Slovak Techno set at Mor Ho!, Red Gallery, Shoreditch, November 8th.

A special 'Slovnaft mix' to round off this night of Slovak and British electronic music...

By the end of the 1990s European techno had moved from the underground to the mass market and a certain blandness was setting in. Techno DJs and listeners were starting to search for more radical and intense sounds. It was just at this point that rumours began to emerge of a club in a nuclear bunker in Slovakia where they played some of the hardest and most industrial techno yet heard. The club was Bratislava's U Club (now the Sub Club) and it would become the nucleus of a small but influential scene.Codex Europa's Slovnaft Mix is a celebration of the energy and dynamism of the Slovak techno scene and an attempt to re-construct the legendary U Club atmosphere in London. The mix will showcase the work of Slovak producers such as DJ Boss, Olga + Jozef, Loktibrada, Rumenige and more, plus remixes from their international allies. 90 minutes of some of the most rigorous, mechanical, brutal and unrelenting techno ever produced...

LINE-UP: 

Helm (UK) 

Bios (SK) 

Ink Midget (SK) 

Shibuya Motors feat. Ddkern (SK/AT) 

Codex Europa (UK) 

VJ-ING AND SITE-SPECIFIC ART by Mikaela Lilhops 

£7 pre-sale /£9 on the door drinks: BYOB

Buy Tickets

Mor Ho page

Facebook event page

Review: Coal Ontology GRVT004

COAL is a project manifesting the “dark side” of Italian producer Giovanni Paris. Like Italian colleagues such as Giorgio Gigli, Paris seems to be on a mission to carve out new conceptual spaces. This is spacious, atmospheric, wide-screen techno, backed up with a darkly atmopsheric video trailer and a more defined (and original) concept than many techno releases. The publicity text alludes to the geological processes of formation and erosion and while these tracks are not exactly direct sonic embodiments of these, the combination of such ideas with this music doesn't seem excessive (a constant risk when producers tried to graft ambitious, pseudo-intellectual concepts onto techno).

The ten minute plus 'Ontology' contains the core of a conventional techno track, but one that's been stretched and twisted, filled out with cold drones, dark undertones and more subtle sonic activity. Even in the later, faster passages there's a mournful, contemplative air to it.

The Bruno Sacco Remix is more uptempo but retains a mysterious air. In its blending of beats and uneasy atmospheres, it's a little like the darker 1990s work by Plastikman. It's a respectful but innovative mix that introduces new dynamism to the original. The final section works especially well and is arranged very skillfully.

Swopping in immediately after this, 'Potassio' opens with some bracing noise blasts swiftly followed by heavy-duty beats. This is the shortest but also most galvanising and menacing track here. Very dark chords and harsh screeches are skilfully balanced to produce a superb and original dark techno track that I wanted to hear again immediately after it finished.

http://www.gravite-records.com

End of Summer Selection