Bytes readies reissue of the killer 1990s electro EPs by SEM aka Damon Baxter.

In the neon-lit alleys where the shadows creep,
In Area 5, where the code runs deep,
Beneath the hum of SEM’s thrumming beats,
Lies a city of circuitry, where reality retreats.

Detroit techno pulses through the veins,
As dystopian dreams dance in chains,
In the flickering lights of byte-laden screens,
Where echoes of the future meet shattered dreams.
 

Strings of dystopian sci-fi weave,
Through the fabric of what we believe,
In the symphony of cybernetic cries,
Where humanity fades and the machine’s sighs.

John Carpenter’s ghosts haunt the streets,
Vangelis’s echoes in every beat,
In this city of shadows, where no one’s free,
The soundtrack of a world lost in entropy.
 

Earlier this month Bytes announced the reissue of the killer 1990s electro EPs by SEM (aka Damon Baxter, who would go on to record as Deadly Avenger) on May 17, 2024. The second track to be made available for public consumption is Area 5, taken from The Demon EP, the second SEM release, on which Damon expanded the pure old-school electro SEM sound to include elements of Detroit techno and dystopian sci-fi strings, giving off serious John Carpenter/Vangelis’s Blade Runner soundtrack vibes.

https://www.theransomnote.com/music/premieres/premiere-sem-area-5-bytes/

@/byteslabel @deadlyavenger

PREMIERE: SEM - Area 5 [BYTES]

Ransom Note is an online music, arts and culture magazine. We provide a home for readers and writers with boundless enthusiasm, esoteric knowledge, fierce opinions and impeccable taste.

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With love until the grave.

THIS IS OUTSIDER MUSIC. WE CALL IT ECLECTRO.
MYSTERIES OF THE SUBURBS.

Kompleksi is an eclectro act from Tampere, Finland, who has released one LP, "Sister Longlegs Dances In The Disco" (Verdura Records, 2008). 

If you want to encompass the full-fledged Kompleksi audiovisual experience, please follow the attached links to other Kompleksi Web resources (such as Vimeo for all Kompleksi music videos in 4K).

"Kompleksi ('Complex') are an Electro-Pop group from Tampere, the post-industrialist city sometimes known as 'the Manchester of Finland,' where concrete Neo-Brutalist tower-blocks and decaying factories sit a short distance from woods and park-land." [...] 

"Firstly, though, it's important to understand that Kompleksi are neither an ironic parody nor nostalgic kitsch; they have little in common with any of the retro-engineered electro-punk groups that currently have a stranglehold on UK style-mags. Instead, they should perhaps be seen as part of a Finnish electronic music lineage that stretches back to 60s mavericks like M.A. Numminen and Erkki Kurenniemi, via the 80's Helsinki Futu ('Futurism') scene that spawned local synthpop groups like Organ and Stressi. And we should also include the Finnish label Sähkö ('Electricity'), whose pioneering early 90s roster created the original template for Minimal Techno: all these disparate influences have congealed into a wonderfully sticky synthetic stew called Kompleksi." [...]  

"Kompleksi's songs are often inhabited by a palpable feeling of melancholy; their lyrics articulate an acute sense of disappointment about lost cultural opportunities or times passed that resonate on a personal level as well as an historical one. The band gleefully invert the usual Modernist tropes, so that songs about the sixties space-race or working together to create a futuristic socialist paradise become metaphors for failed relationships or emotional stasis." [...] 

"For Kompleksi, the Future never quite happened - the golden age we were promised never materialised - like the rest of us, they have been left stranded with their expectations and disappointments in the concrete Here and Now. In this respect they could almost be categorised as an Anti-Glam group: their lyrics hark back to the kitchen-sink mini-Soap Opera approach of Soft Cell or early League, to an era before electronic music became part of the mainstream Pop vocabulary or was co-opted as a soundtrack to the cat-walk. They're also funny as fuck." [...] 

"But be prepared to loosen your expectations when you listen to them: Kompleksi's fusion of Eastern and Western pop sensibilities will initially sound both familiar and alien, especially if your ears have been blunted by over-exposure to pre-packaged post-Britpop acts. Trust me: these Finns have the potential to breathe new life into this jaded genre in the same way that Jap bands rejuvenated heavy psychedelic rock."

(Quotes from Kek-W @ Fact Magazine, UK, March 2008)

Ludmila Fuks is an Argentine music producer, live performer, and DJ based in Buenos Aires. She began her musical career as a producer in 2020, with releases on labels such as Other People (USA), Nein Records (UK), Logia (ARG), Epicure (FR), Calypso (MEX), and Kyma Komplex (MEX), where she also curated the latest VA. With a strong live set, she also performs in DJ format, having already performed in Chile, sharing the booth with Nicolaas Jaar at the showcase for his label Other People, the “Ladridos” festival, and in European cities such as Paris and Berlin (Bulbul, Hör). Her sound is characterized by a strong bass presence and the use of percussion and acid sounds, creating dark, hypnotic, and earthy atmospheres, thus passing through various genres such as acid, indie dance, EBM, dark disco, and electro, adapting to different intensities to generate an ecstatic experience. She is a political scientist and PhD candidate in Philosophy, combining both fields under the alias FKS, with sound installations and experimental tracks.



Instagram: @ludmila.fks
https://linktr.ee/ludmila.fks


https://linktr.ee/ludmila.fks

I like what I like.
what i like is raw music that bleeds into rare music.

[ TAMAN ]

[ LAMINAR ]

https://www.instagram.com/laminar_lmnr/

https://www.facebook.com/taman.hr/

https://kommodamsc.bandcamp.com/