Category Archives: Switched On

New music – Tunng: Don’t Know Why (Full Time Hobby)

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published by Ben Hogwood, text taken from the press release. Photo (c) Paul Heartfield

The much-loved band Tunng are returning, celebrating 20 years since their first release. In those two decades they have maintained a fascinating musical balance, with a blend of electronica, folk and leftfield pop that has consistently marked them out as a band of special interest. Now the announcement of a new album in early 2025 comes with the following press release:

“Time flies when you’re being Tunng. Can it really be over two decades since the band’s genre-blurring, self-styled ‘pagan folktronica’ first emerged from an east London studio. It surely can, and what’s more, January 2025 will mark the twentieth anniversary of This is Tunng…Mother’s Daughter and Other Songs, a debut longplayer whose acoustic guitars and poetic disquisitions on nature, mythology and the human condition, courtesy of Sam Genders, sieved through fellow band founder Mike Lindsay’s lattice of fractured beats and crackling electronics, still sounds like an impiously postmodern wedding of the rustic and the synthetic, the arcane and the futurist.

That 20-year-old signature sound makes a warm return on Tunng’s eighth studio album, Love You All Over Again, a winning amalgam of texture and melody, disconcerting imagery and shapeshifting production, predicated, Lindsay reveals, on a conscious reacquainting with the band’s first principles. “I went back to the first two albums just to listen to how we fused genres – things like Davy Graham, Pentangle, the Expanding Records catalogue and the Wicker Man soundtrack. Over the years, Tunng’s sound has varied and twisted, but at the root there is always a flavour of what Sam and I made on that first album. Rather than searching for a new avenue we went back to what we used to do, which, after all this time, felt like it was a new avenue… Love You All Over Again is our way of coming full circle.”

Lead single Didn’t Know Why, which you can watch above, is a dauntless face-off between metallic synths and pellucid guitar arpeggiation with lyrics about a familiar Tunng song character, Jenny. “It’s very Tunng: dark but then warm and melancholic. Sam heard this and immediately brought back the murderous Jenny, who has appeared on two previous Tunng albums”.  Genders offers his take on Jenny. “She once represented a kind of romantic ideal – ‘the one’ – but now she’s a sort of every-person – a kind of archetype of all of us!”

Love You All Over Again is an album that gets to the very essence of Tunng. “For Tunng to work, it has to feel surprising, odd and unpredictable, and the new album has all that. It’s all about Tunng being back, as a family, within our original boundaries, bringing the love to all who have been a part of our journey over 20 years.”  Lindsay sums up nicely.

Published post no.2,325 – 8 October 2024

New music – Various Artists: Electro Throwdown (Soul Jazz Records)

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published by Ben Hogwood, text taken from the Soul Jazz website

Soul Jazz Records’ new collection, Electro Throwdown – Sci-Fi Inter-Planetary Electro Attack on Planet Earth 1982-89, is described as “a journey into the outer reaches of electro, a galactic roller-coaster ride of turbo-charged sci-fi grooveology.”

The album is comprised of mainly private-press and independent label electro jams of the highest calibre (with some as rare as space ships landing on Mars) all created in the 1980s, at a time when a vocoder, a Roland TR-808 drum machine and a groove was all that was needed to get the party started.

With a few notable exceptions (Michael Jonzun’s Jonzun Crew and The Packman) the album features mainly under-the-radar killer tracks from a host of one-off artists and back-room electronic pioneers – including Pretty Tony, Planet Detroit (James McCauley, aka Maggotron) and Rich Cason – who together helped shape the sound of electro across the USA from Miami to New York, Los Angeles and beyond during the 1980s.

This album is released on super-loud double vinyl, packaged in gatefold sleeve complete with full sleeve notes (from Derek Walmsley of The Wire), plus download code and digital. For more information visit the Sounds of the Universe website

Published post no.2,323 – 6 October 2024

Switched On – Kaito: Collection (InFiné)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Kaito is the name of the project under which Hiroshi Watanabe works, the Japanese electronic musician having joined InFiné after a twenty year stint that began at the Kompakt label.

Kaito is a name of significance for Watanabe – it is the name of his son born in the year 2001, when he started with Kompakt. It means ‘universe’ and ‘secret’ in Japanese, and as the press release says, “these references hint at a spirituality visible in his photographic work and contribute to the elements that make Japanese artists masters of the ambient genre”.

Collection is made up of nine tracks composed during the pandemic.

What’s the music like?

Incredibly soothing and yet subtly energising, too. In some of these tracks Kaito transcends time and space, allowing the music to simply float.

The slow pace of A Call From The Ground is a case in point, where a lovely slow arc of synths works its way over the backing, A piano drifts weightlessly over Summer Mood, while A Life That Can Only Be Dream Now is a lovely sketch expanding like a slowly evolving cloud – complemented by Nexus 2.

Does it all work?

It does – a musical time out of the best variety. Instinctive ambient music is difficult to come by, but this definitely does the job..

Is it recommended?

Very much. The Kaito project is music that is incredibly easy to listen to – and especially at times of stress, where it can just wash over the consciousness.

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Published post no.2,318 – Tuesday 1 October 2024

Let’s Dance – Jamie xx: In Waves (Young)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

It’s nine years since Jamie xx last made an album. That record, In Colour, was a celebration of London in all its forms. This time around, he’s gone for a night out – and In Waves is the result, a concept piece to track his every move and emotion, naturally with the help of a few vocal collaborators.

What’s the music like?

In a word, thrilling. We begin with a blast from the past, a distant recollection of the late 1990s UK garage explosion – Double 99’s RIP Groove taking us straight back to south London. From there we are wrenched into the present day, with the multiple highs of Treat Each Other Right, and the dancefloor beckons.

Jamie xx then hits the floor running, and the central two highlights are the Honey Dijon collaboration Baddy On The Floor, a spring-loaded anthem with a touch of Armand van Helden about it, and the superb Life, currently soundtracking the goals on Match of the Day 2 in the UK, gets to work, its wobbly riff and vocals from Robyn hitting every conceivable spot.

Elswhere there are wins aplenty – from Waited All Night, with Romy and Oliver Sim, to Nobody and Dafodil, a multi-vocal extravaganza that doesn’t fully make sense but which travels through some fascinating sonorities on its way. All You Children, with The Avalanches, is excellent, while the closing Falling Together – while a bit cheesy – proves the ideal sunrise moment.

Does it all work?

It does – a brilliantly thought out album from beginning to end, loaded with musical fireworks.

Is it recommended?

Most definitely. When Jamie xx wants to dance, he has all the tools of the trade you could possibly wish for!

For fans of… Basement Jaxx, Disclosure, Armand van Helden, Groove Armada

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Published post no.2,317 – Monday 30 September 2024

Switched On – Various Artists: Total Kompakt 24 (Kompakt)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Kompakt’s annual compilations are a very reassuring presence in the world of electronic music, and this one is no different, as Michael Meyer assembles a typically inventive and varied set of tracks.

What’s the music like?

With the quality threshold high, Kompakt always find something to tickle the fancy of any electronic fan. The familiar names from the label are here again and deliver the goods – headed by Meyer’s own excellent Urian.

Tee Mango’s So In Love is an English signing, delicate minimal beats orbiting a warm-hearted song. Jürgen Paape introduces a lightness of touch and humour to Chee-Caruso that works really well, while on a slightly tougher course Rex The Dog contributes a distinctive hook to his nocturnal Laika.

Sascha Funke is pretty delicate, with some interesting offbeat play on The Heck, but Jörg Burger’s Legacy of Ashes is a bit too monotoned to hit the spot. By contrast Wassermann’s Die Goldene Zeit is a warm wash of colour over a serrated bass.

Does it all work?

It does, pretty much – reliably good music from a reliable source. Digital customers get the bonus of another seven tracks, which include Deer Jade’s easygoing, piano-led winner Jukurpa and the strident The Shell, a collaboration between Gui Boratto and Darren Emerson. Meanwhile electro-goodness is found from Raxon’s Your Fault.

Is it recommended?

It is, enthusiastically. Keeping up with Kompakt’s output is strongly advised, and as this compilation shows they are still on very good form!

Listen & Buy

Published post no.2,314 – Friday 27 September 2024