iliac × shapes ⁽ᵇ²ᵇ⁾

Attack and Release was meant to embody the feelings of comfort and care, of being pushed outside of those boundaries and taking on a defensive stance. In newly budding relationships, arguments arise and subside, and egos need to be diminished* for the greater good. Iliac and shapes come together in this mix to illustrate the thresholds and conflicts that arise between individuality and love, all while being enveloped in the comforts of ethereal reverbs.

attack release iliac × shapes ⁽ᵇ²ᵇ⁾

Seu amor ainda - lawd knows / salt_server //blend/48

Seu amor ainda - lawd knows / salt_server //blend48

Leading Light

LAVURN is the debut self-titled album from Lavurn Lee, a singer, songwriter, producer, performer and DJ from the inner suburbs of Toronto. He has also lived and worked in Sydney, Hong Kong and Berlin. His music is an emotionally complex assemblage of processed vocals, filtered pads, surgically programmed drums, haunting melodic fragments and hazy textures. This 13 track album of sparse, emotive and experimental R&B is his second for SUMAC and his first under his own name, following a previous record under the name Fake in 2018. Lavurn was made over three years between Toronto, Berlin and Hong Kong in close dialogue with SUMAC founders DJ Plead and T.Morimoto.

Previously, as Cassius Select, he has established himself as a unique voice in dance music, releasing on cult labels such as Unknown to the Unknown, Accidental Jnr, Hypercolour, Banoffee Pies, Raw Basics and Bruk Records. His side projects include collaborations with vocalists such as VV Pete and Daemon, his previous experimental R&B aliases Guerre and Fake, and BV (alongside Marcus Whale and DJ Plead).


THOUGHTS & REFLECTIONS ON THE MAKING OF LAVURN

“I’m trying to make pop music. Not in the industry sense, but in the way that everyone is making their own type of pop music. It wants to be listenable, so it can create emotions. I come from bedroom song writing in the age of the internet. The lyrical content and sounds reflect my demeanor. Big ego with low sense of self-worth. Constantly posturing. At once both strong and weak. I don’t always trust my abilities. I don’t have the voice to produce contemporary radio R&B. I don’t do traditional harmonies, mine are all over the place.

It's the first time I'm writing about my own life in a literal sense. I spent years writing love songs having never been in a relationship. Whereas this feels very raw as a reflection of my experiences. To me the album sounds insular because it was made that way, in isolation. The vocals are used in a sampled way. A chorus for one track might be chopped and turned into another hook. A verse for one song is half timed and used for the chorus of another. Auto-Tune is used heavily. Some tracks are ‘written’ by pulling different beats, textures and vocals from different tracks and seeing what fits together. I tried to take self-sampling further and further. I was thinking of ways to world-build.

Most of the lyrical content on the album is about dealing with a breakup. But the album doesn’t reflect a break-up because it’s completely one sided. It doesn’t reflect the reality that I was an awful person during the relationship. Really it's an inward study of a reaction to rejection. It’s ambivalent. The attitude is “hey imma do me and improve myself”, while also desperately wanting someone back (for all the wrong reasons). There’s a veneer of self-improvement and healing. But it’s all performance. I used to think all the songs had a kind of toxic intent because of this. Trying to impress someone in a way that would make them want to return to you. In retrospect I understand the songs differently. They’re not perfect. A bit confused in their vulnerability. Maybe quite sweet in a way. I think it’s healthy for me to see the lyrics on the album as directed at myself. It’s an album about self-love. I learnt that making music can be a kind of self-care.” 
credits
released February 16, 2024

Written, recorded, produced and mixed by Lavurn Lee
Mastered by T.Morimoto
Photography by DJ Plead

LAVURN - READ VIEW MIRROR

「 taken from 'Give up Chanel' 」
https://mappa.bandcamp.com/album/give-up-channel

🐾

Julek ploski’s ‘Give up Channel’ is on mappa. It’s the follow-up to the Poland-based FL Studio demon’s ‘Hotel *****’, released via Orange Milk in 2023.

It’s an album that wrestles against a shadow self. It’s about shelter from the hailstorm of unwanted memories and guilt pangs and serrated blades of thought. It’s about clinging on to some semblance of hope, knuckles taut and teeth gritted.

The fragmented drift of opener ‘Naysayer’ flows forward like an anxious daydream, pad eddies and piano plinks anchored by Trapaholics drops and bursts of guaracha drums. It’s a mess of mind: the bleakness of ‘Truth’ is punctuated by gun cocking and bullet spray and sudden jester-like blasts of unhinged, schizo-whimsical melody. An internal war without a clear winner.

Shame snakes through this music like venom through an emaciated body. Blue screenlight in a dark bedroom, pulsating temples, lockjaw. ‘Titanic’ hits like the thrashing resistance of a being built for love grappling against the scalding vengefulness it’s forced to contend with, the song’s abstracted rave synths giving way to warped voices and spiralling derangement. ‘Hollywood’ is a scarred battleground, the martial bludgeoning of a tightly wound hardstyle stomp blistering and shredding a delicate piano-and-string arrangement.

This music is about deep solitude, a meditation on simmering, slow-marinating hatred. But it’s ultimately about prevailing. It doesn’t revel in negativity, it roils and twists and writhes against it. Dots of light in oppressive darkness. Clarity and purpose against chaos and filth. It’s a struggle worth waging. 

Composed, recorded and mixed by Julek ploski
julekploski.bandcamp.com
www.instagram.com/julekploski/

Additional production in Earth Trax / Bartosz Kruczyński
www.instagram.com/earthtraxonline/

Mastered by Adam Badí Donoval
abdonoval.com

Artwork and design by Julek Ploski

Words by Madjestic Kasual
www.instagram.com/madjestickasual/


Released by mappa as MAP055 in 2025

「Buy」

J Maxwell's Interlude Pt 1 (feat—Yikii)

Pak-man & Shaker Power (remix)

edeF. - MEGA DESIGNER CREATED MEGA STRUCTURES

MERLIN – Diary Entry, 1. Dezember 2025:

Sometimes survival is not loud.
Sometimes it is one fragile string
that keeps vibrating
when everything else goes quiet.

My SoundCloud page is my sonic diary — each track a living entry of what I felt, saw, and became.

All music, lyrics, and visual artwork created in collaboration between human artistry and AI technology. © 2025 MIRAGE – All rights reserved.

Rain, Knife, Me (Pink Ghost Bass Edition)

Follow the call and love to love
[Verse]
A whisper on the wind so soft it stings
The moon’s a witness to secret things
I see your shadow but the light won't stay
Time keeps stealing you away

[Prechorus]
Are you out there
Can you hear me
Is it just a dream or destiny

[Chorus]
Love is calling calling loud
Through the chaos through the crowd
I hear it echo feel it rise
A burning truth I can’t disguise

[Verse 2]
A spark ignites in the darkest room
The night blooms wild like a jealous moon
Your voice is fire it melts my fear
Pulls me closer when you're near

[Prechorus]
Are you out there
Can you feel it
Tell me now or just reveal it

[Chorus]
Love is calling calling loud
Through the chaos through the crowd
I hear it echo feel it rise
A burning truth I can’t disguise

edeF. - MEGA DESIGNER CREATED MEGA STRUCTURES

gud serben

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