CRINGE MIX #88 - EUROPA

As this summer ends and playtime’s over, QQBBG @qqbabygirl is back with Hong Kong’s producer Kelvin T @kelvin-tttt for their new album ‘AI-CORE’, to be released on Shanghai-based label Genome 6.66 Mbp. The new album includes 8 new original tracks that show how QQBBG subverts what love is about, along with 2 club-ready remixes from Philadelphia-based producer/DJ Estoc and Shanghai-based artist Osheyack. New attempts at different music genres can all be seen throughout ‘AI-CORE’.

A year after releasing ‘Magic Legacy’ (Eastern Margins, 2020), ‘AI-CORE’ runs between heaven and hell, with different musical styles forming an unexpected ‘trip’, starting with ‘Hate Me I’m Dead’ featuring their talented friends and Hong Kong-based producers ASJ and Alexmalism.

Auditory violence and breathlessness can be felt in ‘Say No’ and ‘QQDBT’ featuring Laujan & Jason Cheung from Hong Kong-based band David Boring with its hardcore, breakcore, and industrial sounds. Only stimulation, excitement, suffocation and death exist here.

‘Darling Pink’ and ‘Breakfast’ featuring Shanghai-based vocalist Billionhappy sees QQBBG grieving loss and doom, with their Chinese pop-influenced melodies carefully taking you on an emotional journey. QQBBG returns to her original kawaii form with ‘No.1 Sweetheart’, witnessing glimmers of hope sprinkled throughout the track, as if your shattered heart has been saved by love again.

‘AI-CORE’ releases this October on major streaming platforms via Genome 6.66 Mbp. 


All songs written by QQBBG & produced by Kelvin T
Track 1 produced with ASJ @weareasj & Alexmalism @alexmalism
Track 3 written with Laujan, guitar by Jason Cheung @davidboringhk
Track 7 written by QQBBG & Billionhappy @6akl6xchitga

Tracks 1,2,4,5 mixed by Kelvin T
Track 3 mixed by Jason Cheung & Kelvin T
Tracks 6-8 mixed by Alexis Chan
Remixes by Estoc @splintered and Osheyack @osheyack
All songs mastered by Raphael Valensi
Cover by Tavi Lee @16666666

[GNM027] QQBBG x Kelvin T - AI-CORE

QQBBG x Kelvin T - Ai Core (Estoc Remix）

A Palé (KAVARI Edit)

Taken from SBKT055: TRANCE BAND - Entrancing
Release date: 3rd March 2023

In a global landscape that increasingly prioritizes individuality over collaborative expression, TRANCE is a distinctive project. Initiated by Chinese multidisciplinary artist Tianzhuo Chen, best known for his work with Asian Dope Boys, TRANCE is as artistically amorphous as its constantly evolving line-up, that fluctuates as it shimmers across borders and time-zones. In 2019, the project was demoed in Beijing as part of a solo exhibition from Chen, a 12-hour durational performance that examined the altered states of living and dying and pondered the sounds, sensations, bodies and spaces that notion might suggest. On hold for three years due to COVID-19 restrictions, TRANCE was eventually premiered in Hamburg at the Kampnagel Theatre last year where it was presented as a surreal three-day ceremony. This time around the Trance Band was made up of Berlin-based noisemaker and vocalist Dis Fig, Indonesia's Gabber Modus Operandi, musician and MC KIM KHAN, guitarist and engineer Felix-Florian Tödtloff, and Vancouver-based percussionist and producer CITY. Chen directed the show, channeling each artist's unique energy into an alliance that highlighted their independent skills while pushing towards ideas that simply couldn't have been realized discretely.

"Entrancing" is a live documentation of that incendiary Hamburg session, powered by the performative fireworks that came from having the project halted for two years before it was allowed to burst into life once more. Just as with previous iterations of TRANCE, the space was terraformed into an alien landscape that allowed the collective to enact a carnivalesque display that was tightly controlled but creatively boundless. Musical u-turns were accompanied by monumental stage overhauls that reshaped a muddy, fog-filled outdoor riverscape into an arena, or a sweaty nightclub. This theatrical impact can't be visualized as clearly on the record, but musical cues do just enough heavy lifting to provide a tantalizing contour. When the alluring electro-acoustic plucks and resonant sustained string tones of 'There's a Ghost in the Lantern' cascade into cinematic drone metal on 'Ylva's Theme', it's impossible not to be drawn into the TRANCE narrative. Sonic stage lights flicker with uncommon intensity as the nebulous group rewrite their collective personal stories into stirring, synergistic poetry.

"Something changes!" KIM KHAN calls out on 'Soft and Black', cutting through warbling synths and itchy beatbox percussion. The track builds quickly, reaching a sizzling crescendo of buzzsaw noise and acidic electronics. It's a stylistic sea change that channels the group's kinetic energy into a rock show, and CITY picks up the message on 'Trance Genesis', adding rapid-fire drums to a barrage of guitar skronk. 'Shaolin Affliction' glues Trance Band's jagged artistic edges to a vintage metal template, gradually dissolving into throaty post-hardcore, while 'My Fortress' brings the show to a powerful conclusion with Dis Fig assuming the role of grunge balladeer, bellowing into the void over cacophonous live instrumentation. Unbound by musical and artistic conventions, TRANCE peers out from the basement, the gallery and the playhouse to forge an expression that's all of this and something new entirely. It's refreshing, witty, exhilarating and most of all, completely unpredictable.

Entrancing

v1984 & City - Parallel Phrases [digital only]

SHAP SHAP reunited for the second time 9 artist from Argentina, Geneva, France, Mexico and Colombia for a second volume with unreleased sounds and originals tracks created for this second edition.
Shap Shap over the past years has been collaborated and curating artist from the Global South and this mixtape is the living proof of all that work among the years.

The mixtape brings together dj/producers living and working in different contexts and different countries a and who are all committed to supporting and promote the independent alternative scene in their territories. It thus fits into the fight led by SHAP SHAP which, since 2015, has been taking action against global inequalities and racial and gender discrimination through cultural projects.
credits
released July 17, 2024

Production: SHAP SHAP
Artistic direction: Anita Kirppis
Mastering: Zamani Xolo
Graphic design: Constance Corvol and Izmaël Abdallah
Communication Strategy: Bubblegum Club

With the support of the City of Geneva and Rosa Luxembourg Stiftung Geneva office

Ragazza XXI- Cúspide

All proceeds raised from the sales of the compilation will be donated to funding Palestinian e-SIMs via gazaesims.com (@connectinghumanity_).

Connecting Humanity is an organisation that provides eSIMs to connect people in Gaza to the internet, giving a voice to journalists, medical professionals, aid workers, families and people documenting the genocide, allowing people in Gaza to stay connected to the world.

Contributing artists: Ship Sket, Crimson Chaos, Apu Nanu, exmantera, aDeAD, xeccute, novasdemise, Golce, h4S, Preost, Capiuz, Misha Faulty, EvaneH, Tommy Ryoma, optionlist, bod [包家巷], Bianca Scout, vorem ipsum, Shast, Silv-o, Tailtiu, Mongleaux, TCV, incel-x, Hellsing, Azrel and Charlie Osborne.