Animal Psi

NP217 Roman Nails – ‘Artificial Sense’ C26
Roman Nails is the current electronic music project of Cooper Bowman of Melbourne Australia who has spent time with other projects such as Flat Fix and the Altered States Cassette Label. Cooper orbits around much of the Melbourne scene that we respect greatly from afar such as Total Control, Dick Diver, and Night-People alumni such as Fingers and Superstar. Its always hard to describe that subtle IT factor that a particular band or music project has, those little things that set it apart somehow from other similar music or that which makes the music stand out to these ears. Roman Nails has a special quality, something that is humble and mysterious. The project is based around analog electronics and rides its own vein of raw minimalism that doesnt fall into getting to blown out and focuses on retaining detail. Distinct melodies and synth sounds glide over evolving rhythms to create hypnotic compositions not overly oriented to one stylistic approach or genre tag. Another sweet surprise from Australia.

NP218 Germ Class C26
Germ Class is a collaboration between the mysterious German Army who has worked with Night-People in the past and Dunes the LA based dreamy pop trio with prior releases on Post Present Medium. The collaboration rests a bit closer to Germany Armys past work then Dunes but its a collaboration that is very much a sum of its parts in outcome and keeps with a focused but experimental approach overall. Loose drum patterns form the base for drifting vocals pages that balance between the industrial grit and darkness of German Army and the more melodic ethereal qualities of Dunes work. Overall the music sounds a bit like the less harsh aspects of Throbbing Gristles catalog meeting up with the more experimental sides of early Cocteau Twins. An interesting listen throughout that fits nicely into the eclectic nature of the Night-People catalog.

NP216 Free Music – ‘Kool Toad/Great Music’ C30
Free Music/Kool Toad is William Statler who grew up in the Twin Cities and kicked it in a few bands before transplanting to call Seattle home. Some mutual friends and Twin Cities connections along with William sending us a demo in the mail started the process towards working together and this release taking shape. The demo we got from William was one of those exclamation points that rarely turns up in the mail and instantly impressed. Free Music is eclectic but focused musically, riding a bit of an outsider thread and mutating strains of techno, acid house, and various synth pop strains into something totally unique upbeat and pop music memorable in the best ways. This release is meticulously crafted with utmost variety and consideration towards detail but is generated largely from improvisational methods. Beyond being a friend and artist we are working with Williams music is some of the best being made in the contemporary context and we are excited for what hes cooking up for the near future.

NP215 Blossuming Mums – ‘Dithering Mornings’ C30
Blossoming Mums is a recent project created by long time Night-People alumni and friend Robert Robinson who has been holding it down in Western Massachusetts for many years now with his excellent band Sore Eros. Blossoming Mums is a collaboration between Robert and Amanda Freeman of the Baby Barnyard project. The duo creates music that is obviously part of the Sore Eros aesthetic but stretches out in a different direction to be more ambient, drifting, and hazy in its minimalist psychedelic pop sensibilities and is very reflective of an early morning or late evening Western Mass country landscape. Blossoming Mums let the spaces and drawn out portions of sounds speak just as much as the rich deep melodies they create. Great well recorded polished dreamy music for summer or fall chilling out.

NP214 Principality – ‘Glass’ C26
When Night-People packed up and moved to the Twin Cities one of the first bands on our radar was Minneapolis trio Claps and the bands front man Patrick Donohoe who was a standout person in terms of welcoming us with open arms and showing much kindness, gratitude, and general positive energy towards the label. Principality is one of a few excellent projects Pat is involved with exploring different aspects of post punk, new wave, weirdo pop, industrial, minimal synth and all things beyond and in between. Pat is joined in Principality by friends and scene vets Teddy Borth, Mark Matejcek and Ollie Moltaji to create a band that rides the darker more romantic sides of post punk to dynamic effect without any sense of pretentiousness or fashion getting in the way of the music. Recorded just down the block from Night People HQ by Matt Castore at a Harder Commune Studio, this release showcases some of the best of what the Twin Cities has to offer.

NP213 Boy Harsher – ‘Lesser Man’ C32
Dark electronic duo Boy Harsher is Jae Matthews and Augustus Muller who reside in Western MA via Savannah GA. The band forming in Savannah fits with the gritty heavy EBM and Industrial approach to dance music Boy Harsher are flirting with, a sound that evokes images of a dark romantic sultry environment. Jae Matthews confessional and emotionally delivered vocals work as a nice ethereal and spontaneous foil to Agugstus Mullers precise pounding poly rhythmic machine grooves to create dance music that is as heavy as it is soulful. Recorded at Dollhouse studios by Peter Mavrogeorgis and released prior by the Soft Science label, Night People is hoping to spread the word a bit further about any already great band with this release.

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OptimisGFN – ‘Young Whipper Snapper’ C23 $7
OptimisGFN releases Young Whipper Snapper, an EP dedicated to his family. The Cambridge, MA based Emcee worked with k-the-i??? on the production of this album. The 10+ year veteran to the scene creates hip hop with 70s soul. Using various aliases over the years, the OptimisGFN moniker carries his passion towards music. Limited to 100 cassettes featuring k-the-i??? and One P.

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Concrete/Field & Wound C60 £4.5
A new split cassette release between Concrete/Field and Wound out now on Invisible City Records. One side per artist, each with their unique style but ultimately working towards a similar, defined aesthetic. Dense drones and removed landscapes recall views just outside of our peripheral. Like trying to remember a distant memory, only for it’s details to seem blurred. Four tracks of abstract ambient music that have a very strong sense of place and allow you to get lost in their architecture. Available as a hand dubbed C60 cassette with black and white single sided artwork. Limited to 50 copies worldwide.

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II041 – Ant’lrd – ‘Clouding Indefinitely’ C41
‘Clouding Indefinitely’ is a collection of tape meditations meant to enhance and aid journeys into the reaches of the far in. It is the damp fog rolling by in slow motion as you sit amongst the trees.

II040 – Selaroda – ‘viaje a través de sonidos transportative’ c35
Journey music: to faraway lands, higher states, and alternate dimensions. Capturing microscopic and macroscopic phenomena and transforming them into sonic explorations. These pieces were inspired by the idea of sharing earthly creations with lifeforms from elsewhere in the cosmos. And to those on Earth, may these sounds be nourishing to the mind, body, and spirit.

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Kyle Landstra – ‘Unshared Properties, Vol. I​-​IV’ 4CS $25
While he’s only been recording for a half a decade, Kyle Landstra has already released more than a dozen cassettes on some of the most renowned imprints across the globe, including certainly not limited to Sonic Meditations, Tranquility Tapes, SicSic, Already Dead, Moss Archive, and Baro. But it’s only now that the Chicago-based dronesmith releases his magnum opus. After the exquisite permutations of Mass Solitude (SP-32) in 2012, Landstra now returns to Sacred Phrases with Unshared Properties, Vol. I-IV, a quadruple-cassette that unfurls its aural sprawl and upends the modes of expansive experimentation and droning, modernized new age. Throughout the nine extended sonic drifts, Landstra positions his mass of synthesizers and effects as an unbelievable agile arsenal of contemplative, meditative sound. Each tape finds Landstra honing in on a select setup, exploring facets of various combinations of gear – from gear Landstra is intimately familiar with and used for years, to borrowed gear he is discovering in real-time. For Vol. 1, Landstra dives deep into the (un)known limits of the Korg EA-1, feeling out a simple and intuitive sequencer. The first volume maintains a certain simmer of arpeggiated, fluorescent melodies foiled by waves of tonal textures with a listlessly careening sense of motion. Vol. 2 sees Landstra explore similar but ultimately vastly different territory, relying on a recently-obtained Yamaha QY-100 for inspiration and exploration, finding an endless outpour of micro-rhythms and expansive subtlety that riff into infinity. On Vol. 3, Landstra lets go of the guardrails to float asunder into the ether, bobbing through space without direction and entirely unencumbered, serving as the perfect foil for the paced dynamism of Unshared Properties’ first half. Vol. 4 finds Landstra exploring the capabilities of Waldorf’s hallowed synthesizers, primarily the analog warmth and eccentricities of the Blofield. This is more than a life’s work. Unshared Properties, Vol. I-IV is confirmation of Landstra’s place in the halls of pioneers of synthesizer music. Includes download code. Limited edition of 50.

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Grøn – ‘Indland’ C20
Grøn is the solo project of Bjarke Rasmussen, also owner and founder of the Infinite Waves label. The project is almost three years old now and has four releases under its belt. Indland (Danish for “Domestic”) is his first release for Yerevan Tapes and features two 9-minute self-titled compositions that explores the most ethereal, abstract and aquatic edges of his “cathartic drone”, with the A side containing field and underwater recordings from the Nordhavn harbour and the B side hosting sounds from Copenhagen’s Botanical Garden. Two significative soundscapes from the cold lands of Denmark where the artist hails from. Out September 29, Indland comes on white c20 cassette with photographic insert & free download code. Limited edition of 100.

Mise En Abyme – ‘Crimini d’Odio’ C50
Mise En Abyme is the new project by Cristian Naldi (already in FulKanelli and Ronin) and Giovanni Lami (sound artist with releases on Kohlhaas, Felt and Granny Records). Two different backgrounds and attitudes to create something new, one and constantly evolving. From French [miz‿ɑ̃n‿abim] = “Put within the infinite”, the project is inspired by the technique used in cinema, visual arts and literature, where one image contains a smaller copy of itself, potentially repeating forever. In Mise En Abyme’s music this creates loops and melody fragments that stratify into complex compositions. Their first work Crimini d’Odio (Hate Crimes) is out on black c50 cassette on October 2, limited to 100 copies.

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Anla Courtis – ‘Microtonal Drifts’ CS £4.5
A brand new cassette release from Argentinian sound artist Anla Courtis. The release consists of two sides of mesmerizing yet challenging microtonal guitar workouts. This is edge of your seat stuff which brings to mind swarm behavior and the beauty of it’s quiet chaos. Available as a hand dubbed black C20 cassette with black and white double sided artwork. Limited to 50 copies worldwide.

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Doom Asylum – ‘Falling Apart’ CS $6
Wild, unhinged live techno from a North Carolinian transplant. This is outsider music meant for outsiders. Like Prostitutes, Jerome, and Unicorn Hard-On before him, “Falling Apart” continues to prove that the best electronics comes from those outside the urban bubble. Unlike his contemporaries, Doom Asylum is unafraid to play with more than just rhythm and shades of distortion. A typical track is a web of melodies and filter squelches, twisting and tangling till it boils over with polyrhythms and beer-soaked syncopation.

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Concrete Field/Wound – ‘Concrete Wound’ CS £4.5
A new split cassette release between Concrete/Field and Wound out on Invisible City Records. One side per artist. Each with their unique style but ultimately working towards a similar, defined aesthetic. Dense drones and removed landscapes recalling views just outside of our peripheral. Four tracks of abstract ambient music that have a very strong sense of place and allow you to get lost in their architecture. Available as a hand dubbed black C50 cassette with full colour double sided artwork. Limited to 50 copies worldwide.

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Baldruin – ‘Portal’ LP
Baldruin, the nocturnal brainchild of Johannes Schebler, came into life in 2009 and instantly a unique surrealistic sonic topography was mapped out: through the dense undergrowth of synthesizer sounds and various misty noises a more and more detailed world of sound revealed itself with every new release during the past six years – full of bells chiming, voices calling, pipes whistling and seductive percussive elements. Accordingly Baldruin’s music has a very cinematic quality recalling the psychic soundtracks of Goblin, the feverish exotica of Jodorowsky’s „Holy Mountain“ or the occult “Themes“ of Psychic TV. „Portal“, Baldruin’s first vinyl release, follows this musical path in somnabulistic certainty towards a slighty more airy horizon. The journey’s not come to an end yet, „Portal“ opens a new chapter in the ongoing saga of Baldruin’s Bavarian Gothic.”

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