WEDNESDAY FEB 15, 2017
Boy Harsher
Boy Harsher, the Northampton, US-based duo of vocalist/lyricist Jae Matthews and producer Augustus Muller, announce their new album 'The Runner (Original Soundtrack)', out January 21st, 2022 on Nude Club.
Boy Harsher’s fifth release is not a traditional album — it’s the musical counterpart to a short film written, produced, and directed by the duo, entitled The Runner, which will be released alongside the album in January 2022. The Runner is a horror film intercut with a meta-style “documentary” about Boy Harsher’s recording process. The soundtrack balances cinematic instrumentals with pop songs that push the boundaries of Boy Harsher’s sound. In conjunction with today’s announcement, they unveil the album’s lead single, “Tower,” and share new tour dates.
Both the film and soundtrack open with the heavy presence of “Tower.” The song is an incantation; with its pulsing synths, it’s a spell about desire and impending destruction. By the song’s climax, Matthews' pleas transform into desperate screams. "We wrote ‘Tower’ several years ago and although it's evolved over the years, its initial intent remains the same - that feeling of being enveloped, suffocated, entrapped in a relationship, which in turn manifests into reckless attack,” explains Matthews. “What you love the most can make you into a monster. And that's what this song is about, being a paralyzed fiend."
The visualiser for “Tower” comes from within the world of The Runner —presented as an exclusive session from the NUDETV program “Flesh First,” the duo performs the song in a dim warehouse with a masked drummer recorded on analog video.
Since 2014, Boy Harsher have steadily released what some might call the gold standard of darkwave and new industrial. Matthews and Muller met in Savannah, GA while both studying film and their initial interest in music began with cinema. Matthews would write screenplays and Muller would compose scores for the non-existent films. Their first EP, Lesser Man, was originally released on a small run of cassettes, but rapidly gained online traction and became an underground hit. 2016’s Yr Body is Nothing LP and 2017’s Country Girl EP, propelled the duo into extensive tours and sold out shows across the US and Europe where they became known for their reckless and enveloping live performances. Boy Harsher rode this momentum into 2019’s LP Careful, which was praised by NPR Music, Pitchfork, Resident Advisor, VICE and beyond.
Last year, in the midst of the obvious chaos, but additionally with Matthews’ MS diagnosis, Muller started working on moody, cinematic sketches. It was uncertain what these pieces would become other than catharsis — the duo were unable to tour and making “club music” did not feel right. In Matthews’ period of convalescence, she kept thinking about a sinister character: a woman running through the woods. Together, the duo developed this idea further into a film that explores lust, compulsion, and the horrific tendencies of seduction.
Featuring the dark pop that Boy Harsher is known for, the album also embraces the soundtrack ethos by including eerie instrumentals with tracks featuring guest vocalists that feel like they are from different musical groups — “Machina” is a HI-NRG homage performed by Mariana Saldaña of BOAN, sung in both Spanish and English. “Autonomy'' is a bright and heartfelt new wave anthem featuring Cooper B. Handy aka Lucy. Boy Harsher’s latest project is a reconciliation of uncertain times made into sound and moving image. The Runner and its soundtrack are both a return to form and an evolution for the duo.
This month, Boy Harsher will play their first live shows since 2019, including performances at III Points Festival in Miami and Levitation in Austin. A 2022 tour of North America and Europe in support of 'The Runner (Original Soundtrack)' will follow. More information on the release and screenings for The Runner is to come.
Boy Harsher, the Northampton, US-based duo of vocalist/lyricist Jae Matthews and producer Augustus Muller, announce their new album 'The Runner (Original Soundtrack)', out January 21st, 2022 on Nude Club.
Boy Harsher’s fifth release is not a traditional album — it’s the musical counterpart to a short film written, produced, and directed by the duo, entitled The Runner, which will be released alongside the album in January 2022. The Runner is a horror film intercut with a meta-style “documentary” about Boy Harsher’s recording process. The soundtrack balances cinematic instrumentals with pop songs that push the boundaries of Boy Harsher’s sound. In conjunction with today’s announcement, they unveil the album’s lead single, “Tower,” and share new tour dates.
Both the film and soundtrack open with the heavy presence of “Tower.” The song is an incantation; with its pulsing synths, it’s a spell about desire and impending destruction. By the song’s climax, Matthews' pleas transform into desperate screams. "We wrote ‘Tower’ several years ago and although it's evolved over the years, its initial intent remains the same - that feeling of being enveloped, suffocated, entrapped in a relationship, which in turn manifests into reckless attack,” explains Matthews. “What you love the most can make you into a monster. And that's what this song is about, being a paralyzed fiend."
The visualiser for “Tower” comes from within the world of The Runner —presented as an exclusive session from the NUDETV program “Flesh First,” the duo performs the song in a dim warehouse with a masked drummer recorded on analog video.
Since 2014, Boy Harsher have steadily released what some might call the gold standard of darkwave and new industrial. Matthews and Muller met in Savannah, GA while both studying film and their initial interest in music began with cinema. Matthews would write screenplays and Muller would compose scores for the non-existent films. Their first EP, Lesser Man, was originally released on a small run of cassettes, but rapidly gained online traction and became an underground hit. 2016’s Yr Body is Nothing LP and 2017’s Country Girl EP, propelled the duo into extensive tours and sold out shows across the US and Europe where they became known for their reckless and enveloping live performances. Boy Harsher rode this momentum into 2019’s LP Careful, which was praised by NPR Music, Pitchfork, Resident Advisor, VICE and beyond.
Last year, in the midst of the obvious chaos, but additionally with Matthews’ MS diagnosis, Muller started working on moody, cinematic sketches. It was uncertain what these pieces would become other than catharsis — the duo were unable to tour and making “club music” did not feel right. In Matthews’ period of convalescence, she kept thinking about a sinister character: a woman running through the woods. Together, the duo developed this idea further into a film that explores lust, compulsion, and the horrific tendencies of seduction.
Featuring the dark pop that Boy Harsher is known for, the album also embraces the soundtrack ethos by including eerie instrumentals with tracks featuring guest vocalists that feel like they are from different musical groups — “Machina” is a HI-NRG homage performed by Mariana Saldaña of BOAN, sung in both Spanish and English. “Autonomy'' is a bright and heartfelt new wave anthem featuring Cooper B. Handy aka Lucy. Boy Harsher’s latest project is a reconciliation of uncertain times made into sound and moving image. The Runner and its soundtrack are both a return to form and an evolution for the duo.
This month, Boy Harsher will play their first live shows since 2019, including performances at III Points Festival in Miami and Levitation in Austin. A 2022 tour of North America and Europe in support of 'The Runner (Original Soundtrack)' will follow. More information on the release and screenings for The Runner is to come.
Russell E. L. Butler
Oakland producer Russell E.L. Butler has announced a new EP, I'm Dropping Out Of Life, inspired by the tragic Ghost Ship fire in Oakland last December. He also shared the release's pressurized title track, which delivers driving techno staging an interplay between sonic elasticity and rigidity. The EP will arrive via Atlanta imprint CGI Records, and follows releases by the artist on labels including Opal Tapes and Black Opal.
"The title has been on my mind a lot, since I almost lost my life in the Ghost Ship fire and watched as many of my friends lost theirs," Butler said in a statement on Bandcamp. "This release is about a commitment to life. The life that I refer to dropping out of, is a life where dreams are put on hold, where concessions are made in order to just survive. But that comes at a cost, one that is far too great for me to pay at this point."
The artist is set to appear on Oakland party Club Chai's forthcoming debut compilation alongside artists including MORO, Lechuga Zafiro, and DJ Haram, as well as its founders 8ULENTINA and foozool.
I'm Dropping Out Of Life will be released on January 30 on digital and vinyl formats, and is available for preorder.
Oakland producer Russell E.L. Butler has announced a new EP, I'm Dropping Out Of Life, inspired by the tragic Ghost Ship fire in Oakland last December. He also shared the release's pressurized title track, which delivers driving techno staging an interplay between sonic elasticity and rigidity. The EP will arrive via Atlanta imprint CGI Records, and follows releases by the artist on labels including Opal Tapes and Black Opal.
"The title has been on my mind a lot, since I almost lost my life in the Ghost Ship fire and watched as many of my friends lost theirs," Butler said in a statement on Bandcamp. "This release is about a commitment to life. The life that I refer to dropping out of, is a life where dreams are put on hold, where concessions are made in order to just survive. But that comes at a cost, one that is far too great for me to pay at this point."
The artist is set to appear on Oakland party Club Chai's forthcoming debut compilation alongside artists including MORO, Lechuga Zafiro, and DJ Haram, as well as its founders 8ULENTINA and foozool.
I'm Dropping Out Of Life will be released on January 30 on digital and vinyl formats, and is available for preorder.
Pyramid Club
In music, darkness often devours itself. Those who nosedive down into synthpop’s more perverted forms — industrial, coldwave, darkwave, and all subgenres in between — tend to sacrifice themselves for the sake of the shadows. But that’s precisely what draws devotees in, both the machinists and their audience. The deconstruction of humanity into objective parts, autonomous beats, vocals smeared into alien sneers — these were the tools that proto-industrial types like Cabaret Voltaire and Throbbing Gristle employed to separate themselves from the punk rock ego, the explosion of self. Even in that light, Pyramid Club aren’t just followers of this self-negating cult. Indeed, both members of the clandestine duo have helmed their own projects — Chris Daresta with the cold techno of Anticipation, Matt Weiner with the chrome-clad but buoyant TWINS — and together they run DKA Records, international purveyors of murk. So while “Stay Behind” oozes with all the subversive sludge that devotees to the dark might expect, the Pyramid Club machine burbles and pulses in an uncommonly Technicolor display. The suave gear shift in the middle affirms the expert engineering at work here; Daresta and Weiner may be taking cues from their muses, but they’re clearly spiraling down a tunnel of their own design. -Immersive Atlanta
In music, darkness often devours itself. Those who nosedive down into synthpop’s more perverted forms — industrial, coldwave, darkwave, and all subgenres in between — tend to sacrifice themselves for the sake of the shadows. But that’s precisely what draws devotees in, both the machinists and their audience. The deconstruction of humanity into objective parts, autonomous beats, vocals smeared into alien sneers — these were the tools that proto-industrial types like Cabaret Voltaire and Throbbing Gristle employed to separate themselves from the punk rock ego, the explosion of self. Even in that light, Pyramid Club aren’t just followers of this self-negating cult. Indeed, both members of the clandestine duo have helmed their own projects — Chris Daresta with the cold techno of Anticipation, Matt Weiner with the chrome-clad but buoyant TWINS — and together they run DKA Records, international purveyors of murk. So while “Stay Behind” oozes with all the subversive sludge that devotees to the dark might expect, the Pyramid Club machine burbles and pulses in an uncommonly Technicolor display. The suave gear shift in the middle affirms the expert engineering at work here; Daresta and Weiner may be taking cues from their muses, but they’re clearly spiraling down a tunnel of their own design. -Immersive Atlanta
BIG DED
"The duo plunges into outsider and noise, flipping typically jarring genres with brushstrokes of bathdub, metamorphosing Joybender’s equation with future pagan and aliencore toxicity. Sure, there are games played with Lolina nods, big-show outsider antics that, up until this point, only Dracula Lewis has figured out, and yes, it indeterminately rips and dips of Chicklette feels, but that’s how Big Ded chews you up without actually digesting or vomiting your remains." - C Monster, Tiny Mix Tapes
"The duo plunges into outsider and noise, flipping typically jarring genres with brushstrokes of bathdub, metamorphosing Joybender’s equation with future pagan and aliencore toxicity. Sure, there are games played with Lolina nods, big-show outsider antics that, up until this point, only Dracula Lewis has figured out, and yes, it indeterminately rips and dips of Chicklette feels, but that’s how Big Ded chews you up without actually digesting or vomiting your remains." - C Monster, Tiny Mix Tapes