Features
June 3, 2015
Through the waning moments of the 90′s artful post-hardcore scene and into the 2000′s unencumbered, artful experimental world, Kip Uhlhorn has led a fruitful course of nu-kraut modernism. Largely through his work with Cloudland Canyon and seductive, airy statements with Eden Express, Uhlhorn…
May 26, 2015
In this series for Decoder, I talk with some of the musicians in The Spacesuits collective on the role of chance and randomness in their work. The Spacesuits is an international collective of musicians working in tandem to generate new creation myths, taking their cues from pioneer Afrofuturist, Sun…
May 21, 2015
Readers of this site are undoubtedly familiar with the work of Jeff Witscher, most likely via one of his many alter egos (the most well-known likely being Rene Hell). For around a decade, Witscher has pumped out release after stellar release for a plethora of underground imprints — Monorail Trespassing,…
May 19, 2015
There’s a common adage that popular culture moves in twenty year cycles. As sure as the cutting edge cools, new ears resurrect and reassess as they find importance in the ideas of the past. One need only flip through fresh pressings of Nirvana LPs or see the persistent popularity of nostalgia…
May 13, 2015
Evan Caminiti‘s upcoming new album Meridian represents a shift into truly “immersive,” organic electronics. According to Caminiti himself, the goal here is to “transport” listeners. Though the depth of detail in the rest of his solo output (this will be his second solo…
May 12, 2015
Now entering its 16th year, MUTEK has grown co-continuously with the electronic music and media of the 21st century. Born in Montréal by the opportunity to create a festival focused on digital sound and its many intersections with culture, the festival has become known for impeccably-curated lineups…
May 12, 2015
It’s easy to introduce Thomas Meluch and his music as Benoît Pioulard by talking about dreams — for example, by mentioning how parts of his new album Sonnet (and even his moniker) came to him while he was asleep. But I really want to begin by emphasizing how beautiful Sonnet is. It’s…
May 7, 2015
The Spacesuits is an international collective of musicians working in tandem to generate new-media artworks on utopia. Together with my partner, Winston Scarlett, we’ve provided each musician with a unique set of prompts, which usually deal with concepts like utopia, reincarnation, apocalypse, and…
April 27, 2015
On April 18th, Decoder (as represented by Liz and I) and several dozen others folks from in and around New York hiked up, down, and alongside Mt. Taurus in Cold Spring, a beautiful and relatively well-to-do seeming little town on the Hudson River. While many of the attendants arrived via the Hudson…
April 22, 2015
The San Fran weirdo quartet CCR Headcleaner have been making their mark in the sonic mire of the Bay Area since 2008 via various projects — they run Pollen Season (a label/collective), and have played in Long Legged Woman, Waste Rig, and The Hospitals, among others. They’ve also had releases…
April 16, 2015
Though they pursue their recordings in much different environments, Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe from his current home in Brooklyn and Ariel Kalma at his Main Arm studio outside of Mullimbimby, Australia, both were in fact born to city life. Lowe was born in Kansas City before first moving to Chicago, while…
April 14, 2015
In autumn of 2014, guitarist Daniel Wyche took the stage at The Burlington, a noise-friendly Logan Square dive in Chicago, with drummer Ryan Packard, which opened a series of collaborations between the experimental musicians. The duo worked together on a blistering debut performance of his composition,…
April 9, 2015
Canadian ex-pat Tim Olive manages to wrangle a seemingly endless variety of sounds from a single steel guitar string accompanied by the simplest of electronics. Lightning storms, enormous resonant bodies, damaged machines, oceanic roars, and primal animal calls all emanate from his spartan set-up. It…
April 2, 2015
When I first streamed Dutch producer Kai Hugo’s latest album, Palmbomen II, I was transfixed. In my notebook, I scrawled cryptic notes to myself as I pored over the new LP, the accompanying promo films, episodes of The X-Files, and Hugo’s 2013 album Night Flight Europa (a product of the Hugo’s…
March 26, 2015
San Francisco’s Tiaras released their self-titled album last month on Sacramento boutique punk and garage label Mt. St. Mtn. Tiaras is a shimmering debut, ever-hopeful like much of lead singer Ryan Grubbs’ past work in Ganglians, and marks a turning point for two songwriters aligned since 2008….
March 25, 2015
Originally released in 2011, Lawrence English’s The Peregrine saw the Brisbane, Australia-based producer and Room40 owner poised at the precipice of a long and hallowed discography, including revered works of processed sound on Touch, Line, Immune, Autumn, Baskaru, and his own Room40, among…
March 19, 2015
When I called Bryce Fletcher Hample of REIGHNBEAU, he was in his Albuquerque studio, painting. The musician was preparing for a show exhibiting seven of his newest paintings at The Harwood Art Center alongside a handful of other New Mexico-based visual artists. Hample’s career as a visual artist is…
March 17, 2015
In the last ten years, who in the world has listened to strange, crazy pieces of music obsessively, over and over… and written a widely published novel influenced by those experiences? Survey a few 21st century authors and their musical influences, and you might get some intriguing but unsurprising…
March 12, 2015
For the better part of two decades, Sam Prekop has been something of a household name in indie rock. Serving as a member of late-80s, early-90s darlings Shrimp Boat, recording jazzy pop with Archer Prewitt, Eric Claridge, and John McEntire as the Sea and Cake, or issuing dichotomous sets of pop and…
February 27, 2015
Jan St. Werner has been actively deconstructing electronic music since the mid 1990s, initially as half of the monumental Mouse on Mars (with Andi Toma) and Microstoria (with Oval’s Markus Popp). His solo material, originally recorded under the Lithops banner, is slightly more intellectually stimulating…
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