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LP
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EMEGO 317LP
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Rivet's new album for Editions Mego is an uplifting and joyous affair coming in the wake of tragedy and disenchantment. It is yet another rebirth from an artist willing to take a step back and reprise the current situation he is in. Mika Hallbäck has a long credible history in the Swedish underground. First recognized for his industrial techno works under the Grovskopa moniker he worked privately on more experimental works that eventually came out as On Feather and Wire, an album released on Editions Mego in 2020. After much acclaim for this bold new direction that blended electronic abstraction, pop and industrial forms into a heavy synthetic trip two tragedies struck. One was the passing of label boss Peter Rehberg and then the passing of his dog Lilo, who was as close as a companion one could have. Peck Glamour sees Rivet return to the reawakened Editions Mego with an album of optimism inspired by reconciliation with loss and further explorations of new mental/sonic realms. Hallbäck defines his approach as not being married to any particular machine, instrument, process or genre. However, he holds a particular affinity to sampling, of which, he says, provides the dirt and grit amongst what would otherwise be pristine, generic machine music. Peck Glamour is an album full of tracks brimming with the excitement of exploration. It's the results of a mind informed by punk, industrial, techno, dancefloor, disappointment, trauma and rebirth. Here the synthetic and authentic is viewed simply as the same means of human rationale and expression. The entire trip of Peck Glamour is sewn up with "We left before we came" whereby extraneous recordings of double bass player Gregory Vartian-Foss (tuning/strumming/moving the bass) are superimposed with local field recordings to create a gorgeous bed of sounds acting as an exciting exit music to this sharp collection of cinematic ear excursions.
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2LP
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EMEGO 293LP
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Swedish producer and electronic enthusiast Rivet (Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää, Malmö) joins the Editions Mego fold with a dynamic and diverse album that pivots between the punctuated pop of Ivan Pavlov's COH project, the chromatic slink of Chris and Cosey whilst also bearing a degree of fruit birthed from Hallbäck's home country Sweden in skewered pop such as The Knife. This is electronic music born from the worship of machines and the spirit of punk, mood music brooding with sophistication and subversive twists all underscored with a deep industrial pulse. Are these songs? Are these lyrics? Words melt as beat perpetually takes us deeper into flight. Interpretation is flung open as the audience are invited to gauge what on earth is going on here. Are "Sooty Wing Flecks" a minuscule species of half keyboard half vocoder chatter? Is "Gleitende Liebe" to be trusted or simply laying out a guide for disorientation? "Pearling Woes" is a queasy ballad sung by a robot on a very special comedown. "Keloid" knows exactly where the party can be now whereas Sodden Healer is an uber ride sans mask to destinations dark and unknown. Throughout this trip sharp snares punctuate ghost melodies as vocals rise and vaporize. Shadows hover the walls leaving holographic traces of the duality between fun and fear, the unexpected drifts diagonally across the audio plane teasing and taunting the listener in a unique blend of industrial, techno, pop, and experimental forms. On Feather and Wire is a deep absorbing trip through multiple moods, genres, and guises, as mysterious as it is engaging and one to ingest in a single sitting, lying back, sitting up, standing up and yes, even dancing. Let the angels and angles, the voices and distorted faces take shape before your mind. Who is "Ordine Kadmia"? What are they saying to me, here we go, on and on... With its haunted vocals, coded linguistics, and dark sensual propulsive atmosphere, On Feather and Wire is a sublime contemporary techno pop trip both psychedelic and subversive. Images by Dimitrios Bizios; Artwork by Nik Void. Written and produced by Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää; Post-production by Mika Hallbäck Vuorenpää and Benny Liberg at Inkonst Studio Malmö; Mixed by Oscar Mulero at Dead Souls Studio Gijón; Mastered by Stephan Mathieu.
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12"
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SKUDGE PT009EP
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The concept behind the Driftwood EP can be traced back to an old Swedish theater soundtrack from the '80s. What you get is Rivet's most floor-bending material ever. Filled with evil, lurking storms of the most timeless kind, the journey starts with a bang as "Driftwood" crosses over the whole dance music spectrum, taking cues from funk, post-punk, Manchester and Chicago house. "Crane Dance" follows a more sinister path with its witchy incantations carving a somewhat demonic take on house, a mesmerizing cascade of beats and eerie pads. Lastly, "Line of Moments" brings us some more mellow grounds filled with melancholic strings soon to be revealed as deceivingly acidic chimeras.
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12"
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SKUDGE PT005EP
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Rivet twists it in suitable fashion for the Skudge label -- one gritty house cut backed with an epic flipside.
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