Alphaxone
Phase Two
Sometimes, I stumble upon surprisingly impressive and new [to me] artists. I don’t know how I find them. Perhaps it’s semi-random, perhaps it’s meant to be. In this case, I think I was roaming through dark alleys of atmospheric ambience and fell upon an electronic musician recording under the Alphaxone moniker. At first, I thought this was someone else already known creating a side project under a new alias. But after some digging, I’ve confirmed the artist to be Tehran-based Mehdi Saleh. His work already appeared on Simon Heath’s Cryo Chamber imprint, which has put out releases by artists such as Mount Shrine, Phonothek, and Northumbria, among many others [I recommend that you explore the catalogue]. Phase Two is only three tracks in length, as a follow-up to Phase One, released more than a decade prior. Still, I’ve been listening to other EPs by Saleh, including his self-released TEXTURE SYNTHESIS volumes, and I feel like there is enough music here to be compiled into a cohesive album. Fans of murky synth surfaces, hypnotic subliminal rhythms, and constantly evolving spacial dimensions will absolutely bask in these extra-terrestrial immersive environments. Again, this is a bit of an unexpected find since Saleh has been making music since 2015. Kudos to you if you’re already a fan. Meanwhile, I’ll do my best to break through my echo chamber.
keinseier
Particles
I decided to keep going down the rabbit hole in search of exciting new sounds. I arrived at music by a Hamburg-based electronic musician known as keinseier, who says that their day job is being a film composer. Since the YouTube, Instagram, and Bandcamp pages appear legit, I will proclaim that this is not a “fake Spotify artist”. Of course, I did not need this confirmation, as I can tell from sounds alone. His productions are incredibly musical, lush and glitchy, reminding me of the early IDM era, which seemed to fade away. The output is technically cohesive, featuring advanced synthesis and boutique processing from the array of playthings, boxes, VSTs, and semi-modular effect pedals that keinseier showcases in his tutorials [if words such as Digitakt, Norns, OP-Z, OP-1, Microcosm, and Vongon mean anything to you, you’ll know exactly what to expect here]. I’ve watched a ton of videos reviewing gear before, but most of these guys do not really produce quality electronic music. Okay, fine, Benn Jordan does, and yes, so does Venus Theory and Hainbach. I think I will add keinseier to that list. As I finish up these words, a track titled “Erinnerung” comes on and swallows me into the past when I was mesmerised by Arovane, Julien Neto, Yasume, Secede, and Xela. I’m very happy that music lke this still exists. Very well done – I’m an instant fan!
Infinity Frequencies
The first machine
Once again, this one was a completely new and surprising find for me. I really thought that this one, for sure, was one of those “fake Spotify artists”. What is that, you ask? In a nutshell, it’s how Spotify licenses some music under a one-time fee from a production company, in which hired musicians can churn out tracks on a conveyor belt, one after another, and which, as a result, lack heart and soul. Then, Spotify inserts these into their own curated playlists, et voilà, the cash stays in the firm, and the customer doesn’t know any better. Or do they? One way to confirm the artist as real is to do some searching and find their Bandcamp, Instagram, and Discogs profile to see if they are active and have full albums rather than a handful of singles released only on “their label” and only on Spotify. Curiously, one of Infinity Frequencies‘ tracks has over 10M plays, and I can’t tell how it achieved that, but what I can say is that Joshuah Miller‘s music is still worth checking out. Whether he is real or not. The first machine is a collection of short vignettes that seem to be looping snippets of some abandoned pieces, passed through lofi filters, murky processing and haze. Everything about these tracks has a slightly uneasy feel, as if the music was constructed by an absolete computer waking up into existence. There is undoubtedly some kind of trickery behind this – I can just feel it in my bones. But in the end, I like the music. And so, I share it here with you.
