Issued for the first time in 1982 by Trumpett, LA VIA DEL LATTE was the first Doxa Sinistra tape and it will be the latest Trumpett reissue by Enfant Terrible. The Dutch label already released on vinyl 'Conveyer Belt', the second Doxa Sinistra tape and now you have the opportunity to check eighteen out of twenty one tracks of their first great release (the intro, the outro and "Maurizio's minestrone" are missing into this 300 copies run reissue). Mixing minimal melodic synth lines, guitar riffs, sparse drum machine beats and analog noises with an experimental/industrial attitude, the band succeeded into creating a personal landscape made of short instrumentals (the longest track is three minutes long) characterized by alienated atmospheres where the vocals are filtered and duet with percussive noises and bleeping monophonic keyboards. Alternating fast and tense tracks (check "Ruhrgebiet" or "Kuomintang`s Space Blues") to experimental atmospheric ones (like "Via Del Latte 2" or "Via Del Latte 4"), Doxa Sinistra sounding sinister like a nuclear alarm siren. Spreading their sonic pollution all around your place, the Dutch band will convince you that it's better to sleep with one eye opened...

Coming from Brighton, UK, Manni Dee is releasing his latest single for Vermin Street. The EP contains two original tunes titled "Antidote" and "Universal symphony". The first one mixes Nintendo games bleeps with nice melodies, breaks and sparse vocal samples. The second ones has a laid back attitude thanks to mid tempo breaks and sci-fi vocal samples. Bleeps and melodies blend nicely creating, as for the first one, a cinematic atmosphere. The EP contains also two remixes of "Antidote" (Alby D Cheecky, Manni Dee's studio partner, turned the original tune into a dub/break number with a bit of experimental attitude and Rotterdam's Halp made of it a bleeping techno atmospheric track) and one of "Universal symphony" (now sounding two step and bouncing thanks to Moscow's Pixelord). Nice...

Formerly NJ now Maine based EBM band Sonik Foundry (not to be confused with Sonic Foundry, the media software company; remember Sound Forge and ACID?) came about in 2008, and 'Parish of Redemption' is their second full album release after 'Mechanized' in 2009. 'Parish of Redemption'? Sounds like a gospel album, eh? '¦NOT! No 'Hallelujahs,' 'Amens' or 'Amazing Grace' on this. What you get is fairly standard but solid EBM; competent dark dance music. The band is led by Nikademus, the male half of the band Bow Ever Down. His synth, rhythm and programming cohorts are Malic Acid and Tim Mizerak. Nik's (can I call you Nik? We're all buds in this dark music world to some degree, eh?) vocals are of the intelligible variety, as opposed to the harsh, distorted-to-death kind which is a plus in my book. They're melodic enough but with an edge of menace, so it doesn't spill into the synth-pop/future-pop realm. Somewhere I saw a reviewer saying Nik had a flat-sounding voice. I disagree. Actually, if you took Ozzie Osborn's pipes and mixed it with say, Gary Numan, it wouldn't be far off from what you get here. On the other hand, it's not a terribly powerful voice. Stronger vocals seem to be coming from Malic's occasional shouted/screamed vocal interjections on some tracks. It's an effective and useful contrast though.

As for the music, it is quite serviceable, though not particularly innovative, with above average synth programming. It's hard to be innovative in a genre with the stricture of parameters that EBM has, considering how long it's been around and how many bands have mined the field. You need a fair amount of doom & gloom lyrics, a strong 4-on-the-floor beat, apocalyptic sounding sequenced synth electronics, and heavy bass. As for sticking to this tried 'n true formula, Sonik Foundry do that very well. I can't pick a standout track on 'Parish of Redemption' because there is a great degree of homogeny running throughout most of the album. There ain't no huge hits, and there ain't no dreadful misses, and there wasn't anything that I didn't particularly care for. There is only one track that could be considered balladesque, and that's 'Destiny' where things are slowed down a bit. Reminds me of The Birthday Massacre (sans guitars and Chibi's femme vocals) melodically and in the synth arrangements. This is possibly the nicest change-up on the album. I bet if it was remixed in a duet with Chibi, it would perk up a few ears. If I had to come up with a direct comparison for the band as a whole on this album, I'd say it was the more aggressive aspects of a band like Assemblage 23, and the more thoughtful aspects of a band like Combichrist. (Now there's an analogy for you!)

Two big plusses for this band: No guitars and they do live shows. In fact, they've supported bands on tour such as Ego Likeness, Interface, Uberbyte, Terrorfakt, Unter Null, and of course, Bow Ever Down, and it looks like they'll be touring this summer in the East and Midwest. If you get a chance you should go see them. The album is worth checking out too, especially if you've had a lack of decent new EBM in your life.

Bionulor is the project name of Polish composer/experimental artist Sebastian Banaszczyk, probably better known in European experimental electronic music circles than in the United States. Bionulor is said to be inspired by artists such as Aube and William Basinki, and from what there is on 'Sacred Mushroom Chant' that's pretty close to the mark. This album was created using only the human voice as sound source basis, then processing and manipulating the crap out of it. In that respect, this is a remarkable achievement.

Not knowing anything about the CD except the title, I briefly toyed with the idea of acquiring some hallucinogenics to put me in the proper frame of mind for the listening experience. Brother! I am ever so glad I decided against that! 'Sacred Mushroom Chant' is not an OM-ish mantra that will conjure visions of yantras and mandalas in your brain. Like a real psychedelic trip, this a journey down the rabbit-hole (or maybe wormhole) that is akin to spending nearly an hour in a very strange land, or rather, five of them.

Opening track 'SCRD.MSHRM.CHNT.' is a nearly 22 minute excursion with the sound source being an archival record of a shamanic chant associated with the ceremony of taking hallucinogenic mushrooms. There is a LOT going on in this track, but not always. From the sounds of breathing, backwards cymbal noise sweeps, intermittent snippets of electronic timbres, repeated sample loops, manipulated feedback squeals, unidentifiable sub-bass sounds, to a multitude of other effluvia, this sonic collage whisks you into a very weird realm where the normal laws of space and time do not seem to apply. At about the 7:30 mark it all stops, and then changes. There is a vague hint of rhythmic electronic melody in a repeating pattern. It is purely for the listener to make of it what you will; you could imagine a distress signal in deep space, a cybernetic code, or an interdimensional dance. A little later, a noise loop seems to be making a sound like an alien brain-sucking operation. I swear, I took no drugs while listening and writing this review! I could go on and on about impressions of this track, but we have to move on.

The sound source for 'NHN-B.' is a Japanese traditional song extracted from a collection of old vinyl records. Uh, you'd never know it unless I told you. For a fair amount of time in this track it sounds like you're floating alone through a spacey void, enveloped in a cosmic cloud of minimalistic sonics. Eventually, something takes form though, and that alien entity makes its presence known in a very sneaky and oblique manner. Before you know it, you have been absorbed!

'NL' uses astronaut Neil Armstrong's NASA moonwalk transmissions as its sound source, and in the beginning you get to hear the actual words before it goes warp. Most noticeable on this track is a throbbing bass pulse, and zizzing tendrils of electronics that zip around in the coldness of space. Eh, didn't do much for me. In DCHMP' we get Marcel Duchamp telling us about his readymade sculpture, the 'Bicycle Wheel' which he repeats a number of times, lest we not forget. The electronics here are sporadic and playful, though still generally minimal. I can't help but think it might have been interesting to combine Duchamp's 'Bicycle Wheel' with Albert Hoffman's 'Bicycle Day' as to me, this is the most overtly hallucinogenic track on the album. A lot of elements are echoed, including Duchamp's voice, giving this a very trippy vibe. There is also a prolific use of processed feedback, sometimes unpleasant, but mostly effective.

Finally, in 'NIC NIE JEST PRAWDZIWE' it is Banaszczyk's voice (in Polish, I presume) repeating the infamous "Nothing is true" quote from that old Persian assassin, Hassan-i Sabbah, which starts out like a normal sampled voice loop, then morphs into a bizarre off-kilter electronic pattern, becoming semi-industrial. Buzzes, whirrs, bleeps, bloops, etc, with part of the vocal sampling resurfacing now and then. Highly experimental and creative, but annoying as all fuck to listen to.

As you can see, there are things I really liked, and things I didn't quite care for on Bionulor's 'Sacred Mushroom Chant,' so for me, it's a mixed bag. There is still enough worthy material here though to warrant checking it out. The album was mastered by Peter Andersson of Raison d'être, so you know that aspect is up to snuff. Getting a copy of the physical CD in the U.S. might be a challenge as it only seems to be available through European distributors. (Apparently not available on iTunes either.) Your best bet might be to check out the tracks via Bionulor's MySpace site, then acquire them there.

The debut-album by Mollono.Bass aka Molle getting the support of many other talented techno producers such as Richie Hawtin, Super Flu, Toni Rios, Stehpan Bozin, Phonique and Afrilounge, his environment-influenced hidden playground, whereas the toys are both digital and instrumental sounds chiseling and embossing malleable and solid tech-house rhythmical lines, smells of wet deadwood, soaked grass, mackintosh spattered with mud, first pollens and even antihistamine nasal spray for allergic rhinites, maybe as some reversed claps in tracks such as the flimsy Beyond The Lake sounds like sneezing, which looks like stifled in the nice experiments on the vocals by Ginger of the initial In The Meadow! Jokes apart, this recording by one of the founder of the quartet Kombinat100, who has chosen his own firstly created imprint, Acker Records, for this nice issue, shows an original approach to electronic dance patterns off, not only through the integration of real instruments (in particular the guitar by Jorg Schwenzer as well saxophones, trumpets and piano resurfacing in more house-loungey tracks such as In The Middle Of The Park or Under The Sun) but mainly by the attempt at enlivening electronic sounds - for instance in the previously mentioned Under The Sun, you could listen to a sort of "pan-fried" blow looking like the slow burning of the skin cells under a tropical sun whereas in tracks such as After The Rain or Deep In the Forest, sounds blended together in an enjoyable togetherness reflecting the dynamic swarming of a natural setting -. The moments when electronic uplifting sounds are played together with guitars, ideally bridging imaginary mental world with the organic one - acting as a a sort of bridoon for excessively parabolic mental trips! - and those ones when you could perceive some gipsy music influences (In The Meadow, The Smiling Shaman and The Owl featuring an owl!) some listeners who already approached to Mollono.Bass releases such as Die Liebe or Brummelhorn intercepted, are definitively my favourite ones. I'd say the wintry spring bursting into Mollono.Bass' sound machines could amplify your desire for summer.