Dave Clarke that I got to know the ‘electro’ sound. This through his various compilations ( “X-mix Electro Boogie” from 96 and the “World Service” from 2001). This made me delve further into the genre and I discovered artists like Anthony Rother and Dopplerffect. It is a genre that still moves me after 25 years. And as for Anthony Rother, a lot of respect that he keeps going, I still enjoy his monthly youtube videos in his studio. This “electro” scene is still very much alive : there are still a lot of releases and labels dedicated to this genre. With this album, I hope to conquer a place in this community by combining electro, techno and ebm influences into one package.

SL. “Back To Basic” relies solely on hardware synths, drum computers, and effects. Can you discuss the creative process behind using these tools to craft the album’s sonic palette, and how it differs from working with software-based production?

F. First of all, I have no prejudice between soft or hardware or analogue versus digital. Everyone should use what suits them best. For me this is hardware! For this album I used a specific live setup : 1 drum computer + 3 synthesizers + 1 hardware sequencer. With this I started jamming and laying down the basis for a song. Everything is then recorded ‘live’ on separate tracks into Logic ( through my Soundcraft MTK 22 mixer, usually 8 or so separate tracks). Once this basis was there, I could add things or cut and paste until I had a full song. A way of working that I will also use in the future.

SL. The album features the unique use of the first Belgian Drumcomputer (Modor DR2) and its synthesizer counterpart (Modor NF1). What drew you to these specific instruments, and how do they contribute to the overall sound of CUBIC? I have the impression that your home-studio tends to become a sort of synth museum?

F. I’ve always had a weakness for drum computers. So there wasn’t much resistance to also buying the first (e only) Belgian drum computer. Modor’s products are very tacky and really made for live use. They have a unique sound (although they can sound like the classic analogue machines, their aim is to be just different too). Since Belgium has never been a big player in all these electronic music instruments, it seemed only natural to support this project. I do indeed have a nice collection of instruments by now , but I don’t do this purely for collecting. After more than 35 years, I am still hungry to get to know and discover both new and old instruments. Mind you, to make fine music you don’t need 20 synthesizers . I always limit myself to a few instruments per project!

SL. As an artist, how do you navigate blending genres like electro, techno, and EBM to create a cohesive listening experience on “Back To Basic”?

F. CUBIC has always been a project where I wanted to mix different styles and not limit myself to one genre. Which way this goes often depends either on your mood or on the music you are listening to at that moment. For this second album, this is clearly more ‘electro’ than the previous one. But as said, a next album can then go in a different direction, without really losing your identity. And of course it’s great that the label allows me the freedom to experiment across all these different genres.

SL. What do you hope listeners take away from this album, and how do you see it fitting into the broader landscape of electronic music today?

F. In a certain sense, of course, it remains a niche market in which I operate. But a song like ‘TITT’, with vocals and some nice melodies can certainly find its place within a wider audience. I also notice that the new sounds are generating more plays, so we are heading in the right direction here.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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Glis interview with Shaun Frandsen on industrial sounds and future pop fusion

Eldrina Mich — Mon, 03 Jun 2024 10:01:27 +0000

Glis, the electronic music project founded by Shaun Frandsen in 2001, made an unexpected triumphant comeback with the release of the “Gateway To Oblivion” album, a manifestation of the artist’s DNA, blending the raw energy of industrial music with the infectious melodies of future pop. The new album was produced by Sebastian Komor and also features guest vocals by his good old friend AYRIA, and is a strong candidate to be the best future pop album of the year… We did not resist call Seattle for a chat with Shaun…

The album is out now as download and streaming, including from Bandcamp, and on CD, available via the Alfa Matrix webstore.

Gateway To Oblivion by GLIS

SL: “Gateway To Oblivion” marks your unexpected return after many years. What motivated you to revive GLIS, and what themes or messages did you want to convey with this new album?

S. It’s partly the 20-25 year anniversary syndrome. I was feeling like I should do something to commemorate the passing of time. The main spark was last summer during a family vacation in Mexico. I was drinking margaritas and talking to my brother-in-law (who’s also a musician in the folk rock scene) about how music is the language of the cosmos and how important it is to create new things. When I returned home I finished “Sunrise v3.0” and then started working on brand new music.

SL: The album blends industrial music with future pop, showcasing your versatility as a producer, vocalist, songwriter, and instrumentalist. Can you describe your creative process in developing such a diverse and spontaneous sound?

S. I feel like GLIS has always been a blend of different electronic sub-genres. Some albums more than others, but on this one I wanted to kind of showcase the overall aesthetic of the sound throughout the years. I feel you can get a reflection of each of the previous albums on this new album.

SL: Tracks like “Into the Flames” nod to influences such as NIN and DEPECHE MODE. How did these influences shape the mood and direction of “Gateway To Oblivion”?

S. Those are two bands that have been huge influences on me throughout the years (and both still making great music to this day). “Into the Flames” is a kind of intro track that I imagined would also be the intro to the live gig as well. Yes, we want to play live again too! I think you can definitely hear both NIN and DM influences in this track. A bit of “Songs of Faith and Devotion” and “The Fragile”…

SL: Songs like “Ascension” and “Mexico” evoke a straight-up early 2000s synth pop vibe. How do you balance nostalgic elements with contemporary sounds to create something fresh and relevant?

S. Well, I don’t tend hide my influences. “Ascension” is a straight up ode to ICON OF COIL. I met them in 2001 while supporting them in Seattle during their tour with VNV NATION. That’s when I first met Sebastian who helped produce this album and Andy who I worked with a lot in COMBICHRIST. Mexico” is simply supposed to invoke the party vacation vibe in Puerto Vallarta (Mexico). That’s where I decided I was going to bring back GLIS again. Sebastian Komor had a heavy hand in the production of that track. My original demo was more DEPECHE MODE sounding. He made it a lot groovier.

SL: “Cut Away the Demons” and “Damaged” dive into oppressive industrial noise and powerful EBM. What inspired these tracks, and how do they fit into the overall narrative of the album?

G. “Cut Away the Demons” is supposed to be a track that could have been on the “Nemesis” album. Its lyrics and cadence are inspired by Jean-Luc De Meyer’s vocal contribution to that album. It’s about someone who’s overcome by the darkness of addiction and their resolve to conquer it. “Damaged” is a kind of protest track and a musical nod to late 90’s electro-industrial bands such as :WUMPSCUT: and LEATHER STRIP. Two bands I listened to a lot back in the late 90s.

SL: The album features a unique guest appearance by Jennifer Parkin of AYRIA on “Dream Chaser.” How did this collaboration come about, and what was it like working together again?

G. Jenn and I have always kept in touch throughout the years after I produced her first album. We had an amazing time touring together. We even brought her along when I was in COMBICHRIST. We’ve always tried to catch up when she came to town with AYRIA. Last time she was here (in Seattle) in October I told her I was making new music and she said she would love to collaborate again. It was like old times. A full circle moment as she contributed guest vocals on one of my first releases in 2003, which turned into the first AYRIA album soon after.

SL: Like you mentioned it, Sebastian Komor played a pivotal role in shaping the album’s sound. How did his involvement influence the final production, and what elements did he bring to the table?

S. Sebastian went above and beyond what I thought was going to happen when I gave him my original versions of the tracks. He created sounds that we’re begging to evolve from the music. He added a lot of beat elements as well as melodic harmonies. I can’t tell you how happy I am with his work on this album. He took a lot of my tracks and completely boosted their sound quality. He’s a great producer.

SL: “Gateway To Oblivion” tackles themes around the ascension of mankind and the challenges posed by technology. Can you elaborate on these themes and how they reflect both personal and societal struggles?

S. I mean we can all see it happening before us each day. This merging of technologies with everyday life. We’ve basically become part machine by always having smartphones with us everywhere we go. And with the recent emergence of A.I. we’re facing all new challenges and problems as musicians. We’re at the point where we can choose to embrace it all or find some reason to hold back. Will we soon have to validate the fact that we’re human? We seem to be at another turning point in our existence and that’s the overall theme of “Gateway to Oblivion.” It’s a theme commonly addressed on the Industrial music genre, but more than ever it seems these days. We’re moving close to big changes. Are they all for the greater good? We’ll take a dive in and see.

Eldrina Mich

As Eldrina Mich I work as a go-between and a devil’s advocate when it comes to Side-Line. If our own staff needs to be interviewed then ask the questions no one else dares to ask.

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Caelum Wraith releases goth / futurepop album ’13’ – Out now

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Sat, 01 Jun 2024 16:38:31 +0000

Tampa, Florida-based Goth/futurepop band, Caelum Wraith has released its full-length album, “13”.

Caelum Wraith is the brainchild of composer/singer/songwriter, Edward Hunter. The band was inspired by a broad range of influences including Gary Numan, Depeche Mode, Love & Rockets, NIN, Ministry and more. By day he is busy in data science, analytics and AI. He has lectured at MIT, Game Developers Conference, AWS Re:Invent and has appeared in interviews in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and The LA Times. Edward Hunter is joined in the studio and on stage by Fabio Gadel on guitar/bass and Fader on drums.

“13”‘s concept is based upon the idea of embracing the darker side of life. “It underscores how members of the conservative ‘right’ often conduct themselves in quite the opposite manner of the message of faith and forgiveness taught by their religion,” so Edward Hunter comments.

And he adds: “’13’ speaks to the partially-outcast gothic community which continues to be among the most diverse and tolerant groups despite their embracing of the “darker side of life”. Every day we hear conversations among them alluding to the extent which they feel comfortable revealing their darker side in their families, their jobs and in every-day life.”

“13” is available on all major streaming platforms including Bandcamp and Spotify. Below is the video for “Stars Align”.

Below is the full album available on Bandcamp.

13 by Caelum Wraith

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Daryl Bamonte announces debut single Hence: ‘Stuck In My Throat’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Thu, 30 May 2024 17:50:44 +0000

A chance meeting at a climate conference in Berlin in 2023 has led to the formation of the musical collective Hence. Behind the project we find advertising strategist Knuth who met music publisher Daryl Bamonte during a lunch conversation at said climate conference.

Knuth mentioned his recent purchase of modular synths despite having no musical experience and Bamonte encouraged him by saying, “Record something and I’ll release it.” Knuth simply responded, “OK!”

Yes, things can be very simple sometimes.

The debut single “Stuck In My Throat” will be released on 5th June 2024 on the duo’s newly-formed label, Cosmic Cassettes. It features Danish singer Kennie Orsted and Brooklyn-based Yasmin Haddad from NightNight. The release is rounded off with a remix by Portuguese electronic producer Phaser.

The track will be available through Cosmic Cassettes and distributed by Danmark Music Group, with publishing handled by Archangelo Music/BMG.

Here’s a video teaser.

About Daryl Bamonte

Daryl Bamonte has a career spanning nearly four decades in the music industry. He began working with Depeche Mode, a band formed by his childhood friends, in 1980 while he was still in school. Over the next 15 years, he held various roles with the band, including tour manager and project manager, and even replaced Andy Fletcher as the keyboard player during the final legs of the Devotional Tour in 1994.

In addition to his work with Depeche Mode, Bamonte has been involved with The Cure, taking on broader roles such as executive producer for their self-titled album and the Trilogy DVD. In 2005, he founded Bamonte Artist Management, representing various musicians and bands, and later co-founded Archangelo Music, a label and publishing company, in 2021. He remains active as an artist manager and is also involved in the Norwegian post-punk band Permafrost as a keyboardist.

Bamonte also is an ambassador for Europe in Synch, a consultant for Schubert Music Europe, and is involved in several international music projects and conferences.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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ImJudas interview regarding new album: ‘My most tormented prayers…’

Eldrina Mich — Thu, 23 May 2024 19:44:09 +0000

I had the chance to interview The Italian artist Maxx Maryan, who is nobody else but the male half of cult band HELALYN FLOWERS, for the release of his new album, “Viscerheart”, of his solo-project IMJUDAS that is fusing dark pop, post-punk and cold-wave. He brought us behind the veils of this poignant and so intimately intense release…

You can get the album right now from Bandcamp as download and on CD (plus special packages) and all other digital stores.

Viscerheart by IMJUDAS

SL: “Viscerheart” is described as an exploration of love, suffering, obsession, and self-discovery. What inspired you to delve into these intense emotional themes, and how did they shape the overall narrative of this IMJUDAS album?

MM: I like to think that this new album was born from the unsustainability on my part of keeping inside many of my emotional and sentimental disorders and instabilities, because at a certain point I found myself feeling like I was scratching the bottom, so I pulled myself by the ear and I poured my discouragement into music and words. Above all the words, those throughout “Viscerheart”, are very important because they are my sung confession, my most tormented prayer. This is an album of cowardice, because I sing things that I would never have had the courage to say if not by singing them, just as I sing in the title track of the album “I have the courage to shout it but not write it. Why this cowardice? What doesn’t flow between heart and gut?”. Or again, in the song “Lost my faith in nirvana”, with clenched teeth I emit my most painful mantra “my chest is the seat of hate”. Here I call for help. This is not the album of the stupid basking in negativity as a banner of one’s nihilism, NO. There is great hope here.

SL: Your music has been characterized as ‘Electro-synth Pop with a Goth soul.’ How do you balance these genres, and what elements do you incorporate to maintain this unique blend in “Viscerheart”?

MM: As far as I’m concerned, I’m convinced that knowing how to bypass intentionality can give rise to the manifestation of part of our authenticity. At least that’s what I hope for and what holds together everything I’ve written and done. Probably my extreme curiosity on a musical level, therefore my not being stuck in just one musical area, the joy that learning from different styles and genres gives me and a certain shamelessness and contempt for the ‘safe mode’ are all elements that go to stratify my music. “Electro/Synth-Pop” is technically the result of everything, the ‘roof’ under which everything takes shape. While “Goth soul”, in fact, is what animates it. With this I am referring to a precise spiritual approach inherent above all in early Gothic.

SL: The album features a fusion of synth pop, dark wave, and post-punk. Can you discuss your influences from bands like DEPECHE MODE and GARY NUMAN, and how they have impacted your sound on tracks like “Tazebao” or yet “Go Away” for example?

MM: I think Depeche Mode are now so ingrained in me that any reference to them is unintentional! I discovered them as a child when they showed video clips of “Personal Jesus” and “Enjoy the Silence” on TV, between 1989 and 1990, and I haven’t left them since. With all the importance of an album like “Violator”, when I think of them my heart can only turn to the follow-up “Songs of Faith and Devotion”. When it came out it shocked me and from then on it remained for me a cornerstone of the meeting between electronic music and pop and rock. This is why I think that a song like my “Tazebao” is in some way the daughter of that inspiration, even if this is a consideration I make in hindsight; when I write and record, I don’t think about who or what my music might remember. Only when I listen back then do I enjoy finding correspondences, a ‘vice’, this one, quite journalistic and probably reminiscent of my very distant background as a fanzine-maker, ha ha… I can’t tell you how much Gary Numan in my opinion can be in a song like “Go Away”, probably a lot, according to many, given that in almost everything I do people find a reference to this great artist who I listened to a lot in a certain period of my life which coincided with the first years of Helalyn Flowers. I have to say that I really like his more pop records from the 80s.

SL: “Viscerheart” pushes sonic boundaries and ventures into EDM/Dance-Pop and sonic abstraction. What was your creative process in incorporating these diverse sounds, and how do you feel they enhance the album’s emotional journey?

MM: It’s all about picking up the signs. It is a simultaneity of inspiration between words and the “first” sequence, the “right” one. For me it’s all about abandoning yourself to this but also knowing how to control the creative flow so as not to disperse it between the jaws of reason. I think a certain underlying principle of reversibility is also fundamental in this; the more the container fills with beats the more it is about to pour out to empty itself, and there the beat becomes abstraction, absence of beats, rarefaction. The song “Lost my faith in nirvana” is a perfect example of this. But it’s like a yin-yang; these two concepts are not separate but mutually confluent, so that in one of them there is also a part of the other. This is why it happens that even in songs with a strong dance-pop flavour you can hear a ‘cosmic’ dimension in the background made up of hiss, manipulated and dilated vocoders, noise, drowned in the metaphysical distance of the reverb.

SL: The track “I Love You” from the previous single release is described as a Dark Pop / Post-Punk / Cold-Wave anthem. Can you talk about the creation of this song and what message or emotion you hope to convey through it?

MM: “I Love You” was one of the first songs written for the new album, so I think it represents a bit of its embryo and potential state. The love I speak of is not “another” love, because love is only one when it is authentic. I’m talking about how some ways of achieving it can hurt. Possessiveness, for example. When we are possessive, like someone who ends up excluding you from the world to protect you, we do it because in our minds we think we are pursuing a positive goal, but what results is disastrous. It’s about how good can turn bad, but only because desperation in love can get out of control and turn bad. In this case, evil, if you think about it, is a form of good, albeit degenerate, because it derives from it. It is up to us to discern and recognize these metamorphoses. However, I don’t want “I Love You” to remain, in its meaning, a mere description of how certain things happen (I think that in this song each of us can find at least a piece of our own existence) but that it transcends them, and that do through forgiveness.

SL: Your production on this album features intricate instrumentation, driving basslines, and wave-y guitars. How did you approach the production process to achieve this lush and polished sonic palette?

MM: It’s like a kind of multidimensional awareness. Once you have explored, for example, the rhythmic dimension, then you set off on a new journey such as the search for harmonies, and then again for noise etc. It all depends on how I conceive these emanations and how I don’t so much superimpose them as make sure that they flow into each other. Obviously, an important ingredient is fun. I enjoy. And a lot, too. For example, when, in the production phase, I find myself dealing with the bass, I enjoy thinking about putting into it something of what I have learned from listening to dub music. Or, for guitars, to use tones and drives that I loved hearing on an Andy Summers album and so on. I bring with me pieces of my experience as a true music lover, on a universal level.

SL: “Viscerheart” is said to invite listeners on a hauntingly beautiful journey through human emotions. What do you hope your audience takes away from this journey, and how do you want them to feel after listening to the album?

MM: I would like them, when they have finished listening, to feel a desire for joy. And that “Viscerheart” makes them reflect on not hiding from their own fallibility, so that they can admit all the evil inside us before letting it go and forgiving it. You must know how to cry to love this album. The emotional journey that “Viscerheart” guides is a warning: pay attention to your emotions and nourish your feelings instead. The world needs this, and we need it even more.

SL: As a solo project, how does IMJUDAS differ from your work with HELALYN FLOWERS, and what new creative freedoms or challenges did you encounter while producing “Viscerheart”?

MM: When you’re in a band what you must do is also consider a general vision, agreed with those who share the journey, so your individuality works at the service of a sort of entity, and however intimate your communicative style may be, never this must become synonymous with arbitrariness and mere selfish satisfaction. There are several good ways to be selfish but some of them will never match the needs of a band. This is why the solo-project path exists. And at least for me, having a side-project means transposing your person as much as possible without intermediaries, which might seem like an enviable freedom, but implies total responsibility. At the same time, the constant mirroring of yourself is a double-edged sword that you must know how to handle through periods of waiting. It’s like hunting yourself. Returning more specifically to your question, I think my “challenge” is to obtain a non-analytical but synthetic vision of myself. And I think this challenge is still ongoing. I love the idea of going beyond musical analysis and exegesis, beyond the charm of fragmentation and instead going to the heart of musical inspiration, the one of which I am the vehicle. Regarding, however, my creative freedoms, well, there is no doubt that my love for the most exotic soul of post-punk, the one that has its roots in black African music, as in dub-reggae and the Middle East, has been revealed, at least to the most attentive ears. I think the same also applies to certain industrial abstractionism as well as to a decidedly new wave and non-metal approach to the guitar.

Eldrina Mich

As Eldrina Mich I work as a go-between and a devil’s advocate when it comes to Side-Line. If our own staff needs to be interviewed then ask the questions no one else dares to ask.

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History Of Guns presents 2nd single new album: ‘When You Don’t Matter’

Bernard - Side-Line Staff — Tue, 21 May 2024 10:33:17 +0000

Underground 90s industrial legends History Of Guns present “When You Don’t Matter”, previewing their “Half Light” album – their eighth to date. This is the second taster of their “Half Light” album, following the lead track “No Longer Earthbound”. “Half Light” will be out June 20 via Liquid Len Recording Company.

On hiatus from 2012 to 2022, they finally had the opportunity to finish off an electronic project they’d begun in 2008. The result is the “Half Light” album, which also presented the opportunity to work with Pete Maher (U2, Pixies, Nick Cave, Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails). On this album, founding members Del Alien (vocals) and Max Rael (keyboards, programming) are joined by guitarist Caden Clarkson, the newest member of History Of Guns. The whole was produced by Max Rael, mixed by Max Rael and Caden Clarkson.

Half Light by History Of Guns

“I think most people know of either a moment, or something sadly longer, when you’re on your own, and no one knows where you are, how you are, or even if you’re alive or dead. I think this like a History Of Guns version of a ballad, for abandonment. But whenever we have something we think is beautiful, we always have to smash it up somehow. From an existential point of view it might be true, maybe we don’t matter. We are meaning-seeking creatures in a world with no objective meaning. Ultimately we have to find a way to make ourselves matter to ourselves,” says multi-instrumentalist Max Rael.

Del Alien adds, “It’s like the vain attempt to help people. Maybe they know it, maybe they don’t. It’s not a personal thing is it? Is this what society has done to us? Is it worth you thinking about? Getting cold in a box just to be burned and scattered to the wind, only to end up in the mouth of a dying junkie… or like sleeping with the sanest lunatic you ever met, but there’s no one there in the morning to make you breakfast. If the product is not good from the start, how can it be in the end? Losing the place you stand, just to hold another’s hand.”

History Of Guns was formed in Hertfordshire in 1996 becoming the frontrunners of the UK’s Wasp Factory / FuturePunk scene of the early 2000s. After going on hiatus in 2012, they returned in 2022 with a new album – “Forever Dying In Your Eyes”.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

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