It might be strange to be introducing SEMIOTICS DEPARTMENT OF HETERONYMS who already have 2 albums to their name and toured extensively.

However, the intriguing Barcelona-based duo of Andrea P Latorre and Sergi Algiz are on the cusp of a wider international breakthrough having signed to Canadian independent Artoffact Records (home of FRONT LINE ASSEMBLY, ACTORS, LEATHERS, KANGA and ULTRA SUNN) a few years ago.

From the wider family of dark but danceable duos that include LINEA ASPERA, BOY HARSHER, ESSAIE PAS, PARADOX OBCUR, LOCAL SUICIDE and NNHMN, the shadowy interim single ‘Threshold’ in 2025 pointed to more ambitious structures and inventive interplay that built towards an unexpected climax. Occasionally though, SDH can do pop as ‘All Of That’, the Italo-influenced B-side to their 2022 single ‘Maybe A Body’ proved.

While their 2018 self-titled album debut was reissued by Artoffact in 2024, ahead their first long playing release of new material on the label, SDH have unleashed the superb title song as a single; ‘Rider’ pushes ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK’s buttons with nonchalant female vocals which then twist into something more traditionally folky in the haunting middle eight, Numanesque vox humana synths, spacey arpeggios and hypnotic dance rhythms attached to a squelchy synthbass mantra.

Framing the album’s themes around movement and escape, as well as falling under the spell of JG Ballard, the cerebral DIY video accompaniment for the track captures a tense cut-up aesthetic where a speedy windswept night drive with a blue showroom dummy encounters seedy alleyways, empty highways and wild wolves in the woods before the inevitable… it is bleak yet alluring!

Following their most recent album ‘Fake is Real’ with its highlights ‘Talk In Dreams’, ‘Hollowed Out’ and the brilliant COIL tribute ‘Balance’, SDH’s have promised further growth with a record of collisions or “crash body music” as described by the duo themselves. Intended to be heard after the impact, these are literally striking metaphors with “Bodies exposed to external forces, subjected to repeated impacts, and evaluated after the damage”.

‘Rider’ is from the forthcoming album of the same name released by Artoffact Records on 17th April 2026 in blue vinyl LP, CD and digital formats, pre-order from https://semioticsdepartmentofheteronyms.bandcamp.com/

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
11th February 2026