Cabaret Voltaire "Shadow of Fear (Mute)"
Shadow of Fear is Cabaret Voltaire’s first studio album in 26 years. Richard H. Kirk is the sole remaining member; he’s released many acclaimed solo albums, having invented bleep techno via his groundbreaking work in Sweet Exorcist. Kirk has formed this new album from a series of pulverising live shows. The tone and personality of CV is ingrained in its core as it dances across techno, dub, house, 1970s Germany and general esoteric explorations coupled with mangled vocal samples.
Bipolar "Bipolar (Slovenly)"
Bipolar is the twisted creation of Pouya and Obash, formed in a Brooklyn pisshouse while on a bender in the not too distant past. The duo moved to the USA from “conservative” Tehran, Iran as a cog in a wheel of a true underground scene in pursuit of their passion for cross dressing musical performance based on their love of the circus and all things theatrical. Think SCREAMERS finger-banging THE DICKIES while THE SPITS egg them on – Pouya has already done time on keys with The Spits.
And look at these sick bastards now… Hopefully one day soon you’ll get to see them in the third dimension.
With the addition of Kayla from NYC garage-punk party people THE OTHERMEN on synth, and some other man named Ethan on drums, BIPOLAR mightily spew forth their debut 7incher with timely titles “Depression” and “Virus” among the melee. We’re giving you the worthless Slovenly guarantee that this EP is a cure for at least one of these ailments.
Pódium "Pódium (Slovenly)"
Slovenly Recordings is fully amped to present the debut LP from PÓDIUM de València. Conceived by Nick Trampolino, armed with a drum machine and a guitar, this once personal project quickly evolved into a five-piece platoon with the addition of Salva Frasquet on guitar, Ximo Barceló on bass, Miguel J. Carmona on drums, and África Mansaray on vocals. Pulsating with the epic aggression of hardcore, the impersonal and perverse tone of industrial metal, and fully balanced with the liveliness of the authentic surf scene, we’ll be so bold as to describe them as a curious mixture of Ministry (circa ‘89), Man or Astroman? and the goddamn Go-Go’s ablaze with the pyromaniacal tendencies of Steve Albini’s Shellac. The combination of speed, skill and abrasiveness here converts every track into a 2 minute descent into the kind of hell you’ve been dying to enter.
The creative motor of the band is precisely this mixture of hate, anxiety, and fear that we perceive in the pommeling and obsessive riffs that constantly intertwine the guitars and bass. The drums are simple, linear and robotic, having deliberately taken out the dynamic possibilities to guarantee maximum protagonism and criminal coolness.
William Basinski "Lamentations (TRL)"
William Basinski’s reputation as the foremost producer of profound meditations on death and decay has long been established, but on his new album, Lamentations, he transforms operatic tragedy into abyssal beauty. More than any other work since The Disintegration Loops, there is an ominous grief throughout the album, and that sense of loss lingers like an emotional vapor.
Captured and constructed from tape loops and studies from Basinski’s archives – dating back to 1979 – Lamentations is over forty years of mournful sighs meticulously crafted into songs. They are shaped by the inevitable passage of time and the indisputable collapsing of space – and their collective resonance is infinite and eternal.