For those bemoaning that “there’s no good new music”, you’re wrong. There’s been an absolute torrent of new music lately, so much that I can barely keep up, and as we close off the first third of the year, there’s already been a few album of the year contenders too.
/Subject /Tracks of the Month
/Playlists 
/Spotify / 
/YouTube
/Related /551/Tracks/Mar-24 /Tuesday Ten/Index
/Details /Tracks this week/12 /Tracks on Spotify Playlist/9 /Duration/55:51
That, of course, comes much later in the year, and in the meantime, here’s the twelve best tracks of the past month (there was literally no way I could reduce it to ten). As always, listen via the Bandcamp widgets below, or the Spotify and YouTube links above.
A quick explanation for new readers (hi there!): my Tuesday Ten series has been running since March 2007, and each month features at least ten new songs you should hear – and in between those monthly posts, I feature songs on a variety of subjects, with some of the songs featured coming from suggestion threads on Facebook.
Feel free to get involved with these – the more the merrier, and the breadth of suggestions that I get continues to astound me. Otherwise, as usual, if you’ve got something you want me to hear, something I should be writing about, or even a gig I should be attending, e-mail me or drop me a line on Facebook (details below).
/Track of the Month
/MAQUINA.
/denial
/PRATA
Proof that Spotify algorithms can sometimes throw the right new music my way: this is a Portuguese trio that mix Kosmische grooves, industrial and techno influences, and if that also brings to mind the Bristol leviathan that is SCALER, you’d not be wrong. But unlike the brighter, almost euphoric sounds of SCALER, MAQUINA. deal in the shadows, with a darker, more aggressive sound that must be absolutely brutal live. Songs here take a little while to build momentum, but when they do, like on denial, it is an unstoppable, bracing force.
/Black Asteroid
/Dirge Out feat. Ian Astbury
/Infinite Darkness
Thirty years since his first release, Bryan Black has pivoted his Black Asteroid project to collaboration and an unexpected return of guitars (and rather more vocals than usual, too). The lead tracks are fascinating, using a real mix of guests (Ian Astbury, ACTORS, Louisahh, Front Line Assembly and Blush Response is a heck of a set), and for me, the surprisingly restrained appearance of Ian Astbury on the acid-flecked, thunderous techno of Dirge Out is really quite fabulous.
/BLUSH_RESPONSE
/Avulsion
/SPRAWL_
Joey Blush has long been relentless with their release schedules (it’s barely a year since the outstanding NEUROSCAPE, and there have been other releases since), and with new album SPRAWL_ already on the horizon, it ain’t stopping any time soon. The first track from the new album slows down the pace somewhat, with Avulsion a powerful, mid-paced stomper that has the kind of electronic kick drums that you feel in your gut. As is usual for Blush, the production is exquisitely detailed, too, and with Marc Heal guesting on a couple of tracks on the album, I’m intrigued to see if this is a more overt return to industrial sounds (as opposed to techno).
/CONTAINER
/ERASER
/YACKER
A rather different techno release comes from Ren Schofield as CONTAINER. You know those occasional complaints that too-much industrial techno is really just techno? Well, Schofield is, not for the first time, ready to change your mind – not to mention blow your eardrums. Fucking hell, this album is loud. Screaming acid hooks fight for space with vicious, noisy synths and drums that sound unnervingly real. This is very much a case of a noise artist barging in on techno, turning up everything to eleven, then turning it up a bit more, and it’s absolutely fantastic.
/DREAM HACK
/Liquid Dreams
/White Heat / Acid City
Sam Evans of Randolph & Mortimer has been busy lately with his main band’s work, but he’s also found time for an intriguing side-project. Very much a love-letter to the expansive, alternative electronics of the nineties, the three tracks on this EP take up no less than forty-six minutes. The most obvious influence on these tracks is Underworld, and particularly the Underworld of the dubnobass… era, where the stretched out techno into almost prog-like forms, but never forgot to go full-force for the dancefloor when needed. The best of the three tracks here for me is Liquid Dreams, with nods to two of my favourite Underworld tracks (Cowgirl and MMM…Skyscraper I Love You, but is also content to head off in a few other interesting directions across the generous eleven-minute runtime.
/KLACK
/Let’s Go To Berlin!
/Modern Production
KLACK also released something of a love letter to electronic music this month: both EBM, classic electronics, and…Berlin. Let’s Go To Berlin celebrates the unofficial capital of techno – both in a variety of references to classic tracks, but also a hilarious spoken-word element of Matt Fanale trying and failing to find classic clubs, mistaking randoms for Daniel Myer, and realising that things move fast there. One of KLACK’s greatest tracks, it keeps that great balance of humour and a deep respect for the music that influenced them and that they clearly still love.
/ACTORS
/In Real Life
The much-anticipated new material from ACTORS this year – their next album comes later in 2024 – has, like last time, begun with a more measured, downbeat song. In Real Life has a measured, slower pace and darker tone – with synth sounds that nod to The Knife to these ears – but retains the hallmarks of the best ACTORS songs: big, heartfelt choruses and a sleek approach to production that makes the whole song glisten.
/Meat Beat Manifesto & Merzbow
/Burner
/Extinct
Japanese noise legend Merzbow has been an active project for forty-five years, and it’s fairly clear that he has no intention of slowing down. The latest of a great many collaborations sees him working with Jack Dangers (Meat Beat Manifesto), and this release – two lengthy tracks – is fascinating. Both tracks explore the idea of deconstruction, with ¡FLAKKA! gradually disassembling the rhythms and looping them into new forms, but Burner is the more interesting one to me. As the title suggests, this fifteen minute track sounds like the studio was burning down around them as they loop a furious rhythm set-up. The track eventually collapses amid the flames, with only fire remaining by the end.
/S.I.N.A
/Little Girl
/Alte Liebe…
Probably the most surprising of three notable returns this week on HANDS was that of Sina Hübne and Stefan Böhm, with their first new release since the excellent Nie Une Immer in 2006. The standout track on a typically varied release – S.I.N.A never really fitted in genre pigeonholes anyway – is the rampaging Little Girl, where backed with a hyperactive, electropunk musical set-up, Sina rips into misogynistic sneering with a spectacular clap-back.
/S.K.E.T.
/Educate Agitate Insubordinate
/Empires Fall!
Gosh, it’s twenty years since the first S.K.E.T. release on HANDS? Their radical, left-wing politics haven’t relented over that time, and this time around their noisy sounds are inspiration for voices to be heard and actions to be taken: fighting against far-right Governments and tyranny, and starting to make a fairer, more just world. One of the most thrilling tracks here is the breathless, chaotic Educate Agitate Insubordinate, that has the odd moment of calm that seems strangely uplifting, before we’re thrown back into the angry maelstrom once again.
/5F-X
/There Will Be No Android Messiah
/Robby Road
The third of those unexpected HANDS returns this week is everyone’s favourite furry alien overlords 5F-X, who’s live shows back in the day were truly off the “What-the-actual-Fuck?!?” scale. Their new album has various sci-fi characters on a (British) Zebra Crossing on the cover, and the opening track Fifth Bad Vible is a very clear nod to a certain classic Autechre piece. However, they do remind us not to get our hopes up about machines saving humans: there’s no Android Messiah, there’s just us to get this right.
/Powerman 5000
/1999
/Abandon Ship
I was rather surprised to find that the upcoming Abandon Ship is PM5K’s eleventh album. I know them mostly for Tonight The Stars Revolt! and Anyone for Doomsday?, the former of which is twenty-five this year, and the new singles suggest that they are certainly looking back a bit on the new album. Not that this is a problem, as the material from that time is enormous fun.
Dancing Like We’re Dead is a big, hi-tech groove, but the nostalgic tones of 1999 are perhaps even better. A surprisingly restrained track – that riff and build suggests a mighty explosion that never quite comes, instead switching up into a dancefloor groove that’s really rather great.