James Bernard
Unreleased Works: Volume 1 Acid Dreams

Constructed from a library of sounds collected by the artist in the rainforests of Borneo, Llyr’s debut album is an expansive documentation of natural beauty and human interference. Out July 29th on Max Cooper’s Mesh imprint, it is the first full-length album from the Berlin resident.The result of painstakingly manipulating these recordings via a multitude of cutting edge production techniques, Biome is an expression of precarity and beauty. It invites the listener to be enveloped by Llyr’s augmented reality rendering of the tropical rainforest, one of the Earth’s most biodiverse and iconic biomes, and encourages them to consider our impact on the natural world.Split into two sections - Pre-Anthropocene and Anthropocene - Biome tells its story with vast sonic ecosystems of molecular detail. Opening to the sounds of bird call, faint monkey hollers and the gentle crackling of mist-enshrouded trees, the album sets its tone with an archetypal impression of the jungle; one of instant familiarity. This is then expanded on across eight tracks, with the first four offering an abstract meditation on the marvels of nature, and the remainder of the album presenting a sonic vision of human interference - more chaotic and complicated than before.Llyr’s recordings include signifiers of human presence left untouched as an integral part of the story, with natural phenomena manifesting in different ways on each track. The resulting creations are a testament to the inherent musicality of the natural world. ‘Courtship Signal’ uses a recording of frogs singing in Kubah National Park to map out the rhythms and pitches of its composition, reconstructing an exact structural replica of these mating calls before manipulating and recomposing. Elsewhere, ‘The Hawthorne Effect’ captures a swarm of insects engaging in a rare mating ritual, sampling both a collective hum and individual percussive moments to build an entire library of sound. Similarly, ‘Winged Chamber Music’ carves out a majestic sonic cave using recordings of water dripping and the chattering of bats pitched down to human hearing range. Having engaged wholeheartedly with these moments as they occurred, Llyr extracts themes and motifs with a sincere respect for their origins.The first section is made in its entirety from Llyr’s own rainforest recordings with no use of drum machines, synths or samples. The recordings feature at every possible scale from macro to micro: unmodified binaural field recordings set the scene; granulated layers add pseudo-synthetic textural atmosphere; iteratively processed one-shots provide punctuation; and carefully designed custom instruments, forged from short fragments and cycles, express harmony and rhythm. The second half, heralding the arrival of humans, relaxes the rule book and a smattering of synthetic elements enter the fray to maximise visceral impact.The resulting work is a debut album that considers extensive themes by weaving these rare recordings into a remarkably coherent sonic blueprint. Biome resonates as both an affecting listening experience and a thematic exploration of the changing world we inhabit.

Sunrise Artist and Sunwaves Resident Vincentiulian next up on OGE's White series!

CiM returns to Delsin with a nine track LP crafted out of his personal Amiga archives. Simon Walley started off in the early 90s trying to write Amiga demo scene music. Influenced and inspired by the blossoming techno electronica sounds in the UK around that time, he tried to replicate those sounds via old school tracker techniques. Learning through ripping modules by Romeo Knight, Audiomonster, Firefox and Mantronix from demo disks, and writing/re-writing in Protracker resulted in a unique style, creating fresh clashing beats out of tweaked Amiga samples. A 386 PC that drifted in tempo was sync'd by ear to add pads and melodies that the MIDI-less Amiga couldn't generate. Recording most of it on the fly, fooling around in Protracker and leaving all mistakes in and un-edited. All tracks written between '96-98.

Pager headhoncho and master of leisure Markus Sommer comes back on his own imprint with a warm and punchy 4 tracker sliding in smooth like silky houseslippers. Put out your fav sunchair and soke up that garden party vibe from front to back!

Judas on Arts.

Fragments of Reality returns for the eagerly awaited third instalment with four exclusive tracks catering for diverse dancefloors.ATAXIA & Mister Joshooa kick off with 'Subversive' - a slick tripped-out breakbeat-driven jam from Detroit's Marble Bar and TV Lounge residents. It's a powerful and expertly programmed production with a barrage of drums and bass held down by an array of ricocheting synth and vocal FX, tried and tested on Detroit's most discerning dancefloors. Next up Harrison BDP let's loose with 'Dirty Mochyn', a 90's inspired roller from the prolific producer featuring his signature dubby sound design, synth licks and a throbbing bassline.Strap yourselves in, as the flip side opens with a deep house composition from hotly tipped Leeds based producer Adam Pits. 'Pat On The Back' sucks you into a wormhole of bubbling music with cosmic pads swirling around the stereo field and a beautifully expressive synth line - finished to perfection with a highly swung TR909 groove. The record is then perfectly balanced by Berlin based Keisuke with 'Ok Taiko' - a deep driving house track following hot on the heels from his killer debut EP on Phonica White. 'Ok Taiko' oozes with TB303 goodness and nostalgia-evoking piano stabs, all strung together with an ever evolving house rhythm.