Goin’ Old School isn’t a trip down music memory lane, it’s a mugging in the dark alleyway of nostalgia:
today we’re kicking off with Bomb The Bass’ raucous Hip-House monster Megablast from 1988 .
Here’s The Art Of Noise’s haunting, yet Industrial, Moments In Love from 1985.
Finally funkin’ out with Tina Cross’ Koo De Tah’s hit Body Talk, again from 1985.
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Polish ElectroPop duo Rebeka, who you may remember from last year’s Stars on Discotexas, release their new album today. Hellada is a twelve track ElectroPop oddessy that comes out of Kamp!’s label Brennnessel, and to celebrate the release the duo are giving away one of the albums tracks, Unconscious.
If Unconscious is anything to go by, the album’s going to be areal treat. A distant, ecclectic slice of ElectroPop. With a gently synth backing, made up of pulsating bass and warm tones, the track creates a dreamlike, hazy mood with more than a little 80s SynthPop referencing going on. Iwona’s vocals glide over the song like slightly eerie silk. Loaded with surprising flourishes Unconscious brings some enigmatic, haunting, but irresistibly groovy, SynthPop into your life. Check out the album.
Rebeka’s Hellada album is out today.
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London brooding SynthPop outfit Strangers single, Something New is finally out, and it comes equipped with a cracking B-Side, Never Enough (recently reMixed by No Ceremony). The guys have seen fit to unleash this alternate version of the B-Side with a few new touches and vocal help from English songstress Kyiki.
This is a big, bombastic, ElectroPop monster of the stadium variety. Powerful drums, layers upon layers of heavy synths and an epic, sweeping vocal all combine to deliver a rousing opus. Dark and moody in places, with haunting piano against grinding synth bass, the track goes euphoric for the choruses with a wall of spine tingling sound. A B-side worthy of being a a single in it;s own right, you should pick up both.
♫ Strangers (Feat. Kyiki) – Never Enough)
Strangers’ Something New is out now on Just Off Pop.
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Dresden is SynthPop legends Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark’s second single from their impressive current album English Electric.
Check out the trippy visual laden video for the track that utilises a nice mix of live action and animation.
OMD’s Dresden is released 17th May, pre-order here.
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Goin’ Old School isn’t a trip down music memory lane, it’s a mugging in the dark alleyway of nostalgia:
Kicking off with Den Harrow’s Italo classic, from 1985, Future Brain.
More Italo from rom the same year, it’s Italy’s Max Him’s single Japanese Girl.
Finally, German SynthPoppers Modern Talking’s début single You’re My Heart, You’re My Soul form 1984.
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We’re not going to lie, we were quite worried about this tune. Apart from the odd tune, Boys Noize have not been impressing of late, the last album, Out Of The Black, was more filler than killer, so the thought of Ridha getting his hand on Pet Shop Boys didn’t fill us with optimism. Imagine out relief then when, after a Mixmag première, it turns out that Boys Noize reMix of Axis isn’t too shabby at all.
The original of Axis is pretty amazing Stuart Price produced Italo gold and whilst Boys Noize reMix doesn’t hit those crazy highs, it does deliver a fairly storming hard dancefloor juggernaut. With a whole pallet of spiky synths, this reMix if Axis really does build up an infectious groove that it’s pretty hard not to get into, and serves up quite a nostalgic old school flavour. An out of place 2007 middle-eight aside, this a high octane killer of a tune.
♫ Pet Shop Boys – Axis (Boys Noize reMix)
Pet Shop Bot’s Electric album is due out in June.
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Here’s the video for French Minimal SynthPoppers Tristesse Contemporaine’s new single, the hypnotic and moving Waiting. A track loaded with 80s synth experimentalism and Indie-Electro cool.
The video is directed by Jørgen Leth, and taken from his film 66 Scenes From America in a scene titled Andy Warhol, Burger.
Tristesse Contemporaine’s Waiting is released 13th May on Record Makers.
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New Jersey based retro Popster Only You has been on our radar for a while now. First coming to our attention back in October last year, this one man band has been steadily letting loose a selection of slickly producer, retro, Pop tunes and is now ready to collect them all, alongside some new material, on his début EP, Another World.
Released this week, the Another World EP hold five storming tracks. Thee of which we’ve covered before; Secrets, The Starchild and the EPs highlight Reap The Voice You’ve Made, alongside two brand new tunes. The EP opens with it’s title track, and the releases only instrumental. Another World eases you into the tone of the album gently. A swirl of lush synth sounds rush around the track, pinned down by vintage drum sounds and a pair of intertwining melodies that wrap around each other like smoke. I would have been concerned about kicking off the EP with an instrumental, but am proved wrong as Another World introduced you to the EP’s nostalgic 80s tone. Where Will I Be? is the calm before the album plays out on Reap The Voice You’ve Made. An anthemic lament set to driving arpeggios and sparkling lead lines. The guitar feels slightly out of place here, especially against the Italo bassline, but it doesn’t feature much so it’s all good.repertoire. Where Will I Be? is a welcome addition to Only You’s repertoire. In the current climate of male vocaled retro Pop releases (i.e. a surprisingly large amount of them ), Only You had done an excellent job of carving out a coroner of the niece for himself. We look forward to more.
♫ Only You – Where Will I Be?
♫ Only You – Another World
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How on the heels of March’s 1991, here’s the new single from Russia’s greatest export, the unstoppable Tesla Boy. Taken from their forthcoming second album, The Universe Made Of Darkness, this new tune sees Tesla Boy back in an 80s groove, after 1991’s flirting with the 90s, and rocking it harder than we’ve heard them rock before.
M.C.H.T.E leaves a little of Tesla Boy’s smooth Disco grooves behind in favour of massive raw drums and growling synths. Anton’s epic vocal soars over a backing of almost Tropical purcussion, thickly layered synths, and a production that makes everything big, reverby and live. Although keeping a strong synth Funk groove, M.C.H.T.E has more in common with the stadium SynthPop of Depeche Mode than their Dreamwave roots. And that’s all good, Tesla Boy did Dreamwave flavoured ElectroPop better than anybody, and now it’s time to tackle their next electro target. Bring on the big Tesla Boy SynthPop, we say.
♫ Tesla Boy – M.C.H.T.E
M.C.H.T.E is taken from Tesla Boy’s forthcoming album The Universe Made Of Darkness, released 21st May.
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Goin’ Old School isn’t a trip down music memory lane, it’s a mugging in the dark alleyway of nostalgia:
Fist up, from 1986, Thompson Twins’ King For A Day.
Some New Beat ElectroPop from Celebrate The Nun with 1989’s Ordinary Town
And Black Box with some early funky House Pop from 1989, Everybody Everybody.
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electronic rumors 