Weâ??ve noticed a great publishing effort behind the fourth studio album by one of the most unpretentious and underrated Dark electro project, the young but hyper-prolific German (from Chemnitz, a town sited in the ex-East Germany nearby the Czech borders, formerly known as Karl-Marx Stadt) band Wynardtage, supported by a lot of meaningful trademarks of the scene and co-released by Equinoxe (release number 66) and Rupal Records (release with the magical number 23... ), entitled The Grey Line, maybe referring to the homonymous one, which people studying earth sciences know very well, referring to the band which separates daylight from darkness. Following his previous album Praise The Fallen, widely acclaimed by specialized press as well as by EBM-dark djs, weâ??re almost sure that this brand new album will obtain a comparable acclamation mainly for an aspect which should not be underrated by electro dances, often called "danceability". Even if Wynardtage declares "The world is still the same â?“ only I have changed... ", the listener which knows Kai Arnoldâ??s (the mastermind unraveling the threads of Wynardtage) past albums easily recognizes that the themes are more or less the same of the previous works, mainly rooted in ferocious critics to social matters and false morality mixed up with personal statements, fears and wishes, even if it seems that the (strictly darkish!) canvas enwrapping this lyrics all over the 11 tracks of the album is more intended for dancers wearing obscure spectacles (or gas masks!)... Harsh sounds combined with suffocating ones, martial 4/4 sequenced beats, epic atmospheres and great vocals will kick your ass and perfectly fits this nervous times! A song like Cutting Down is what we imagine is "silently" resonating in the minds of managers on the point of announcing an imminent cut of work forces (sometimes suicide inducing..), while the title track is one of the best episodes of the whole album: the guest singer Melanie G. from the band advantage perfectly interpretes the depressively foggy breeze of this sybilline song inviting the listener to create a vision to (re)create a personal delight. And the whispering and suggestive dialogue introducing If There Is No Tomorrow seems to be tragically predictive, donâ??t despair and dances on the corrugated front-row beats shaking that song. We like the recurring habit of interweaving spoken parts and smashing beats with swampy electronic sequences and rusty vocals tumbling down on rhythms which sometimes reminds to us slushing wheels, especially in tracks like Crash Of A Star â?“ a song which seems an angry reflection on the delicate matter of young people suicidal pulsations, nicely contrasting with the following track, Now We Are Alive, a song which will arguably echoe in unhappy existences... especially the Painbastardâ??s remix â?“, My Life or The Frozen Point (paradoxically one of the highest point of the whole album according to our ears and tip-tapping feet... ). The European version of the limited edition includes three remixes: the above-mentioned one by Painbastard, a more "elastic" crushed version of Mask by ESC and a disengaged techno rush by X-Fusion remixing Tragic Hero, but we know that American and Russian tracklists are slightly different as they include other remixes. After you listened to the album you could ask to yourself if Wynardtage chose a similar title â?“ The Grey Line â?“ just to preannounce a forthcoming transition from dark to light or arguably to make a present to people afflicte by split personality, but itâ??s possible that youâ??ll formalute similar silly question panting and panting after dancing... So... keep on dancing on the grey line, folks!

Equilibrium is sometimes like taking off your shoe in order to remove a pebble thrown unexpectedly inside of it and hurting feet while walking by a little spiteful brontosaurus. That could be just an interpretation of what this Italian band seems to suggest by the use of a nice shot for the green filtered cover artwork by Alessandro Della Savia (pay attention...there's a message under the leaves!) and inside and throughout the "rough" lines of an album which is only apparently just delightful and saturated with pleasurable grooves. Positive messages even if homemade and juicy tunes by the way! Let's state from now on that H.U.G.O. is just an acronym standing for Homemade (...and as many things with this distinctive quality, you could undoubtedly say it's greatly more genuine than any other musical prescription deriving from a widespread "serialism"! By the way... could you deny that fried noodles are healthier than Elvira Coot's delicious tidbits?!?) Unlimited Groove Opportunities and speaking generally you know thereâ??s nothing more concrete than opportunities (or could we speak about possibilities?!?). Thatâ??s the reason why in my modest opinion, thereâ??s nothing particularly mystical or out-of-head in their music even if rich of references to some dreamy acts from Bristol music masters as well as ethereal "ambientalists" such as Boards Of Canada. But when the skilled voice by Daniela Zebraâ??s uvula utterly flutterly sings, moans and (sometimes) whispers with total absence of fawning "life exists only in the absence of equilibrium", it seems that they enjoy being controversial and thatâ??s why they could not be defined a pop band! The lyrics are somewhat like memory pills as they even quote Herbert Marcuseâ??s one-dimensional man, punksâ?? believing, pagan principles based on the alternation of seasons and changes on human life, a bizarre female version of Stevensonâ??s fictional character created to represent the splitting of personality (the famous â?“ and not so â?“ strange case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr.Hide), with some provocative statements (for instance in Whacked you could listen to a sort of gentle invective full of praises against an imaginary starlet totally absorbed by a "fake" star system ideology... ), while the music seems to be a conglomerate assemblage of different influences well amalgamated by a groovy cheeky rhythmical pattern, often invading the fertile grounds of psychedelic electronic movements with that way of "ease-grabbing" distinguishing poppy tracks, chiming tones and well-crafted basslines. Even if in some episodes the compositional aspects lacks of homogeneity, youâ??ll arguably appreciate their trembling and sibylline style and their refined alchemy.

Seasonal music, id est a music that could be fitted to or associated with a particular season, has always been a good deal and thatâ??s quite notorious to a lot of music operators since centuries: Christmas-related marketing specialists launching cds fillep up with Xmas carols, pop stars, official and unofficial religious institutions and even ancient Celtic bards and Hindi gandharvas seems to know that! And thereâ??re some nice attempts even among electronic musicians (think for instance to Martin Julesâ?? Herbstlaub or as well as well as more famous ones by classical old composers (from Vivaldi to Prokofiev) aware of the fact that each season of the year could arguably have its own sound. This intriguing album well-crafted by the Canadian musicians Aidan Beker and Jim DeJong (aka The Infant Cycle) issue by the juicy industrial and experimental Russian label Zhelezobeton seems to be another attempt of giving voice and grabbing sounds from the intimate spirit of the four seasons eternally cycling in a year (even if nowadays pollution is slightly changing the natural rules... ). Rural Sprawl â?“ what an elegiac title! â?“ contains four tracks, one for each season, four states of the soul, which seems to be the acousmatic harvest from a mindful haemorragia derived by the squeezing of perceptive spheres of the musicians by help of a respectable kit including tapes, a bass, some guitars, a feedback generator, a sampler, some playouts and a thumb piano. Four tracks partially reminding works by Strings of Consciousness or Origami Galaktica, mainly designed on powerfully hypnotic overstretched drones enriched with entrancing binaural pulses and nicely sequenced sounds, skewing the audio climax. This sprawl starts with the flat loopline saturated by a guadually eruptive infiltration of an atonal sound sustained by fluttering rhythms and a follicular guitar tune, wholly exudating the memory of those sneaking summer noons and its intimate sense of stunning stillness. My favourite track â?“ and just by chance my favourite season â?“ is the one dedicated to autumn: the sense of suffocating oppression is reduced and a more melodic and melancholic (and sometimes moaning) tone permeates through the drone surrounding the listener till the end, when it turns into a strangled lovely guitar solo... Both Summer and Temperature Drop were recorded in 2001 and already release on a very limited CD-R by the Italian label Blade Records. In order to complete the natural cycle of this album, Aidan and Jim recorded two others in 2005. The first one reflects the lethargic savour of winter throughout a silently murmourous set of subtones, an hardly dragging kit of electronic sounds and pure jems of isolationist drones, gradually preparing the ground for the more organic one of the final track, an enchanting anthem with tiny sounds on majestic sounds waves, summing up the reflowering of natural elements normally marking spring-time in a captivating way. Very good record, highly recommended for brain machine addicts!

A lot of music reviewers as well junkpunk lovers and Alec Empire-ian universe's satellites gave this uk aggro-industrial band a warm welcome after the issue of their premiere full LP, entitled Seethe, two years ago, even if their style's partially inspired by the harshest side of digital punk, which someone considers as an agonizing glamorous trend - maybe that's the reason why there are so many references to zombies... -. This is partially true as you could easily recognize some influences of mid 90's industrial bands such as Atari Teenage Riot or Dan Gatto's Babyland, but they show a trespassing musical personality (even if someone could argue that zombies lost their soul!) even when they throw stereotyped massive noise walls joining them to some bangings from recognizable drum machines and emulators. And the proof that this foundation (not intended for vegans and pro-clerical people) shows more than a wide assortment of bangs, clangs, lasers and bleeps is given in this EP. The favourite shooting target of these famished digital punksters seems to be the hypocrisy of religious organizations and organized religions, a smashing invective screamed by The Juddaman - lovely according to an unpredictable response from our ears ,the way he chooses for growling, shouting and tweaking "God"! - in the lyrics of Godless (itâ??s reasonable youâ??ll scream "we donâ??t need your sins, we donâ??t need your god, we donâ??t need your lies,... " as if possessed after repeated listenings... itâ??s just a temporary possession, mummy and daddy!), an ass-shaker virulent danceable track which it's going to be played by a lot of djs selecting this kind of stuff for their followers. Godless has been so appreciated that these butchery's fanatics decided to run a remix contest on their website. In Purging Ep, you could listen three of the remixes they received from their fanbase. The Ladder one is the most danceable (a sort of techno-ebm-march with a rough distortion on an alarm sound...), the Digicore one shows a punkey set on a sort of jungle which is soon covered by the sound of a distorted guitar and by violent kickin' grape-shots, while the Multi-Panel one has a strange weirdy appeal with an astonishing mumbling chord. We really appreciated the lyrics of Victims, reminding the brutal assassination of Sophie Lancaster and her boyfriend Robert Maltby, a famous murder case in Great Britain, as they were killed just for their attachment to the goth way of wearing. Victims is not the first tribute to these victims - one of the first to write a song ("Illusion") for them was Ronan Harris by VNV Nation -, but we agree with the intent of denouncing one of the most frightening example of social intolerance. Different interpretations could be given to the words of Fucking Sick, demostrating the lyricist knows the tricks of the trade quite well! The most intimate tracks of this ep are Septic and You Made Me Suffer, the latter of which has something morbid reminding to us a mixture of Sonic Youth and Starfish Enterprises covered with a slighlty digital sauce. After listening to this good ep - you'll never hear any tracks from it on Vatican radio...we're almost sure about that! -, you'll have a persuading explanation of the reason why they shared the stage with most famous names of the scene such as Sheep On Drugs, Caffeine Kill, Angelspit, Das Ich, Funker Vogt, Killing Miranda and many others. Hurry up if you're a cd maniac disliking digital downloads as the CD version of Purging is available as a limited edition run of 300 individually numbered copies.

In the Greek mithology, the famous fortuneteller Tiresias got blind after a dispute between Zeus and Hera. One sunny day (as on Mount Olympus as well as on airplanes, the sun always shine, arguably!) those gods decided to summon him as a witness as he personally experienced both feminine and masculine sexual condition (just for having disturbed the copulation between two snakes... it should be a disgusting vision!) to solve a dramatic question: who has more pleasure in sex? The man, as from Heraâ??s viewpoint, or the woman, as Zeus claimed? Mister Tiresias, who used to be a successful prostitute when he lived in the countenance of Lady Tiresias, unveiled the secret sentencing that womenâ??s sexual pleasure is far better than menâ??s one. Thatâ??s the reason why this unlucky forerunner of transgenderism obtained blindness by the angry goddess, but on the other hand he could predict future as a thanksgiving gift from Zeus... It could sound strange that the notorious German industrial/dark-electro band Project Pitchfork has chosen this mithological character to metaphorically represent all the rebels agitating our dirty society by a constant research of the hidden truth. An explanation of this choice could be justified by the fact that Tiresias was punished for revealing secrets to mankind... the same risky way some "fortunetellers" in our society are still running in order to contrast the will of blinding the whole mankind by governments and war lords, which looks like more interested in focusing mass attention on effects instead of causes... good conoisseurs donâ??t need further explanations! Itâ??s not the first time this band uses interesting intellectual links to grab the attention of listeners all over the world. Nowadays theyâ??re followed by thousands of people, which are delighted by their unique mixture of whimsical and irriverent lyrics, exquisite 80s melodies and easy danceable rhythmical patterns... other thousands joined to the fanbase after discovering that Rammstein played side by side this band at their very first steps â?“ could you imagine the powerful energy injected on audiences by this two great German bands sharing the same stage??? -. Thatâ??s why thereâ??s nothing to wonder about if this release has been considered one of the longest awaited album in the beginning of 2009! ... and it seems they came up to their (and our) expectations! According to us, the choice of "staying electronic" is praiseworthy! Referring to his own personal and more experimental projects (Santa Hates You â?“ a project fitting the "hard and loud" stylistic concept â?“ and Imatem â?“ which sounds more synth-poppy, focusing on deep melodies and enchanting harmonies -), Project Pitchforkâ??s frontman and mastermind Peter Spilles stated: "Fulfilling the needs of these two musical alter-egos of mine, has the great side effect of generating a sort of creative "free space", providing me with clarity about where I really want Project Pitchfork's musical future to be, without trying to make it sound like something else. In other words: my two side projects allow Project Pitchfork to go back being Project Pitchfork, and to stay Project Pitchfork.". And the future of Project Pitchfork seems to be totally anchored to the combination of danceable beats and electronic well-crafted sounds pulsating synchronously with a provocative vein. All lyrics deals with contemporary problems and includes mind-blowing exhortations able to feed personal reflections without being too intimistic and obscure. Thereâ??re an ironic condemnation of the (nasty!)habit of drugging children with psycho pills (finally a real parental advisory!!!), the easeness by which governments begin wars sacrificing young people in Darkness, the contradictions of some monotheistic religions in Your God. Other songs seem to run against personal experiences: Full of Life seems to be addressed to people who got their dreams lost blinded by life and its more offensive aspects, while The End fastens listenersâ?? attention upon all kind of endings. But we adore Mr.Spillesâ?? skill as a lyricist (and even its frightened eyes and possessed smile!) in the most "mystical" parentheses of the record... have a listen to The Tide to perceive the melting side of Tiresiasâ?? dream injection... Strophes saying "The moon was told to keep a distance/No one else could hear our call/An angel taught the word "resistance!" /and so the moon began to fall... " sounds prophetical enough... All songs are interlaced through inspiring "instrumental" parts called Dreams, with a considerable level of "transcendence"! So what... ? All Tiresias of the world unite... . And get ready to shake it! PS: Beware of the snakes!!!