Balmat’s first release comes from @lukes-anger, a Norwich, UK-based artist whose two decades of electronic music-making have encompassed a range of tools and techniques, from MaxMSP to modular synthesis. Along the way he has built an extensive catalog encompassing ambient atmospheres, abstract soundscaping, and more. With Languid Gongue, he puts multiple approaches into play. Experiments in microtonal composition balance out pieces in standard tunings, while esoteric electronic machines merge with familiar acoustic treatments and microphone techniques. 

The result is a constellation of his signature sounds: freeform new-age fantasia; spring-loaded toytronic arpeggios; quartz-driven braindance clockworks. Drifting between consonant, almost lyrical compositions and shape-shifting textural sketches, the album drifts with the nonchalance of a sky-high cirrus cloud, and it glows as if illuminated from within. When we heard the material, we knew that it was the perfect choice to launch the label. To us, it sounds like a roadmap for points unknown.

Languid Gongue

Luke Sanger - Languid Gongue [BALMAT01]

Next up on our podcast series, we have Albert Salinas Claret, aka Wooky, artist, and owner of Barcelona-based label Lapsus Records and C.E.E., He also co-runs a recently launched Balmat, with Philip Sherburne.
Tracklist: https://leftbank.club/archives/1034

Left Bank Podcast 015 - Wooky

Further information: bleep.com/features/bleep-mix-198-wooky

Bleep welcomes @Wooky to the mix series, for just short of an hours worth of hand-selected gems from the founder of Barcelona’s trailblazing Lapsus records. It’s a fitting insight into the wealth of styles the label and Wooky himself have become aligned with over the last two decades, with mind-bendingly high-quality control throughout. Setting out with ambient braindance and dub techno stylings, Wooky takes us through broken & percussive UK gear and tripped-out contemporary club trax, moving between tempos and melding genres along the way. Some of the freshest Lapsus releases are in here too from Wordcolour, Delay Grounds and plenty more.

Bleep Mix #198 - Wooky

Described by his peers as a keystone in ambient-electro, Datassette (@datashat) is a bastion of the underground and one of alternative electronic music’s most exceptional and enigmatic talents.

His extensive and diverse discography spans two decades and includes a plethora of albums, EPs and remixes for independent record labels, including: Ai Records, Apollo/R&S, Wall Of Sound, CPU and Shipwrec. His work and creative output also extends to the design of music libraries for TV and radio; producing sound effects for 8-bit video games; working as a graphic designer and co-running the Misc label.

Datassette has never been shy of creating complex, addictive and emotive music and this magical music formula is replicated on Sentinel, his new EP for Lapsus Records.

As is emblematic in his long-standing career, Datassette demonstrates a healthy non-conformist approach to conventional labels and pigeonholing. By using a combination of powerful vintage hardware and latest generation digital techniques, the British producer continually manages to redefine his sound. This new four track EP sees him fuse dub, electro, braindance, ambient, experimental electronica and even abstract hip hop.

Sentinel

Datassette - Sentinel [LPS29]

Sa Casa des Carbó is an old fishermen's house located on the seafront in Cala Vedella, a small beach cove situated on the west coast of Ibiza. Through its windows filters the salty air and the murmur of the sea, while also offering a glimpse into the history of a land with a powerful nomadic spirit and a cultural background that has no equal.

In November 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic and driven by the desire to embark on an inner journey, Mario G. Quelart (@lucient_music) chose this peculiar enclave as a source of inspiration and focal point for his debut album 'Sa Casa des Carbó'. For ten days Lucient self isolated by choice and undertook an introspective journey to find himself. It was a voyage through uncertainty and fear, with moments of tranquillity; a personal pilgrimage traveling through light and the shadows, in which time became a relative element.

'Sa Casa des Carbó' is a sound journal of this experience, an album with an ambient base, but which opens the door to experimentation, rhythm and psychedelia. Field recordings –the sea, the birds, the wind, and a strangely silent airport– are fundamental parts of this journey and serve as a canvas for an album of cosmic electronica with Balearic overtones.

Sa Casa des Carbó

Lucient - Sa Casa des Carbó [LPS30]

pq, real name Pete Jones, is a relative newcomer to the world of electronic dance music, but he has always been interested in making people move. His musical journey began in Nottingham as a drummer and songwriter for various metal and hardcore bands. When he moved to Leeds in 2011 he began to take interest in the darker and more experimental forms of dance music. Six years later, after having met fellow drummer and producer Spooky-J, the two moved to start a residency project in Kampala, Uganda in 2017 with the Nyege Nyege crew. Here they formed Nihiloxica, one of the most significant acts to rise out of the East African platform, a band with which he continues to write and tour to this day.

The nomadic producer has released via Nyege Nyege, Hakuna Kulala, Crammed Discs, Blip Discs, Opal Tapes and Hundred Flowers among others, with an eclectic output ranging from ambient and electroacoustic, through techno and grime, into club workouts. He also releases on Spooky Shit, a hyper-club label he runs with his best mates Spooky-J and Ekhe. This imprint proved formative in pq’s style, influencing a unique take on club music that is equal parts experimental, humourous and destructive on the dancefloor.

Proprioception is the name given to the body’s innate sense of positioning and motion. It governs our ability to move and detect our limbs in space. It enables us to dance. Centred around an energetic 160bpm core and punctuated with moments of blissful ambience, pq's ‘proprioception’ shimmers like a dream. As he elegantly shifts tempo, genre and style, pq’s signature analog and digital synthetics bounce around in polyrhythmic harmony, inspiring both bodily movement and out-of-body experience, all the while never taking itself too seriously. Can you dance if you can’t feel your limbs? pq is on a mission to find out.

written and produced by pete jones / pq.
mastered by pedro pina.
designed by basora.
LPS31.
www.lapsusrecords.cat
©️ & ℗ Lapsus Records 2022

proprioception

BUT ON BANDCAMP

pq - proprioception [LPS31]

@surgeonsgirl radiates energy with healing powers. She possesses a bizarre magnetic force that enables her to transform environments at will, transporting listeners into an intoxicating parallel realm. Her music overflows with luminescence and otherworldliness and casts a spell over all those who hear it. 

Sinead McMillan is one of the most thought-provoking and revelatory projects to emerge from Bristol in recent years. Her impressive debut EP 'A Violet Sleep', released on Bristol's Livity Sound label in 2020, unashamedly exposed her love for analogue synthesizers and explored the intersection between experimentation and emotion, through the immersive sounds of her beloved machines. While demonstrating an incredible sound maturity, she continued to delve into this sonic terrain by releasing 'The Empress Moss' on London's Inside Out label in 2021.

Lapsus welcomes Surgeons Girl into their fold with her luscious EP entitled 'Sever'. The five-track EP showcases the evolution of the British producer’s sound, where melody and texture take centre stage, with both elements engaging in a delicate and dynamic conversation for thirteen hypnotising minutes that intertwine and reshape our state of consciousness. Deliciously sequenced arpeggios, simmering bass lines and enticing percussion, all laden with effects that effortlessly appear then disappear. It is IDM with distant dub echoes, extra-terrestrial avant-techno and deeply emotive experimental electronica.

Sever

Surgeons Girl - Sever [LPS32]

Neil McDonald's love of the outdoors is a constant feature in his music, hence his Lord Of The Isles (@lordoftheisles) moniker, a direct reference to the Highlands and islands of his native Scotland.

His vivid, effervescent and blissfully cinematic sound paints a soundtrack to unmade films, building imaginary worlds inspired by his childhood passion for science fiction. It is therefore no coincidence that the closing track 'Subtle Thoughts' samples the inimitable voice of Carl Sagan and is also the name of his forthcoming album on Lapsus Records.

Subtle Thoughts' is an album of sumptuous melancholic electronica that, like all his previous works, avoids being pigeonholed. In it we find ambient and IDM, but also breaks and down-tempo 4x4 beats with deep ruminations, and even passages akin to new age and Balearic. In Neil's own words, the real concept behind 'Subtle Thoughts' is "The spaces in between. Listening to the quiet voices. Freedom of expression and being open. It also contains my hopes and fears for the future of our world, but mainly hope and love".

Subtle Thoughts

Lord Of The Isles - Subtle Thoughts [LPS33]

Twelve years have passed since eedl released their masterpiece “Everse” [spa.RK, 2007] and in that time the duo -formed by Miguel Ángel Martínez and Joan Duat- have shied away from the spotlight and stage. Despite this apparent lethargy, their previous two works - "Parallemped EP" [spa.RK, 2003] and the aforementioned "Everse"- provided them with cult national scene status, while raising more than a few eyebrows among European “headz”. Both works continue to sound overwhelmingly modern and undated, an obvious signal that eedl is a special breed of cutting edge electronic music.

Although creatively silent for a number of years they have remained musically active. As well as his career as a product designer, Miguel Ángel has applied his musical experience to the technology sector, and since 2016 has fully immersed himself in “modular”–Winter Modular, Befaco, Plankton Electronics and Patching Panda–; Meanwhile, Joan, office programmer and classically trained pianist, has found his equilibrium with work and building a family life.

"Unstored" is their long awaited return to the fray and their second studio album. It is comprised of eight songs, some of which have been have been slow cooked since 2002, with others gestating more recently. Maybe such a long hiatus seems excessive, but the meticulousness nature and obsessive love for detail found in "Unstored" more than justifies the wait, which at times felt like a long goodbye. This collection of songs navigates between perfectionist electronica, new generation electro, noisy harmonies, glitch and deconstructed rhythms; a sonic memoire with strong roots in British experimental electronic music -reminiscent of Autechre or Plaid-, another reason in understanding the longing produced by their extended absence.

It is therefore with great honour that in early January 2020, Lapsus will release the new album from the elusive eedl project in a luxury edition format.

eedl - Unstored [LPS21]

Written, mixed and produced by Albert Salinas Claret
Released 1st January (Lapsus Records, 2010) - www.lapsus.bandcamp.com
Mastered by Alex Candela at Flow Audio - www.flow-audio.com
Artwork and typeface design by Marc Salinas - www.wetraphic.com
Cover photo by Albert Salinas

Inicii skin

Growing up in Milton Keynes, the largest of the "new towns" outside of London designed and built in the 1960s, perhaps explains why producer Nicholas Worrall is subconsciously drawn to clearly delineated sonic structures and flawed techno utopianism, two concepts that are ever present in both his sound and aesthetic approach to music.

Wordcolour (@wordcolour) was formed just two years ago, at a time when Worrall was habitually cutting up and splicing human voice samples ripped from YouTube memes, film dialogues and musique concrète tapes.

The first artistic demonstration of these ideas arrived in 2019 via his mixtape “I Want To Tell You Something” for the Blowing Up The Workshop platform. This unique set immediately grabbed the attention and support of the specialized music press and media, including Pitchfork and Resident Advisor.

“Tell Me Something” is Wordcolour’s official debut EP and heads straight for the dance floor. It is comprised of an unusual melting pot of influences that fuse the UK club sound, post-dubstep and a style akin to Paul Lansky's ‘90s musique concrète. “Tell Me Something” offers a vibrant leftfield, avant-garde techno and edgy electro, all immersed in the vast cosmos of the human voice.

“Tell Me Something” will be released at the end of July on vinyl and all digital formats. Reserve your copy now at www.lapsusrecords.cat.

Tell Me Something

Wordcolour - Tell Me Something [LPS24]

Founder @lapsus-records & C.E.E.
Co-founder @balmat_cat
Bookings: mario@lapsusagency.com

Inicii skin

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