(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

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.

(Photo by Brian Griffin) Ultravox member Chris Cross, whose real name is Chris Allen, died on March 25 aged 71. The news was announced last night by former bandmate Midge Ure who described bass player Chris as “the glue that held the band together”.

Midge Ure: “We worked together, we played together, made music and directed videos together. We were instant friends as well as Ultravox comrades. Even after years apart we managed to pick up where we left off like the years in between never existed. You were the glue that held the band together. You were the logic in the madness and the madness in our lives. It was great to know and grow with you. You are loved and missed old friend.”

About Chris Cross

Chris, born on July 14, 1952, in London, established Tiger Lily in 1974, a band that would evolve into the iconic 80s group Ultravox. Alongside him were Dennis Leigh as the frontman and Stevie Shears on guitar, with Warren Cann on drums and William Currie, known as Billy Currie, joining later.

Between 1974 and 1979, John Foxx led Ultravox as its lead singer and primary creative force. In March 1979, Foxx departed to pursue a solo career, and Midge Ure took over as the lead vocalist, guitarist, and frontman from November 1, 1979. Ure, who had been collaborating with the band since April that year after working with Billy Currie on the Visage studio project, rejuvenated Ultravox, guiding them to their commercial peak with the “Vienna” album and sustaining success until their disbandment in 1987.

In 1992, a reformed Ultravox under Currie’s leadership saw limited success, with two albums not charting and only one single barely making it to number 90 in the UK charts. The band’s most celebrated lineup — Currie, Ure, bassist Chris Cross, and drummer Warren Cann — reunited in 2008, leading to live performances in 2009 and 2010, culminating in the release of a new studio album, “Brill!ant,” in May 2012.

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!

side-line.com

Lots of you have probably heard Noemi Aurora and her very attractive and unique voice within Helalyn Flowers, as well as through her numerous guest vocal appearances over the years. A first solo album is planned for early next year via the Belgian label Spleen+, and a first teaser came a few weeks ago in the form of an EP, “Blood As Lipstick”, which is available on Bandcamp. 

We wanted to know a bit more about what the lady had to offer…

SL.  Your latest single, “Blood As Lipstick,” is described as a rebellious hymn to inner strength and resilience. Can you delve into the inspiration behind the song and how it ties into the broader themes of empowerment and courage?

‘Blood as Lipstick’ can be interpreted as a symbolic representation of personal transformation and empowerment through the alchemical process of transmuting pain and adversity into beauty and strength. 

Overall, ‘Blood as Lipstick’ portrays the story of a woman who transforms the pain and wounds of her life into something beautiful and empowering. It emphasizes the alchemical process of transmutation, where the individual uses their experiences to cultivate strength, resistance, and inner beauty. 

My lyrics encourages embracing challenges and using them as catalysts for personal growth and transformation.

I dedicate this anthem of mine to all the women warriors who fight against discrimination and submission. But not only that, they are also dedicated to all human beings of any sex and origin, since anyone who knows pain and suffering deserves to find the strength to react to adversity and injustices.

‘Blood as Lipstick’ ties into broader themes of empowerment and courage by encouraging listeners to embrace their authenticity, find their voice, and overcome obstacles with unwavering determination.

SL. The press release mentions a range of musical influences from Kate Bush to Dead Can Dance and Zola Jesus. How do these influences shape the sonic landscape of “Blood As Lipstick,” and how do you incorporate them into your unique and captivating sound?

The musical influences mentioned in the press release, such as Kate Bush, Dead Can Dance, and Zola Jesus, play a significant role in shaping the sonic landscape of ‘Blood As Lipstick’.

These artists have distinct styles and sounds that have inspired and influenced my music. These artists are just a tiny selection from the multitude that I have been listening to for years and years until today. I could add many others such as Siouxsie, The Cure, Depeche Mode, Dalbello, Roxy Music, Joy Division, Visage, Madonna, Doris Norton, Franco Battiato and an infinite multitude of high listens from various decades that have worked in my subconscious until emerging in a distilled from my compositions. The artists selected in the press release represent different generations because I enjoy giving space to both the more historical artists who have always been part of my musical background, as well as the younger ones who I have discovered and who have a common fanbase with me, and who have a message to offer and a unique sound. I always like to stay curious and open to discovering new sounds that can suggest an interesting vibe and enrich my cultural baggage.

Going into detail, for example talking about Kate Bush, I draw inspiration in terms of her experimental approach to songwriting and her ability to create atmospheric and ethereal soundscapes. This influence can be heard in the dreamy and otherworldly elements present in ‘Blood As Lipstick.’

For me she is a brilliant artist, when as a child I discovered her on video and listened to her voice hitting very high notes with such a unique timbre, I was truly impressed. She also combines music with theatricality, dance and visual arts which are also basic elements of my artistic journey.

Dead Can Fance’s influence can be seen in the incorporation of world music elements and the use of unconventional instruments.

In Blood As Lipstick, as well as other songs from my next album, I played the wooden recorder which was my first instrument that I studied since my childhood. I approached the study of this instrument in an obsolete way because I used to duet with my brother by playing the guitar scores of Joe Satriani and Steve Vai. A truly original and bizarre result I must say! As for the rhythmic part, I overdubbed ethnic artisan rattles and microphones environmental

Their fusion of different cultural sounds has inspired me to explore and incorporate diverse musical elements into my own work, adding depth and richness to the overall sound of ‘Blood As Lipstick’.

Zola Jesus, I discovered her thanks to the fanbase we share and which allowed me to get to know her music, leaving me pleasantly impressed. 

I found some common traits in her regarding the intention and the way of managing her vocal delivery and expression.

I strive to create a sonic landscape that is both familiar and innovative, by blending elements from my background with my own musical ideas and experiences, I aim to create a captivating and distinctive sound in ‘Blood As Lipstick.’

SL. Can you provide some insights into the concept and themes that will be explored in coming  album, and how it might differ from your previous works with Helalyn Flowers?

As a solo artist, my upcoming album ‘Kintsugi’ will explore themes of personal growth, self-discovery, and introspection. 

Kintsugi is a beautiful Japanese tradition that involves repairing broken objects with gold dust, highlighting the intricate joints. This ancient technique allows us to elevate and value things that would otherwise be discarded due to being shattered. Metaphorically, Kintsugi can be applied to our lives, transforming soul wounds into powerful energies that make us wiser and aware of our goals. Instead of seeing wounds as weaknesses or missing pieces, they become our strengths. Just as broken objects can be enhanced with gold dust, we can transform our wounds into the gold of awareness.

In contrast, my previous works with Helalyn Flowers often focused on different themes such as dystopian worlds or even the exploration of darker emotions. While there were elements of introspection and personal reflection in our music, the overall tone and approach were different.

With my solo album, I have the opportunity to delve deeper into my own personal experiences and emotions, allowing for a more intimate and introspective exploration. The music will have a more stripped-down feel, with a focus on storytelling and emotional connection.

While Helalyn Flowers is known for its fusion of industrial, electronic, and rock elements, my solo album will incorporate elements of dream pop, ambient, and alternative genres to create a sonic landscape that is both haunting and captivating.

Overall, my solo album will offer a different perspective and musical experience compared to my previous works with Helalyn Flowers. It will be a deeply personal and introspective journey, exploring themes of self-discovery and vulnerability in a more electronic, experimental and atmospheric musical setting.

SL. The press release describes “Blood As Lipstick” as a symbolic ode to female empowerment and the lunar side of intuition. Can you elaborate on the symbolism and themes explored in the song, especially in relation to the transformative moments when blood turns defiantly into lipstick?

‘Blood As Lipstick’ is a song that explores the themes of female empowerment and the transformative power of embracing one’s pain and turning it into something beautiful. The symbolism of blood turning into lipstick represents the strength of women, as well as their ability to transform their experiences of pain and adversity into sources of power and beauty.

In the song, the act of turning blood into lipstick is a metaphor for the process of reclaiming one’s own narrative and finding empowerment in the face of challenges. It represents the defiance and determination to rise above difficult circumstances and transform them into something positive and strengthening.

The lunar side of intuition mentioned in the press release refers to the connection between women and the moon, which has long been associated with feminine energy and intuition. The moon symbolizes the cyclical nature of life, with its phases representing the different stages of growth and transformation. By exploring the lunar side of intuition, the song highlights the innate strength and wisdom that women possess, and the importance of embracing and trusting their own intuition in navigating life’s challenges.

With ‘Blood As Lipstick’ I encourage women and anyone else who feels involved, to embrace their own power, trust their intuition, and find empowerment in their own unique journeys.

SL. From your cover of The Cure’s “Friday I’m In Love” to the original compositions, your work showcases a wide range of styles. How do you maintain such versatility in your artistry, and what challenges or joys does this bring to your creative process?

Maintaining versatility in my artistry is something that I prioritize and actively work towards. I believe that exploring different styles and genres allows me to continually grow as a musician and expand my creative horizons. It also keeps my music fresh and exciting for both myself and my listeners.

One of the joys of being versatile is the freedom it gives me to experiment and explore new musical territories. It allows me to constantly challenge myself and push the boundaries of my creativity. I find great joy in the process of discovering new sounds, experimenting with different instruments, and incorporating diverse musical elements into my compositions.

However, this versatility also presents its own set of challenges. It requires a deep understanding and appreciation of various musical styles, as well as the ability to adapt and embody different musical personas. It can be a daunting task to switch between genres and styles seamlessly, but it is a challenge that I embrace as it goes hand in hand with joys of maintaining versatility in my artistry. 

While it can be demanding and require a lot of effort, the rewards are immense. It allows me to constantly evolve as an artist, connect with a wider range of listeners, and create music that is diverse, dynamic, and true to my artistic vision.

SL. As a solo artist, how does your approach to creating music differ from your collaborative work with Helalyn Flowers? Are there aspects of the creative process that you find particularly liberating or challenging in both scenarios?

As a solo artist, my approach to creating music differs in several ways from my collaborative work with Helalyn Flowers. 

The main difference between my solo project and the work with Helalyn Flowers, where we are a duo, lies in the total management of the songs. In Helalyn Flowers we had to balance the more rock/metal characteristics in a different way. In my solo project, as a producer, I have the opportunity to highlight certain characteristics during the mixing, production and mastering phase, which were not possible to share in Helalyn Flowers.

This level of creative freedom can be both liberating and challenging. On one hand, it allows me to fully express myself and experiment with different musical ideas and styles. I have the flexibility to take risks and push the boundaries of my creativity without the need to consider the preferences or expectations of others. This can lead to exciting and unexpected musical discoveries.

On the other hand, this freedom also comes with the responsibility of making all the creative decisions on my own. It requires a strong sense of self-awareness and clarity of vision to navigate through the creative process and make choices that align with my artistic goals.

In both scenarios, whether as a solo artist or in a band, the creative process is a deeply personal and introspective journey. It involves tapping into my emotions, experiences, and inspirations to create music that is authentic and meaningful. The challenges and rewards may differ, but the underlying passion and dedication to creating music that resonates with myself and my audience remain constant.

SL. As fans anticipate the release of “Kintsugi” and further explorations into your solo work, is there a message or feeling you hope they take away from your music? How do you envision your connection with your audience in this new phase of your musical journey?

“Kintsugi” represents a metaphorical exploration of the cracks and imperfections of the soul, and I hope that listeners can find solace and strength in embracing their own vulnerabilities and scars.

In this new phase of my musical journey, I aim to create a sense of connection and understanding with my audience. I want them to feel seen and heard, to know that they are not alone in their struggles and experiences. I hope that my music can serve as a source of comfort, inspiration, and empowerment for those who listen as I want to create a space where they feel safe to explore their emotions and reflect on their own journeys. 

I want my audience to feel a sense of catharsis and transformation and to carry that feeling with them long after they have listened.

Additionally, the best connection being made with my community is through my Patreon page. This platform which allows my fan club to be in close contact with my artistic experience, from the creative phase to the group chat, allows us to explore the concepts expressed in my songs and to create a connection from a daily point of view which is truly an inspiring experience. 

I invite all those who want to actively participate in my Multiverse of Sounds and Visions to subscribe to my Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/noemiaurora 

Thank you very much for this space and I greet with great affection my dearest Shining Disasters who support me since the dawn of time!

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.

www.side-line.com

The Swedish synth group Strange Tales is set to release their full-length album “Untold” on Friday, November 24th, across all streaming services. On the eve of the release, they will host a launch party and free concert at FOLK, Foajén, Järntorget in Gothenburg, Sweden. In addition to the digital release, a limited edition 6-panel digipack CD featuring extra tracks and remixes will be available. Furthermore, the album will be offered as a limited edition colored gatefold vinyl, showcasing cover art by Gothenburg artist Patrik Andiné, an alumnus of the Royal Institute of Art (1990-95).

Fans can currently pre-order “Untold” from Bandcamp, either as a digital download or on CD.

Featuring on the album is Toril Lindqvist of electroclash band Alice in Videoland, with production handled by Charles Storm of Cloudchamber Studios (known for his work with Exit North, Mando Diao, Anna Öberg, Håkan Hellström, and Henrik Berggren).

About Strange Tales

Formed in the mid-1980s, Strange Tales was born from a love for the New Romantics movement, London sojourns, 12″ vinyl records, and synth music, founded by Johan Larsson, Tobbe Lander, and Jonas Berg. Their sound is a blend reminiscent of bands like Depeche Mode, Ultravox, Human League, Visage, Duran Duran, among others. Initially playing at youth clubs, their first release was a 1985 demo cassette titled “Five Songs”. Tobbe Lander notably ran the synth club Romo Night in Gothenburg for two decades, a hub for both prominent and indie synth acts in Sweden.

After a hiatus, the band has reunited with new material. They emphasize a philosophy for their music: engaging, varied, and impactful. As they put it, “Music should evoke real emotions, mirroring life’s unscripted and unique nature. Our songs are crafted with this ethos – they’re meant to resonate deeply and authentically.”

To get a taste of their music, check out Strange Tales’ music videos below.

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!

side-line.com

The solo synthwave project of Peter Endall, Suburban Spell presents the new single and video “Bright Gold Cross”, a teaser for the forthcoming “Falling Down” EP. The track’s title directly alludes to the long-lasting repercussions of poor decisions and succumbing to guilty pleasures. The accompanying video was crafted by Melbourne’s Dingo Cross Films, with production and direction by Paul Puccio and Cassie Dart.

From April 25, “Bright Gold Cross” will be accessible on various esteemed digital platforms, such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Bandcamp. However, the video is already available for viewing today on Side-Line.

Suburban Spell, Peter Endall’s solo venture, melds numerous 80s synth-pop influences with a touch of noisy grind. Drawing inspiration from new wave’s golden era and 70s-80s electronica, his music is undeniably influenced by artists like Ultravox, OMD, Visage, Jean-Michel Jarre, The Cars, Gary Numan, and New Order.

Peter Endall explains that “the song ‘Bright Gold Cross’ symbolises absolution within a Christian religious context and how it can be employed to erase years of abhorrent behaviour. Absolution is a process that forgives mortal sins and allows one to perish in a ‘state of grace’, eventually gaining entry to heaven. This essentially serves as a ‘get out of jail free card’ for those inclined to exploit it.” He adds, “The peculiar circumstances of my childhood upbringing and the religious cult in which I was raised during those years have had a somewhat quixotic effect on me and Suburban Spell. Exposed to a belief system that ultimately proved to be flawed and maintained an inconsistent set of values throughout my formative childhood years, these challenges consistently resurface when creating music for the Suburban Spell project.”

Peter’s former band, Schizo Scherzo, was active during Melbourne’s vibrant 80s music scene, performing alongside acts such as The Eurythmics, Pseudo Echo, Real Life, and Fergal Sharky. Re-emerging on the music scene as Suburban Spell, Peter has discovered his niche in contemporary Australian electronica.

The “Falling Down” EP is set for release on June 23.

The “Falling Down” EP follows one year after his “Split Levels – Remixes” EP, a collection of reimagined tracks from his “Split Levels” album. The remixes feature goth-rock/post-punk legend William Faith (Christian Death, Mephisto Walz, Shadow Project, Faith & The Muse, The Bellwether Syndicate), as well as New Zealand’s Robots In Love, Australia’s Ontic, Pittsburgh’s Tragic Impulse, and Italian artist Kurs.

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!

side-line.com

English musician Barry Adamson came to prominence in the late 1970s as a member of the post-punk band Magazine and went on to work with Visage, The Birthday Party, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, and the electro musicians Pan Sonic. In addition to prolific solo work, Adamson has also remixed Grinderman, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Recoil and Depeche Mode. He for instance created the seven-minute opus “Useless (Escape From Wherever: Pts. 1 & 2!)” remix for the latter band in 1997. He also worked on the soundtrack for David Lynch’s surrealistic crime film Lost Highway.

He has now announced details of a series of long out of print catalogue releases on Mute, starting with the white vinyl edition of his 1996 album, “Oedipus Schmoedipus”, limited to 1000 copies, out on 29 July 2022. This 1996 album features collaborations with Nick Cave, The Associates’ Billy Mackenzie and Jarvis Cocker. You can listen to a new edit of “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Pelvis” featuring Cocker right below.

The reissue series continues on 23 September with the “Stranger on the Sofa” album (2006), available for the first time on vinyl (pressed initially as double red vinyl), and “Back to the Cat” (2008) on clear vinyl – both originally on Adamson’s own Central Control label – alongside a strictly limited edition (1000 copies) antique blue vinyl issue of 2021’s “Steal Away” EP of new songs, originally released digitally on Mute.

Then, on 2 December “I Will Set You Free” (2012) and “Know Where To Run” (2016), get the reissue treatment (on curacao and silver vinyl, respectively) before Mute continues the series, reissuing Adamson’s entire catalogue.

Currently working on a new album, Barry Adamson published the first part of his memoir “Up Above the City, Down Beneath the Stars” (Omnibus press) in 2021.

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!

side-line.com

Genre/Influences: Electro-Pop.

Format: Digital, CD.

Background/Info: Happiness Project changed their name into H/P. Previous singles “Ultraviolin” and “Black Tea” revealed a true metamorphosis. “Programma” features ten songs of vintage Electro-Pop.

Content: The album stands in the tradition of BOREDOMproduct; pure Electro-Pop with delicate bleeps and retro sound treatments. H/P moved a bit further composing their songs with analogue equipment which only reinforced the 80s feeling. The songs remind me of bands like Taxi Girl, Kraftwerk, Visage and even Elli & Jacno. So it’s not really a surprise they invited Alain Seghir from the 80s formation Martin Dupont to play bass guitar on the last song of the album.

+ + + : The 80s approach is not the most original format, but real analogue gear still have this magic effect on me. Unique sound treatments mixing coldness together with melodies create the soul of this work. And it’s a great album revealing multiple noticeable songs like the already known singles “Ultraviolin” and “Black Tea”, but also the excellent opener “I Prefer Two” which sounds as the offspring between Kraftwerk and Taxi Girl. Another great piece of music is “The Alarmist”. It’s pure nostalgia and especially the strings are magic. “Les Choses” is another cool song I want to mention. Last, but not least I also like the production of the vocals revealing different songs featuring male- and female vocal parts.

– – – : I don’t have real minus points about this album, but let’s say that the ‘softer’ cuts like “Hope In The Distance” and “Black Tea” aren’t my favorites.

Conclusion: H/P has achieved a great piece of music. The metamorphosis from Happiness Project into H/P sounds like a great sonic upgrade. 

Best songs: “Ultraviolin”, “I Prefer Two”, “The Alarmist”, “Les Choses”, “Programma”.

Rate: 8.

Artist: www.facebook.com/hp.programma

Label: www.boredomproduct.fr / www.facebook.com/boredomproduct Read the news on ‘Programma’.

BOREDOMproduct released “Programma” on 11 February 2022, digitally and on CD. The ten tracks are “I Prefer Two”, “The Alarmist”, “Les Choses”, “Hope In The Distance”, “Black Tea”, “9 Mars”, “Programma”, “Behind”, “Ultraviolin” and “Vicinities”.

The album was recorded at Synthélabo in Marseille. Lead vocals and synthesizers come from f/t, lead and backing vocals from c/p, and bass guitar, piano, strings, synthesisers and vocals from c/t. Member U-0176 played synthesizers, analogue sequencers and drum machines and handled programming, Alain Seghir added bass guitar to “Vicinities”, and Laurent Cristofol supplied analogue effects, mix and mastering.

Listen to “Programma”:

About h/p

h/p is the French electronic trio of Christelle Fournioux, Fred Tuyeras and Cyrille Tuyeras, who use the initials c/p, f/t and c/t. The group worked as Happiness Project until 2021, splitting lead vocals between two singers and combining synthesizers, drum machines and bass guitar.

As Happiness Project the trio released “Remove Or Disable” in 2008, “9th Heaven” and “Desillusion” in 2012, “Poupée Mécanique” in 2013, and “Mutation” and the “Big Cities” EP in 2018. They also took part in the BOREDOMproduct compilation “Broken Memory: a tribute to Martin Dupont” in 2017.

The name change came with the “Liquid Mirrors” EP and the two-track single “Ultraviolin” in October 2021, followed by “Black Tea” in December 2021 and “Programma” in February 2022. The trio talked about the shift in the Click Interview with H/P in May 2022.

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.

www.side-line.com

(Interview by Simon Helm) Dubstar first came to prominence in the 1990s with the kind of hummable dreampop songs that worked as well driving as in clubs. 

Despite chart success, they went on hiatus at the end of the decade. Singer Sarah Blackwood joined Technique and went on tour with Depeche Mode, which led to the founding of Client, the first band on Andy Fletcher’s Toast Hawaii label. Collaborations followed with Martin Gore, Nitzer Ebb and Die Krupps, as the band rode the electro-clash wave.

Blackwood returned to the Dubstar fold and, in 2018, the act returned with a new album, One. Honed to the duo of Blackwood and musician Chris Wilkie, Dubstar’s sound maintained its classic resonance, but with updated and reinvigorated melodies.

The band’s latest release is “I Can See You Outside,” which comes with a video addressing themes like CCTV surveillance. Their previous single, “Hygiene Strip,” tackled the public health crisis. This is deeper material from a group that once got into trouble for using pictures of sexy pencil cases on their covers.

We spoke with Dubstar to find out more about creating under lockdown and their colourful history.

SL: Dubstar seems to be in a much better place as a duo. How do the two of you work together to create the new songs?

Sarah: We live a couple of hundred miles apart, so rely on WeTransfer and sending songs back and forth to each other. Chris will usually start with a template; and, if I like it and it feels and sounds good “sung,” we develop it. Sometimes the vocal suggests different areas to approach, like a key change or a word tweak, and sometimes they don’t need much development; they are almost fully formed and ready to send on to the mother ship, which is [producer Stephen Hague’s] studio.

Chris: Even the people at the end of my street seem a couple of hundred miles away nowadays. But yes, we already had a bit of practice at working “remotely” for geographical reasons. I can usually imagine what the songs will sound like with Sarah singing them, but often unforeseen ideas will emerge in response to what happens the first time she approaches it. Maybe because she hears something which I hadn’t, and her delivery suggests another layer of meaning.

SL: You have been working on new material with Stephen Hague. He seems to have collaborated with a lot of Northerners – New Order, Pet Shop Boys, OMD, Holly Johnson and Pete Shelley being just a few examples. How did you take to him, being from Yorkshire?

S: He’s very mild mannered and easy going. This time around, it was like picking up from where we left off. I can’t quite believe I’m saying this, but I’ve known and worked with him, on and off, for 25 years.

He has seen me through drunken melodramas to sober neurosis; through Dubstar to Client and back again. He even helped me design my kitchen. He’s always tried to nurture and encourage me as a person, especially during the first album, when I was overwhelmed by just about everything. He was a welcome, quiet and calming, influence; and he used to lend me books he thought would be relevant and helpful. Stephen went out of his way to put me at ease, which I massively appreciated. In all the madness, his recording studio was always a place of calm and focus. 

So, the Northerner in both myself and Chris is pretty direct. We don’t need pandering to, and hope what you see is what you get – which I think works well with Stephen’s laid-back calm, on both a productive and a personal level.

C: Perhaps it helps that he’s from Maine and is essentially a Northerner himself, in U.S. terms.

He brings a tranquility-of-mind to proceedings, which is something which me and Sarah have always struggled to achieve without assistance!

SL: The new material doesn’t shy away from confronting themes lifted from the headlines, including the pandemic. How have you been coping during the crisis?

S: I have significantly narrowed my horizons to stay sane, what with ever-changing restrictions. I can’t seem to keep up with which iterations are the most recent, so I just keep my head down, stay close to home, and go out only when it’s absolutely necessary.

I’m massively introverted, anyway, so I’ve quite enjoyed nesting and making unrealistic plans for my home environment, but some of my friends have found it very difficult and I worry for them. My WhatsApp groups with my friends and relatives have become lifelines, even if all we share is yet another banana bread recipe or the latest Donald Trump meme. I see more of my parents, via Zoom, than I ever did, so I think some good has come out of it.

I think my biggest problem will be re-adjusting, if and when the time comes. I haven’t used public transport or been into the centre of town since February. Two evenings out ended disastrously in anxiety attacks, so I think a gentle re-introduction is most definitely in order.

C: I haven’t coped well at all, but making the record has been a lifeline. I liken it to any recycling process: you can take fear and sorrow, and transform them into something less harmful, or even useful.

SL: Sarah, you have sung with Die Krupps. What was it like performing a Visage song with Germany’s legendary industrial act?

S: Well, I remember the recording of it vividly!!!! About three days before, in the middle of a tour, I was given a CD of “Der Amboss” with strict instructions to learn it – which really was mission impossible with absolutely no access to a CD player. Smartphones then were still a twinkle in the eye of Steve Jobs. 

So, on our Saturday off, Ralf [Dörper] dutifully appeared at the hotel just after breakfast, bundled me into a car, and whisked me off to a recording studio in Düsseldorf. I had the journey time to listen to it, on repeat, and then he told me I had to sing it in German too! I have no aptitude for languages, whatsoever, although all my German friends love teaching me very bad things to say for their own amusement. 

Honestly, trying to get my Yorkshire mouth and dialect around the song left us all in fits of laughter. I could see Ralf and Jürgen [Engler] doubled over in tears through the window of the control room, especially “habe spas mit mir”! It took a long, long time to record. 

I had the absolute pleasure of singing it with them onstage in London a couple of times, but I think a lot of the fans were confused as to who I was and why I was there. They were very accepting, though, and gave me a nice cheer. 

And then, post gig, I showed Die Krupps how to stretch out their hip flexors in the dressing room. That was an unforgettable image of them all doing the couch stretch. So game. Love them.

SL: Dubstar were managed, at one time, by the same man who had signed Test Department and Cabaret Voltaire to major labels. How did that come about?

S: Just like Marc Almond, our first encounter with Stevo [Pearce] was in Leeds. His first words were, “See that billboard? Your name will be on there one day, in lights!” 

I wasn’t bowled over, to be honest. That sort of thing doesn’t really float my boat. In fact, it would be more likely to induce panic if it ever happened. He was one in a long line of potential managers we had seen. The record label were losing patience with us. We needed a manager – needed one the day before yesterday – and we were terrified of making the wrong choice, but were also so tired, physically and emotionally. We were at the stage where the last one we had seen was the best one – and he was the last one.

Also, his girlfriend was Cleo Rocos. Cleo was Stevo’s secret weapon. Both Chris and I wanted to be in Cleo’s orbit. She was just one of “those” people:  warm, fun and genuinely caring. She became a bit of a rock for me at the time: encouraging me with writing and performing; buying me CDs of interesting artists, like Dory Previn; picking up false eyelashes for me on her travels; and, most wonderfully, she used to ring me when she knew I was scheduled to be on my own in a hotel room. 

She was a big fan of watching C4 Friday night comedy, especially Frasier, and Chris and I continued that tradition long after Stevo had stopped managing us. We always sent a little thank you into the universe for Cleo. 

To me, then, Stevo appeared quite bonkers. He also told me he was dyslexic, and the one thing I admired about him was that, every day, he would learn a new word and incorporate it into his vocabulary. He never saw limitations, only exciting possibilities – no matter how crazy. One of his more publishable ideas was to engineer a photo opportunity in front of the Selfridges Christmas tree, with him dressed as Santa bestowing us with our gold disc for Goodbye sales, whilst the EMI executives posed as elves. In the little green suits and curly toe shoes. It never happened.

C: I was aware of Stevo as a teenager, because he was often referenced in relation to The The or Soft Cell, and I used to find his notes of wisdom on the Some Bizzare record sleeves interesting. The one he put on Soul Mining always stuck in my head: “With every kick in the face and every hurdle you pass, the rewards get greater“.

It seemed very profound and benevolent, so I suggested that he put one on our Goodbye album. It wasn’t quite as snappy, but I appreciated the lineage.

We could probably fill an entire book with anecdotes just from the period where he was our manager. I was amused that he had a literal, free-flowing fountain of Dom Perignon in his office on New Bond Street to entertain visitors, until I realised who was paying for it.

SL: It seems like narcissists are everywhere in the music industry these days. Does that mean they are winning?

S: Ha, I’ve encountered a couple over the years. I don’t think I ever will again, now I’m a little older and hopefully wiser. I think narcissists have always been with us but social media has given them a platform to thrive, and we are becoming more able to spot them. It’s that thing: the more you look for them, the more you see. Maybe social media exaggerates those traits in people, too, like a virus, which is very sad. They start as entertaining and end up being toxic, which can stir up emotions – and sometimes that’s not a good thing.

We have never been more scrutinised as a society; nor judged as individuals, particularly in media and politics. I think having a profile comes with responsibility, which some don’t realise, and it’s time we all started to scrutinise how we communicate. It used to be something we all just took for granted, but maybe the negative aspects of social media have thrown up some things we can all learn from. 

C: It’s unsurprising that narcissists would be attracted to the music business or any role in public life, because it affords them attention. They’re often good at it for a while, but it’s bound to end badly, because they lack the ability to perceive how others see them.

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!

side-line.com

The Nottingham & Bristol UK based industrial duo Goteki is back with a fourth album. “Songs from the void” will be released on Monday April 13th and is Goteki’s fourth album and their first since 2009’s “Santa Muerte”. The 10 track album brings Goteki back to their roots, fusing classic 90s industrial with 80’s New Romantic and 70s Prog Synth in a style they call ‘Death Electro’.

The album will be available on Spotify and https://goteki.bandcamp.com.

The band is the brainchild of composer Ross Tregenza which began life from the ashes of Tregenza’s first project – cybergoth band Sneaky Bat Machine. SBM died and made way for Goteki in 2000. Since then, the band has been through countless stylistic and musical iterations, and a roster of band members, with singer/songwriter Tregenza and live Bassist Ali Star at the core.

In addition to a plethora of singles, remix albums, EPs and curated collections, Goteki have released 3 albums to date.

Between Goteki releases, Tregenza has had a diverse musical career that’s heavily influenced Goteki’s music. He wrote music and played synth & guitar for 80s pop band Visage for a number of years and also works as a composer and sound designer for video games, including the legendary Timesplitters and Crysis series of games.

If you wonder how the band sounds, then this best of is a good starter.

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!

side-line.com

Genre/Influences: Electro-pop.

Background/Info: Indie Moon is the meeting between two singers established in Paris (France) and fans of 80s electronic music. Frédéric Bourreau and Elise Drilhon are now active since 2017 and have unleashed their debut album this year.

Content: We can easily speak about an ode to some 80s new/electro-wave hits as this album features 10 cover versions. You’ll discover 3 Depeche Mode covers while the others are covering Tears For Fears, Visage, Yazoo, Taxi Girl, The Stranglers and Elliot Barett. Indie Moon has adapted the original versions into rather intimate, electronic versions. A few more musicians contributed to the work while both singers perform on the album.

+ + + : I especially like the intimate atmosphere running through the work and some passages, which are more into minimalism. Both singers are talented, but I’m especially impressed by Elise Drilhon when she sings “Don’t Go” from Yazoo. If you know Alison Moyet’s powerful timbre of voice you’ll have to agree it’s not an easy song to sing. The song “No More Heroes” from The Stranglers is the one on which Indie Moon convinced me the most.

– – – : I’m not saying that it becomes boring to discover albums filled with 80s covers, but it’s no longer a surprise. The vocals are good, but some music arrangements are a little less naïve.

Conclusion: No doubt about it, this is the kind of formation that will be more appealing on stage instead of releasing discs with cover versions. It however remains a way to celebrate and remember some essential songs from the new-wave era.

Best songs: “No More Heroes”, “Lie To Me”, “Don’t Go”.

Rate: (6½).

Artist: www.indiemoonband.com / www.facebook.com/pg/indiemoonband

About Indie Moon

Indie Moon pairs Paris-based singers Frederic Bourreau and Elise Drilhon, active together since 2017 as fans of 80s electronic music. Their debut album gathers ten cover versions of new wave and electro-wave songs, reworked into intimate electronic arrangements with the help of additional musicians.

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.

www.side-line.com

Electropop act Cyber Monday has its first cover version out namely a cover of the track “To have and have not” by the 80s act Ronny. The track has just been released and is free to download for a short period of time via the band’s label right here.

You can check the video below.

With Ronny, Cyber Monday has picked up an artist which many had forgotten as her career was extremely short-lived. She used to be a top French model who after meeting entrepreneur Rusty Egan in the Paris club Privelege co-produced several songs with Midge Ure, Vangelis, Georg Kajanus and Peter Godwin. You might also remember her as the model who appeared on the Ultravox “Station” record sleeve and can be seen in Visage‘s “Visage” video. Ronny also did a duet with Steve Strange called “The Lady Is A Tramp”. Neither the single nor the video was ever released.

If you wan’t to check out the original by Ronny, you can check that one below.

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!

side-line.com

Released in collaboration with Other Voices records is the digipak (limited to 300 copies) “Under the radar” by Psyche. The Cd is a compilation of rare, out of print and unreleased tracks, including alternative versions of Psyche’s biggest hits such as “Unveilling the Secret”, “Uncivillized” or “Sanctuary”.

Orders for this rare gem can be placed right here.

All tracks have been remasterd for this special release. You’ll discover lots of highly sought-after tracks for the collector but also a good starting point for the new fan. It includes – among others – also the excellent The Human League cover of “Things that Dreams are made of”, featuring the lead vocalist of Elegenat Machinery and other cover-versions of songs by Joy Division, Depeche Mode and Visage, collaborations with Red Industrie and Luminance and more.

The complete tracklist can be viewed here.

This track with Luminance will also be on this release: “Left Out”.

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!

side-line.com

Whilst checking out the recent free Alfa Matrix download compilation “Matrix Downloaded 006“, one new name popped up: ImJudas with “People Of The Blame (Alfa Edit)”, a dark wave track that already caught the attention of many especially thanks to it references to bands like early Alphaville, Deine Lakaien and related acts. Well, we can now reveal that ImJudas is in fact the brand new electro dark wave solo-project from maXX of the Italian dark/gothic electro metal duo Helalyn Flowers!

We contacted maXX a few days ago to give us some info on this well hidden project from him. But first, here’s the track (which you can download for free from bandcamp now).

SL: I had expected a guitar-powered project from you, but you totally went synth/electropop with ImJudas, talking of a real surprise!

M: Actually nobody was expecting this! You know, many figure me as a rude guy attached to his guitar but the truth is that I simply live my life as a manifesto of self-expression. Why Synth Pop? I didn’t wake up one day and sat at the studio trying to do something different. I don’t plan my projects that way. They all come from a voice within and that voice is the singing in my head. It happened that I was touring with Helalyn Flowers and on the road back to home I had in my mind two of the ImJudas songs. When I started working at the studio I simply followed my instinct and sang my lyrics on a synthesizer and a drum machine. It worked so I stuck that line. It’s a part of me that still I hadn’t time or a chance to let come out.

The main focus is on my voice and on the rhythm as well. There are almost no guitars on purpose because they would saturate the sound too much and these songs need more room within, a sort of something untold. Secondly, I already have other projects that unleash me as a guitarist, like Helalyn Flowers, that all you already know, and Black Shine Fever (formerly known as BlackCore) that is my other solo-project which EP is going to be released this Winter and that sounds like a blend of Post-Punk, Heavy Metal and Goth Rock.

I don’t know if the ‘synth pop’ label is appropriate for describing ImJudas, at least on my personal level, because there is this current tendency to have everything so polish, so clean, with clinic productions that all sound the same and that I keep my distance from. What I love in the early works in this genre was just the dirt, the slight defects, the image of the machines replacing traditional electric instruments and not humans. When I put ‘play’ on albums like ‘The Art of Falling Apart’ of Soft Cell or ‘Dark Star’ by Deine Lakaien I can feel that Rock n’Roll element that was typical to the genre. I am still in that mood, that’s the way I like it (sorry K.C.). I’d like that people accept the fact that ImJudas is not a ‘nice’ act’ and that there is a bloodline of Rock music within it. Well, sonically ImJudas may have all the rules of Synth Pop but I wish that everyone will catch the dark/wavey blood of ImJudas too.

SL: Any special references next to the aforementioned acts?

M: I like to think that ImJudas is some kind of ‘double’ that I exhaled when I was a kid and watched at the ‘Silence of the Lambs’ movie. That’s when I heard for the first time that dark and dancy stuff from Colin Newman and Q Lazzarus. I started searching for those records so I ran into Depeche Mode, Pet Shop Boys, Dead Or Alive, Visage, Talk Talk and all that great 80s stuff before I went deeper and deeper with acts like Coil, Deine Lakaien and Virgin Prunes. The common source of all these acts were always icons of the 70s like Bowie and Roxy Music that I love so much. Also the new-romantics were influenced by that stuff and in fact they inspire me as well.

ImJudas is now the face of that ‘double’, it’s the voice of that child ravished by a beautiful underworld of black and white shapes.

SL: You have been working in total secret on this project, I guess Noemi was aware of your tendencies? 😉

M: How couldn’t she? Eheh… She is aware of all of my tendencies as well as of all the music that I write and that still is imprisoned in hard-disks and CD-R’s! Simply, my ‘secret’ is based on my belief that if I have to unleash something then that something must be ready for me. I can wake up tomorrow and put all of my unreleased music on Bandcamp just for a compulsive share-thing but it wouldn’t be true to myself.

A project of mine should live its own life in the dark before being launched. It must have its own story. Noemi has been my muse, my advisor and always pushed me to bring this to the light of day. I was in the studio listening to these songs over and over again with other music trying to come out of my mind… so at a point, it’s been healthy to me to unleash everything. It’s like freeing a flock of wildened birds imprisoned in the house. And Noemi was always there at my side telling me wise words. I thank her everyday. She’s a part of ImJudas, she takes care of the whole visual and she is my vocal trainer too!

SL: How does it feel to finally come out of the closet?

M: Hah! I feel like I’m still in the closet! Jokes apart, I always try to not think at this kind of things. I learned to feel detached. I ain’t the kind of emotional guy, I want to turn emotions into feelings. But… How good is the human circle of emotions when it allows you to lose yourself in the tide, even just for a while? ?

SL: what’s in the pipeline for ImJudas?

M: My next song to be released after “People Of The Blame (Alfa Edit)” is going to be a cover version of the Front 242 classic ‘Don’t Crash’ on an Alfa Matrix tribute 2CD out next 16 December. I want to release my debut album next year because this stuff is tired to be played among these four walls and I can’t afford to get insane, at least not now! ;-))

You can find ImJudas right here on Facebook.

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!

side-line.com

Background/Info:

Read the news on ‘Crystal Tears’.

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.

www.side-line.com

Read the review of ‘Crystal Tears’.

Side-Line also covered Avarice In Audio’s ‘Anthracite Nights’.

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!

side-line.com

Out in June is the newest Vanguard album “Never surrender”. The album is the follow-up of the teaser single “I want to live” which was released in late 2015. For their 3rd studio album, Jonas Olovsson and Patrik Hansson asked the help of producer Rob Dust who is probably known to some for his remix and production work for Camouflage, NamNamBulu, Chrom, Frozen Plasma, Visage, Torul, Joachim Witt and so on.

Because of delays the band’s new album “Never surrender” has taken more time than expected so the band told a while back. Not that the band didn’t tease their fans in the meantime as you can see/hear below. The album is now up for pre-order right here!

Pre listening the new album in the car. Soon.. ? #vanguard #synth #synthpop #electropop #neversurrender

A photo posted by VANGUARD (@vanguardofficial) on Feb 18, 2016 at 9:58am PST Read the review of ‘Never Surrender’.

The new album will have 12 tracks and you can view a preview below.

And here’s a video for “I Want To Live” in a KC Killjoy Vs ExoSun Starsign Mix.

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!

side-line.com

Visage are set to release their 5th and final studio album on the 6th November 2015. The new album will be entitled “Demons to Diamonds” a name chosen by the family of the late Steve Strange. The album artwork has been done by Boy George and will feature the studio songs that Steve Strange was working on with Visage prior to his death in February 2015.

The album is launched to coincide with the inaugural ‘Steve Strange’ New Romantic music festival in Porthcawl, Wales on October 31st. All royalties from the album will be donated to the newly formed ‘Steve Strange Statue’ fund “which will establish a permanent and lasting memorial to Steve Strange and his musical, style and fashion legacies” so the band says.

The albums holds material Steve Strange and Visage began working in spring 2014. It is the follow up album to the 2013 “Hearts and Knives” album. Over 15 songs were written during that time and the band had recorded just over half when Steve died on February 12th 2015. The band completed the album later on. The album features contributions by Mick Macneil (Simple Minds) and Didier ‘Space’ Marouani (“Magic Fly”). The album also features a cover version of the David Bowie song “Loving The Alien”.

A limited edition vinyl only single containing a extended remix of “Lost in Static” and a brand new track is available now from Control Room Recordings.

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!

side-line.com

Genre/Influences: Electro-pop, body-pop.

Content: This limited vinyl 7” is a meeting between a long time established and electro-pop icon and an upcoming and promising new artist.

Psyche needs no longer introduction with Darrin Huss being a kind of living legend in the electro-pop scene. Luminance is a Belgian project, which has released a couple of interesting releases since 2014. The debut album “Sans Visage” is actually out on the Belgian-based Die Blinden Records. So this is the meeting between different musical decades, but sharing the same fascination for electro-pop inspired music.

“Left Out” reminds me of good-old EBM for its typical vintage electronic style while the song is carried by a somewhat floating and elevating chorus. It totally matches with Darrin Huss’ charismatic timbre of voice.

“Passenger Seat” moves a step further in the retro-electro style. It’s a great body-pop constructed song built on mysterious sound atmospheres and driven by spooky vocals. This song reminds me of the great 80s decade of underground electronics and I can imagine it’s the kind of song Darrin Huss must have liked to sing on.

Conclusion: I can only hope both artists will have the good idea to renew their experience to create this vinyl and maybe unite for an entire album. There’s some magic inside this duo.

Best songs: “Passenger Seat”, “Left Out”.

Rate: (DP:7½)DP.

Bands: www.psyche-hq.de / www.facebook.com/Psyche / www.facebook.com/Luminance-314907865278384

Label: www.artoffact.com / www.facebook.com/artoffact

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.

www.side-line.com