This week's RA Podcast marks something of a debut for Infinity Division, the new solo project from Canadian artist Ash Luk, best known as one half of EBM-techno duo Minimal Violence. (Minimal Violence had itself been a solo project since last year, when cofounder Lida P left the group.) Getting his start in Vancouver's punk scene as part of the band Lié, Luk's approach to dance music is informed not only by those origins but by Western Canada's long history with industrial music and techno (spot Skinny Puppy and Tunnel Canary in the tracklist).  

Minimal Violence first impressed us with their hardware-focused house and techno, a harder-edged version of the sound that was sweeping Vancouver at the time, before moving on to Ninja Tune sub-label Technicolour and then Tresor for a series of records that saw their sound become more expansive, sharper and more melodic, incorporating not just techno and punk influences but also trance, EBM and more. These are the genres that feed into Infinity Division, and Luk's RA Podcast hurtles through everything from old Prodigy, '90s German hard trance, Canadian breakcore and new tracks from his project. This is heavy dance music that's also heavy on melody, unafraid of huge crescendoes that hit that sweet spot between punishment and euphoria. Buckle up.

Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/852

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RA.852 Infinity Division

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As 5,000 lawyers, regulators, academics and technologists convened for the International Association of Privacy Professionals Global Privacy Summit 2024, a team of MLex journalists were in Washington DC to chronicle the most important yearly gathering of the world’s privacy community. Covering GPS panels on artificial intelligence, data transfers and an array of privacy issues, and interviewing key regulators on the sidelines of the conference, the MLex team gathered after the conference to share their insights on the event.

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When Canadian engineering company SNC-Lavalin was named in a bribery investigation in Brazil, it suggested that the company had failed to put its governance failures behind it. The probe by Brazilian federal prosecutors into corruption allegations involving the country’s state-owned nuclear plant is likely to add to the Montreal-based company’s woes back in Canada, where prosecutors have accused SNC-Lavalin of funneling millions of dollars to corrupt Libyan officials. The Brazilian probe is now likely to create a new headache for the company back in Canada.

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