A new album by Mike Paradinas a.k.a. µ-Ziq usually reliably offers the prospect of playful IDM progressions, often carefree, gladly with wantonly added damage to the fabric of the building. In long-player format, Paradinas had last done so in 2013 with »Chewed Corners«. On »Scurlage«, his first real album since then, things are different. Starting with the label. Instead of his own Planet Mu this time Analogical Force. The record title is not a word creation, but a village on the Welsh peninsula of Gower, where the music was created during the lockdown. And this appears a trace more morose than usual. The first number, »Blakers Loop«, even has something decidedly of that eighties pessimism, a kind of coldwave IDM, if you will. With a few additions of bass music, thoroughly present, but just constitutionally bad-tempered. Later the mood thins out a bit. The second half starts with the rather upbeat and optimistic »Oxwich & Penrice«, two more villages on Gower. Elsewhere, too, there’s some of that lightness that ideally comes from Paradinas’ nerdy attention to detail. The overall clouded note, on the other hand, is possibly explained by the fact that the cover motif, the megalithic tomb Arthur’s Stone, also located on the peninsula, inspired the majority of the tracks. Memento mori on cranky.
Oh No Noh
As Late As Possible
Teleskop