Thursday, March 24, 2022

Dopplereffekt - Neurotelepathy pre-order, Mirovaya Liniya and more


There is a new Dopplereffekt album coming soon on Leisure System. The 10 track Neurotelepathy will be released on double vinyl and CD  on 10th June and 14th April for digital. Full details and pre-ordering at this Bandcamp link. There is one track on the BC player that you can listen to now.

'Who controls the mind controls the body.


After three years of experimentation in isolation, Dopplereffekt have emerged with Neurotelepathy, an oracular narrative of cerebral entanglement and advancement. The sleek mathematical models of 2017’s Cellular Automata have evolved into these synaptic interpretations, transferences and modifications, rejecting binary expectations to meditate on the possibilities and pitfalls of what’s to come.

With their second LP and fifth release in total on Leisure System, the duo of Rudolf Klorzeiger and To-Nhan have themselves achieved a near-telepathic capacity for collaborative thought and mechanical construction. They continue to use live appearances to present experimental trials of theoretical models, and that effort is heard in the sizzle and swing of the percussive highlights here, programmed with a serious depth and wriggle that reflect both an extension of and return to form. Considerations of the machine-human interface, neurological realities and physical probabilities dominate. But these tracks are economical and precise, glittering with emotional depth and cinematic effects. The album's core, a three-act movement of symphonic uncertainty and revelation, marks one of the pair's most evocative compositions in a career full of them.

Territory is monitored, traced and scanned, resulting in unexpected modulations. Underlying systems are questioned, competing mindsets animated and mutated: brain-to-brain, brain-to-machine and beyond. Neurotelepathy processes these transformative mental, psychological and transgenerational states both traumatic and triumphant.'

Leisure System will also issue Cellular Automata (2017) on CD for the first time, it's out on June 10th and can be pre-ordered on Bandcamp.

Dopplereffekt were one of the artists who took part in a show to celebrate 30 years of Tresor on Arte. You can watch their 32 min opening performance at this link. It's great to see and hear them filmed in such quality (they are in a studio with no audience).

A new collaborative audio visual project between Heinrich Mueller and Julia Pello has just been announced. They are using the name World Line / Mirovaya Liniya and there are currently three tracks on their Bandcamp page. They seem to be following the poetic theme of Zerkalo (Julia Pello was a member). Great to see them working together again.

It's possible that US sci-fi series Man From Atlantis (1977-1978) was another early influence on the underwater world of Drexciya. James Stinson would have been around 8 when it first aired (there were 4 TV movies and a 13 part series). I've previously written about The Abyss, Battle of the Planets and Sealab 2020 in this context. An outline of the story concept is below.

'Mark Harris is the lone survivor of the legendary sunken continent of Atlantis. Having adapted to life underwater, Mark possesses webbed hands, light-sensitive eyes, and the ability to swim at low depths in the sea for long periods. He draws strength from water and can overpower most ordinary men. Mark assists an institute for undersea research operated by his human friends, Dr. Elizabeth Merrill and C.W. Crawford, and joins Dr. Merrill in several exploratory missions aboard a high-tech submarine. They encounter several bizarre phenomena, including portals leading to other dimensions, a substance capable of altering personalities, an impish creature whose touch causes a mental return to childhood, and the scheme of a portly millionaire, Mr. Schubert, to melt the polar icecaps.'

Some of this certainly sounds familiar; a humanoid adapted to life underwater, a research lab, an aqua wormhole, strange phenomena and a Dr. Blowfin type character. You can even spot a prominent sea snake in this video of the opening credits.

Drexciya and Deltron 3030 are the main subjects of this excellent piece by Nathan Evans for Key Mag.

A really wonderful new fan made video for Glass Domain's 'Interlock' from 1991. I've said here before how the lyrics sound like advert copy and this video really makes the music seem to come from an official LEGO advert too.


 

Monday, March 07, 2022

Dopplereffekt Calabi Yau Space reissue, live dates, radio mix, Wavejumpers and archiving


The reissue on WeMe Records of Dopplereffekt's Calabi Yau Space (2007) on regular black double vinyl is now in stock online and record shops. Image and text comes from Bleep.com. The regular black vinyl reissue of Japanese Telecom's Virtual Geisha (2001) by Clone Records is also now available in all good record shops. 

'14 years since it was originally released on Rephlex Records, WeMe Records give Dopplereffekt's 'Calabi Yau Space' the reissue treatment, following their excellent reissue of 'Linear Accelerator'.

Here, eight analogue experiments referencing deep space exploration, theoretical physics and the supernatural are brought into focus. When first released, the tracks were perceived by some as Dopplereffekt at their most challenging and avant, standing out from the quintessential beat-driven electro sound they were known for. The tracks have an experimental focus and are at times completely free of rhythm, with shifting layers and discordant melodies achieving a rich, austere timbre. Close your eyes and turn it up for maximum effect as the precision sound engineering acts as a kind of eyelid cinema. It's certainly a departure as 'Calabi Yau Space' falls neatly into the lineage of deep experimental listening, and is more reminiscent of Schultzian Tangerine Dream or the Radiophonic Workshop than the fetish electro Dopplereffekt is best known for.

An essential record and a joyous outlier for Dopplerfekkt fans, and a great voyage for all fans of Techno in the sense that the term was originally intended.'

Dopplereffekt provided the 'Phones Down Finale Mix' on Afrodeutsche's The People's Party on BBC Radio 6 Music. She also plays Drexciya's 'Bottom Feeders' earlier in the show and talked about what a huge influence they were on her. I hope this podcast plays in every territory, if not the track-list is...

Dopplereffekt - Mitosis
Robert Hood - Internal Empire
Jeff Mills - Life Cycle
The Exaltics - The Truth
Cosmocracy - Human Rebellion
Joey Beltram - Drome

It's great to see more shows for Arpanet and Dopplereffekt getting booked. The line-up for Arpanet's Liverpool (8th April) show now has a a greatly expanded line-up and a new show for Berlin (14th April), Mexico city show on 30th April. has also just been announced (details for both are linked in comments). Dopplereffekt too are confirmed for a festival in Portugal (17th August).

Wavejumpers is a new group featuring Tyree Stinson (ex-Aquanauts), their debut release The Sunken Treasure EP on Underground Resistance will be released in late March/early April according to Rubadub. You can pre-order and sample all five tracks from it at this link. There is even a video interview with them at 56 min here

I found this excellent video from 2013 where Jessy Lanza discusses her love of Lifestyles of the Laptop Cafe by The Other People Place. 

I've updated my 2014 post on Heinrich Mueller's remixes/remodels. I've included everything I know about for sure with links to play every track. There are now 42 of them and essentially he creates something unique to the original in most cases. The first was in '96 for Scan X and the latest was in 2018 for Death in Vegas. If you know of any I've missed please let me know, enjoy! 

This is an epic 2018 interview with DJ Stingray for DJ Mag. Some sample text below...

 'Sherard tells of a folder of plans and designs a freshly inspired Stinson gave him during this time, which he’s never shown in public. Sadly, these plans never came to fruition, as Stinson passed away of a heart defect aged just 32. “I took the Drexciya off my name out of respect,” explains Sherard. “I never wanted people to think, ‘Who is this clown riding off the back of Drexciya’s legacy?’ I wanted to show eternal respect and gratitude. He got me onto the world stage and I probably wouldn’t never have made it as a DJ to this stage otherwise. It wasn’t something I was after.”'

It seems like Drexciya saw each of their projects as existing in different dimensions from each other with perhaps The Other People Place being the most literal example of this. For the Storm Series they created the 'Dimensional Waves' production company and James Stinson talked about this as a way to 'wave jump' from label to label around the world as well. 'Dimensional Glide' (2001) by Transllusion could be a reference to this process, an evolution of their 'Wavejumper' track and concept from 1995.

So it could make sense to see Drexciya, Lab Rat XL, Transllusion, Shifted Phases, Abstract Thought, Jack Peoples and even Elecktroids as existing in different dimension from each other. Gerald Donald, as quoted as The Author aka Remnant of a Hydrogen Element in the film, Hydra Decapita (2010) by The Otolith Group has also talked about Drexciya in these terms, 'There is no more Drexciyan dimension. That dimension is closed. Like a wormhole, like a stargate. So this final information you read here is just remnants of a possible possibility that could have happened.'

One of my readers kindly shared this press release/info sheet and as it's not on Discogs or anywhere else online I'm archiving it here. This came with the vinyl album (there was a shorter press release that came with a four track promo 12" EP).

'A coffee table album for the cyber generation or music that can change by sonic revolution?

"Lifestyles of the Laptop Cafe" is the work of an infamous and highly regarded techno artist from Detroit. An associate of Underground Resistance, his true identity remains a mystery.

An interstellar fugitive who fictionalises frequencies into unreal environments. "Lifestyles" combines the chilled summer sounds of low groove techno with eerie radar bleeps, muffled underwater echoes and liquid synth producing soundscapes that are romantic and unsettling, strangely alien yet strangely familiar. 

Highly evolved techno-chillout for darkness or light

Lifestyles of the Laptop Cafe (Warp 90) is released on 3rd September'