It’s our weekly round up of new tracks! You know, when we started ID:UD last year I remember thinking that there was probably going to be a dearth of stuff to write about in the January/February period. My experience has usually been that interesting music doesn’t start dropping ’til the spring, but not so in 2012. It’s amazing how much stuff has come across our desk thus far, to the point that we’re having to pick and choose far more than I expected to keep up with it all. As always, if you send us anything (we’re fine with a link to Soundcloud or Youtube), we’ll listen to it, and if we like it, we’ll find some way to talk about it on the site. Alright, let’s get this show on the road.
Propaganda Magazine woulda loved these guys.
Formalin, “Dead Fashion”
Berlin’s Formalin have a new album Wasteland Manifesto coming out March 2nd, and as is the style with bands of Out of Line, have a pleasantly professional looking video clip to go with it. I wasn’t wild about the group’s debut record of dark electro from 2010 (“My Fetish” was pretty decent, but generally the vocals didn’t work for me) but I dig this: the mid-tempo drums, round, bassline and string sounds remind me a bit of what Necro Facility were doing with the Skinny Puppy template last year, minus the melodic vocals.
For all the Emptiness, “No Paradise (Dance mix by Decoded Feedback)”
Toronto’s Jonathan Kaplan has released a new EP featuring two vocal versions of instrumentals from his debut Axioms and a friggin’ murderer’s row of remixes from the likes of Icon of Coil, Beborn Beton, Assemblage 23, and others. I like this particular one by Kaplan’s fellow Torontonians Decoded Feedback, who deliver a surprisingly light and bubbly version. Come to think of it, both bands have a certain European je ne sais quois about them, if I were gonna try to pin it down in the case of For All the Emptiness I’d say it’s in the vocals, which remind me of classic English synthpop in the Ultravox vein. And hey, you can get the whole thing free via FatE’s website, you had best get on that.
HexRx, “Crawler (iVardensphere Public Disservice Announcement remix)”
Apparently Roger Jarvis is working on some new Kevorkian Death Cycle material, which means between his two projects he’s gonna have a busy year. I believe this track will be on the forthcoming HRX EP Serial Hex Addict, which will be out in March. As always, we love a good iSphere remix, and though the old public service announcement parody is a well worn trope, I did get a chuckle out of it.
LabXIV, “Without a Friend (The Present Moment cut)”
Information about LabXIV is totally scarce, as in I don’t know a single thing about them and Google ain’t comin’ up with anything neither. Considering that I’m used to being able to tell you the addresses and blood types of any given band within three seconds of hearing about them (thanks Internet, I think) it’s actually kind of nostalgic feeling to know nothing about a band. They were kind enough to send us a link to their new video, which is of a remix of their debut (?) single by ID:UD faves The Present Moment on the retro-electropop tip. The vibe of the clip is distinctly filmic (to cop a 10 cent art school word), fitting considering it was made by the same folks who made TPM’s excellent “Intrigue” video last year, which you’ll recall was well-loved in this neck of the woods.
