Basic Printer - Moon Gear (2012)

Here we have a submission from Jesse Gillenwalters of Binghamton, NY, who makes creative electronic pop songs under the moniker of Basic Printer. "Moon Gear" is one of an impressive 9 releases, and is a concept record where the music serves as soundtrack to a fictional game about the planet of Platonia. It's easy to imagine, at least if the game is a video game, as this is synth-heavy music lending immediately lush, warm and colorful tones to these 10 songs.

While "Moon Gear" is a very accessible listen, it's not a straight-up pop record by most stretches of the imagination. There are stringed instruments throughout steering this toward the realm of chamber pop but the warped synth tones, of which there are many, keep that tag at a long arm's length. The record overall also stretches into the progressive and weird, especially on "Flora Aetus" and my favorite track "Knockout Mouse". But Gillenwalters' voice maintains a pop timbre when not heavily effected, giving some songs a Max Tundra meets Har Mar Superstar sort of vibe.

This is the second record I've heard out of Binghamton, NY that I've really dug (the first being Underground River). I'll have to put Binghamton on the short list for a possible Scenes Of A City post (check out previous posts for Guayaquil, Ecuador and Vilnius, Lithuania).

Get it here:

Basic Printer - Moon Gear 

Henri Claudel - Technology (2014)

You have got to love how open and appropriating the music community is today. When I first started going to metal/punk shows in the 90s, bands were forced to play with relatively similar acts. Rarely would you get any cross-pollination between music communities. Perhaps it is the remix culture that exists today (and discussed in a previous episode of our podcast) that is responsible for this desire to fuse and borrow from just about every sound on the planet.

I don't know what "Cold Wave" is, but this Scottish band is apparently that. All I know is that it is awesome retro-inspired synth pop that clearly borrows from the past and yet still sounds vibrant and fresh. The awesome Russian label Singapore Sling Tapes has put this out on cassette, which fits this style well. Sure everything is better on cassette, but I could totally see Marty McFly blasting this from his Delorean on one of his time traveling trips. Well my friend, he fucked up the past as a result, and now we have this relic of our possible dystopian future. Highly recommended.

Get it here:
Henri Claudel - Technology (2014)

esprit 空想 - virtua.zip (2014)

This is my first post on this blog, so allow me to introduce myself: my name is Evan. Okay, so this past week esprit 空想 released his last installment for this particular moniker. esprit 空想 has been making some of my favorite plunderphonic synth funk music, and I certainly consider his music to be on par with similarly funky contemporaries in the "vaporwave" "future funk" scene (lux, macross, reverb lite (b), ultra, yung bae (yumi?)). Honestly, esprit 空想 does something most of these other bands don't/perhaps can't do; he actually composes the music and uses samples as "a brushstroke rather than a canvas." Not that there isn't anything to be said about utilizing samples as a canvas, but the fact that these songs are built from scratch is something that gives esprit 空想 a sort of authenticity that can't be diluted by recognizing a song in a sample and thinking, "my gaht, the original was so much better, is this abomination trying to ruin the song?" example of such https://soundcloud.com/therealyungbae/waves-bansheebeat-yung-bae the original song is entitled Mermaid by Tatsuro Yamashita--you may like it, but I can't help but cringe at yung bae's interpretation. The point being, esprit 空想's music speaks for itself rather than through something else, which makes his music particuallarly compelling. Would it be pertinent to talk about the aesthetic dimensions at work within this particular scene and esprit空想's music? Probably not, there has been so much "critical theory" done to this genre so far, I figure the best approach is to just listen. Go take a gander and immerse yourself in some funky synth music reminiscent of John Maus, Roland Young, Dwight Sykes, and VHS warble. Reminiscent may be the wrong word/// to be had hear

Teeth - A Is For Asshole 7'' (2010)

Teeth - A Is For Asshole 7'' (2010)

Strange record from Mike Sniper and a group called Spider (A Member of the Spits and his girlfriend).