One thing that Belgian duo METROLAND never disappoint with is a finely tuned concept.
For his first solo album as 808 DOT POP, Passenger S has ventured towards the science of physics for ‘The Colour Temperature’. Defined as a characteristic of visible light that has important applications in lighting, photography, videography, publishing, manufacturing, astrophysics and horticulture, colour temperature is part of everyday life and measured in units of kelvins.
In tribute to his eponymous constant, the opening ‘Planck’s H’ is electromagnetic action expressed musically for that very intellectual topic of quantum mechanics, although the absence of elektronisches schlagzeug might confuse some. ‘Illuminants’ really wouldn’t sound of place on a METROLAND album, while ‘Radiaton Laws’ chordially appears to be a clean mechanised reworking of NEW ORDER’s ’Temptation’.
The sequence-laden overtures of ‘The Tungsten Filament’ naturally glow but ‘Blackbodies’ is melodic robopop with a feminine twist featuring vocals from Noemi Aurora of goth electro duo HELALYN FLOWERS. Now imagine if KRAFTWERK fronted by a girl and we are not talking about Kylie in the ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’ video here.
The bubbling ambience of ‘Kelvin (2700)’ acts an interlude before the perky ‘Thermal Contact’ provides rhythmic relief with its clattering drum machine and snaps of synthesized noise, as does ‘Ultraviolet’.
‘The White Tone Of Lamps’ provides another lecture over an electronic backdrop, but much better is ‘Incandescent (Iridium)’ which delightfully expresses itself in a manner of a Vince Clarke and OMD collaboration with the virtual vox humana lady oddly providing both the science talk and the alluring heat.
‘Thermodynamica’ takes on a shadier approach into aurally illustrating the properties of matter with its knowledge essential to the generation of nuclear power; the late Florian Schneider once said “nuclear power is like a knife; it can be used for slicing bread or to stab you in the back”. Therefore, it is fitting that ‘Inside The Light Bulb’ closes ‘The Colour Temperature’ utilising the synthesised speech sound design reminiscent of the KRAFTWERK legend.
While not a radical departure from the template of METROLAND, ‘The Colour Temperature’ will satisfy the ears of their fans as well as those who might like a bit of ORBITAL or KOMPUTER.
So until Passenger S and Passenger A come back together to consider their next thematic concept, it’s time to 808 DOT POP.
To celebrate 40 years since the release of their very first recording, SOFT CELL have re-released their debut EP ‘Mutant Moments’ as a 10 inch transparent vinyl edition.
Originally released as limited run of 2000 7” singles in October 1980 on the band’s own Big Frock imprint, the EP sold out immediately.
Less than two years later, SOFT CELL would score five Top 5 UK hit singles in the space of just 13 months.
On the striking self-produced artwork, SOFT CELL were credited as David Ball (Synthesizer, Tapes, Electronics), Marc Almond (Vocals, Synthetic Scratch) and Steve Griffith (Visuals). Meeting as art students at Leeds Polytechnic, Almond needed music for his performance art so with his Korg 800DV synthesizer, Ball had the avant-garde credentials that the flamboyant vocalist was looking for.
“‘Mutant Moments’ was very homemade”Dave Ball told ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK in 2018, “very lo-fi and made on no money, done at art college”. On this reissue, he has personally supervised the remastering process to ensure a vast improvement on the original pressing, declaring it as “A vintage slice of lo-fi Polytechnic synthpop, lovingly remastered for you”.
Gloriously gritty, ‘Potential’ began the four song set with a metronomic buzzfest while the wonderful ‘L.O.V.E Feelings’ was a melodic sign of things to come with some basic but beautiful synth sounds and an air of John Barry’s ‘Midnight Cowboy’.
Photo by Paolo Di Paolo
Although ‘Metro MRX’ was to sonically improve later when produced by Daniel Miller for a Flexipop giveaway, the ‘Mutant Moments’ version was scarier, especially when Almond eerily announced “he’s my favourite mutant!” over a heavily processed otherworldly rhythm box.
While ‘Frustration’ ended up on SOFT CELL’s subsequent 1981 debut long player ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’, it was barely recognisable in its earlier incarnation with its synth hooks yet to be part of the song.
Meanwhile Almond’s distorted cries of “I WANNA DIE” were deadly sinister while Ball creepily deadpanned that “I’m an ordinary bloke”!
The wider breakthrough on the ‘Some Bizarre Album’ with ‘The Girl With The Patent Leather Face’ was to come in early 1981 as SOFT CELL duelled with DEPECHE MODE over whose track was the stand out. Rated higher at the time than the Basildon boys, Ball and Almond were signed by Phonogram and the rest is history.
It’s amazing to think how much of an impact SOFT CELL were to have in popular culture and everyone from FRANKIE GOES TO HOLLYWOOD, BRONSKI BEAT, ERASURE and PET SHOP BOYS to NINE INCH NAILS, PSYCHE, FISCHERSPOONER, TIGA and HERCULES & LOVE AFFAIR owe them a debt of gratitude for paving the way.
The do-it-yourself art school aesthetic of ‘Mutant Moments’ importantly enabled it all to begin with its dysfunctional gutter pop and primitively wayward electronic backdrop.
MOOD TAEG are a detached combo split between Düsseldorf and Shanghai.
From the likes of CAN, CLUSTER, NEU! and HARMONIA to more recent exponents of the form like CAVERN OF ANTI-MATTER and IMMERSION, MOOD TAEG follow in the tradition of instrumental kosmische experimentation.
Just like those records of cosmic yore, their debut album ‘Exophora’ on Happy Robots Records comprises of five lengthy tracks exploring the rhythmic hypnotism of Apache beats, half speed guitar and expansive electronic soundscaping.
With a heart that is both analogue and metronomic, over the course of just under ten minutes, the mantic opening number ‘2MR’ pays respectful homage to ‘Hallo Gallo’ from the first NEU! album. Running at just six minutes, ‘Deictics’ adds a synthy rumble to proceedings with schizophrenic voices before a bass guitar run morphs in, adding to the mind bending trance laden effect.
The frantically motorik ‘Corpora’ comes closest to being a pop tune despite the gargoyle grumblings and glistens with a cristallo shine that has pulsing electronic keys acting as a melodic engine room as well as a rhythmic one.
‘Interrogative’ displays an affinity with HARMONIA using a offbeat and a psychedelic vibe, but ‘Mood Block’ changes tact with a delightful rhythm unit on a speedy Schaffel setting while Mellotron derived pipe passages add a blurry haze to the spacey cocoon of bleepy sound.
This music is not wholly avant garde, so if a blended cacophony of drifting textures and occasional melody over some tightly rigid rhythm construction appeals, then ‘Exophora’ will satisfy the ears and minds of many kosmische enthusiasts, sitting nicely not far from the most recent FUJIYA & MIYAGI.
The worldwide lockdown has produced a number of fitting and poignant musical responses from muscians and artists.
SNS introspectively told of their ‘Small World’, while Zachery Allan Starkey was much fiercer in his appraisal as he reflected in collaboration with Bernard Sumner on how New York had become ‘Fear City’
The latest song on the topic is ‘All Alone’ by Lithuanian-Kurdish singer Alanas Chosnau and Berlin-based producer Mark Reeder. Following on from the equally relevant ‘Losing My Mind’, a cinematic number that Chosnau and Reeder contributed to the French Cold War movie ‘Le Chant Du Loup’, ‘All Alone’ comes from the pair’s upcoming album ‘Children of Nature’.
Co-produced by Mark Reeder with his regular studio partner Micha Adam, ‘All Alone’ uses a classic four chord progression shaped by sequencers, chilling string synth and a midtempo Compurhythm.
Meanwhile, Chosnau projects the solemn vocal air of Peter Heppner of WOLFSHEIM as he emotively asks “Does anybody feel the same way like me?”. ‘All Alone’ of course comes in a single mix because as can be seen in the striking video crafted by award winning director Aleksandras Brokas, he is in on his own…
Reeder first met Alanas Chosnau at a film festival and have put together a collection of retro-modern love songs which now feel prophetic in the current situation, so much so that they probably could have named their project CORONA CRISIS.
Alanas Chosnau was born to a Lithuanian mother and Iraqi-Kurdish father, growing up in Baghdad before returning to the then Soviet-governed Lithuania to be raised by his grandparents. After the fall of communism, he became the singer of the domestically popular DEPECHE MODE influenced duo NAKTINĖS PERSONOS. He said: “We had no idea what was to come, but it seems we touched on a frequency from the future and the song appears to have been derived from a deep, inner-feeling we both had at the time”.
Dedicated to all currently living a life in lockdown, Mark Reeder told ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK: “I’ve been in isolation-lockdown for 59 days now. I’ve actually not been outside at all in this time, except for the occasional quick breath of fresh air on the balcony. I’m treating this like being in a spaceship. As if I was on my way to a new world.”
During the MTV era, the advent of college radio with an Anglophile stance on American campuses and stations such as KROQ in Los Angeles featuring DJs like expat Englishman Richard Blade had a huge effect on youth in the US.
Considering themselves smarter than the average mainstream BON JOVI fan, this audience facilitated a breakthrough for a number of darker tinged acts alongside the bands who had been featured in John Hughes teen flicks like ‘Pretty In Pink’, ‘The Breakfast Club’ and ‘Some Kind Of Wonderful’.
So unlike the UK where they were more than likely to have totally different audiences, American fans of SIMPLE MINDS, DEPECHE MODE, OMD and ERASURE could often be seen attending the concerts of THE CURE, SIOUXSIE & THE BANSHEES, THE PSYCHEDLIC FURS, ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN, THE SMITHS and THE SISTERS OF MERCY alongside the goths and positive punks.
As a result, the New Wave movement in North America turned out in a way that would be considered incongruous by British music fans. But what it did culturally was influence generations of aspiring music creatives to mix and match genres without necessarily being self-conscious about it.
One of those acts is California’s VANDAL MOON. With a sound seeded from post-punk, goth and new wave, they are shaped as much by their use of drum machines and synthesizers as much as guitars and the inevitable deep baritone vocals.
Front man Blake Voss manages to sound somewhere between Andrew Eldritch and Richard Butler, while instrumentalist Jeremy Einsiedler is the more electronically inclined of the pair. Having guested on records by FM ATTACK, BETAMAXX and MECHA MAIKO, the Santa Cruz duo has ended up with a foot each in the synthwave scene.
As a result, ‘Black Kiss’ is by their own admission is the duo’s most purely electronic work yet, largely written using synths while being inspired by THE CURE, DEPECHE MODE, THE SISTERS OF MERCY and THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS.
Conceived around the futuristic love story of two androids escaping enslavement, ‘Black Kiss’ begins with the profound statement that is ‘Hurt’; now if THE SISTERS OF MERCY’s ‘Lucretia My Reflection’ was redone with synths, it would sound like this.
‘Dead’ plays along with a more typical gothic template using a guitar-laced setting, but pretty cascading synth hooks add to the chilling atmosphere while metallic percussive samples provide some industrial edge. Meanwhile, the ‘Black Kiss’ title track signals impending doom and chipmunk voice samples provide a foreboding not-of-this-world aesthetic.
The more obviously synth driven ‘We Are Electric’ uses pulses and drones simultaneously for its low end, penetrating the darkwave via its hybrid overtones. This is perhaps not surprising as FM ATTACK’s Shawn Ward makes a notable guest contribution.
However, ‘We Live Forever’ surprises as a moody synthwave ballad; featuring Leanne Kelly from the San Francisco indie-pop duo NEW SPELL on vocals, it sees an understated Blake Voss adapting to a less overwrought singing style and delivering it very well.
But the frantic ‘Wicked World’ puts everything back on the epic gothic path with a thundering run of percussion that recalls Stevenage’s finest FIELDS OF THE NEPHILM and their ‘Moonchild’; trivia fact pop pickers, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK was in the same class at school as The Neph’s drummer Nod!
‘Robot Lover’ enjoyably passes ‘Enjoy The Silence’ through a Wayne Hussey filter while ‘Suicidal City Girl’ is superb, showcasing electronic post-punk disco at its best with enthralling echoes of THE DANSE SOCIETY.
With the more laid back approach premiered on ‘We Live Forever’, ‘Pretend To Die’ sees Shawn Ward return on synths and here the FM ATTACK synthy shades are strong.
Hypnotic to the point of being gothic trance, the apocalyptic closer ‘No Future’ is another surprise, a magnificent four-to-the-floor dance number complete with squealing drops and a mighty climax. If this track doesn’t crossover into the German alternative club scene, then ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK will eat its copy of SIOUXSIE & THE BANSHEES ‘Superstition’…
But despite all these retrospective alternative influences, what VANDAL MOON have come up with is something unique at this moment in time. THE CURE and THE SISTERS OF MERCY were never as synthy as VANDAL MOON, so with their melting of styles, Voss and Einsiedler have presented their own take on a familiar classic approach.
Mixed and mastered by Maurizio Baggio who worked on THE SOFT MOON’s ‘Criminal’ and the BOY HARSHER breakthrough album ‘Careful’, ‘Black Kiss’ sits up there as a great modern alternative pop record with its gothwave aesthetics. If it had been released in 1984, many of these songs would have gone down extremely well at The Batcave, the famous London goth haunt where Hamish Macdonald and Rusty Egan DJed. Today, they wouldn’t sound at all out of place at Slimelight.
A fine record that captures a dystopian outlook on life with an appealing electronic sensibility, ‘Black Kiss’ has the potential to connect with a number of different tribes and audiences.
We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Ok
by Dave Ball is published by Omnibus Press on 11th June 2020, pre-order from 
on 
is released digitally by MFS on 18th May 2020
is by their own admission is the duo’s most purely electronic work yet, largely written using synths while being inspired by THE CURE, DEPECHE MODE, THE SISTERS OF MERCY and THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS.
Follow Us!