Tag: industrial electronica

singer/songwriters by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstay Chopper Shares Dark and Seductive “Wet Hot Summer”

Jonatan K. Magnussen is a Copenhagen-based singer/songwriter and musician, best known for being the frontman of Danish goth outfit The Love Coffin, and for being the frontman of JOVM mainstay act Chopper. And with Chopper, Magnussen specializes in what he dubs “shock pop,” a crowd-pleasing sound that draws from Eurodance, glam rock, industrial electronica, disco and B horror films. 

Over the course of the past year or so, the JOVM mainstay released two EPs:

  • Shock Pop Vol. 1, an exploration of the inherent dualities of the human condition that thematically touched upon love, sexuality and carefree joy while attempting to place influences like Pet Shop Boys, Skinny Puppy and Underworld within a modern context.

  • Shock Pop Vol. 2 features a broodingly atmospheric and cinematic sound that seems indebted to Rebel Yell-era Billy Idol, The Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus, Scary Monsters-era Bowie and others. 

The JOVM mainstay will be releasing Shock Pop on November 1, 2024 through Pink Cotton Candy Records — both digitally and on vinyl. The album compiles Magnussen’s two critically applauded Shock Pop EPs into a singular album, which aligns with his initial vision. The album’s material sees Magnussen fully embracing vulnerability, kitsch and flamboyance with expansive and meticulously arranged avant-pop and post-punk inspired songs.

Shock Pop‘s latest single “Wet Hot Summer” is a brooding bit of 80s synth-driven goth/industrial that continues a remarkable run of hook-driven, club friendly material — but while possessing a kitschy, almost campy sensibility. The song, as the Danish JOVM mainstay explains delves into the complexities of love, lust and identity while also exploring themes of duality and contradiction, navigating the tension between emotional intimacy and distance.

Filmed by Brian Raaby Andersen and Thomas Skjøldstrup, and starring Mille Katharina Justinussen and Magnussen, the accompanying video follows a young woman on night out in Copenhagen — with the night increasingly taking on a dark, goth-like vibe.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: JeezJesus Shares a Dance Floor Friendly Protest Song

Joe McIntosh is a Leamington Spa, UK-based musician, producer and creative mastermind behind the emerging electronic music project JeezJesus. While studying Music Technology at the University of Salford, Manchester, McIntosh played guitar and keys for a number of Manchester scene acts, including VALA and The Peace Pipers.

As a producer, McIntosh worked with The Peace Pipers, producing 2019’s debut EP, Patterns and 2020’s double single “Helicopter”/”The Towers.” The Leamington Spa-based artist went to record material with his first project GIMP that included the Reject EP and a few singles.

His latest project, JeezJesus sees McIntosh sonically heading towards a more post-punk-leaning direction. And his debut JeezJesus single “End of Days” possess an uncannily precise 1980s goth/industrial sound, complete with thumping 808s, slashing guitars, relentless four-on-the-floor drum machine, rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses paired with brooding baritone vocals.

Released during the UK general election earlier this year, “End of Days,” as McIntosh explains is an anti-war song informed by the current, larger global climate. “This is my first real attempt going towards a a more post-punk style as opposed to my previous more dark electronic direction, although the song retains elements of this.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy 59th Birthday, Trent Reznor!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Nine Inch Nails mastermind Trent Reznor’s 59th birthday.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Paris’ Comma Period Shares Hypnotic “Presets for Life”

Vivian Morrison is a Paris-based electronic music producer, artist, remixer and creative mastermind behind emerging project Comma Period. Morrison initially started the project to remix a couple of songs for French multi-instrumentalist Colleen.

Comma Period quickly developed into a project rooted in retro-futuristic escapism, cyberpunk loneliness and synthwave nostalgia for a future that will never be and we’ll never see. The project’s debut EP Ruin Porn was released earlier this year. Thematically, the EP’s material is informed by the modern fascination with ruins — both ancient and modern. But it’s also about the horror of the ruins of Gaza, Ukraine and elsewhere, and our powerlessness to stop the ongoing madness of our world.

The EP’s latest single “Presets for Life (Radio Edit)” is a hypnotic, industrial banger featuring layers upon layers of glistening and woozy synth oscillations paired with skittering beats. While sonically recalling Snap!’s “Rhythm Is A Dancer” and JOVM mainstay LutchamaK, the song as the emerging Parisian explains, ask a couple of questions: Wouldn’t it be nice if we had presets in real life, like in music software? And those presets would tell us how to behave, how to love, how to live and how to die?

Edited by Morrison, the accompanying video for “Presets for Life” features open source videos available on Pexels, and follows a young boy exploring a suburban ruin. Throughout, the video’s imagery gently undulates to the music, adding a lysergic feel to the visual.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Fat Dog Shares Euphoric Trance Banger “Running”

Led by Joe Love, the rapidly rising London-based electronic act Fat Dog — Love (vocals, production), Chris Hughes (keys, synths), Ben Harris (bass), Johnny Hutchinson (drums) and Morgan Wallace (keyboards and sax) — can trace its origins back to 2021, when Love decided to form a group and take the demos he’d be making as a way to keep himself during lockdown out into the world. Initially, Love had two simple rules: Fat Dog was going to be a healthy band, who looked after themselves and there would be no saxophone presence in their music. But those two simple edicts have long-since been broken.

With Hughes, Harris, Hutchinson and Wallace, Love found like-minded mavericks to help bring the dream home. “A lot of music at the moment is very cerebral and people wonʼt dance to it,” says Hughes. “Our music is the polar opposite of thinking music.” The band’s Chris Hughes should know. He was originally a fan of the band, who at that point had been making a name for themselves with a series of exhilarating and/or wonky shows across South London before he joined.

Those early gigs formed the bedrock of what the rapidly rising British outfit were all about: seizing the moment, drinking too much with the moment, going home separately from the moment, but making up with the moment again the next day. Naturally, the rising British outfit quickly developed a following — and it helped that every show across London had become a huge upgrade on the last.

There’s something far deeper going on with the band. “Thereʼs a sense of community about Fat Dog,” says Hutchinson. And after completing their first shows in the US, including a set at a taco joint, the band has quickly built up a following Stateside. Building upon the buzz in their native UK, the Londoners will tour the UK next month and November, as well as make a run of the European festival circuit, playing sets at festivals in the UK and Europe over the summer.

Amazingly, the band’s breakthrough year or so, has come as the result of only two official singles under their collective belts: “King of the Slugs” and “All The Same,”  propulsive, club rocking, industrial-inspired banger built around glistening synth arpeggios, and orchestral sample-driven hit, industrial clang and clatter paired with skittering, tweeter and woofer rattling boom bap, enormous shout along worthy hooks and a plaintive vocal delivery.

Fat Dog’s highly-anticipated full-length debut, WOOF is slated for a September 6, 2024 release through Domino Recording Co. Produced by the band’s Love, Jimmy Ford and Jimmy Robertson, WOOF‘s material is influenced by Bicep, I.R.O.K., Kamasi Washington and the Russian experimental EDM group Little Big. Sonically, the album reportedly sees the London upstarts firmly establishing music for letting go, anchored around a blend of electro punk, snarling rock, techno soundscapes, industrial electronica and rave euphoria. The sound that Fat Dog makes, according to Love is “screaming-into-a-pillow music.” He continues, “I wanted to make something ridiculous because I was so bored. I don’t like sanitized music. Even this album is sanitized compared to what’s in my head. I thought it would sound more fucked up.”

WOOF‘s latest single “Running” is a hook-driven bit of club rocking trance, built around glistening, razor sharp synth arpeggios, relentless four-on-the-floor, thumping club beats and shouted vocals. But underpinning the club friendly euphoria is a tense, paranoid unease that befits our corporate sponsored hellscape.

Directed by Stephen Agnew, the accompanying video for “Running” is a surreal, breathtakingly cinematic visual with hints to Ken Russell, Ingmar Herman and others that reveals the true origins of the cult of Fat Dog and their real leader.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: OWLS Returns with a Furious Howl of Protest

Emy Collum is a Longford, Ireland-based producer, musician and creative mastermind behind the rising electronic music project OWLS. Starting his career in earnest playing drums for a number of local indie bands, Collum stepped out into the spotlight as a solo artist and began crafting darkbrooding songs paring driving rhythms and grooves, dynamic vocals and abrasive textures.

Sonically, his material draws largely from post-punk, techno and synth pop — or as he describes them “songs for the night, for the moon and its shadows” and “dark tunes you can dance to.” Thematically, his work focuses on the uneasy balance between love and brutality. 

The Irish producer released his debut single 2021’s “They Kill.” 2022 saw the release of his acclaimed debut EP End Me. Last year was a busy year for the acclaimed and rising Longford, Ireland-based artist: He made the rounds of the national, summer festival circuit. He played headlining shows in Dublin — and he played at a slew of underground events throughout the country. He closed out a busy year with two more singles “Swallow My Love” and “Bury Me,” a brooding and uneasy mix of industrial and post punk built around relentless, twitter and woofer rattling, skittering beats and whirring and wobbling synths and bursts of angular guitar paired with the Irish producer’s furious howls. 

Lyrically and thematically, “Bury Me” saw its narrator on a tumultuous dance between life and death, hope and despair with an uneasy, unvarnished honesty. 

The acclaimed and rising Irish producer “Body Bags” is an aggressively furious, in-your-face goth meets techno howl of protest featuring skittering tweeter and woofer rattling thump and scorching synth arpeggios with eerily processed and distorted yet strangely beautiful howls attempting to burst out from the chaotic, messy and punishing soundscape.

According to Collum, the song and its accompanying video has been largely informed by the current and unfolding events in Gaza. “‘Body Bags’ looks at humanity turning it on itself,” Collum says. “For all the beauty and harmony in the world, we are chaotic by nature — violent and cruel to our own. It explores the human condition and our ability to inflict pain and suffering upon the most vulnerable.” Throughout the video, violence and cruelty are treated with the mundanity of daily errands.

The events in Gaza has forced the rising and acclaimed Irish artist to look outward instead of inward, as he has previously done. “All of my songwriting up until now has been dealing with internal conflicts and self assessment. It feels selfish looking inwards when being faced with bloodied images daily. I teach history. I had a Palestinian student join one of my classes recently. They presented a project on the ancient buildings of Gaza City only to highlight the fact that they’re no longer there. That hit hard.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Boise’s Street Fever Shares Brooding and Sultry “Fate”

Street Fever is a mysterious and enigmatic, Boise-based multimedia and mixed media artist who crafts gritty soundscapes that incorporate elements of hardcore, hip-hop, industrial techno, EBM, noise, electronica, pop and classical music. The mysterious Boise-based artist cites Three 6 Mafia, and the DIY hardcore scene as major influences on his sound.

For the mysterious Idahoan, his work is anchored in an ongoing and continuous spiritual awakening informed by a desire to better understand themselves as an artist, spiritual speaker and human — and by the profound experiences and circumstances of his life: After losing all their professions, being institutionalized several times and nearly losing their life in a Southeast Asian prison, the mysterious Boise-based artist has used the project as a platform to speak on their own addiction and recovery with the hopes that they will connect with others who are seeking personal and spiritual growth. Aesthetically and thematically, the Idahoan’s work is a journey of self-discovery and enlightenment through thought-provoking creations while seeing them deftly balancing between destructive possession and holy reclamation.

The Boise-based artist’s latest single “Fate” is a sleek and slickly produced, club friendly bit of industrial electronica that seemingly channels Downward Spiral-era Nine Inch Nails, A Place to Bury Strangers and Out of the Black-era Boys Noize featuring aggressive, tweeter and woofer rattling beats, wobbling synths, buzzing guitars and a yearning vocal that pieces through the haze. “Fate,” as the artist explains is a reflection of self-love and desire, and a deep look into one’s shadow to embrace who out is that we want to be. It’s also a call for the listener to dive deeper into th love we want to give ourselves and the feeling of an indescribable love from a power beyond ourselves. And as a result, the song evokes the tug of war between desire and presence.

Directed by Street Fever, the accompanying video is shot in a cinematic black and white, and seems to channel the video for Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer.“

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays The KVB Share Brooding Yet Club Friendly “Labyrinths”

Formed back in 2010, the acclaimed Manchester, UK-based JOVM mainstays The KVB initially started as the solo recording project of its founder, singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Nicholas Wood. And as a solo project, Wood released a series of limited cassette and vinyl releases. But my 2011, vocalist, keyboardist and visual artist Kat Day joined on, finalizing the project’s lineup.

Since Day joined on, the JOVM mainstays have released several critically applauded albums and EPs through a series of different labels that saw them crafting a sound simultaneously inspired by The Jesus and Mary Chain and Cabaret Voltaire that became increasingly streamlined. The duo signed to Geoff Barrow‘s Invada Records, who have released 2018’s Only Now Forever, 2019’s Submersion EP and 2021’s Unity.

The duo’s seventh album, the James Trevascus-produced Tremors is slated for an April 5, 2024 release through Invada Records. Tremors sees the band returning to the darker, coldwave sound of their earliest releases and some of their early influences, while retaining the infectious hook driven pop of 2021’s critically applauded Unity. The band have dubbed the new album’s material “dystopian pop” and specifically wrote it with the live show in mind — energetic and full of hooks and dynamic moments.

Thematically, the album’s material, as the band explains expands “on previous album themes of dystopia, apocalypse and the human condition, but with a more pessimistic outlook and deeper distrust than before. It also touches on themes of loss, and the resistance, lament and acceptance of inevitable change.”

Tremors latest single, “Labyrinths” is a shadowy and brooding yet club friendly bit of coldwave/New Wave built around skittering, tweeter and roofer rattling beats, glistening synths, scorching guitars and a motorik groove paired with Wood’s seemingly detached delivery. “Labyrinths” sonically nods at Suicide, New Order, JOVM mainstays The Vacant Lots, A Place To Bury Strangers and others — but a bit sleeker, which gives the song’s underlying menace and unease a cinematic quality.

With “Labyrinths,” the band explains that “it’s the most aggressive track on the album and a nod to some of our early releases. Lyrically, it was inspired by the collection of short stories of Jorge Luis Borges and its references to historical subjectivity, the flexibility of truth and construction of narratives.”

The accompanying video is a highly digitalized realm of screens within screens with computerized effects in the background, with the duo signing and playing the song with layers of analog glitch. The duo describe the video as “a visceral assault of digitalised nature, CRT screens and analogue glitch textures. We wanted the first video single to reflect the album artwork and the energy of the edit to mirror the aggression of the song.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: OWLS Shares Abrasive and Uneasy “Bury Me”

OWLS is a rising Longford, Ireland-based producer, who crafts dark and brooding songs paring driving rhythms and grooves, dynamic vocals and abrasive textures. Sonically, his material draws largely from post-punk, techno and synth pop — or as he describes them “songs for the night, for the moon and its shadows” and “dark tunes you can dance to.” Thematically, his work focuses on the uneasy balance between love and brutality.

2023 has been a busy year for the Irish producer: He has made the rounds of the national, summer festival circuit. He has played headlining shows in Dublin — and he has performed at a slew of underground events throughout the country. He closes out the year with “Bury Me” a broody and uneasy mix of industrial and post punk built around relentless, twitter and woofer rattling, skittering beats and whirring and wobbling synths and bursts of angular guitar paired with the Irish producer’s furious howls.

Lyrically and thematically, the song sees its narrator on a tumultuous dance between life and death, hope and despair with an uneasy, unvarnished honesty.

Directed and shot by Nathan Sheridan in Longford, Ireland, the video features the Irish producer in a dilapidated and abandoned school building, a brown Ford Cortina, a woman clad in leather burying an eggplant in the woods and more.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Montréal’s AN_NA Shares Uneasy, Industrial “So Far”

Formed over three decades ago, French-born, Montréal-based married couple and electronic music duo AN_NA have had a lengthy career in which they’ve used their experiences in electronic music, industrial and experimental music to create a unique sound of their own while playing with different styles and genres. They’ve found that their penchant for experimentation has given them the space to evolve as artists while keeping them open to new ideas and influences that could be incorporated into their own sound and approach.

Now, if you’ve worked in the music industry long enough, you’d begin to recognize that surviving for longer than a few minutes in a cutthroat industry is extremely difficult. The members of AN_NA have managed their lengthy careers by being true to their art — and making music that they’re passionate about.

At the end of 2022, the French-Canadian duo began to write and record new material, which they began releasing as a series of singles across the following calendar year, before being officially released as their forthcoming album More Pills.

Their sixth and most recent single of the year “So Far” is a brooding yet dance floor friendly bit of industrial electronica built around glistening synth arpeggios, a relentless motorik groove and twitter and woofer rattling thump paired with icily detached vocals and anthemic hooks and choruses. The result is a song that channels Detroit-based electronic music legends ADULT., complete with a similar sense of unease.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: The Serfs Share an Icy, Club Banger

Cincinnati-based synth punks The Serfs — founding members Dylan McCartney (vocals, percussion, guitar, bass, electronics) and Dakota Carlyle (electronics, bass, guitar, vocals) along with Andie Luman (vocals, synths) — can trace their origins back to when McCartney and Carlyle were working the fryers at a local pub and generally wallowing in puddles of despair.

The duo decided to express their grim outlook through the self-hypnosis of drums and synthesizers. After a couple of bungled attempts to play live shows, Luman joined the project, finalizing their lineup.

The Cincinnati-based trio’s third album Half Eaten By Dogs is slated for an October 27, 2023 release through their new label home, Trouble in Mind. The album reportedly sees the trio putting a decidedly Midwestern spin on the modernist twitch of future-forward acts like Total Control, Cold Beat, Skinny Puppy, Dark Day, This Heat, and Factrix while being informed by the existential doom of our current moment — with the album’s material at points featuring doomed proclamations of natural and supernatural disasters.

Half Eaten By Dogs‘ latest single “Club Deuce” is an icy, industrial-inspired club banger built around glistening and shimmering synth arpeggios, burnt out, tweeter and woofer rattling 808s paired with Lumen’s sultry cooing. Channeling early Depeche Mode and mid-80s New Order among others, “Club Deuce” is specifically designed to make you head to the dance floor and move — right now.

“I thought of the idea for this song at first like a movie in my mind,” says Luman. “It was the story of a fated man and a modern day Venus with complete and unrelenting control. The set was a quiet corner in a thunderstruck city with endless commotion in the distance. The whole thing glowing like a neon sign. ‘Club Deuce’ churns unhurried until it billows all around you and you’re caught like a fly in the jaws of a venus fly trap.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Mervyn Shares Brooding and Intense “The Bomb”

After spending years writing and recording pop and rock music, French artist and producer Mervyn made a radical departure in his creative approach with the release of his debut EP Holod, a defiant cry of revolt against war and the unbearable violence of our world. While meshing several different genres and styles, the French producer created an uncompromising sound with a punk rock urgency and ethos.

The EP’s latest single “The Bomb” is a brooding, intense and uneasy bit of industrial electronica built around twitter and woofer rattling thump, dense layers of synth oscillations, eerie screaming, howled vocodered vocals and an eerie Nine Inch Nails “Closer“-like coda. “The Bomb” evokes a desperate scream into an indifferent void.

The nightmarish accompanying video features some slickly edited incredibly eerie religious imagery, stock footage of dancers from the 20s and 30s. It’s fittingly creepy.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy 58th Birthday, Trent Reznor!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Trent Reznor’s 58th birthday.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: m o k r o ï e Shares Post-Apocalyptic “Natural”

Francesco Virgilio is a French electronic music producer and artist, best known as the creative mastermind behind m o k r o ï e, an electronic music project that specializes in a sound that features elements of electro pop, electro soul and industrial that sees him pairing music with unique imagery and video through three releases, Global System Error, Machines & Soul and Works2k21.

Released earlier this year, Virgilio’s latest m o k r o ï e single “Natural” is cinematic bit of electronic music built around layers of glistening and glitchy synths and skittering beats that brings John Carpenter soundtracks to mind.

The accompanying video by Virgilio features two characters in a post-apocalyptic world trying to escape an ongoing natural disaster, which is heading towards them. Even then they think they’ve escaped into an idyllic paradise, nature’s brutal force is inescapable.