GUNNAR HASLAM レコード& CD

Review: Prolific L.I.E.S. cohort Gunnar Haslam inaugurates the Kavalanic Languages label with some of his sinewy, head-twisting hardware techno machinations, showing us just how to make militant techno as thrilling as possible and leaving ample room for experimental weirdness as well. Opening track "Sostanze" is a taut and wiry beast that will lay waste to mild-mannered crowds, clubs and DJs, while "Atayalic" ramps up the industrial influences for a scary-in-a-good-way romp through evilest techno. "Ururu" is less malevolent but no less kinetically charged, firing off a wealth of pinging percussive synth tones that sound rather modular in nature. Beatless experiment "Ialysas" is no slouch either, pinging out unsettling tones of a discordant nature and creating something quite compelling in the process.

Review: In a vast discography that has spanned well over a hundred releases in the past five years, Ron Morelli's LIES label have issued twelve artist albums thus far. This latest Gunnar Haslam long player means the New Yorker has been responsible for a quarter of these LIES albums! Clearly Haslam is as comfortable within the creative expanses afforded by an album as he is laying down cuts on a 12". Lebesgue Measures finds Haslam essentially picking up where he left off on 2014's Mirrors and Copulations, offering a further evolution in his superbly crafted approach to techno. Across the nine tracks, Haslam plots a measured journey into supple acid lines, expertly programmed drums and occasionally incandescent sonic detail.

Review: Since making his debut in 2013, techno producer Gunnar Haslam has barely put a foot wrong. Here he returns to Delsin - a label he first graced in 2014 - with more left-of-centre, industrial-tinged dancefloor jams and otherworldly ambient explorations. Opener "Athabaskan Languages" is raw, rough and ready, and places the action around the kind of hard-to-describe rhythm that borrows heavily from the wonky time signatures of jazz. "Sirenik" and "Hellegat" are more straightforward techno affairs, with just the right balance between rolling grooves and dark, stripped back intensity. The EP also includes a superb chunk of blissful, deep space ambient in the shape of "Sarsi".

Review: Having surprised a few with the far-out nature of his thrillingly ambient Let One Hundred Flowers Bloom release on Mister Saturday Night, Gunnar Haslam returns to dancefloor pastures with this follow-up for the esteemed NYC imprint. Opener "Poshlost" is trippy and melancholic, with dusty, dub techno-influenced chords ricocheting around a delay-laden sound-space, underpinned by a simple-but-effective rhythm. "Margareten" ups the intensity, with ragged acid lines and a relentless techno groove providing contrast to the deepness of his chords. Finally, "Replacement" sits somewhere between the two tracks, with rolling techno chords, fuzzy textures, gently building melodies and fizzing percussion creating a rush-inducing mood.

Review: LIES call time on another busy year of releases with Mirrors & Copulation, a second album from New York artist Gunnar Haslam. In the period since Haslam announced his potential via his self titled debut album on LIES, he has swiftly risen through the ranks of techno newcomers and now brandishes a discography that covers Delsin, Mr Saturday Night, Argot and more. Listening to the eight tracks that make up Mirrors & Copulation gives you the sense Haslam's sound has developed and become richer since his debut LP, and there's a new found confidence to the execution that results in a broader set of tracks that feel like a more cohesive listen.

Review: The media-shy Gunnar Haslam first introduced himself to the wider world of electronic music with an album on L.I.E.S. and since then he's gone on to collaborate with Tin Man as Romans while releasing records for Mister Saturday Night and Chicago label Argot. Gunnar Haslam's Delsin debut also marks the onset of a new series from the Dutch label entitled Cameron with fellow L.I.E.S. graduate Voiski and Shlomo also pencilled in to contribute. "Ataxia No Logos" is an EP highlight which matches the booming sound Claro Intelecto delivered on his Stanza EP, while "Corridor Metaphysics" is a smooth, DeepChord-like production mixed with 909 hi-hats. "Dunsinane Hill" is a superb deep house production saturated in fuzzy overdrive while "Discrete Markov Dub" sounds similar to music Unbroken Dub has released on Rawax.

Review: New York's Mister Saturday Night is one of a handful of labels that are genuinely capable of surprising us with each successive release (as their thrillingly eclectic forthcoming Brothers & Sisters compilation brilliantly proved). For example, who would have predicted that this first MSN 10" single (the first from sometime L.I.E.S man Gunnar Haslam) would open with two and a half minutes of dark, intense ambience and distant Middle Eastern singing? Elsewhere, Haslam inches further towards the dancefloor, retaining the dark and exotic feel on "Discouraged", before pummeLling us with discordant, delay-laden DJ tool "Denomiazione Version". Brilliantly left-of-centre stuff all round.

Review: After a brief spell moonlighting on the Argot label, the producer known simply as Gunnar Haslam returns to the LIES label where he made his debut last year with what is presumably the first in another deluge of releases from Ron Morelli's label. If you were one of the many caught up in the charms of Mimesiak, Gunnar Haslam's LP for LIES, you will find yourself immediately swept up by the productions on Porte Maillot which could feasibly have come from the same recording sessions. Lead track "Feuve" wastes little time in swooping through a heavily atmospheric widescreen soundscape with low rumbling percussion propelling the production forth. Meanwhile, "Laghi Sotterranei" and "Archive" both sound like Haslam has been inspired by that excellent KWC 92 LP to dabble in music for an imaginary soundtrack.

Review: Gunnar Haslam's debut LP for L.I.E.S. arrived with typically little fanfare and turned out to be one of the most striking debuts the label has put out, delivering 10 tracks of downtempo techno sketches which showed the unheralded producer to have a quite distinct style. His follow up arrives on Argot, and sees the producer focusing more specifically on the dance floor, with three tracks that sound much more full bodied than on his debut. "Bera Range" sees a clattering combination of hi-hats and snare rolls contrasted with its laid back synth waves and dystopian melodies, a theme carried forward into "Optional", which combines a brooding '80s horror movie drone with lighter snatches of melody and almost jazz-like drums. "Nevenoe" is a fittingly queasy end to proceedings, its snatches of North African musical textures floating forth on a billowing cloud of bass.

Review: Naif steps up with an interesting split disc that spans the new and the old, as L.I.E.S and Argot bright spark Gunnar Haslam takes over the A side with the fulsome bubble of "Overcomplete" while Roman Flugel's long-standing Acid Jesus alias gets a little reissue treatment with the abrasive percussion workout of "Radium". The former is undoubtedly the friendlier, darewesay delineated offering, as a tidy 303 line and steady drum machine sizzle work into a trusty formation for the floor. Flugel's effort is of course a more fringe effort that makes dubby effects processing sound like the devils work, and is all the more distinctive for it.

Review: Ital's Lovers Rock label makes its first appearance of 2016, in the process offering up a quartet of fresh new cuts. It's arguably nowhere near as bleak and foreboding as you'd expect, with DJ Python's yearning IDM cut "Amazonia", in particular, delivering little less than melodic melancholia. Ital, too, is in a relatively positive mood (see the fluttering new age synths and druggy, bottom end throb of "Vacation"), though Gunnar Haslam flips the script completely on his titanium-clad, clandestine electro smasher "Vector No Campo". Sleeper Cell's ultra-deep, trippy ambient cut, "V", completes a fine package.