Xenia Reaper
Luvaphy

Often spotted about town, it’s no secret that JCow is diligently, quietly (and not so quietly) crafting big tunes. This release is the sound of that inevitable 2020’s shut-in inspiration. Written during those periods, they are finally seeing the light of day.With focused time in the studio, some serious imagined musical landscapes are the result. Tracks designed for dance-floor breakouts and closed-eye catharsis. We’ve heard these tracks come a long way from inception. Cerebral and kinetic, each track has a unique character, functional yet bound to stand out in any set.Tracks like ‘a complex range of human emojis’ pay-no-mind in referencing the past with a sly smirk and an updated twist, while the title track ‘in my elem3nt7’ conjures up a certain mystical environment - The tracks bold narrative shift midway is a notable payoff. Swerving boldly into new territory, the percussive motifs fade and return from new angles, sounds cutting and slicing through the speaker like angelic machine gun fire. The drum programming is truly used like a weapon on this one, with those majestic horn samples like calls from the ether.Exaels ‘swampbuggy’ reworking of title track on the B2 provides the perfect alternate universe, working its way from a sparse ambience into an inspired IDM-leaning breakbeat epilogue.

Now in its tenth year, Frankfurt-based record label Die Orakel has earned itself a strong catalogue of classy releases in a distinct sonic and visual attitude, its latest being a compilation called Braindance.A fair assumption about Braindance as a genre could be, that it's rather in the zone of kaleidoscopic and whimsical quirktronica, less about IDM's futurist tropes. From Die Orakel's point of view, its very own Braindance compilation marks the label's tenth anniversary by releasing an intense listener's atlas, to its own and their creative collaborators' musical slant of mind.While much could be said about spectral traces of a leftfield past, nostalgia isn't heard anywhere. The more you listen to this selection, the deeper the tracks plug into your brain—stretching from ethereal harmonic licks rippling with fragile glitches, bleepy to bass-heavy electroid steppers of any BPM range, to abstract-scientific neo-modular artistry.Die Orakel's Braindance transmission can be had as a 15-track digi-release, as well as a 4-track vinyl EP. Pick either for your library of the future.

INDEX:Records is blessed to announce the homecoming of Ike. It’s been a wee while since his last full club outing, but we welcome him back to this realm with open-arms.Lacing up with chuggy system-rattler 'Vernis VIP' Pulsar is a symbiosis of palpitating-wub and delicate, soft melody. On 'Rose Quartz', perfectly sedated drums are melded with luscious vox – a gratifying release to bass-driven tension-builder, 'Gage'. Mushing a cherry immaculately on top is a Mathis Ruffing indulgence ('Gage Remix'), who treats us to a frenzied yet controlled excursion into DnB hedonism.