Unknown Pleasures
Unknown Pleasures · 10.03.2025
When I read in the promo email that Mika Häkki of Monolord, a band I don't really like, had released an album, it was reason enough to almost delete the email. Then I clicked on the link to the promo jukebox and heard the complete opposite of Monolord: fragile, acoustic songs that make the endless expanse of Sweden audible. There's nothing more to say about it. This record is at the intersection of bluegrass, Americana, and the epic expanse of Earth, performed on an acoustic guitar with...
Unknown Pleasures · 07.03.2025
The Italian sound and drone monsters Ufomammuth aren't my cup of tea at all. But what bassist Urlo delivers with his solo project The Mon in the form of the Gesamtkunstwerk "Major Arcana" is quite simply a masterpiece of visual and acoustic aesthetics. The diverse layers of frequencies and sounds, in their contradictions, form a tightly interwoven web of simultaneous lightness, transparency, and density, similar to the tent construction of Munich's Olympic Stadium. Whether this, according to...
Unknown Pleasures · 06.02.2025
We Germans now have a relatively large and diverse underground scene encompassing numerous musical genres. And I'm always amazed at who starts extremely interesting projects somewhere in the German provinces. This is what's happening with the duo "Sounds of New Soma" from Krefeld, which one would normally associate with the soccer club KFC Bayer Uerdingen. The two sound wizards Alexander Djelassi and Dirk Raupach have released numerous albums since 2013, and I discovered their project through a...
Unknown Pleasures · 30.01.2025
Berlin is a country for itself in Germany. 80 millions of us hate Berlin because it´s the only capital in Europe that is financed by the rest of the country. Germany is affording Berlin. Few people with a more open mind are proud on every bands and artists who came out from Berlin, started with Bowie, Iggy Pop, Einstürzende Neubauten, Techno or Rammstein. Brueder Selke & Midori Hirano has a huge potential to set art into music, no matter if it´s movie ore paintings or even sculptures. A...
Unknown Pleasures · 12.12.2024
Obviously two friends decided to do some music which is only understood by those two friends. This song is like a four minutes browsing through early 90´s Americana, which switches to a melancholic, gothic influenced acoustic tune and later into a kind of Neurosis-noise. So there is no need for a 90´s mixtape which turns out into a funny kind of campaign for music destruction. Check their records and despite all the noise they´re doing, it´s full of fun making noise and music.
Unknown Pleasures · 12.11.2024
At the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Paris, it was clear to even the smallest person that France and French society are deeply permeated with culture. Not with fashion, as in Italy, but with culture. This requires courage to make art, to cross boundaries and to combine the impossible. Just like Gojira. Not quite as extreme, but with an unmistakable aesthetic, Mauvais Sang from Paris come along. Somewhere between alternative and art rock, a text that cannot be topped in terms of...
Unknown Pleasures · 02.10.2024
The Australian band "Black Aleph" performs music that should be saved for special moments. It is not background music for everyday things, but for special feelings that intuitively call for this band. I look out of the window here in Munich and there is an autumnal gray veil over colorful leaves, the smell of the last apples and pears are in the air and all these different aspects of autumn are carried on the spheres that this band produces. Personally, I find the video too colorful for this...
Unknown Pleasures · 25.08.2024
On the first rainy day after a month of sunshine, I stumbled upon this fantastic song by the Swedish dua Citzend via algorithm. The review appears under unknown pleasures because I am a total fan of the Norwegian band Madrugada, the Swedish duo Swarm of the Sun and dark music in general. And now two Swedes come along, creating an intimate atmosphere and at the same time a great expanse with very few instruments that sound quite isolated from each other and play next to each other rather than...
Unknown Pleasures · 02.08.2024
Imagine a band that combines the dark melancholy of Joy Division with the mystical, psychedelic energy of The Doors. Their music is permeated with a deep, atmospheric vibe that evokes the vast landscapes of Americana, but delves into the darker side of the human soul. Dark, driving bass lines and hypnotic, reverb-soaked guitar riffs merge with narrative lyrics that speak of lost souls and ghostly deserts. The singer's plaintive voice leads you through a sonic no-man's land where dark country...
Unknown Pleasures · 29.06.2024
It is one of the most exotic mixes I have heard during my time with Heavystoned. After the first few notes, the listener feels transported to the Middle East, or rather to Turkey, because there are a few quarter tones that our western ears immediately recognize as foreign. Then two bands actually play next to each other, for example the oriental band plays in one rehearsal room and the psychedelic band plays in the other rehearsal room, and the listener stands between the two rooms. As the song...