The Berlin-based post-punk duo Circolo Vizioso have released their debut album “Verrückt”. The music was created mainly with electric violin, guitar and drums. The band is heavily influenced by the sound of 1990s American post-punk and indie rock (i.e. Fugazi, Sonic Youth) and 80s-90s Eastern German and Eastern European punk bands.

Circolo Vizioso is made up of Tony Scafidi (guitar, bass, drum, hi-hat, vocals) and Paul Geigerzaehler (violin, snare drum, vocals).

Earlier, the band presented the singles “Walls”, written in outrage over the Russian invasion in Ukraine, and “Choppy”, a high-octane song spawned from a bout of depression brought on by a failed love story.

“On ‘Verrückt’, we wanted to stretch the potential of the bass drum, the high hat, the snare and the tambourine to the utmost. As two people having to sing, play guitar and violin and drums at the same time makes it challenging to come up with refined and intricate drumming. But it does give us an interesting opportunity to exert a furious, instinctively ancestral and liberating beat on a few drums,” says Tony Scafidi.

Paul Geigerzaehler adds, “We wanted to make an album that could express anger, frustration and disaffection against an unfair world and all the discomfort entwined therein. And we wanted to do it with direct and bare lyrics abrasive violin lines, fat distorted guitar solos and big fuzzy riffs. Yet we wanted people to let go of this batshit crazy world in a sort of self-exorcising dance, where one can go to sleep with the illusion of having sweat their demons off at least for the night.”

Formed in March 2020 on a balcony in Friedrichshain, Berlin during the first Covid-19 lock-down, Circolo Vizioso was born as an attempt to keep art and music alive and to provide support to their neighbours during a time when no concerts were happening and no cinemas, museums or galleries were open. Circolo Vizioso is these artists’ attempt to resist the isolation and the lack of social and human contact, as well as the hunger for music and art during this unusual time.

The “Verrückt” album is available via Bandcamp, and from other music platforms, including Apple Music and Spotify.

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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Genre/Influences: Cinematic.

Format: Digital, CD.

Background/Info: Italian bass player and multi-instrumentalist Massimo Pupillo has released massive things, collaborations and productions in his career. He got involved with Zu and collaborated with an endless number of famous artists like  Mike Patton (Faith No More), Jim O’ Rourke (Sonic Youth), Guy Picciotto & Joe Lally (Fugazi), FM Einheit ( Einstürzende Neubauten), Damo Suzuki (CAN), David Tibet (Current 93), Mick Harris (Scorn), Gordon Sharp (This Mortal Coil & Cindytalk) etc etc.

Content: This work sounds in the true line of Glacial Movements; a sonic exploration of deeply Ambient and Cinematic fields. The work is fully evasive although featuring a few darker, mysterious, parts -which are mainly emerging at the end of the work. The wafting side of the work has been accentuated by the effect of voices. 

+ + + : This work has a true visual strength which is totally fitting with the great artwork of the album featuring landscapes and pictures of tribes. It feels like traveling through isolated spaces mixing mainly relaxing passages together with a few obscure parts.

– – – : The main point with this kind of productions is that there’s no visual content and that’s what I’m a bit missing; a wider conceptual approach mixing music together with other artistic creation like film, photography, ballet etc..

Conclusion: An album inviting the listener to dream away and visit other dimensions and cultures.

Best songs: “Ulda”, “Beaivi”, “Sami”.

Rate: 7.

Artist: www.zuism.net/massimo /  www.facebook.com/massimozu

Label: www.glacialmovements.com / www.facebook.com/glacialmovements

About Massimo Pupillo

Massimo Pupillo is an Italian bass player and multi-instrumentalist, best known as a founding member of Zu, with whom he released eighteen albums and played more than 2,000 shows worldwide. He has also collaborated with musicians including Mike Patton, Jim O’Rourke, Guy Picciotto, Joe Lally, FM Einheit, Damo Suzuki, David Tibet, Mick Harris, and Gordon Sharp.

“Our Forgotten Ancestors” was released on 20 October 2023 through Glacial Movements in digital and CD formats, featuring eleven tracks including “Beaivi,” “Ulda,” and “Sami.”

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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La Jungle is a Belgian duo from the Southern part of the country set up in 2013 by ‘Roxie Rookie’ and ‘Jim Frisko Binwette’. They already released an impressive number of productions this year striking back with their sixth opus “Blurry Landscapes”. The album has been released as a collaboration between different labels:  Black Basset, Rockerill and  A Tant Rêver Du Roi. La Jungle deals with a mix of Krautrock, Industrial, Techno and a few more genres which they prefer to define as ‘Organic Trance Music’. “Blurry Landscapes” is a great music accomplishment but still a fascinating concept mixing the work the music of La Jungle together with Outsider/Art Brut artists. I invite you to discover this talented project by this interview. 

(Courtesy by Inferno Sound Diaries)

Q: Tell us a bit more about your musical background and what incited you to set up a band and La Jungle specifically?

Roxie: One of the reasons our band is still existing 10 years after is surely because we didn’t want to perform the same kind of sound Jim and me. I was more into Noise-Rock duos as Pneu, Lightning Bolt with mathy touch, with Zach Hill and “Hold Your Horse Is” by Hella as references. You can maybe hear that, especially in our albums from the early years, “La Jungle” (2015) and “II”(2016).

Jim: I was more into, Nirvana, Fugazi, At The Drive-In/The Mars Volta-stuff. I was also into New-Beat wave back in the days. But to start this band we just threw ourself in a garage and that’s what went out.

Q: You already released an impressive number of works so how do you explain this prolific process? Is there any specific formula in the writing of the songs and what makes the chemistry between both of you?

Roxie: Let’s talk about this chemistry, because it’s not only in the rehearsal room or in the creative process. Jim and me are pretty different and surely opposites on many points. And I think it’s a good thing for your band if you don’t always share the same state of mind with your partner. Jim is most of the time waiting the last minute and the last second before doing a random stuff planned for month, while I always want to do it the sooner the better, the first day if possible. Two visions, two ways to do, but it works. It’s hard sometimes but we can find a balance in 99% of the situations, and with this balance comes a natural rhythm of work, of new songs, of recordings and releases, of tours and concerts. We even have our own label together with regular new publications since 2020. So, it works anyway.

Jim:I don’t compose before the rehearsal room as I did for some other bands. Here we jam together and if a song is coming out great! It’s all about spontaneity.

Q: Your newest album “Blurry Landscapes” is for sure a very specific and I dare to say ‘conceptual’ album featuring Art Brut artists. How did you come up with the idea and finally the meeting and collaboration with all these artists? How did they react to your music and can you give us more details about the accomplishment of the work?

Roxie: We have many ideas of records or bands or releases or as you say ‘concepts’ we want to set up. But most of them are on a list, in our head, and we will make them exist when we will find the time and a decent mental condition for this. For example, we are working hardly on something for three weeks now in our rehearsal room. It’s been two or three years since we started thinking and talking about this. But we both have families, we are constantly on tour and for sure we manage a lot of stuff in this band. So we had to wait many years before starting this specific process. You will maybe hear or see a result next year. Who knows.

It’s exactly the same situation with “Blurry Landscapes”.The idea of making an album where each new track is illustrated by an outsider artist is on our list for a long time. And then came a major event that changed all our plans: pandemic. With pandemic, we finally found time at home with our families, time to sleep better too, no tour for several months. We also found time to think about what this band is, and what we want to do with our duo in the next years. And so we started the writing of our 5th studio record “Ephemeral Feast”.Months later Covid was still there, so we decided to call a good friend of us, Coline, now coordinator of Art Et Marges-museum in Brussels to start the creative process around “Blurry Landscapes”; dress a list of outsider artists from the museum we would like to work with, making new songs, drawing some draft of the future vinyl and its booklet, moving in creation spaces and meet people as Inès Reddah, André Robillard or Serge Delaunay. That’s how it started.

Jim: Yes, and I think we had some of the best meeting during this process. We can learn so much from them, more than what we can give them.

Q: Because of their mental/psychic restrictions Art Brut/Outsider artists are often living aside of society. How did it feel to get faced to their reality and what experiences come directly into mind when you think about these meetings?

Roxie: We have visited many creation spaces dedicated to Outsider art while writing “Blurry Landscapes”. We have met most of the twenty artists involved in the visual part of the record in their daily space of work, in their artistic intimacy. Most of the time, it’s really quiet places, it’s out of this world. The time is not running the same way. Most of the people don’t even notice you just came in. You have pieces of art and huge Outsider collections everywhere, on the walls, on shelves or archived behind a hidden door. 

Unfortunately, with pandemic restrictions, we were forced to communicate with some artists exclusively with video meetings. It was surely not the most interesting part of the process, but we really wanted this album and collaborations to be released in 2022/2023. So we also made some exchanges and collaborations only with mails, as it was the case with La “S” Grand Atelier, where residents could not see each other in the worst month of the pandemic. Hard times. So the human experience was not really there, but it worked anyway, and the artists enjoyed the tracks we sent to them, and they answered us with great pieces of art. Jim:And they were all happy to collaborate with us. They did it in a spontaneous way. Full of honesty. It means a lot for us.

Q: Sound-wise La Jungle clearly stands for Krautrock with some extra influences on top. What’s your perception of the ‘sound’ you’re dealing with and do you handle specific criteria and references in the writing/production process?

Roxie: I think we try to make something organic since the beginning in 2013. That’s why we don’t use samples, triggers, modern keyboards setups or pre-recorded loops. If you apply this rule on the drums specifically, you will notice that you have no classic Rock or Pop-patterns on the records. Most of the time, the bass drum kicks on each beat, as Disco or Techno. On top of this kick, I try to make something filled with a lot of drums and cymbals, and also with a really aggressive snare as you can generally find on noise records. It’s pretty rare hearing me playing something rudimental on the drums with La Jungle. Some people are bored with that because it’s too much, some others are amazed and even see and hear it as a funny fact. I don’t really have control on this, that’s the way of playing drums I developed with this band years after years. It’s something that came naturally.

Jim: Organic Trance music. I’m constantly searching for new sounds. I try to change my pedal boards for each album.

Q: I’ve been impressed by the number of live shows you already did and especially this year. How do you see yourself as a live band and what makes the magic of La Jungle on stage? And how do you transpose the songs from the studio to the stage? 

Roxie: We performed so many gigs, especially this year as you notice, that I don’t really know how to see ourselves anymore as a live band. There is an expression in French ‘La tête dans le guidon’; that means that you’re so deep in your stuff that you cannot see what you’re doing from a different point of vue or angle. I feel that especially because we released three albums on three consecutive years (2021, 22, 23) and because we are on tour for two year and a half now (250 gigs) since the pandemic ended in May 2021.

Your question about studio and performances is also an interesting one. Because we recently took the decision to write future songs exclusively playable on stage. If you see La Jungle live and hear the records before, you will notice we don’t play a lot of songs from the three last albums. Because most of the songs on these records are just not fun to play or even not possible to play live. Some of it would sounds pretty boring on stage actually. Too slow, too much lyrics, not really catchy. And there’s sometimes too much loops to let ‘the magic’ (as you said) happens. So yes, we have to figure it out for the future. Thank you for your time.

Jim: Main point is energy. It’s like our sport. We can sweat all the bad out from our bodies. It feels good. We always want to play new stuff on stage. So yes we are working again on something as pure live songs. We’ll see. Thank you

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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Genre/Influences: Industrial-metal, industrial-rock, EBM

Background/Info: The famous Wax Trax! Records label was originally much into new wave and punk music and was founded by Jim Nash and his partner Dannie Flesher in Denver in 1975. In 1978 the independent label moved to Chicago and became the most important record label and store/boutique for industrial music in the US that served as the headquarters of underground electronic and industrial bands in the eighties and nineties. The strong brand Wax Trax! offered record deals to the artists they liked (as fans) and also licensed European artists in America. The very impressive Wax Trax! catalogue featured well-known bands like Ministry, Front 242, Revolting Cocks, KMFDM, Front Line Assembly, Coil, Chris & Cosey and more!

Content: Industrial Accident has contributions of Al Jourgensen (Ministry/Revolting Cocks), Paul Barker (Ministry/Revolting Cocks), Chris Connelly (Ministry/Revolting Cocks), Luc Van Acker (Ministry/Revolting Cocks), Richard23 (Front 242/Revolting Cocks), Patrick Codenys (Front 242), Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails), Bill Leeb (Front Line Assembly), Groovie Mann (Thrill Kill Kult), David J. Haskins (Bauhaus), Sascha Konietzko (KMFDM), En Esch (KMFDM), Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters, Nirvana), Jello Biafra (Dead Kennedys), Steve Albini (Big Black), Cosey Fanni Tutti (Throbbing Gristle), Ian MacKaye (Minor Threat, Fugazi) and more. It explains the rise and fall of an important musical movement as well as the details and artifacts of this entire Wax Trax! Records history that was nearly lost forever.

A lot of hilarious anecdotes are explained by the contributing artists which makes it fun to watch! Al Jourgensen: “I played in Divine’s band by the way, playing guitar for Divine was … bizarre!”. Luc Van Acker, when speaking about Laibach: “How provocative can you be? It takes intelligent people to understand that! Wax Trax! created a space where we could do whatever we wanted!”. Unfortunately the label without business model (operating on trust, without contracts with their artists) declared bankruptcy in 1992 and Jim and Danny sold it to TVT Records. Jim Nash passed away on October 10, 1995 and Dannie Flesher deceased on January 10th, 2010.

+ + + : This 94 minutes (+ 75 extra minutes bonus material) documentary was directed by Julia Nash (daughter of Jim Nash) and won awards on the Santa Cruz Film Festival and Chicago Underground Film Festival. It is also available on Blu-Ray and as download on AppleTV, Amazon Prime and Google Play/YouTube Streaming.

– – – : Just one minor point: to make the circle complete, maybe an interview with some licensed European bands that were released by Wax Trax! (The Neon Judgement, The Young Gods, A Split Second, Laibach and more) would have been interesting, to hear their point of view.

Conclusion: Although it’s a huge story to tell the complete Wax Trax! history, this documentary gives a pretty good overview of what happened in the old days. Jim and Dannie “accidentally” built up the industrial scene in the US due to their passion and love for this music and bands and will never be forgotten!

Label: www.waxtraxchicago.com / www.facebook.com/WaxTraxRecords.Chicago/

About Wax Trax! Records

Wax Trax! Records was founded by Jim Nash and Dannie Flesher, first in Denver in 1975 as an outlet for new wave and punk records. The label moved to Chicago in 1978 and grew into the main hub for industrial music in the United States through the 1980s and 1990s, signing and licensing acts on both sides of the Atlantic.

The label ran without contracts, on trust between Nash, Flesher and their artists. It filed for bankruptcy in 1992 and was sold to TVT Records. Nash died on October 10, 1995, and Flesher died on January 10, 2010.

“Industrial Accident: The Story Of Wax Trax! Records” is directed by Julia Nash, Jim Nash’s daughter, and gathers the artists who built the label’s catalogue to tell that history on screen.

Genre/Influences: Industrial-metal, industrial-rock

Background/Info: Al Jourgensen is the charismatic pioneer, musical genius, innovator and iconic founder of the industrial-metal genre (the fusion of repeating metal guitar riffs, samples, keyboards and distorted vocals on a danceable beat). This fully authorized visual history with 248 pages of rare and unseen photos, artwork, and other stuff that spans Ministry’s entire career, shows how the band (that everyone wanted to sound like) evolved from ’80s synth-pop, over EBM/industrial to trash-metal. Ministry has been nominated six times for a Grammy award and is definitely a band you must have seen live at least once in your life!

Content: The four-pages introduction is done by Al’s good old friend Jello Biafra, explaining some hilarious anecdotes. Then this limited 9″ x 9″ casebound book is divided into six chronological chapters starting from the early Wax Trax! era (1981) until the latest release “AmeriKKKant”. We get to see lots of nice rare (promo and live) pictures, cut-outs, artwork, flyers and posters. On almost every page there are interesting quotes or anecdotes from befriended artists like Charlie Clouser (Nine Inch Nails), Moby, Billy Corgan (Smashing Pumpkins), Ian MacKaye (Fugazi), Gary Numan, Perry Ferrell (Jane’s Addiction), Jaz Coleman (Killing Joke), Phildo Owen (Skatenigs), Jeordie White (Marilyn Manson), Alexander Hacke (Einsturzende Neubauten), David J (Bauhaus), Robin Zander (Cheap Trick), Paul D’Amour (Tool), Page Hamilton (Helmet), Scott Ian (Anthrax), Franz Treichler (The Young Gods), Gibby Haynes (Butthole Surfers), Sean Yseult (White Zombie), Dave Lombardo (Slayer), Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top), Till Lindemann (Rammstein), Mark Gemini Thwaite (The Mission), Chris Connelly (Revolting Cocks) and many more. Just like the music of Ministry changed from soft to very hard, it is clearly shown how Al’s style has changed all over the years ending up with dreadlocks, tattoos and piercings. The author of the book is Aaron Tanner (who also created a visual history for Pixies) and features artwork from Brian Shanley and Paul Elledge.

+ + + : We get an exclusive look at Uncle Al’s personal collection of behind-the-scenes pictures together with contributions from band members past and present.

– – – : Although many well-known artists are featured in this book, some (expected ones) are missing …

Conclusion: There’s only one thing we can conclude: Ministry has had a huge influence on many artists and Al is still going strong after all these years! This book is definitely a must have for the fans!

Artist: www.ministryband.com / www.facebook.com/WeAreMinistry
Label: www.melodicvirtue.com / www.facebook.com/melodicvirtue Read the news on ‘Prescripture: The Visual History’.

About Ministry

Ministry began in Chicago in 1981 when Al Jourgensen launched the project as an outlet for new wave and synth-pop with funk and disco influences, releasing a first 12″ on Wax Trax! Records before signing to Arista for the 1983 debut album “With Sympathy”. After parting ways with Arista, Jourgensen returned to Wax Trax! for a run of 12″ singles, including “Everyday Is Halloween”, before signing to Sire for 1986’s more EBM-influenced “Twitch”. The band’s sound kept evolving toward the industrial-metal blend documented in this book, and Ministry has remained active since, releasing the 2024 album “Hopiumforthemasses” and announcing “The Squirrely Years Revisited”, a 2026 collection revisiting its early synth-pop material.