Experimental/Electronic charts

Review: Now that's what we call an album title 2021. As the name implies, we're skirting the edges of 1980s Japanese pop, opting to explore the strange, sci-fi hued, traditionally rooted noises that weren't necessarily dominant in the Far East country at that time, but certainly found favour with more explorative listeners. And it's not hard to hear why.

Tracks like 'Days Man' by Yoshio Ojima could work well in a slo-mo house or electronica set today. While preceding effort 'Hikari No Ito Kin No Ito' from Mishio Ogawa is like a strangely innocent hybrid of lullaby and pop song. Elsewhere, the twinkling synths and wet snare hits of Naomi Asai's 'Yakan Hikou' further accentuate the surrealism running through so much of what is here. One for the trophy cabinet, collectors take note (and form a queue).

Review: Perhaps only dedicated avant-garde electronic heads will know about The New Backwards, the final project from the seminal industrial band Coil. But that doesn't make this 2008 masterpiece worthy of this new gory, visceral reissue; far from it. Limited to just 555 copies and splattered with the murderous blood of listeners who didn't survive the album's first incarnation from beginning to end, this one contains 8 additional tracks, including an exclusive live 'work in progress' track ('Backwards'), documenting the many criminally insane production choices Peter Christopherson and co. would make in real time.

Review: US producer SSPS is a ram outsider who is well known to fans of the weird and the wonderful. His adventurous experiments have landed on labels like L.I.E.S. and Kode run by Traxx and collide punk, noise, wave, hardcore, slow beat and jakbeat. This is a retrospective release that brings together some of his many highlights and proves why he is so well-loved by a community of fans on the fringes of the underground mainstream. As well as this genre references there are plenty of odd vocals and smeared synths unifying the sounds which here included four tunes recorded live For Unlimited Nation Summer Of 2020.

Review: Hudson Mohawke has always been a bit of a universe-builder, sonically speaking. Few dance music producers to emerge in the post-millennium period have created such a unique aural personality and carved out such an individual place for themselves. Despite giving us a number of incredible pieces of work over the years, Cry Sugar was in many ways the Scottish enigma's coming of age moment. Simultaneously smashing out hardcore, slomo UK breaks, weird-hop, freak&B, alternative-leaning EDM pop, soul, jazz, festival chart house, electronic sleaze and hyper emotional electronica overtures, the 2022 record was rightly tipped as one of the year's finest. And the perfect score to the tumultuous, chaotic and confusing times we woke up in at the time this one was being meticulously pieced together.

Review: It was in 1998 that pioneering Canadian musician levin Key released his solo debut Music For Cats. Artoffact Records reissued it on vinyl back in 2014 and now they do so again but this time on gatefold pink and blue splattered vinyl double album. It's a unique work that blends classical, glitch, and noise-driven pieces, featuring collaborations with artists like Dwayne Goettel, Genesis P.Orridge, Philth, and Mark Spybey. 'Music Fur Cats' showcases Key's songwriting depth, followed by 'Wind On Small Paws' with its electro-industrial sci-fi vibe. 'Meteorite' offers glitchy beats. Familiar tracks like 'Bird', 'Blotter', and 'Greenhouse Gasses' provide accessible listening, albeit experimental. 'Music For Cats' is gritty and against the grain, yet melodic. While not mainstream, it's an intriguing, well-crafted release, appealing to experimental electronic enthusiasts and completists alike.

Review: Originally released as a double CD in 2002, Moon's Milk (In Four Phases) is a collection of four EPs Coil issued seasonally in 1998 via their Eskaton imprint. Featuring John Balance, Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson, Drew McDowall, and William Breeze, it was recorded in their Chiswick, London home studio before they relocated to Weston-Super-Mare. This pivotal work has long been considered a high point in Coil's discography, though it was never reissued or pressed on vinyl at the time. Arranged around the equinoxes and solstices, Moon's Milk captures Coil's deep dive into improvisation, ritualistic sound design and mystical atmospheres and stands proud as a testament to their individuality.

Review: You had us at Sakamoto. Or rather you had us at "excerpts from Ryuichi Sakamoto's time working under Nippon Colombia's label, Better Days. First released in 1992, this 12-track compilation runs from tracks that appeared on the Japanese synth legend's debut album, Thousand Knives, first released in 1978, through to songs written with the iconic session group KYLYN, featuring celebrated guitar great Kazumi Watanabe. Ever the auteur, even if you didn't know this was Sakamoto in proper landmark mode, there's no chance the sounds here could really be confused for anyone or anything else. It's mature and intelligent, yet strangely - and typically - fun, childlike and a little cartoonish, sharing as much in common with experimental electronica that was emerging during the 1970s and 1980s as video game scores from the 1990s.

Review: Even many years after his sad death, the global audience for Nujabes' music continues to grow. To honour the tenth anniversary of his passing, Hydeout Productions asked Haruka Nakamura to create a tribute album and encouraged him to move forward while preserving Nujabes' timeless essence. The project began with the release of the music video and 7" vinyl of 'Reflection Eternal' and now the full album Nujabes PRAY Reflections arrived featuring Nakamura's reinterpretation of Nujabes' melodies through piano and guitar. This is not a traditional cover album, but new music inspired by Nujabes with artwork by Cheryl D. McClure that blends both artists' creative worlds.