This month, I’m covering the best tracks of the month a week earlier than usual – mainly because I already had plans for /Tuesday Ten /599 and /600 that fit neatly in the next couple of weeks. That said, I already had enough tracks by this time last week, never mind this week, so there are fifteen to cover this time around, as usual with a mix of genres and styles.
/amodelofcontrol.com now has a Patreon page, at this stage purely as a potential way of helping to cover the running costs of the site. There is absolutely no compulsion to do so: if you feel you can chuck a small amount to the site each month, that would be appreciated.
/Subject /Tracks of the Month
/Playlists 
/Spotify / 
/YouTube
/Related /594/Tracks/Jun-25 /Tuesday Ten/Index
/Details /Tracks this week/15 /Tracks on Spotify Playlist/12 /Duration/51:51
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
/Promenade Cinema
/Play With Fate
It is, amazingly, nearly seven years since Promenade Cinema released their astonishing debut album LIVING GHOSTS – one that this site made Album of the Year for 2018. Life, COVID lockdowns and a move away from Sheffield have perhaps slowed down the duo’s momentum somewhat, but every time I’ve seen them live since, they remain a brilliant group. The first single from their upcoming third album continues their exploration of cinematic, thoughtful synthpop and remains true to their distinctive sound (their songs are instantly recognisable, as no-one else sounds like them). Play With Fate, too, is a sharp-tongued track that sees the duo step out of the shadows they’ve been inhabiting, to bask in the glow of the spotlights for the first time in a while, and the glare of those lights suits them well.
/Deftones
/my mind is a mountain
/private music
It’s been five years since the actually-quite-great Ohms, and in the meantime we finally got the second Crosses album, too. A new album has been teased for a little while, it seems, but as per usual with Deftones, even touring weeks before the single release saw no sign of new material. my mind is a mountain, the first track from private music, is a three-minute blast of what the band do best. It hits hard from the first seconds, has that lurching, mid-paced groove that suits the band so well, and Chino Moreno switches between his harsher bark and melodic croon. It’s the Deftones, they are still doing what they do after thirty-odd years, and they still sound fucking great.
/FÏX8:SËD8
/New Eden
/Octagram
This intriguing German project has bubbled under the radar somewhat, despite the upcoming release being the project’s sixth album. Octogram appears to be an expansive concept: leaning into the idea of the 8 also being rotated and becoming the symbol for infinity, all eight songs on the album apparently extend to eight minutes in length or so, suggesting a proggy take on sample-heavy electro-industrial, and lead single New Eden delivers exactly that. Droning, ominous synths sweep around punchy drum patterns, and Martin Sane’s vocals, as are often the case, are twisted and distorted deep in the mix, making them more part of the texture than telling us anything important. Sure, this is another project that owes a fair bit to peak Skinny Puppy, but rather than the hits, the interest here is their nightmarish, darkest moments, and Sane does an excellent job exploring that shadowy world.
/Ethel Cain
/Fuck Me Eyes
/willoughby tucker, i’ll always love you
After the extraordinary sideline of Perverts – nearly ninety minutes of howling dark ambient and drone – that probably put off quite a few fans, which I’m sure was absolutely the point, the proper follow-up to Preacher’s Daughter comes next week. The new album is apparently a prequel to Preacher’s Daughter in narrative terms, and musically the first singles have gone in different directions too. That earlier material seemed to these ears to owe something to the shocking intensity of Chelsea Wolfe in particular, while Fuck Me Eyes goes a very different way. It has the feel of a synth-based eighties power-ballad, but strips away the production to leave the husk of it. Cain has described it as “an ode to the girls who are perfect and have everything, yet carry the reputation of town slut”, and the unflinching words of the song certainly make it very much of a time and a place. I suspect more twists and turns are coming next week.
/Street Sex
/TURN BLUE
/FULL COLOR ECLIPSE
The noisy Austin, TX duo Street Sects have been quiet for a while, after a period where they seemed to be on a relentless push to deafen and intimidate every listener with a string of furious releases in the 2010s. So naturally, they are returning with two releases on the same day, named slightly differently to denote two rather different approaches. Spitting Images, the first track from new Street Sects album Dry Drunk, is what we might have expected: punishing industrial punk that hits so hard that you can almost see the strobes that they make extensive use of live. Where things get really interesting are on the single TURN BLUE from Street Sex album FULL COLOR ECLIPSE that dials back the intensity (a bit, it’s a relative thing) and goes in for unexpected melodies and string samples amid a track that leans more into industrial funk and remarkably, sticks the landing. For a band with such a formidable reputation, this is deeply surprising turn, but one that somehow works.
/Agency-V
/Freaking Out
/Never Meant To Be
I’ve been a fan of Peter Steer’s work for a long time – particularly the much-missed synthpop band Tenek – and Agency-V in some ways picks up the threads from that project. Working this time with Lloyd Price and vocalist Marie Williamson, we’re definitely back to the realms of punchy, anthemic synthpop that despite initial appearances, bares teeth in song regularly. The recently released album on US label Distortion Productions pulls in various singles and B-sides from the last couple of years, particularly the instant highlight Freaking Out, which bounces along on an infectious rhythm and has a great chorus to boot, too.
/Isaac Howlett & A State of Flux
/Spiralling
Continuing Howlett’s exploration of more uptempo songs under his own name (rather than as Empathy Test) comes this impressive collaboration with the mysterious A State of Flux collective. It’s a dancefloor-ready, soaring synthpop track that packs quite the punch musically, but the greatest interest perhaps comes from the lyrical content. Few artists are as raw and honest about male depression and anxiety, frankly – Tom Shear as Assemblage 23 is one of the few others that has long been eloquent in describing his mental struggles – and Howlett here addresses it running in the family, and how mental health struggles begin to affect those around you too. An essential track in multiple ways.
/IAmImperfect
/The Fallen (Dirty Mix)
I’ve featured this Sheffield-based duo before, and I have no problem featuring them again if they continue releasing such strong singles. Live the duo is Paul on vocals and synths, with Kelly D on guitars, and unusually for what is nominally a synthpop band, the guitars are an integral part of their sound on record, too. The Fallen is a sharp, immediate track, with a dense sound and a plaintive, fragile vocal from Paul that suits the sound well. They are also great live, too, so make sure you catch them when they play a town or festival near you.
/Nine Inch Nails
/As Alive As You Need Me To Be
/Tron: Ares OST
I may have no interest in watching Tron: Ares – having the deeply problematic Jared Leto in the film makes it a no (and this is far from the first accusation of this kind) – but the Nine Inch Nails soundtrack for the film might well be worth the time, certainly going on the exceptional first single from it. There are no discernable guitars here – instead this is a cyberpunk-worthy, all-electro stomper and it’s fucking great. Trent Reznor seems to have been happy experimenting and doing soundtrack work over the past decade, but hearing the first out-and-out banger in a while from his band is quite the surprise. It’s got a mighty, bass-heavy groove, there’s a big chorus, and an intriguing outro that spins out into mutant disco. Not perhaps what I might have expected, but this is a welcome and impressive surprise.
/INVA//ID
/Dogma
/The Path
LA industrial-metal crew INVA//ID have been on a hell of a tear of late – not content with the sprawling album The Agony Index at the turn of the year, this is their fifth EP/single release in a year, and this one appears to feature all new material as well! This short EP, barely ten minutes in length, packs a heck of a punch regardless and seems to be songs in the wake of their excellent cover of Show Me Your Spine from last summer: the songs are all gnarled guitars, fucking filthy basslines and drum machines in the classic WaxTrax! style.
The 131 seconds of Dogma is the best track of a strong set, with synths that sound like they are put through a meat grinder, guitars being attacked like they need to be destroyed, and it ends way too quickly. Remember when you first heard Ministry around 1990 or so? Yeah, like that, but perhaps even better.
/RewØund
/Dead and Gone [Glitch Mode Mix]
/Dead and Gone
The longstanding Glitch Mode stable in Chicago has a new recruit: by their own description, “a Chicago band that mixes metalcore with industrial and electronic sounds”. The downtuned guitars and dense electronics make for an interesting collision between thundering metalcore and the intricate production quality of Sean Payne’s Glitch Mode work, with the expansive, melodic chorus something of a surprise amid the noisy, industrial-metallic chaos. An unexpected addition to Glitch Mode, but one that works surprisingly well.
/Soulwax
/All Systems Are Lying
/All Systems Are Lying
The Dewaele brothers are back at last: the first album from Soulwax in seven years sees them jettison guitars entirely, instead it was “built entirely from modular synths, live drums, tape machines and processed vocals”. Despite that, the first of the twin lead singles – Run Free – still sounds like a rock band is at the core, the muscular heft of the rhythm section giving that away. The title track is a little more interesting, as what I presume is Laima Leyton’s occasional delivery of the refrain, but continually edited and twisted each time – lies at the heart of a spiralling electro track that seems to be an obvious questioning of what you hear these days. Is it the truth, or is it yet more, edited AI slop fucking with your mind?
/HIDE
/GRIEF PARTY GUEST LIST
/SPIT OR SWALLOW EVERY SOUL WILL TASTE DEATH
The duo of Heather Hannoura and Seth Sher are perhaps one of the most intense, unyielding industrial acts around at the moment. Entirely unafraid of dragging their audience down into the hellish depths with them, initial experiments with more approachable industrial sounds were jettisoned for an extraordinary, confrontational sound that is fragments of songs that have been hammered and shattered into pieces, with Heather’s vocals howled from the depths of bitter experience. There is no respite, instead a determination to make you understand by burying you in their fury. That said, GRIEF PARTY GUEST LIST contains a thumping beat, but one distorted so that it sounds like it is coming from the other side of the wall, daring you to turn your attention from Heather’s searing vocal that is apparently a memorial for artist Láwû Makuriye’nte.
/Senser
/Ryot Pump
It’s been over a decade since the last new Senser material, and the first track from an upcoming new album was released (at last!) yesterday. Perhaps the deteriorating political climate has lit a fire under the band again, but Ryot Pump is a rap-metal monster, their heaviest song in decades that busts through the walls with thick riffs and monstrous drums. It’s a searing anti-fascist, fighting the system track that brings us back to where Senser started, as an angry political band who want to affect change. It’s also great to hear Heitham Al-Sayed and what sounds like Kirsten Haigh trading vocals again (although on this track, Kirsten is very much the foil to Heitham). Either way, it’s a banger.
/Collide
/Wings of Steel – Signals Mix
/Signals (Vol. 1)
In this age of streaming, best-of compilations are something of a dying breed, and while Collide probably warrant one (although as always with a band with dedicated fans, ask fifty fans and you’d probably get fifty-one tracklists, or more), they’ve sidestepped the idea a bit by revisiting songs from across their career and giving them new mixes for the most part. There is a second volume coming in September, apparently, so if there’s a song you particularly love omitted this time around, you’ve got a good chance next time. There’s newer songs here, the odd rarity (After Dark was unknown to all but the most hardcore fan when it dropped recently), there’s three covers (Lunatics Have Taken Over the Asylum feeling somewhat on the nose right now), some old favourites (particularly the single edit of Euphoria), and then there’s a couple of revelations. Particularly Wings of Steel.
Where has all this detail been? Statik dug into the mix on this one, with a whole bunch of elements that I’d never even heard before on this new take, that otherwise wisely leaves what was always one of Collide’s greatest songs as is. The mix is so much more expansive, with guitars streaking across the mix as well as providing deeper texture, the various samples weaving through and a general feeling that this is what they were aiming for in the first place. A revelation.