Rudolf C
Common Era

ABT011 - CA - 2018RPBlooming Summer by Blue Hawaii

The new Cristian Vogel album "1Zhuayo" sounds as if non-musicology & ultra-blackness is not an end or a destination to be arrived at, but as if it is the point of departure, much like tomorrow relates to the day after tomorrow. As if we have left the space of certainties and are moving instead into one of manifold possibilities. They are anticipated in the micro-structures of sound, which is the process of playing with and against the software. Beyond genre delimitation and fragmentation, it is non-music in the post, without itself immediately becoming a cliché, like deconstructed club music or hyperpop. Without being superficially conceptual, the musical material alone succeeds in creating a different, coherent, sonically possible world.

DE279 - US - 2020Group Rhoda, the solo project of Mara Barenbaum, returns to Dark Entries with ‘Passing Shades’. An integral member of the Oakland electronic music scene, Barenbaum has been writing, performing, and plunging into oneiric depths as Group Rhoda since 2009. This is the project’s fourth LP, and the third time Barenbaum has collaborated with Dark Entries; previously on the Max & Mara LP ‘Less Ness’ in 2013 and the Group Rhoda LP ‘Wilderless’ in 2017.Passing Shades is an investigation of the metaphysics of loss and the transitory nature of the material world. But it is not a grim collection; over 8 songs, Group Rhoda diverges through synthesizer-laden symphonics, four-to-the-floor inflections, and cosmic musings. Barenbaum’s striking voice and singular songcraft guide us through this labyrinth. Arpeggiated waltz “Flow” channels wisdom sought through martial arts; “Earthly Ark” sets a Margaret Atwood poem from the God Gardener’s Hymn Book to somber electronics. The vocoded canticle “Nevermore” is dedicated to the memory of a beloved cat. ‘Passing Shades’ is both mystifying and revelatory. Folk forms are echoed only to detour into the alien. Each song functions as both a fragment of a larger puzzle and a koan unto itself. ‘Passing Shades’ was mastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios. The sleeve was designed by Eloise Leigh, and features a hazy, clouded sky.

Sol Invictus 10" by Colin Fisher

Brand new label VIBRASJON kicks off with a tsunami remix EP, joining two of west-coast Norway's favourite sea-gazers. Following Vullum's "Ohms Love" LP from last year, Telephones reimagines and transforms the material through three elaborate new metamorphosis. Beatless ambient, leftfield trip-hop and euphoric balearic techno - from 0 to 137 bpm. "Changgu-Satturnu (Telephones' Mind Meld)" takes you on a cinematic ride to the etheral, while the strong emotional tide of "Tustna (Telephones Slowmocean Ambient Mix)" pulls you out, far and deep through rogue waves and swells of starry-eyed nostalgia and pure feel. Flipping the record, not to mention tempo, "Tustna (Telephones Sueñotechno Rush Mix)" is exactly what it sounds like: A pounding 12 minute mind-trip through ambient techno, to a parallel universe where Hawaii, Detroit, Goa and west-coast Norway are all grains of sand at the same beach.. do not miss!