“I don’t like country & western, I don’t like rock music… I don’t like rockabilly! I don’t like much really do I? But what I do like, I love passionately!!”: CHRIS LOWE
HUE & CRY have surprised all by expanding their sonic palette and going “electro” on their new album ‘Everybody’.
While best known for their sophistipop hits ‘Labour Of Love’ and ‘Looking For Linda’, Pat and Greg Kane have not stood still and embraced the sound of DeepMind arpeggiators, hydrasynths, wavetables and classic drum machines for a rawer aesthetic and an unexpected weirdness.
Much of the writing took place pre-Covid between 2018 and 2020, and with the emotional turbulence he was going through, Pat suggested making an electronic record to Greg, initially referencing David Bowie’s ‘Low’. As well as influences from the earlier phases of SIMPLE MINDS and THE HUMAN LEAGUE, the album also features excursions into Latin House and Future Disco.
Acting as the enticing first single and album opener, ‘Stronger’ is mighty with its message of resilience and hope, all swathed in complex bass sequences, atonal arpeggios and sweeping resonances to “let the softest kind of power make me stronger”. But there’s an even bigger surprise is the frantic Germanic 194 BPM thrust of ‘Everybody Deserves To Be Loved’, the result of experiments with Moogs of the DFAM and Subsequent 37 variety.
The housey ‘Make My Day’ and ‘And Then You Bloom’ both allow Pat to play with his more soulful sensibilities and Greg in his familiar jazzier place, but on the other side of the coin, the synth bassline of ‘In Our Ruins’ recalls DALEK I LOVE YOU’s ‘Two Chameleons’ which OMD used to cover live in their earlier days; it’s a nod to old synth TV theme tunes and the quirkiness exudes its own charm.
‘Force Majeure’ pushes a beat and a pulse with an uplifting musical backdrop despite having something darker going on lyrically while there’s a playful PET SHOP BOYS vibe to ‘Kinda Blue, Kinda Love’. Closing the album, ‘Broken Gods’ utilises more avant sonics in its cutting detuned synth to provide yet another surprise to those who have never listened to a HUE & CRY album before.
Like their contemporaries JOHNNY HATES JAZZ, BLACK and PREFAB SPROUT who applied modern music technology to each of their brands of sophistipop, HUE & CRY’s transition into “electro” is not perhaps not as surprising as first perceived. With its future-facing lyrical subjects that confront powerlessness, polarisation, climate change, authoritarianism and technological overreach, jagged synthesizers and drum machines are the ideal vehicle for these messages where in the world of HUE & CRY, ‘Everybody’ matters…
‘Everybody’ is released on 29th May 2026 as a limited-edition ultimate collector’s box set, CD, vinyl LP and digital download
HUE & CRY 2026 live dates include:
Manchester Bridgewater Hall (9th October)*, London, IndigO2 (10 October)*, Cambridge Corn Exchange (11th October)*, Birmingham Symphony Hall (16th October)*, Gateshead ICM Glasshouse Sage 1 (17th October) **, Inverness, Eden Court (22nd October)**, Aberdeen Music Hall (23 October)**, Edinburgh, Usher Hall (24 October)**, Glasgow Royal Concert Hall (30th October)***, Perth Concert Hall (31 October)***
* Co-headline with ROACHFORD
** Special guest: ROACHFORD
*** Special guests: JOHNNY HATES JAZZ
Featuring the hit singles ‘6 Underground’ and ‘Spin Spin Sugar’, SNEAKER PIMPS’ 1996 album ‘Becoming X’ turned out to be quite prophetic for one of its members Chris Corner.
While he would take on lead vocals after Kelli Ali’s departure on the subsequent albums ‘Splinter’ and ‘Bloodsport’, Chris Corner would soon venture out on his own as IAMX.
After the 2004 debut IAMX long player ‘Kiss & Swallow’, Corner relocated from London to Berlin which proved to be the ideal backdrop for the recording of ‘The Alternative’, ‘Kingdom Of Welcome Addiction’ and ‘Volatile Times’; this trilogy captured an electro Gothic aesthetic that combined the theatrics of Weimar Cabaret with themes of sex, alienation and dependency with strongly melodic songs swathed in an accessible grandeur.
Also a visual artist who has directed for Gary Numan, after making videos in Los Angeles to accompany the singles ‘Come Home’ and ‘I Come With Knives’ from the album ‘The Unified Field’ which brought in Jim Abiss (who had engineered ‘Becoming X’) as co-producer, Corner relocated there in 2014. The West Coast of the USA has been his creative base since and led to very productive period with ‘Metanoia’, ‘Everything Is Burning’, the instrumental record ‘Unfall’, ‘Alive In New Light’, the ‘Echo Echo’ acoustic album, ‘Machinate’ and the two volume ‘Fault Lines’ series among the works released.
Continuing his unconventional creative public therapy, Corner embarks on another European tour as IAMX to coincide with the release to streaming platforms of the previously tour-exclusive 4 track EP ‘UNMASK’ and the remix collection ‘IAMIXED’.
Chris Corner kindly spoke to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about his career to date and his transition into darker alternative electronic sounds to herald his next creative chapter.
You moved to Berlin in 2006 and then Los Angeles, how important has location been to your creative mindset?
Super important. It’s been essential to my stability, mental health, creative flow, and finding my purpose and my place. Environment is very important to me.
I lived a lot of years in the city and I thought it was kind of sexy and exciting and cool, but in the end, it pretty much led to a breakdown and mental health crisis. It wasn’t just the city, it was like combined city stimuli and overwork and existential crises and all of those combined.
I’ve moved from London to Berlin, that was a great move. Again, it was like each one was sort of relieving mental pressure, I think. And arriving finally here, which is very much just pure nature, is just what I’ve always been looking for.
I moved from Berlin to LA, spent a few years there, and then ended up in the desert out near Joshua Tree. First, spent a few years there, kind of indulging that kind of alien space and just sort of stayed in the area.
I still have everything here. I still have my creative spaces and I still have parties and people come out and still do all of those human things. But I think that quick and easy access to the universal feeling is what I’ve always been looking for. That shows in my, not necessarily in the work or the quality of the work, but just the life feeling that I’m carrying now. And it’s been essential.
Although you have always used synths, what prompted the shift into darker electronic sounds and use of modular hardware?
As much as I love analog and digital synths, there’s this sort of workflow that always felt limiting and a little bit strict. You know, you always have oscillators, you always have frequency modulation, you always have this, you always have that, a filter. In fact there’s a certain structure that is a little bit limiting.
The beauty of modular and this modular mindset is this sort of limitless, experimental way of piecing things together. I’ve always been looking for that, whether it be inside the box with plugins and digital synths and things like that, or outside.
When modular came into my life, it was introduced to me by cEvin Key from SKINNY PUPPY. It just opened this doorway into another space of electronic music that I’d always been yearning for, a more organic, creative, immediate space while also being hands on. A little bit like when you sculpt things.
I still feel like humans need to sort of be in contact with what they’re doing. And that’s one of the frustrating things about always working in computers, that we miss this tactile thing. Modular gave that back to me in a weird way because obviously I grew up with electronic music, but also I’m a guitarist and I have a traditional instrument background. And I can play piano and write songs in those ways. So modular brought a bit of organic energy into that electronic realm. The spontaneity and unpredictability of it made it feel more human than anything else.
What are your favourite electronic tools at the moment for the creative and production process?
There’s a really superb modular piece of gear called Morphagene, which is basically a granular sampler. It’s very expansive in its scope and you can do incredible things with it, manipulate things that you put into it in very, very unpredictable and otherworldly ways.
That’s a great thing, and it’s also a hands-on thing. In the box, if I’m working on my laptop or on my desktop computer, in my digital audio workstation, I would be using plugins like Portal. It’s a very interesting plugin by Output, an effects unit, but it also reacts in very unpredictable ways. And then I’ve got traditional mods of traditional synthesizers, like the SEM by Arturia.
I’m always looking for something that is pretty much going to surprise me.
How did excellent songs on ‘UNMASK’ like ‘Artificial Innocence’ and ‘There Will Be Times When I Will Need To Hurt You’ come to be left off the ‘Fault Lines’ albums series?
They weren’t ready when those albums were being finished. They were always on the periphery, not quite lyrically part of that story. For instance, ‘There Will Be Times When I Need To Hurt You’ was an incomplete song from many, many years ago. I started that in my time in Berlin, so that’s how old that one is, ancient. But it never made it onto any of the albums. It just wasn’t complete.
Certain things get thrown to the back of the room and you just sort of forget about them actually. There are many moving parts, particularly if you’re producing your own music and you’re working by yourself all the time. There’s nobody else to sort of reflect what could be. You’re kind of responding to the moment quite often. And it’s only now and again you have this feeling of like, “Oh, I need to really be organised and figure out what the hell I have here.”
But most of the time I’m really just working within my own head. I’m very unorganised in that machine. It’s just the way that I’ve always done things. It’s always, if I can keep it all in my head, then it must be relevant for what it is now, rather than thinking I should crowbar something in. So that’s my theory, that I subconsciously know what needs to go on that album. Those songs were just floating around.
When we tried to do the more fractured approach of releasing things in between albums, not necessarily being so structured about it, ‘Artificial Innocence’ was also kind of bugging me. I knew there was something special in it that I wanted to explore, and it wasn’t quite finished. So they just came to the surface.
And really, if I’m honest, sometimes by accident I accidentally find something that I’d forgotten about. And ‘There Will Be Times…’ was one of those tracks where I just found it and then realised, “Oh, it’s not gonna take that much to bring this into my modern self”. So yeah, it’s a bit of accident, it’s a bit of knowing, it’s a bit of different timing with those two tracks.
How do you look back the making of your two ‘Fault Lines’ albums?
It’s a combination of dread and pride. It’s been a super chaotic time personally. So the fact that those albums were able to be made at all, I’m pretty proud of. Cause there’s a lot of life distractions, but in it there’s a lot of intimacy and privacy that I just can’t help but write about. That’s how I always am.
So I’m not looking too deep into that right now. I think in a few years I’ll look back and try and process this with a bit more clarity and distance. But generally, I’m proud of them.
Even though I can always pick apart my work and say, “Yes, I see that is flawed because of this” or “That’s great because of this” sometimes you just have to complete and move on. That’s generally a high priority for me. I don’t think too much about perfectionism in the bigger picture, even though there is a certain element of perfectionism within the technicality of doing my work.
For me, it’s more about prioritising movement and getting things out. Sometimes I’ll hit it really well with a whole record, and sometimes maybe not. I’m pretty proud of all my work, so I’m proud of those too.
‘The Truth (Mimetic Hexes Rework)’ is really good, so for ‘IAMIXED’, how did you choose which songs to have reworked and did you set a brief for the various remixers or did you give them total interpretive freedom?
How do we pick them? Probably a mixture of randomness and some kind of personal need to exorcise my ghosts. I think ‘The Truth’ was super precise in its meaning about what was happening at the time to me privately. So I felt like I needed that to go on. It was super relevant to me. And then other ones are more like, “Well, that’s just a banger, so let’s do that”.
I also left a couple of choices to the remixers where they could decide which track they wanted to do. Like the Holy Braille track, I think they decided they wanted to do ‘Disciple’. So it was a combination of those things.
‘The X ID’ (clubdrugs Rework) is really good and might be the best of the ‘IAMIXED’ set, but is there a favourite for you?
It depends on my mood, depends on what I’m doing in the day, depends where my head is. If I’m driving along the road and suddenly I remember, “Oh, that’s that song,” and I like that. I think they’re all amazing. And I’m not just being kind of an ass-kissing, people pleaser. I truly believe that.
What is the lot of the independent artist now? You have proved it can work but what have been the pitfalls?
Yeah, surviving as an indie artist is exceptionally challenging. I think the hardest thing is the financial insecurity. You’re basically selling a product that is unpredictable, and you’re selling a product that’s based on culture and art. It’s a vague product if you do it in a way that is not a commercial cash grab. If you do it with your heart, culture changes, technology changes, everything’s changing all the time, and the pace of things is accelerated.
The biggest challenge is adapting, and the constant anxiety about having to adapt just to be able to sell a product, and being aware of that fact. I could say, “Well, maybe I should just always think about writing hits…” but I’m not in it for that.
You have to really balance this feeling of survival with love. That’s the sticky thing about being in the art business of any kind. Everybody’s looking for authenticity, unless it’s pop sh*t of course, but to have authenticity, you can’t constantly compromise for financial security. So what if my own authenticity isn’t sellable? Then what does that mean? Does that mean I have to change myself, change my product?
The anxiety is a bit of an engine, and it does drive you to improve your methods. I don’t think it necessarily improves your art, because it can add a level of doubt all the time if you’re not financially successful. I don’t like that about the music business, because I’ve met many incredible people over the years, and they’ve made incredible art and sold nothing. But I guess that’s just life. It’s an unpredictable, wishy-washy, intangible business. We’re constantly grabbing for what we can know about it and understand to make the best move.
There’s no structure apart from the structure that you make yourself. So you’re constantly creating your own industry in a way. Nobody ever comes to you and says, “You’re doing this”. You just have to create it on every level — not just the music these days. You have to create everything: content, tours, so much. That’s the lot of the indie artist.
How are you handling today’s social media world in terms of the IAMX brand, have you accepted and altered your approach over the years?
No, I haven’t accepted it. I wish I did. And I’m trying. We’re trying to dig a bit deeper now, experiment with a bit more of a creative approach to respond in different ways. I’m trying to get my head into it more.
It’s always been lacking because I hate it. I can say that with certainty. I’ve questioned whether I hate it or I’m just avoiding it and being lazy, but I think I just hate it. It’s just not attractive to me, the whole thing. I’m trying to find a way in, to be able to provide what I do best—which is the content to a certain degree—and to be mildly connected to it. I think a social media person needs to be good at doing that, but also have this deeper connection to the creativity of the project that’s happening. It needs to be very responsive.
It’s a difficult thing to find, because I don’t know if anybody likes social media anymore. Does anybody like it or is it just a grinding poison? I don’t know. It’s a very strange area, that whole thing. It offers a lot — well, it promises a lot all the time. It’s constantly promising you this thing, and that’s the addiction. You think that you can promote yourself massively, and you can grow, and you can do these things, and there’s always possibility, but it doesn’t quite do it unless you’re doing fucking rage bait or something like that. So I question the whole thing.
I will continue to try to lean in. In the past I’ve just sort of cut myself off and didn’t do anything. Neither did it create some kind of mythical character of “Oh, he’s so mysterious and great, I’m gonna follow him”. That didn’t work either. So it’s like, okay, you’re either there or you’re not.
There used to be a time when artists and musicians could just not do interviews, not do anything publicly, and that would make it more interesting or attractive. Unfortunately, I don’t think those days exist anymore. I think those days are dead. So yeah, I’m trying.
Do songs such as ‘President’ and ‘Think Of England’ (which you haven’t performed for a while) still resonate with you, especially with the various tensions and flashpoints around the world?
Yeah, they do. I’m pretty proud of quite a few of those old songs in terms of how they’ve held up lyrically. I think there is a certain timelessness to what they’re talking about. Some things have changed, but generally it’s always talking a little bit about the human condition in general.
So until AI takes over everything, I think we’re still gonna be connected to those things that those songs are always talking about. The yearning for change, critique of people in power, all those things. Gender interest too. When I was talking about my own androgyny and all that kind of stuff, I did not think culture would go there. So gender interest, that’s definitely a nice surprise. There’s definitely topics in there that I’m glad have held up.
In 2011, you talked of ‘Volatile Times’ so is it timely to bring songs like ‘Ghosts Of Utopia’ and ‘Music People’ back or are you wholly focussed on moving forward?
Sometimes I catch a glimpse or a memory and ‘Ghosts of Utopia’ might come into my head, and I’m like, “Oh sh*t, that’s pretty cool”. Talking about the divided hearts of America, and that was before Trump. Politics is just a reflection of our worst intentions, right? So it’s not rocket science in a way.
I remember working on ‘Volatile Times’ and the records — I don’t know if it’s the same for other artists — because I produce everything, they deeply consume me for years. So I do like to go back to certain things. But as a whole, I feel like I exhaust most possibilities with them, spiritually at least, and then I move on.
Maybe with a lot of time. Like with a track like ‘Bernadette’, I feel like I want to go and tweak that now. But I definitely grind them into the ground when I’m working on them. They consume my whole life and my being.
I often don’t feel like I need to go back to them, possibly for live, but live is more of a response to mood as well. It’s usually building upon what’s happened on the previous tours, adding bits and bobs. It’s rarely a whole revamp of everything.
So was ‘Bernadette’ from ‘Volatile Times’ someone you knew?
Yes.
One song that still remains in your setlist is ‘Spit It Out’, why do you think that one endures?
Maybe it’s because I feel like I never finished it and it bugs me to hell that I keep wanting to try and it’s never done. People like it. I don’t know if they necessarily like it in the way that I think they do. It’s difficult to know. I don’t always have a clear perspective on what it’s all about.
People like to sing along in the chorus. It’s one of those things that you see elevates people during the show, but other tracks do too. It could just be that it’s a kind of toxic worm in my brain that won’t get out and I need to keep chipping away at it. Or maybe it’s just a good song. I don’t know.
You once did a cover of DURAN DURAN’s ‘The Chauffeur’ and even performed it at an event in Japan with Simon Le Bon back in 2003, why that song and how did that duet come about?
When I was a little kid, my sister was obsessed with DURAN DURAN and she would play the albums. I liked it a lot, but that track particularly — it was a B-side — had this heaviness and slightly more serious, dark feeling that surprised me. Because as a kid you had this cool sexy boy band, right? So when that popped up, it was a doorway into sexuality and stuff that got my imagination going.
When it came about, I was in Tokyo working on stuff for a company that Simon co-owned. They were doing this compilation and they liked IAMX and wanted covers of things. I chose that, not for the benefit of Simon, but because I loved the song and it had this childhood yearning that I felt like I could do something with, because I was that kind of artist myself and interested in that.
He really loved the version. I think he felt flattered too, and the whole thing was a sort of mini-bromance for a bit. Then he decided to come on stage while I was performing it at that little festival we did. Interesting time.
You’re friends with Gary Numan who did remixes of ‘Spit It Out’ and ‘Happiness’ while you have directed his videos ‘I Am Dust’, ‘My Name Is Ruin’, ‘Intruder’ and ‘Saints & Liars’, have you tried making music together?
No. It was always avoided. It’s interesting. I think from both of our perspectives we kind of knew that was not the thing to be doing together. We’re both very clear and purposeful about our own projects. I think we can support each other in slightly different ways, but this idea of two titans clashing on the same page never felt right.
We got the chance to work together around the video thing, and that was great. He really loved my video work, so that just felt like the way to go.
I don’t feel like I need to do that with him. I still consider him a close friend. I think that kind of collaboration can actually damage things weirdly enough. I’ve had that in the past where collaborations are just unusual. It’s a unique way to relate to someone creatively. It can actually be super uncomfortable and intimate. It can be super light and cool too, but I think with our personalities, it probably would have been uncomfortable.
You are playing Infest in Manchester and also the two UNITY festivals in Germany, what are your plans in terms of presentation and content? Do you approach festivals differently from your own shows?
You are forced to approach festivals differently anyway. I try not to, but you have to loosen your grip. It’s so technical dealing with it, and festivals are generally chaotic, so there’s a certain amount of letting go involved. That’s quite difficult with IAMX shows because I’m pretty exacting. It just feels good for me to be exacting. So there is that. I don’t particularly like festivals, but having said that, I’m going to do my best to make these extraordinarily exciting — adding a quite special setlist, maybe some old tracks that haven’t been played for a long time or never been played at all.
So it’s going to be a pretty unique set, that’s for sure. It’s going to be super bombastic and highly energetic, but also incredibly emotionally intense for everybody. I want tears and sweat. Grinding thighs.
What is next for you? Where is your creative mindset now taking you?
I’m slowly injecting a bit of writing into my weeks. I am writing, and there are a couple of exciting things happening. On a private level I’m trying to get myself into a new creative compound space. I’m moving to another location, so I’m building that up. It’s a lot of work, but exciting.
I’ve got a new person in the project, which is very cool. I’ll be writing the new record fully and properly in the fall. I’ll be doing shows until then, but also writing a little bit, preparing, mentally gathering my thoughts and material. Then the next step is to release a new record in the spring. And that’s pretty exciting to me, even though I don’t really know what it is yet. I’m kind of looking forward to it myself.
The beauty of this life is that it does always feel exciting, even if you’re not quite sure what the fuck is happening. There’s just this feeling of possibility. I love that about art and this lifestyle. Regardless of the financial challenges, it always provides a sense of excitement and purpose.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Chris Corner
IAMX live dates in 2026 include:
Thale Unter dem Himmel (31st July–1 August), Hildesheim M’era Luna (9th August), Leiria Extramuralhaus (21st August), Manchester Infest (21st-23rd August), Oberhausen UNITY (18th–19th September with VNV NATION), Berlin UNITY (2nd–3rd October with VNV NATION)
Michael Oakley has declared his third album ‘Prologue’ as a new beginning.
The Toronto-based synthwave artist released his last album ‘Odyssey’ in 2021 and while there were those tropical backdrops on songs like ‘Babylon’ and ‘Real Life’ alongside the textural strummed acoustics of the Steve Winwood-influenced ‘Wake Up’, what appeared to be missing was the “synth” in his “wave”.
In an aid to remedy that, Michael Oakley has declared ‘Prologue’ as being his most ambitious album yet. The title is deliberate, it isn’t a sequel or a continuation — it’s a declaration that something new is starting.
Continuing to work throughout the record with regular writing collaborator Ollie Wride, despite a “Welcome to The Pleasure Dome”, ‘Warriors Of The Wasteland’ is not a FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD cover but wears its ‘Rebel Yell’ influences on its sleeve in a song that easily could have being playing with the boys in ‘Top Gun’.
Co-written and co-produced with James Meays of MISSING WORDS who also contributes guitar, the vibrant Trans-Atlantic pop of ‘Memory Of You’ is signature Michael Oakley, as is ‘Falling Skyward’ with both songs showcasing maximised production standards, something that not always the case with acts using today’s tech. And with the superb ‘School’, Oakley somehow manages to successfully cross Haddaway and Robbie Williams with NEW ORDER and PET SHOP BOYS! It’s as if Peter Hook wandered into the recording of ‘What Is Love?’ while there are also backing vocals from popwave starlet Dana Jean Phoenix.
‘The Glory Years’ is more balladic and wouldn’t sound out of place on a Brat Pack Movie soundtrack but ‘World Of Promises’ has a darker percussive bite with a Middle Eastern promise that is running up that hill and adds another string to Oakley’s sonic bow. Meanwhile ‘Shot To The Heart’ targets the Schaffel with a “bang-bang-bang” in obeying the “laws of attraction”.
Holly Dodson of PARALLELS guests with her best Belinda Carlisle impression on the lively ‘Hurts Like Heaven’ and here the rhythms rumble and the orchestras stab for some supreme Europop to joyously party like it is 1993. Nothing to do with GUNS ‘N’ ROSES, the ethereal closer ‘Use Your Illusion’ actually sounds more like COCTEAU TWINS although Oakley stops short of attempting Elizabeth Fraser’s abstract glossolalia.
Michael Oakley’s own summary for ‘Prologue’ is to “Imagine what DEPECHE MODE’s ‘Violator’ album would have sounded like if it was produced by Trevor Horn”; now while that is not quite how the album actually sounds, the sense of ambition and willingness to develop is here.
Applying the euphoric sounds of European dance music and mixing it with the cinematic Americanised architecture of synthwave and his own assured singer-songwriter sensibilities, ‘Prologue’ is undoubtedly the best Michael Oakley album to date.
Software used: Ableton Live 12, Propellerhead Reason 13
Synths used: Spectrasonics Omnisphere 3, Arturia V Collection, Reveal Sound Spire, Lennar Digital Sylenth1, Korg M1, X5DR, Nexus 5, VPS Avenger 2, Roland JD800, JV2080, JX08, UVI Emulation II+, Cherry Audio Mercury 8, Rob Papen Blue 3, Baby Audio BA-1, Tal-U-No-LX, Serum 2, Synapse Audio The Legend
‘Prologue’ is released by NewRetroWave on 29th May 2026 in a variety of vinyl LP, minidisc, cassette and CD formats as well as digital, available from https://newretrowave.bandcamp.com/
Described as “someone pulling signal from static”, Berlin-based experimental electronic punk artist Cosey Mueller releases her second album ‘Embodiment Of Denial’ via Bretford Records.
Championed by Iggy Pop via his show on BBC Radio 6 Music and with a feisty attitude reminiscent of Peaches, Cosey Mueller has procured an increasingly driving danceability to her work while ensuring there are potential “Ohrwürmer” within the hooks. But behind this backdrop, she raises questions about love, power, equality, honesty and the media.
Even though the various topics might seem uncomfortable and dark at first, everything is lubricated by a playful sense of humour that serves to ease any tensions. For example, the album’s trailer single ‘Der Politiker’ parodies sloganeering and reclaims the declarative statement for the forces of good to gets you dancing while it pulls back the curtain. “It’s the denial to embody anything forced upon us by the outside and by others” she says.
Cosey Mueller spoke to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about the making of ‘Embodiment Of Denial’ and how it balances seriousness and wit, body and mind, and form and content across its eight relentless tracks.
How did your journey from the punkier bands DAS DAS and GLAAS develop into going solo and using more dominant electronic sounds?
Well the truth is that my solo project Cosey Mueller was myself experimenting with a synthesizer and drum machine in 2020. It was deep in the pandemic times, I had no job, a lot of time to kill and some ideas. I didn’t know how to record, I just recorded everything on cassette. And I never thought it would become a live act, it was just experimentation with sound and words. When I realised that it’s quite unique and has a life of its own, I decided to continue and it has been a road full of “learning by doing” ever since. The fact that the sound is more dominated by electronics is simply because I used a drum machine and synth, it was not a conscious decision.
Photo by Johannes Bünemann
What sort of music did you grow up enjoying?
All kinds of music. I was born in Greece and actually grew up with traditional Cretan music and 90s pop which was on TV and radio. The big change came when I was about 11 years old and we started having internet at home (which was a new thing). I started discovering artists like David Bowie and Lou Reed but also discovered the history of contemporary music in general, which fascinated me. Then of course the German electronic stuff, KRAFTWERK, DAF.… but also a lot of punk and rock ‘n’ roll. Anything that sounded good and had some honesty, energy, good lyrics and artistic value in it.
Do you have any preferred software tools or synths for composing?
I prefer analogue machines and use Ableton for recording. My favourite synth for composing is the clone version of Roland SH-101, I wish I had the original.
How do you look back on the making of your first solo album ‘Interior Escapes’?
Well it was a good and bad time. As I mentioned before it was during lockdown, a super weird time, there was not much to do. I really love the album because I feel like it captured some kind of magic: the naiveté of not really knowing what I was doing is something I will never be able to repeat (it was the first album I produced). And I put a lot of ideas in it which had accumulated in the years before when I was studying art in UdK, doing a lot of word collages and stuff like that. The art and music and personal feelings all came together. There was no intention to go anywhere with it, it’s a very pure album.
Are you naturally ‘Antisozial’?
Yes but I can’t be anymore since I play so many shows and work together with people. I guess I have ended up being more ‘sozial’ now, which is kind of ironic.
There is a lot going on around the world and closer to home which is disturbing yet accepted so before we know it, it could be “TOO LATE”; so how did ‘Embodiment Of Denial’ develop as a track and become the focal point for this new politically charged album?
Well we don’t live in easy optimistic times obviously. The track ‘Embodiment Of Denial’ is more personal though. I never followed the path of having a normal life with a job, house, car, kids etc. In the past 5 years, I have given myself completely to making music, which offers no security and is kind of wild sometimes. It can get hard to communicate with normal people and to function in everyday life. I feel that I am the “Embodiment of denial of reason” sometimes, although I am a very reasonable person actually.
Two years ago I wrote the song ‘Falsches Ding’ which means “The wrong thing” and it has a similar theme. For some reason I feel like there is something wrong in unapologetically doing your thing. But this feeling is not mine, I did not come up with it, it was planted in me by society, parents, teachers etc. It’s important to resist embodying something you are not or something that is forced upon you. And I think it’s never too late to do that. So at the end there is optimism and hope. That’s what it’s about. And obviously it’s too late to stop me now.
‘Nimm Mich’ translates as “Take Me” and retains your post-punk spirit, how do you balance your guitars and synthesizers in your solo work?
I don’t know. I try to combine sounds I love. I really love punk, rock ‘n’ roll and the guitar playing of Link Wray or Chuck Berry for example, which has nothing to do with electronic music. But I also love synthesizers and drum machines, so I just try to bring those elements together.
The hypnotic ‘Contraddict’ gets down to the alternative disco, how did you become more interested in doing something more danceable?
This track is obviously inspired by the song ‘Los Niños Del Parque’ by LIAISONS DANGEREUSES, but it became something completely different. There was a lot of experimentation, I had no idea how to sing it so I just improvised the lyrics following some written notes and kept the first take, doubling the vocals later. I have an artist’s education so sometimes I just do stuff and if I like it I keep it, if not I throw it away, there’s often no intention, no plan, no expected outcome. I had no idea this might become more danceable.
‘Obey’ is a superb lo-fi electro number that is quite different from the other tracks on the album with its charming primitive beatbox and Divine intervention, how did this one come together?
Actually ‘Obey’ was a jam session at first. The beat comes from a Yamaha keyboard, the song is not quantized and all the instruments are played by hand. So I guess that’s why it sounds different. The lyrics came later, inspired by the atmosphere of the song, it has something serious and urgent in my opinion. I could even imagine this one as a soundtrack.
You talk about the “New discomfort” on ‘Neue Ungemütlichkeit’ which has a bit of a klassik kosmische vibe, what was this song influenced by musically?
I would say this song was influenced by my own music. I tried to do something similar to ‘Parallel Gekreuzt’. The difference is that I worked on the structure of the song much more, put some breaks and changes in it whereas ‘Parallel Gekreuzt’ happened through experimentation and is more organic.
‘Der Politiker’ is more obvious and quite NDW, is there any particular politician you are taking aim at?
No, it’s not directed to one person in particular. I felt that people have a general dissatisfaction with politics in 2024/25. And I noticed that people’s love turns to hate very fast and very easy when it comes to politics.
The angry ‘Verlogen’ refers to untruths, how do you find navigating the internet and social media?
It’s hard and has changed our perception of reality. Because there is no truth or untruth and this creates disorientation. The real becomes the unreal and the unreal becomes real. Like in a dream. I have started to not believe in anything anymore. It’ s a bit sad.
So who is the ‘Media Maniac’?
It is the men in positions of power abusing it, using the media to manipulate individuals. But also you and me because we receive whatever is thrown at us by the media and it can influence our thoughts and feelings.
What is next for you?
Touring, playing concerts in places I have never been to, as much as I can. And continuing to write, think and create music. Thank you!
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to Cosey Mueller
Additional thanks to Dina Paschalidou Brudi at Eclectica
Comprising of Andrea P Latorre and Sergi Algiz, Spanish duo SEMIOTICS DEPARTMENT OF HETERONYMS have realised their promise and made their best album yet in ‘Rider’.
Commonly known by the abbreviation SDH, the pair started releasing music as members of post-punk band WIND ATLAS who by their final album ‘An Edible Body’ sounded like there was an electronic act waiting to escape, as the 2025 interim single ‘Threshold’ would later prove.
SDH released their self-titled debut in 2018 which has since been reissued by their current label Artoffact Records. 2023’s ‘Fake Is Real’ with potent songs like ‘Balance’ and ‘Talk In Dreams’ went out search of nightclubs where the dress code specified mischievous EBM and electronic psychedelia.
The new album showcases further growth and with their dark but accessible songs possessing a club-friendly gothique rich in anxious emotional tension, this “crash body music” is intended to be heard after the impact with “Bodies exposed to external forces, subjected to repeated impacts, and evaluated after the damage”. Everything sounds as if each track were a test of endurance.
On behalf of SDH, Andrea P Latorre spoke to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK about their creative journey to date…
You mentioned on social media that with ‘Rider’, you “composed most of this album during a turbulent time when, frankly, it’s hard to hold onto hope”, were these personal matters or more existential?
Both. Obviously we are in a turbulent and terrifying time where neoliberalism is clearly failing the most vulnerable individuals on this planet in a resounding way. Faced with this situation, it is complicated to keep acting as if nothing is happening, or to keep releasing music and playing as if nothing were wrong — but somehow it is the only thing we have left. The little good that remains. While we keep resisting and fighting, making music is still something we can do for free and in a free way. We are also going through a complicated time as individuals; everything becomes harder and more uphill as the years go by, especially for a DIY band — but if we are still here, I suppose there is some inner force, or a force of some kind, that demands it of us.
How do you look back on your previous full-length album ‘Fake Is Real’, do you see ‘Rider’ as a natural progression? What in the creative approach was different with the new record?
Yes, I think everything we do is a natural progression of what came before. Not in a deliberate way — we don’t compose like that — but from a much more intuitive place. It has always happened to us that we are unconsciously searching for more precise ways of expressing what we sense. I can’t put it any other way. For me, the approach has been much freer. Sometimes, when you are a small, under-resourced band from Spain, the effort you have to make is so titanic that it is easy to lose your way and forget why you do things. It’s understandable — it comes from exhaustion — but with ‘Rider’, I feel that we have pushed ourselves to do what we truly wanted to do, which is no easy thing. Even so, I feel we can still be even freer.
Did Spain’s own dark 20th Century history have any influence in your thinking for ‘Rider’?
I mean… I think that, whether you like it or not, we are all influenced by the place where we grew up, for better and for worse. Not only by the Spanish Civil War and the authoritarian dictatorship — which lasted a long time, ended very few years ago, and left us in a state of complete isolation from the rest of the world — but also by our history: as a colonizing empire, by an exacerbated Catholic Christianity. All of that exists, and it is absurd to think that it doesn’t form part of who you are, or that you don’t react to it — in our case, by rejecting it. I think all of that defines you, yes.
Photo by Fissura
Do you think being based in Barcelona offers you a unique perspective in that many of world flashpoints are all around you?
Yes. I am from Valencia, but I moved to Barcelona very young, at 19, and without a doubt, my perspective on the world — and, I would like to say, my openness and my musical knowledge — is thanks to having grown up as a young adult in a bigger city that was more open to the world. Valencia is fantastic in many ways (I have now come back to live here), but I wouldn’t trade for anything having spent 12 years in a city that gave me the best in terms of music, literature, (free) education, culture… also the worst, socially and economically, but I am kind of grateful for that too.
So was the standalone single ‘Threshold’ in 2025 an important transitional recording in the lead up to making ‘Rider’?
Actually, no. Threshold was a song we made for our former band WIND ATLAS which was more post-industrial à la Chris & Cosey, COIL, PTV… but it did make sense to us that the single should be something unusual for SDH, not so dancefloor-oriented.
How did the car crash metaphors in the songs on ‘Rider’ come into being?
It all came together in a fairly organic way. We are both obsessed with the movie ‘Crash’ (the good one), and on top of that, I personally had a very serious motorcycle accident that left me unable to walk for a year — so pain and collisions are things I think about often and that are part of my life. Also, for some reason, when we proposed the concept of the album to the people at Fissura who did the cover design, they themselves suggested that the cover should feature a dummy — one of those mannequins used in crash tests. Everything came together in a very organic way.
Was the intensity of the composing and recording affecting your personal well-being, like having insomnia or dreams in English, that kind of thing?
Yes. In previous records there is more novelization or intellectualization — ‘Rider’ is a very visceral album that draws heavily from my own experiences. Obviously, what is real? I think fake is real and vice versa — that is, every construct is fictional and every fiction is true insofar as it produces realities — but yes, the writing of this album uncorked something that plunged me into some very dark months that I have found quite hard to come out of.
With the ‘Rider’ song and the album in general, you show off a diverse vocal range, not just from an octave point of view but timbre, tone and style… what is the process in deciding how to vocalise a song?
There is no process. That is, there is one, but it’s not deliberate. I naturally pay attention to those things without meaning to — I have always been drawn to singing, but even to the way people speak, to phonetics. So I suppose my brain and my voice are unconsciously searching. I have always been afraid of learning too much about vocal techniques, because for me singing is something very natural and fluid and irrational — but I suppose it’s an absurd fear, and that if I knew what I was doing, I would probably do it better, haha.
Who is the target in ‘You’ve Lost The Keys’ or is it multiple?
That I’ll keep to myself. But let’s just say it’s directed at a specific person with whom I have been through some difficult times.
The current trend in dark electronic music production, particularly in “darkwave” appears to be this horrible overblown artificial distortion, but SDH manage to have a punchy energetic emotive sound that doesn’t hurt the ears… what tools, hardware, software and synths are you using to achieve this?
Honestly we hardly listen to darkwave music. Maybe years ago, when we started the band, we were a bit more interested in that style, but nowadays we’re pretty disconnected from the scene. That probably makes us unaware of what bands in this style sound like today. Although I suppose we could be defined as dark electronic music, our influences come from other places, especially on this album. Before ‘Rider’, Sergi sold the little hardware he had and spent all the money on records, and for this album he hasn’t used anything but his computer and various software synthesizers and samples.
‘Dawn Fawn’ shows you still like to be dance friendly, is maintaining this important, especially for live performances?
Yes, and because I genuinely like lightness. It’s difficult because what comes naturally to me is intense, but we always try to laugh at ourselves and take some of the weight out of the idea of making music or writing songs. Even though it is tremendously difficult, I think the best songs in history are, even when dark, light — and they laugh at themselves.
Who is it that you “despise” in ‘Keep My Hands’?
I’ll also keep that to myself, but not everything one writes has an exact correspondence with reality. It’s more complex than that, at least for me.
‘Cruel’ displays a rockier approach and even has guitars! What was this influenced by?
Including guitars on the album was something Sergi had in mind for a long time, and we really would have liked to have included more, but some ideas were left on the back burner… I don’t know what was the direct influence but I remember Sergi told me he listened to the first GARBAGE record for the first time in years when he decided to include guitars… maybe it has something to do. Also, ‘Ultra’ era DEPECHE MODE maybe?
How did the collaboration with LUST FOR YOUTH come about, did you work together or remotely on ‘Night Visit’?
We have known Hannes of LUST FOR YOUTH for a long time, from when we were putting on shows in Barcelona completely DIY. He is one of those friendships that form in moments that are truly genuine and that, somehow, has held on over the years. We have crossed paths here and there but have always kept in touch. It’s one of the things we take away from those years of learning. Basically we made the song and Sergi was certain that it needed Hannes’ voice. We sent him the song, he liked it, wrote lyrics, recorded his part, and then we passed it on to Jack M!R!M! (another good friend we have found along the way over these years of touring) and he produced and mixed it. For me, it gives ‘Night Visit’ a very important dimension. It has been a dream come true.
Photo by Fissura
‘Behind This Dream’ is a glorious club-friendly closer to the album, how did this come together?
Haha, it’s one of my favourite songs on the album. At first I didn’t know how to approach it — the instrumental wasn’t suggesting anything to me — but one day, both of us were at Sergi’s place feeling quite frustrated, after I had finished watching ‘Northern Exposure’ (the series), it just came out of me. Exactly as it is now — the lyrics and the melody. For me it’s one of the best lyrics I have ever written, and I suppose I had been carrying it inside, pressing to get out, for a long time. It’s about disappointments, about unmet expectations, about accepting defeat.
Do you have any favourite songs from ‘Rider’?
My favourites are ‘Behind This Dream’, ‘Something Sublime’… I love ‘Defeated’, ‘Keep My Hands’ and ‘Rider’, I think? Actually I like them all, haha. Sergi has a special fondness for ‘Dawn Fawn’ and ‘Rider’.
It is a good period for dark female-fronted electronic acts, do you feel any affinity to artists like LINEA ASPERA, BOY HARSHER, PARADOX OBCUR, DINA SUMMER, DLINA VOLNY and NNHMN?
Well, yes, of course we like some of those bands! But as I told you before, the truth is we don’t listen to much darkwave — female or male fronted. Personally I listen to a lot of ambient, dark ambient, noise and more experimental electronics, and then pop along the lines of Faye Wong or COCTEAU TWINS. We have always felt very grateful to be part of this scene — the promoters and audiences we have encountered along the way have been absolutely wonderful — but also a little outside of it, both because of the music we make and listen to, and because there aren’t many bands from Spain in it, or that we have come across out there.
What is next for SDH?
We hope to play a lot. We would like to tour Latin America, do another European tour… playing the songs live is what we are most looking forward to right now.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its special thanks to SDH
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