Armand Van Helden
Why Can't You Free Some Time

After this long period of pandemic and staying at home, these tracks represent a glimmer on which to look out and have the hope of soon returning all together to party.

There's a sense of dark mystery throughout this latest from Onont Kombar, which some will recall from his contributions to the 2016 mini-album, 'Split', featuring celebrated tracks such as 'The Doors'. Not quite a case of more of the same here - all three pieces feel very original - but nevertheless that steely and unnerving cold wave vibe is very much present and correct. This outing veers from suggestion to full intoxication. 'The Last Days Last Forever' sounds like a recording of a track from distance; you struggle to make out the details but together they create a powerful overall mood. Meanwhile, 'Epitaph of Ego' brings acid warbles and snares to the fore, resulting in a tune that owes much to the more Romantic side of electro and electro pop, with 'Moondust In My Eye' employing a chugging groove to give its whirring, industrial details a dash of obscure funk.

Mark Fell (SND/Sensate Focus) and Gábor Lázár's scintillating and innovative debut collaboration marked The Death of Rave's 10th release, and is now back on clear vinyl.»The Neurobiology of Moral Decision Making« explores a radical re-calibration of conventional meter and tone in modern electronic music, probing specific aspects of Max/MSP software with the potential to acutely challenge our perception of time and space.It’s a maximalist, future-shocking play of tension-and-resolution created from minimalist elements, featuring Lázár's calligraphic, torso-morphing chromo-notes punctuated by Fell's signature Linn drum cracks at ostensibly obtuse, yet deeply funked-up junctures across ten tracks in 50 minutes.They range from precision-tooled 2-minute scrambles to swaggering showpieces, culminating in what has become a meme for Mark Fell albums with the uncannily emotive closing statement - a 12 minute masterstroke consolidating all the album’s ideas in one breathless, beguiling arrangement.If music can be considered a catalyst for social change, what are the implications of this mutant record? Considered in terms of the dancefloor, it mirrors the muscle-memory re-programming impact of OG hardcore & jungle or Chicago footwork - think of scattered bodies attempting to synch with new, accelerated and “irregular” rhythms - offering a freedom of expression and interpretation that's typically scarce in most grid-locked musics. Likewise, the inversion of melodic convention in favour of warped, dynamic contours and visceral, psycho-acoustic timbre offers a sharpened grammar of emotional expression and sensation that doesn’t wilt to ordinary sentiment.Yorkshire-based Mark Fell is among the world’s leading sound artists and sonic thinkers. Owner of an illustrious and influential catalog of releases spanning early works in the SND duo thru to more recent solo work under his own name and Sensate Focus, and collaboration with DJ Sprinkles, Errorsmith and Sandro Mussida.Gábor Lázár hails from Budapest, Hungary. In 2014 he presented his debut album, ‘I.L.S.’ via Lorenzo Senni’s Presto!? followed by ‘EP16’ for The Death Of Rave. He has previously shared a split tape release with Russell Haswell presented work at Karlsruhe’s ZKM and undertook a residency at Stockholm’s EMS.

Steve Rachmad's subliminal debut album 'Secret Life Of Machines' was originally released way back in 1995. In 2012 the album was re-issued, although three tracks didn't make it to the vinyl re-issue. Now ten years later this new EP now re-issues also these three tracks after all: 'Satyricon', 'Hydroxy' and 'Draghixia'. Steve Rachmad's richly melodic strain of techno has resulted in a huge body of work he has been growing since the early 90s. His sound is the perfect distillation of machine soul - dubby atmospherics and crisp, danceable dynamics balanced in perfect unison. Amsterdam's Delsin Records gathers together some of the Dutch techno figurehead's most important, sought-after works in a new EP series, all remastered from the original DAT tapes from Steve's archives. Adding to the weight of this series, the accompanying artwork is being created by Boris Tellegen, aka legendary graffiti artist Delta who first began designing sleeves with Secret Life Of Machines. Since then he created many works for labels including Delsin.