Telex announce ‘MAXI’, a 13-track album of extended versions on Mute
Telex release “MAXI” on Mute on 4 December 2026: 13 new extended versions on double red and blue vinyl and CD, launched with a maxi mix of “Moskow Diskow”.
Telex - Photo: Xavier Lambours
Thirteen new extended versions, cut from the original tapes, make up the next Telex release. “MAXI” arrives on Mute on 4 December 2026 as a double album on transparent red and blue vinyl and as a CD, with a digital release to follow in 2027. The launch track is a maxi version of “Moskow Diskow”, the 1979 single from the Belgian synthpop trio’s debut album, now out as official audio on Mute’s YouTube channel. The album is available to pre-order.
Telex were Marc Moulin (1942-2008), Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers, and the two surviving members went back to the original tapes to build the Maxi versions, which come with new mixes and new mastering. The album collects “Moskow Diskow”, “Soul Waves”, “L’Amour Toujours”, “Rock Around The Clock”, “Temporary Chicken”, “Dance To The Music”, “Eurovision”, “En Route Vers De Nouvelles Aventures”, “Rendez-Vous Dans L’Espace”, “Peanuts”, “Twist À Saint-Tropez”, “Spike Jones” and “We Are All Getting Old”, each carrying the “(Maxi)” suffix. The tracklist spells the opener “Moskow Diskow”, as on the original single, while the audio upload titles it “Moscow Diskow”.
Telex revisit ‘Euro-vision’ and ‘Rock Around The Clock’
Two of the extended tracks come with a television history. “Euro-vision” was Belgium’s entry at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1980, where it finished 17th of 19 with 14 points. Moers described the entry as “very Situationist International, the worm in the apple.” The band set out to finish either first or last, and did neither. Their cover of Bill Haley’s “Rock Around The Clock”, slowed down and sung through a vocoder, brought the trio an invitation to perform on Top of the Pops in 1979; Mute calls it “a ticking, vocoderised, supremely deadpan robot parody of the original”. The later material on “MAXI” includes the cut-up “rap” of “Peanuts”, from 1988’s “Looney Tunes”, and “Rendez-Vous Dans L’Espace”.
About Telex
Telex formed in Brussels in 1978, when Marc Moulin, Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers set out to make electronic pop without guitars. Their first single was a cover of Les Chats Sauvages’ “Twist à Saint-Tropez”, and the debut album “Looking for Saint-Tropez” (1979) carried “Moskow Diskow” and “Rock Around The Clock”. “Neurovision” followed in 1980, the year of the Eurovision entry, and “Sex” in 1981, with lyrics co-written with Sparks. “Wonderful World” appeared in 1984 and “Looney Tunes” in 1988, after which the trio remixed its catalogue as “Les Rythmes Automatiques” in 1989 and then went quiet as a recording unit. The sixth and last studio album, “How Do You Dance?”, came out in 2006. Moulin died on 26 September 2008, and Telex announced their retirement that year.
The partnership with Mute began in 2021 with “This Is Telex”, a 14-track compilation released on 30 April 2021 with the tracks newly mixed and remastered by Lacksman and Moers. It added two previously unreleased covers, “Dear Prudence” by The Beatles and “The Beat Goes On” by Sonny & Cher, both found while the compilation was being assembled. Mute then reissued the six studio albums, remastered from the original tapes, as a limited vinyl and CD “Telex” box set, announced in October 2022 with the teaser “EP1” and released on 14 April 2023. Three days later Lacksman and Moers sat down with Mute founder Daniel Miller for a public talk in Brussels (A night with Telex and Mute Records founder Daniel Miller in Brussels). Moers went on to release his second solo album, “As Is”, in 2024, led by the single “Microwaves” with Claudia Brücken of Propaganda. “MAXI” is the first Telex release of newly made versions since that box set, and the third stage of the Mute campaign after the compilation and the reissues.
Support Side-Line
More people read Side-Line than ever, and there is still no paywall and no advertising. Readers pay for it instead - from $5 a month.
Why we ask
Advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news organisations we have not put up a paywall, and we refuse to add annoying advertising, so we need to ask for your help. Side-Line’s independent journalism takes time, money and hard work to produce, and we do it to push the artists we like, who are equally fighting to survive.
Handled by PayPal.
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!
