Like Domino’s, I’m late (and I’m also The Noid, ruiner of pizza), so this one’s on me. Share with your friends who need guidance or validation about new music and their place alongside it. Your socials are a good place for that too.

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RIKKI G.GODD Cost of Living LP (Spectral Disc)

Hereditary decap scene over and over styles. Obliterated bitcrushed-beat-blit like Blawan/Zuli “Trigger Finger” hours, food-processed at the speed of slice, with lots of interesting/correct choices on drum samples (“I Am Dead,” “Cost of Living,” “Scum”)  laced in between whiplash speed tempos and pixelated peripherals. Gets even better when things turn to the unexpected, like the 9 A.M. stained glass sun burning holes in your mind drone of “Diet Heaven.” Taking this trip directly into my eyeballs tonight, wanna join me?

MINA MILLS Negative Attitude 12” EP (Caustic Heap)

Shadowy midnight manifestations of mauve-grey velvet moods and Celsius trails from Chicago techno artist Mina Mills, cutting through the room with 4/4 floor directives of indirect tension and hands-on-table twitch. “Dance Moms” does what it says – manipulated dialogue of intense parents screaming at their small children, like we’re used to – and a divine, outta nowhere break of reverb/woodblock slam on “Music for Trespassing” that deserves its own track, are the standouts on this strong EP.

CHONCY Trademark LP (Feel It)

Cincy chancers Choncy chew the edges of the frame of the now and try to drip back to 99-03, with a strong, wound-up set of danceable postpunk with Weirdos/Dangerhouse-esque songcraft, a singer taking it through the nose, and an energy that’s charging full speef uphill to dangle off a cliff. Michael Jackson holding that baby over the railing sorta madness hours. If some kid asks you what it was like in those days, tell ‘em it was Sta-Prest, spock hair, burgeoning drug problems, shoplifting and music like this. They’ll never wanna go back, but we can still dream.

OPTIC SINK Relentless Metamorphosis: An Original Score for the Films of Maya Deren LP (DIG!)

Longform synth washes and cryptic clicks from Memphis’ premier electronic trio, and while their songcraft across three studio albums continues to flourish, this is maybe too big a bite, at least from the referential perspective the films demand. It’s still a worthwhile hang, more like practice space atmospheres of where Natanot and co. extend the long shadows of The Cure’s Seventeen Seconds. Really almost any alternate soundtrack would falter over the burnt-in imagery of Maya Deren’s films; they are hard works to reconcile with any other sensibilities, and until the crazy speed-run towards the middle of the final track, this hangs a little too loosely off those shoulders.

GIGLINGER Kasåkern LP (East Sound Studios)

A studio-based project out of Helsinki, Giglinger impressed with their blood-pact commitment to having been working it out since the ‘90s and an earlier LP that channeled Gordons/Bailterspace otherworld lug in the liminal space between where the muscles wore out and the cyber-hydraulic limbs were finally working as expected. Kasåkern is somehow the group’s debut full-length after all this time, and as anticipated it’s huge mid-tempo guitar produkt with a ton of headroom and the sort of riffs that continental mainstays like Les Thugs were able to churn out back in their era. Kinda makes you wish these folks would do a little more! Excellent work.

Love, Mercedes Condom