ilkae - Pistachio Island (2001)

Chilled-out sounds released by the great Merck, a Florida-based label that put out tons of great shit over a relatively short run.  Pistachio Island = 45 vignettes of ambient, beat-driven IDM, along with the artist's encouragement to play it on shuffle. This conceptually playful approach feels like a relic of a bygone era of electronic music, but sonically, the record feels like an antecedent to the whole "chill lo-fi beats" thing, only in ADHD form.

I'm not typing all that out; find the track listing here.

Warm filaments

If you like this, listen to:

Gimmik - ?!Load-Error E.P. (1997)

Opiate - While You Were Sleeping (2002)

All Sides - Dedalus (2007)

First album by All Sides, a moniker of German artist Nina Kernicke which she has since changed to Allseits. Dedalus evokes vast, dark spaces with minimal bass-lines, throbbing rhythms, and amorphous guitars.

Track listing:

1. The Idea

2. They Come by Night

3. Luv

4. Dedalus

5. The Unfinished End of H.W.

6. Mistake

7. Against the Sun

8. Runaway

9. Icarus

10. Into the Sea

11. Stay

Life is an optical illusion

If you like this, try:

The Third Eye Foundation - Semtex (1996)

Cyclobe - Luminous Darkness (1999)

Escarnium - Interitus (2016)

Dark, punishing Brazilian death metal. I kinda wrote Interitus off at first -- there was so much OSDM-worship coming out at the time, I think I was just burnt-out -- but upon revisiting, it kicks ass. Refreshingly, Escarnium weren't just aping Incantation. In fact, they're not really aping anyone in particular, although they are somewhere in the razor-sharp, subtly cerebral realm of Immolation.

Track listing:

1. The Horror

2. While the Furnace Burns

3. Starvation Death Process

4. Radioactive Doom

5. Omnis Mortuus Est - Inheritus

6. Macabre Rites

7. Genocide Ritual

8. The Gray Kingdon

9. 100 Days of Bloodbath

10. Human Waste

Piled up, entangled

In putrid human flesh

You'd probably also like:

Trauma - Imperfect Like a God (2003)

Inverted - The Age of Harvest (2015)

Mother Tongue - Open in Obscurity (1988)

A one-off collaboration between Andrew McKenzie (The Hafler Trio), influential experimental/industrial musician Z'EV, and poet/writer Dorothea Franck. Side A is an 18-minute mass of droning, textural musique concrète; Side B incorporates percussion and Franck's voice into the mix. 

Track listing:

1. Geelgalayah

2. Who

3. Wind Carved My Face

4. Lying in the Desert

5. The Humble Man

6. Heart

This is not enough

You should also hear:

Ron Geesin - Right Through (1977)

Zero Kama - The Secret Eye of L.A.Y.L.A.H. (1984)

Soultek - Dreaming Under a Starlit Sky (2009)

Related:

Intrusion - The Seduction of Silence (2009)

More immersive dub techno from another one of Chicago producer Steven Hitchell's many aliases. A hypnotic trip through a nocturnal world of echoing, soft-focus synths and pulsing, punchy beats. Once in a while, a harsher element might attempt to break through, but it quickly disperses like rain on a window.

Track listing:

1. Dreaming Under a Starlit Sky

2. Forever Feeling

3. Elektricity

4. Lighter Path

5. Clouds Overhead

6. Lost in Love

7. World of Dreams

8. Glacial Blue

Soul twist

Also listen to:

Ro70 - Ro70 (1995)

Onur Özer ‎- Kaşmir (2007)

The Lover Speaks - The Lover Speaks (1986)

Excellent, sophisticated pop rock/new wave from this short-lived English duo. The Lover Speaks were clearly aiming for the fences with their self-titled debut, and artistically, their efforts paid off -- it's what I want Spandau Ballet to be -- but the album's commercial impact was pretty much nil, and the band broke up while recording their second album. Given that they received their first industry boost by Dave Stewart of Eurythmics, it tracks that The Lover Speaks are best remembered for Annie Lennox's cover of their single, "No More 'I Love You's", which I'm pretty sure most people (in America, anyway) don't realize is a cover.

It's worth noting that, while The Lover Speaks had only two official members -- vocalist David Freeman and everything-else-ist Joseph Hughes -- The Lover Speaks was undeniably a group effort. Most significantly, there's vocalist June Miles-Kingston, whose ethereal, Elizabeth Fraser-esque singing is so prominently featured in every song that it's truly awkward that she wasn't billed as an official member.

Track listing:

1. Every Lover's Sign

2. No More "I Love You's"

3. Never to Forget You

4. Face Me and Smile

5. Absent One

6. Love Is: "I Gave You Everything"

7. "This Can't Go On"

8. Still Faking This Art of Love

9. Tremble Dancing

10. Of Tears

The language is leaving me

You'd also like:

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - The Pacific Age (1986)

The Dolphin Brothers - Catch the Fall (1987)

Hauschka - Substantial (2004)

First album by Hauschka, a pseudonym of German pianist/composer Volker Bertelmann. Breathtaking, minimal piano pieces with the lightest touches of layering -- a field recording here, an electronic texture here, a synth here, a second piano there. Substantial really taps into a deeply melancholic place in my psyche. Like, as far as my conscious brain is concerned, I'm good, but as soon as this record starts playing, I'm contemplating all the different paths my life could have taken, missing friends from high school who I haven't thought of in years, and mulling over all the sweet things that I should say to my loved ones but just can't ever seem to. Not sure that this is coming off like a ringing endorsement of this record, but it's supposed to be.

Track listing:

1. Orange I

2. Vielleicht

3. Golden

4. Dark I

5. Sequence I

6. Fragile

7. Wait

8. Sequence II

9. Cardiff

10. Dark II

11. Orange II

Left with a trace of all that was

You should also hear:

Bing and Ruth - Bing and Ruth (2006)

Clogs - Lantern (2006)

Strangelove - Love and Other Demons (1996)

A relatively unsung gem from the Britpop era. Love and Other Demons kicks off with the gnarled, discordant guitar squall of "Living with the Human Machines", before settling on a noire, string-laden sound to accompany the album's themes of addiction and alienation. If that description reminds you of Suede, it should: Strangelove opened for Suede on their Dog Man Star tour, and Brett Anderson sings backing vocals on a couple of tracks here. They also opened for Manic Street Preachers just before Richey Edwards' disappearance, and for Radiohead on one of their first major tours. So clearly, they were in rarified Britrock company, and they had the tunes to back up the hype, but vocalist Patrick Duff chose wellness over rock stardom -- he'd been struggling with serious addiction and mental health issues -- and ended the band shortly after their next album came out.

Track listing:

1. Living with the Human Machines

2. Beautiful Alone

3. Sway

4. 20th Century Cold

5. She's Everywhere

6. #1432

7. Casualties

8. Spiders and Flies

9. Elin's Photograph

10. The Sea of Black

A futureless peep show

You should also hear:

The Auteurs - Now I'm a Cowboy (1994)

The Tears - Here Come the Tears (2005)

M.E.S.H. - Piteous Gate (2015)

Dystopian first LP by M.E.S.H., the main project of Berlin-based producer James Whipple. Much of Piteous Gate is spent in an uncomfortable stillness -- harsh, atonal hits reverberating into a web of heavily processed signals, synths, and digital landfill. When an actual beat does enter the mix, it invariably trips over itself, reboots, contorts, and never quite finds its place. Oneohtrix Point Never fans, on the other hand, should feel right at home.

Track listing:

1. Piteous Gate

2. Optimate

3. Thorium

4. The Black Pill

5. Kritikal & X

6. Epithet

7. Jester's Visage

8. Methy Imbiß

9. Azov Seepage

Nothing created without the seed

Nothing destroyed without the meat

You should also listen to:

Tigersmilk - Android Love Cry (2007)

Erik Levander - Kondens (2008)

The Mike Theodore Orchestra - High on Mad Mountain (1979)

Unrelenting, funky, immaculately crafted disco from Detroit producer and frequent Dennis Coffey collaborator Mike Theodore. Unlike so many "The (Blank) Orchestra" disco acts, The Mike Theodore Orchestra was, effectively, an actual orchestra -- on Discogs, 66 people, most of them musicians, are credited for working on High on Mad Mountain, including 7 (seven) separate percussionists. Also unlike so many would-be disco epics, these four extended tracks actually earn their sweeping scope through perfectly executed builds, deceptively intricate arrangements, weirdness, and sheer groove.

Track listing:

1. High on Mad Mountain

2. Wonder Man

3. Disco People

4. Dragons of Midnight

Backside, frontside, do your boogie

If you like this, listen to:

The Andrea True Connection - More, More, More (1976)

France Joli - France Joli (1979)