Happy Monday, kids! In addition to new tunes and Gravity (which gets a solid endorsement from this website), my weekend was jam-packed with baseball and beer. It’s impossible not to be swept up by the Pirates’ incredible run after two decades of losing seasons, headed by Andrew McCutchen’s five toolsiness (and general radness), aided by the most forceful baseball crowd presence in recent memory, and culminating in insanity like this. As for beer, the long-awaited Brassneck Brewery finally opened in Van, brought to us by the geniuses behind The Alibi Room and Steamworks’ original run of greatness. Their initial eight beers are a solid and welcome addition to our fair city’s flourishing beer scene (their double pale and Russian imperial were my faves), and I can’t wait to see what’s next. That’s the news round these parts: onto the new tracks!

Thankfully, the fire regulations don't place any limits on krogan customers.

Seeming, “The Burial”
A bitter martial pop tune about chthonian reclamation, the first number we’ve heard from the new project of Alex Reed (formerly of ThouShaltNot and the author of the fantastic Assimilate) is nothing short of breathtaking. Accomplishing the sort of emotional punch in three and a half minutes most albums would be lucky to accumulate over their full run time, this is one of the best songs I’ve heard all year, full stop. Stay tuned for more details about Seeming…

∆AIMON, “Seraphim”
Hey, no sooner do we note the silence concerning the new ∆AIMON record than boom: the first track from the LP, here as an ID:UD exclusive! Truth be told, we got to hear this cut live at Terminus, but in studio form it’s easier to hear what’s changed since Flatliner: this is much more raw and panicked than anything we’ve heard from the duo, and we’ve been told it presages the general mood of the record. Once again, stay tuned…

Fotonovela feat. Marsheaux, “Close To Me”
No, not a Cure cover. Pretty sure my only exposure to Greece’s Fotonovela previous to this was an unfairly overlooked remix they did of Kirlian Camera’s K-PAX, but here they are hooking up with that most excellent synthpop act from their native land, and the results are quite nice. Crystalline and uplifting.

In Death It Ends, “Centre Of A Circle”
Porl King’s doing some housecleaning before having guests over, dropping a pair of by-donation EPs of new outtakes before releasing IDIE’s third LP in two years, Analog Witch. I’m liking the extra percussive clatter on this one.

Kindest Cuts, “Handsome Killer”
Brand spankin’ new synthpop act from Winnipeg. Not much info on or track record from the duo at this point, though they’re releasing a proper debut soonish. Digging the slightly detached vocals and the classic sawtooth. Tip o’ the cap to Kate M for the heads-up!

Klangstabil, “Shadowboy – The Awakening”
Like we admitted a year and a half back at Kinetik, we’d been derelict in tracking Klangstabil’s recent movements, but no more. The veteran act has an album dropping at the end of the month, and we plan on being all over it. So: apparently Shadowboy‘s been in the making for some time, as has the vid for the title track. Comprised of quick clips of attendees at Maschinenfest 2010 who were kept in the dark as to what they were contributing to, it’s a strangely affecting video, with more than a few familiar faces in the mix (hiya, Shannon!). The album’s concept is so detailed and singular that it should really be read about from the source, and as for the song itself? Creepy, sprawling, haunting.