Swedish electropunk band Bondage Fairies on Hamburg based label Audiolith launch their tour at Hafenklang in the heart of the Hamburg fish market district. Famous for their high energy shows and devoted fans, the unknown members met up with Release to chat about secret identities, chiptunes punk music and being stalked by Russian fans. [more...]
Franck Hueso is on tour under his alter ego Carpenter Brut and with his new album “Leather Teeth”. The king of syntwave returns to the stage with an astonishing live show coated in a dazzling mix of 80:s horror film clips, harsh electronic synth lines and with metalhead attitude. Release spoke with the mythical French synthwave star about his roots on the metal scene, to reach the Nine Inch Nails level of live shows and following the DIY path. [more...]
American EBM act Youth Code is continuing their two year-long tour with latest album “Commitment to Complications” with yet a new headliner, in yet a new music scene. After supporting acts as metal band Baroness, post metal act Deafheaven and, for Release readers, well known industrial act Skinny Puppy, Youth Code is back in Europe. This time with the major synthwave act Carpenter Brut, a tour that, however, kicked off with two shows supporting Front 242.
Release writer Jimi Nilsson and photographer Jule Roge met up with Youth Code before their show in Hamburg to get insight into their unusual background in the hardcore/punk scene, how it is to support such completely distinct acts in disparate music scenes and the sound of the next album. This is our second Youth Code interview. [more...]
Celebrating the 30th anniversary of “Mystery Hotel” and way beyond 35 years as an artist, Darrin Huss of Canadian “poppy” darkwavers Psyche summarizes a long-lasting career and promises a new Psyche album in due time.
We have written about these Canadian-German veterans several times before and won’t bore you with the basics. We met a cheerful Darrin before his show at Hafenklang Goldener Salon in Hamburg to talk about everything from being a cult band to the progression of the Psyche sound over the years. [more...]
“What we call ‘sky’ could be a hall of mirrors. What we call ‘moon’ could not be a real body. A new universe is emerging, showing the need for a new human mind”. The Italian astrophysicist Giuliana Conforto conclude that the moon is merely a hologram of the Earth, possibly an alien construct, and is the inspiration behind the title of the new album by long-lived Italians Kirlian Camera. Six years after their latest album release, they are back with the grandiose electropop release of “Hologram Moon”, involving collaborative work with Covenant singer Eskil Simonsson.
In Jimi Nilsson’s Release interview with Elena Alice Fossi and founding member Angelo Bergamini we learn about the ideas behind the band, collaborations, how to be considered non-Italians on the Italian alternative scene and being a survivor in a music industry fraught with digital disruption. [more...]
If you’ve been paying attention, you should be as utterly infatuated by London electronic pop duo Empathy Test as I am. Their time-travelling mix of analogue 80:s synthpop and contemporary electropop, with bits and pieces of chillwave and dreampop, refined into 22 tracks on two debut albums, makes Empathy Test 2017 an exciting addition to the electronic pop scene.
Release Music Magazine’s newest recruits Jimi Nilsson and Julia Schwendner (photo) meet up with Empathy Test singer Isaac Howlett before the concert at Nochtwache in Hamburg for a chat about unexpected fame and glory, how it is to end up in a music scene they never aimed for and the reason for releasing two debut albums.
Icelandic band Legend recently released their second album, “Midnight Champion”; five years after the critically acclaimed “Fearless” from 2012. Back then, Release’s Peter Marchione interviewed the singer/frontman, Krummi Björgvinsson. What would be a better follow-up than to let them meet up again – five years later? [more...]
Mesh is perhaps not a band you associate with classical music. But the electronic Bristol band played a very special concert with orchestra with 65 musicians at the Neues Gewandhaus in Leipzig and recorded it for posterity. The result is finally released: 30 minutes of live tracks together with three orchestral tracks that were recorded in the studio. We were intrigued about this whole project, so we got in touch with the band and asked them a couple of questions. [more...]
Carbon Based Lifeforms are a really experienced duo of Swedish ambient music producers. The pair, Johannes Hedberg and Daniel Segerstad, have been making music together since 1996, and recently released their latest studio album “Derelicts” on the Finnish label Blood Music, known for their extreme metal. Mike Whyte talked to the duo about the story behind the album, influences, and threw in a couple of cheeky questions along the way.
[more...]
Swedish / Norwegian powersynth band Xenturion Prime emerged from the ashes of Code 64 when Hasse Mattsson and Bjørn Marius Borg joined forces. They released their excellent debut album “Mecha Rising” in 2014, and then entered radio silence until now. These days the band have added Cathrine Räisänen Andersen to the roster and is thereby a trio. The new album “Humanity Plus” is out now on Progress Productions, and it’s a damn good one. We decided to have a chat with the band about what they’ve been up to since last time. [more...]