An excellent release of free improvisation by these three musicians: Nils Ostendorf, trumpet; Philip Zoubek, prepared piano; Philippe Lauzier, bass clarinet & saxophones. The first two tracks are quite good and if I hadn't known it beforehand I would have said they were actually electronic pieces. The prepared piano work gives us a wonderfully dense cloud of overtones that sounds quite cinematic at times. The other pieces are more obviously coming from acoustic instruments, but with a richer expression of sound, as the musicians use various techniques to pull quite surprising sounds out of their instruments. The results can be quite delicate and gentle at times and then quite abrasive and aggressive. I liked this very much.

German sound artist Thorsten Soltau uses material by the German artist Weiss from his release 'Rephlex' to produce four new tracks. Weiss then takes the new tracks and remixes them again. Minimal in structure and sound, the pieces sometimes dance to the rhythm of a new primitivism and at the same time spit in glitchy electronic abandon, and then rests in pleasant slumber. The joy of pure sound and rhythm. Sometimes the sound could be a bit creepy, with granulated voices and conversations contemplating something malevolent. Sound falling apart but still musical. I liked this very much.

Seven tracks of sometimes subtle and sometimes not so subtle layered noise and field recordings (and political manifestos on four tracks spoken in a growly voice like a bad horror movie), giving the 'Manipulations' title a double meaning. I'm not really interested in politics and don't think this will change anyone's mind (if you could understand what is being said in the first place, it's pretty distorted), but I do think it's well recorded and interesting as a noise/sound artifact.

This Dark-Wave band returns with a full-length CD full of competently performed songs expressing the themes you would expect from the genre. For the black t-shirt crowd who watch a lot of teen- and twenty-something vampire series TV and movies. It's all done well but I feel that all the aggression and danger has been smoothed out by an over-produced treatment. It's just all a bit too polite.

Nonnon is Dave Madden of Salt Lake City. I usually don't like hip-hop based music but this I like for some reason. It's probably the kitchen-sink attitude Dave uses to bring about his highly experimental beat based songs. It is well in the realms of hip-hop rhythm-wise but hanging out on the edge so far that he's liable to fall off. The music is not dangerous, in an aggressive way, but it there is aggression here. Subtle but still present. Demanding that you listen, not knowing what's coming next. Definitely worth a listen for that at least.