Wednesday, 4 October 2023

Unintended Vacation

Hey there, it's been a little longer than usual. I'd sort of expected it to be in all honesty, some of you might know I'm in education and as a result September and on is a bit of a bad time™ Anyway, I have a little moment to catch up now, so let's not waste any time getting stuck in. I'm currently eyeing things to pick up in the next Bandcamp Friday, and while I'm not short of things to get, I haven't had a chance to listen to too much due to the pre-mentioned busy times, but let's see what I have in the pipeline.

Alekos Kontopoulos - Vacation-home (1955)



Still, there's some one-offs I plan to get my hands on - I've been spending a lot of time in the breakcore memes community these days, which is un-ironically a great way to discover new tracks from indie producers. There's a bit of a coherent aesthetic behind a lot of the indie breakcore it seems: lotsa glitch, anime and general internet culture abound. As a person into all of those things it's been kind of nice to get into - enter Deathbrain's Remember Tomorrow, an encapsulation of all the above. I don't think I'd ever describe a breakcore track as 'euphoric' before, but there's not really a better descriptor for this one. Beautiful stuff.



That trend continues with Love In The 70's from Telkin, the cover art being that same kind of mangled that is fairly common in the scene (though notably not on the Deathbrain tune above!). It differs in execution slightly, not quite breakcore in the super hardcore sense - to my ears it takes a little more inspiration from the more melodic bits of Moving Shadow's backcatalogue, certainly sounds more in line with early 00's liquid funk like the early Hospital Records releases. I still need to give the whole album a spin, but if it's all like this I certainly won't be complaining.



It's been a while since I checked in with HEALTH - their latest single carries on that electronic turn they've been on ever since Death Magic. And HATEFUL might be one of their most electronic-oriented works ever - waves of industrial influence leave it coming out more like an EBM tune, or a particularly aggressive electro house track than their noise rock roots. If you're a newcomer to HEALTH this is a good demonstrator, and if you like what you hear I can heartily recommend Death Magic to get more of that fix. Love the vocals as always, and that break in the last quarter come 2:45 or so is perfectly timed to let both you and the track breathe before slamming back down. This one will definitley be in my basket come Friday.



And that'll be all for today, I'd like to try and keep things a little more regular but like I said, it is unfortunately a busy time for me, both in work and generally IRL. I'm going to try my best to not have it become a Hardcore History situation where I only post once every 6 months or something though! I can always drop some quick-fire ones like this in every now and then. Appreciate those of you who are still checking in and sorry for the delay! Until next time, as always - stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF