ARTICLES
2006 Top 10s and 20s
2006 Artist Picks

ALBUMS
17 Pictures
Angina P
Ateleia
Benni Hemm Hemm
The Boats
Cappablack
Celer
Dead Letters Dead Words
Deceptikon
Deerhunter
Denzel + Huhn
Displayaz
Dollboy
Drone
Eluvium
Emanuele Errante
The Eternals
Fear Falls Burning
Marcus Fjellström
Fonoda
Funkstörung
Goldfrapp
Gyroscope
Robert Henke
James Holden
The Idealist
Anders Ilar
Landing
LCD Soundsystem
Library Tapes
L Pierre
Lullatone
Tor Lundvall
Mad EP
Mahogany
Melodium
Mem1
Daisuke Miyatani
Mole Harness
Momus
Monoceros
Mormo
Mothboy
Original Hamster
Pierson & Horton
Prince Valium
Radical Face
Retail Sectors / Yaporigami
Rylander & Elggren
Scott Solter Plays PIM
Sideshow
Silicone Soul
Skream
Splinters
Mark Templeton
Thread Pulls
T. Raumschmiere
Tycho
Ultre
Virculum
Xela

COMPILATIONS/MIXES
AudioArt 03
Cumulous
Dubstep Allstars Vol. 4
Eriksen / Toft / Utarm
Katapult VA Vol. 3
Let's Lazertag Sometime
Mr Geoffrey & JD Franzke
Skagen / Halvorsen / Toft
Tectonic Plates

3"/7"/10"/12"/EPs
Gabriel Ananda
Robert Bardini
DAT Politics
Dead Letters / R. Sundin
Dogmixer
Benjamin Fehr
Fenin
HL
I Make This Sound
Zoë Irvine
Kyriakides and Moor
Lamont & 2tall
Ljud. & Piloten / Kama Aina
Jacob London
Sam Mcqueen
Miskate
Ryo Miyashita & Hiiragi_
[nara]
New Faces
Of / Greg Davis
Charlemagne Palestine
Phon.o vs Litwinenko
Portable
PostPrior
Samarah
Nicholas Sauser & Ditch
Someone Else
Hannes Teichmann
Tractile
Andy Vaz

IMAGES
F.S. Blumm

Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words: Old Ghosts, New Ghosts, All Ghosts
Ideal

Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words / Ronnie Sundin: Fuglesang, Astronaut
Fang Bomb

In keeping with the morose moniker, Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words' style is as downcast as one might expect but Gothenburg, Sweden-based Thomas Ekelund's sophomore collection of brooding soundscapes, Old Ghosts, New Ghosts, All Ghosts, is far from dissatisfying. Split into two parts (Circles, Fucking Circles and No Ghosts), its nineteen pieces include nine untitled fragments and interludes—the opener only four seconds long—that add complementary atmosphere and ten industrial-sounding drones constructed from loops and outdoor field noises. At certain moments, you could imagine yourself standing outside a factory door, absorbing the churning rhythms of the machinery inside; at other times, you find yourself surrounded by loudly tolling bells, or at the seashore serenaded by creaking harbor sounds. There's an assured and unhurried flow to the material that's appealing, not to mention wonderful moments like “In Perfect and Imperfect Circles,” a somber dronescape that's equal to anything on Tim Hecker's Mirages or Harmony in Ultraviolet. Gloom never felt so good.

The Fang Bomb 7-inch disc offers a striking, even perverse, incongruity between the prototypical NASA cover portrait of Christer Fuglesang and the aural grotesquery of its two tracks by Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words and Ronnie Sundin—all the more reason to embrace it. The release pays tribute to Fuglesang, the 1000th person to leave earth on a space mission and Sweden's first astronaut, who in December 2006 as part of mission STS-116 docked with the International Space Station and performed two spacewalks to rewire it. Fang Bomb calls Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words' style ‘concrete drone pop' and “Born to Go,” a prolonged belch of grungy noise that suggests what you'd hear if your head were stuck inside an old muffler while a decrepit engine roars to life, makes good on the description. Sundin's “Space is the Place (In Space Nobody Can Hear Your Demons Mix)” slowly builds into a brutalizing monstrosity that pairs an insistently rumbling bass throb with the dissonant wail and squeal of a dental drill. Born to go straight to hell is more like it.

January 2007