Once again this month we have been plundering the underground for choice cuts of innovative and experimental electronic pop. Wrestling with the inappropriate tags and search engines of the online music community can be frustrating, but we have still managed to find a small selection of great new tunes.
Meanwhile, in the Red Six studio, resident producer Maze Car continues to experiment with another genre within electronic music, following on from our deconstruction of techno back in December. Over the next few weeks, he will craft something in this genre to accompany another article written by us for the blog. Watch this space for updates!
Chemistry by tv room presents us with some really fresh production techniques. Eli Ganem's unique style is a quirky 8-bit bedroom hip-hop that carries melodic emotion and quirkiness together. Game fx pitch and echo around a soft, restrained vocal; and voluminous stabs of well sculpted synths add an extra dynamic. The small collection of short songs on the tv room stream make for similarly intriguing listening, and this original writing is sure to find favour with followers of other quirky experimentalists like Moloko and Broadcast.
James Pond is a short piece by Japanese theremin master Kuritez. The track opens with synthesised droplets that set the mood of water falling on water. Subtle percussion opens the production as it swells with analog bass, subtle bells and acoustic piano stabs. The drums mature into weighty band-limited bass and snare as the brighter layers of delayed, staccato synth arps continue to play off each other before the music submerges. Innovative sounds.
Women of Mars by Jet Jazimov represents synthwave coming of age. Much music of this genre places its tongue firmly in its cheek and only aims to mimic the music of the 1980s arcades and garish graphics. This track, however, harnesses romantic timbres and chord sequences above soft jangling guitar to produce a sensitive and genuine song. The wavering guitar progression and complementary synth interplay polishes the track off sweetly. True.
