First Floor #283 – The Unfortunate Twisting of Language
Thoughts on accountability, plus a round-up of the latest electronic music news and a fresh bundle of new track recommendations.
I didn’t publish a long-form piece on Tuesday. I’m sorry about that. Truth be told, I actually spent several days writing an essay for this week, but as I got closer to the finish line, I realized that I simply wasn’t happy with it, and decided to scrap it rather than sending out something that simply wasn’t up to par.
For what it’s worth, the piece at its core was about accountability, or more specifically, the lack of accountability in contemporary electronic music culture. That’s by no means a new phenomenon—people have been behaving badly (and largely getting away with it) for as long as I can remember—but it’s still maddening, especially now that we live in a time when everyone’s unsavory choices and hypocritical moves are often right out in the open. It’s never been easier to find people who are saying one thing and doing another, but in an era of content overload and microscopic attention spans, even the most egregious actions routinely fail to inspire lasting consternation. Moreover, the savviest actors have learned how to couch even their most questionable decisions in therapy-speak, faux-academic language, surface-level progressive politics and appeals to whataboutism, knowing that even if some online firestorm does erupt around them, they can most likely tamp down the flames by presenting themselves as a thoughtful and concerned figure.
A quick example: While doing some research this week, I found public comments from someone—to be clear, a white European man—who was being criticized for their involvement in initiatives funded by the Saudi government. While acknowledging (some might say minimizing) that the regime he was working with was autocratic in nature, he simultaneously pushed back against the criticism he’d received by saying it was a vestige of colonialist mentality.
My head nearly exploded.
Maybe I’ll write more about that person some day—more research is required to do it right—but in the meantime, I’ll just say this: If you’re reading First Floor, I hope you find it to be a place where words mean something, and where language isn’t being manipulated in service of justifying unethical decisions or laundering anyone’s reputation. I’d like to think that I say what I mean and I mean what I say, and if that’s something you’re interested in, then please stick around.
Anyways, should we get into today’s First Floor digest? The last seven days have been exceedingly busy in the electronic music realm, but I’ve done my best to cut through the noise and highlight only the good stuff for you. Read on and you’ll find news items, new release announcements, suggested reading links and a whole lot of track recommendations, all of them plucked from albums and EPs that dropped during the last week or so. And if that’s not quite enough to satiate your appetite, there’s also a special guest recommendation from Slovak-Hungarian artist Adela Mede, so make sure to give that a look.
Let’s get started.
FIRST FLOOR IS HEADED TO LISBON
Next week, I’ll be traveling to Portugal to take part in the conference portion of this year’s MIL festival. They’ve actually invited me to participate in two different talks, both of which will be happening on Friday, October 10. The first, “The Ethical Labyrinth of Capital in the Music Industry,” will focus on the impact of investment capital and large corporations into the modern music economy, and the second, “Main Character Music Journalism,” which I curated and will be moderating, is inspired by a recent First Floor piece in which I highlighted the growing pressure for writers to take a starring role in whatever content they create.
Once my MIL talks are complete, I will then be heading over to the Well Read bookshop, where I’ll be taking part in a long-overdue launch event for my book, which admittedly came out two years ago (whoops). Lisbon, however, is somewhere I’ve long wanted to present my work, and this particular event will be hosted by Van Der, who will direct a conversation about not just my writing, but also the past, present and future of electronic music culture. Entrance is free, though those wishing to attend should RSVP here.
REAL QUICK
A round-up of the most interesting electronic music news from the past week, plus links to interviews, articles and other things I think are worth sharing.
Is Spotify finally starting to feel the heat? Writer Ted Gioia recently explored that question in his Honest Broker newsletter, as did Darren Hemmings in his Network Notes newsletter, and while neither of them could say anything for certain, the streaming giant has been making some moves lately that certainly look like attempts to rehabilitate its image. Last week, the company issued a statement saying that it had bolstered its efforts to regulate AI-generated content on the platform, removing 75 million “spammy” tracks in the process. A few days later, Spotify then announced that its widely reviled CEO, Daniel Ek, would next year be transitioning into a new role as Executive Chairman, with executives Alex Norström and Gustav Söderström stepping up to become co-CEOs.
What does this actually mean? That’s not clear, and Spotify itself downplayed the gravity of the changes to its org chart, stating that it was a formalization of how the company has been operating since 2023. Nevertheless, by presenting the idea that Ek was stepping back from overseeing day-to-day operations, even slightly, Spotify likely hopes to create some daylight between the company and its soon-to-be-former CEO’s deeply unpopular investments into military technology. As Hemmings pointed out, even the new AI policy could be viewed as a cost-cutting maneuver, as it frees the platform from having to store and manage a whole lot of data that probably wasn’t generating much income anyways. What’s most telling, however, is that none of these announcements mentioned pending changes to the streamer’s payment model, royalty rates, use of so-called “ghost artists” or any of the company’s other unsavory business practices that have drawn criticism in recent years. There’s a good reason that US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib this week reintroduced the Living Wage for Musicians Act, which was drafted in collaboration with United Musicians and Allied Workers (UMAW) and “would create a new streaming royalty to compensate artists and musicians more fairly when their music plays on streaming services.”Speaking of musicians’ struggle to make a living wage, I was impressed by Kelly Moran’s honesty about the financial challenges faced by independent artists when she spoke to Larry Fitzmaurice for a recent interview in his Last Donut of the Night newsletter. During their conversation, she was open about the challenges of making ends meet in an expensive city like NYC, and also traced back the winding road that produced her latest LP, which is out this week on Warp. (More on that a bit later in today’s newsletter.)
Joanne Robertson, whose new Blurrr album has been drawing rave reviews, was also quite candid in this wide-ranging conversation with Madeline Frino for Nina. Though her music is not surprisingly a major focus of the discussion, she also touches on motherhood, painting, her tendency to mumble and what she thinks about the tradwife movement.
Still reeling from the recent passing of JD Twitch (a.k.a. Keith McIvor), the dance music world will likely be saying goodbye to the Optimo co-founder for quite some time, and new tributes to the beloved Scottish selector have continued to surface. Writing for DJ Mag, Daniel Dylan Wray put together a collection of remembrances that included thoughts from Bicep, Midland, Tim Sweeney, Mary Anne Hobbs, Chris & Cosey and many others. Cameron Holbrook and Travis Kirschbaum put a similar piece together for Beatportal, soliciting the thoughts of Daniel Avery, Heidi Lawden, Man Power and more.
After more than a decade of culture being dominated by poptimism and the whims of the algorithm, it’s somewhat jarring to see The Guardian publishing an opinion column in which writer Rachel Aroesti argues that perhaps it’s time for cultural snobbery to make a comeback. Admittedly, many of her references are way more mainstream than anything that usually gets discussed here in First Floor, but there’s still something to be said for her assertion that the “let people enjoy things” mentality has left culture in a less-than-optimal state.
There’s no doubt that talk of Palestine has been inescapable within electronic music circles this year, but it’s also true that shockingly little of that talk comes from the mouths of actual Palestinians. Sama’ Abdulhadi, who’s arguably the most prominent Palestinian artist in the world, is someone whose words should resonate far and wide, and she tackles the topic head on in the latest episode of Resident Advisor’s RA Exchange podcast, talking to journalist Chloe Lula about the music industry’s actions since October 7 and the degree to which her peers have let her down.
Resident Advisor also published a rather scathing feature by Rachel Grace Almeida last week, taking aim at Keinemusik, the Afro-house trend that’s bizarrely being led by European artists and the “algorithm-smoothed spectacle” that mainstream dance music has become. Though the piece is unsparing in its critique, it also strives to figure out why things have trended in this direction, examining the way in which social media has given rise to a situation in which some of dance music’s most financially successful figures are likely completely unknown to readers of a site like Resident Advisor. Thoroughly reported and full of thoughtful analysis, it’s the sort of thing that a publication with RA’s resources will hopefully be doing more often. With any luck, maybe they’ll even apply a similarly critical lens to their own business practices, or at least the (slightly) less commercial ecosystem that dominates the site’s usual editorial offerings.
OBLIGATORY BOOK MENTION
My first book is out now. It’s called First Floor Vol. 1: Reflections on Electronic Music Culture, and you can order it from my publisher Velocity Press. However, if you’re outside of the UK, I recommend that you either inquire at your favorite local bookshop or try one of the online sales links that have been compiled here.
JUST ANNOUNCED
A round-up of noteworthy new and upcoming releases announced during the past week.
Tim Reaper will likely forever be known as a junglist—the UK artist’s passion for the genre was at the heart of his First Floor interview last year—but in recent months, he’s slowly started to branch out into other sounds and tempos. Over the weekend, he self-released sfs, a 20-track collection of what he describes as “slower stuff.” It’s available now via Bandcamp.
Wata Igarashi has a new album on the way. Scheduled to land via Dekmantel, it’s called My Supernova, and is being billed as a high-octane effort that the Amsterdam-based Japanese artist has filled with “tunnelling rhythms and psychoactive arpeggio sequences.” November 7 is the official release date, but LP track “Shockwave” has already been shared.
Six years removed from his last full-length, Shlohmo has suddenly returned to the fray, and will be dropping a new album, Repulsor, via the R&R label on October 31. An alumnus of the LA beat scene, he hasn’t yet said much about the forthcoming record, but first single “Chore Boy”—a collaboration with SALEM—has already been made available, as has the song’s official music video.
Eris Drew will be at the helm of the next installment of the !K7 label’s fabled DJ-Kicks mix / compilation series. Described by the T4T LUV NRG co-founder as a deep dive into the “funky, emotional, ecstatic house-and-breaks backbone that defines [her] sound,” it’s slated to arrive on November 14, but a new song from Drew herself, “Momentary Phase Transition,” has already been shared.
Considering that Dania is my wife, it’s a little shocking that I haven’t mentioned this in previous editions of the newsletter, but the Iraqi-born, Tasmania-raised and Barcelona-based artist is about to release a new album on the Somewhere Press label. Inspired by the strange world that emerges after dark, it’s called Listless, and it’s due to surface on October 3 (i.e. tomorrow). Ahead of that, the song “Heart Shaped Burn,” which features drumming from Rupert Clervaux, has already been shared, as has its corresponding video.
Released in June, the Spanish film SIRĀT has garnered quite a bit of attention, at least among a certain slice of European cinephiles, and now its soundtrack—which was composed and produced by Berlin-based French artist Kangding Ray—has been issued by the Invada label. It’s out now.
ADELA MEDE HAS BETTER TASTE THAN I DO
First Floor is effectively a one-person operation, but every edition of the Thursday digest cedes a small portion of the spotlight to an artist, writer or other figure from the music world, inviting them to recommend a piece of music.
Today’s recommendation comes from Adela Mede, a Bratislava-based Slovak-Hungarian artist whose work explores the connection between experimental electronic sounds and the wonders of the human voice. The legacy of Central European folk traditions looms large in her music, but Mede is by no means a traditionalist; if anything, she’s more of a searcher, one who interrogates the ghosts of the past while pushing her emotive compositions into zones that, depending on the song, might be unsettling or spiritually transcendent. Her most recent album, Ne Lépj a Virágra, was released in 2023 via the Warm Winters Ltd. label, and featured contributions from Polish talents Martyna Basta and Wojciech Rusin. Mede’s recommendation below, however, is something she cooked up on her own, and despite being more than half a decade old, it’s something that speaks directly to her own personal history.
Mede Gyuláné “Ősz az idő ködös nagyon” (Csemadok Dunaszerdahelyi Területi Választmánya)
I’ve been dabbling in some archival Slovak-Hungarian folk song collections to further understand why I’m so incredibly drawn to this music. I came across this song called “The weather is autumnal.” I liked the name, the melody was beautiful, and after looking more closely, I realised it’s being sung by a woman who shares my name and came from the same village as my grandfather. The artist is Mede Gyuláné (which is an old-school way of referring to a lady who is married, combining her maiden name and her husband’s last name) and though the song was originally collected in 1959, it’s since been archived by Csemadok, a national cultural institution of ethnic Hungarians in Slovakia.
I really like the last verse, which says, “We won’t go to the next world / we’ll go to America / …goodbye homeland.”
LISTEN UP
The following is a selection of my favorite tunes from releases that came out during the past week or so. Click the track titles to hear each song individually, or you can also just head over to this convenient Buy Music Club list if you prefer to listen to them all in one place.
STEMcell feat. Acrux “Destroyer” (STEMcell)
Launched earlier this year, STEMcell is both a label and an artist collective, one that strives to subvert the atomization of the current streaming and social media landscape. Rather than distributing each release under the name of an individual artist, STEMcell lists it under the name of the collective instead, with the actual producer listed as a featuring contributor. Adding to the intrigue (and the potential confusion), the individual producers are all semi-anonymous and work under brand-new aliases, selecting monikers that also happen to be the proper names of stars—the ones in outer space, not Hollywood.
Got all that? Maybe not, but what ultimately matters is that STEMcell has so far shown an affinity for high-definition sound design and high-impact bass-techno hybrids. (Considering that its members have reportedly appeared in the past on labels like Houndstooth, Samurai Music, Monkeytown, Aus, Unknown to the Unknown, Lapsus, Local Action, Black Acre and Lex, this isn’t totally surprising.) Destroyer / Insurrection is the crew’s latest missive, and though it’s credited to Acrux, a little social media digging reveals its creator to in fact be Ross Tones (a.k.a. Throwing Snow). On “Destroyer,” he’s at his menacing best, serving up a pulsating, post-industrial beast that patiently saunters into the room, confident that its digital shards could slice up anyone who puts up even the smallest bit of resistance.
Daniel Szwed “S6 (with Mala Herba)” (Rope Worm)
The closing track on Daniel Szwed’s collaboration-heavy new SPLINTER album, “S6” finds the Polish drummer offering up a potent slice of industrial post-punk. There’s a lot to love about the song’s serrated squall, but its emotional power flows from the resonant voice of Mala Herba. Holding court amid the buzzing chaos, she exudes an almost regal sense of poise, her witchy, melancholy-tinged incantations blasting straight through Szwed’s digital crunch and howling distortion.
OTON “DB Channel” (Alliance Club)
OTON “United” (Alliance Club)
Technically speaking, OTON’s New Forms of Silence 2 is a techno album, but it’s one in which the Belgian artist makes a point to move beyond the blazing tempos and rigid structures that often define the genre. Within its 10 tracks are forays into chuggy sludge, spacious ambient and the kind of off-kilter drum patterns one might expect to find on a Livity Sound or Timedance release, but what really holds the LP together is OTON’s newfound interest in hazy reverb, which takes center stage on the standout “DB Channel.” A casually tumbling dub techno number, its shambling rhythms have been submerged in a kind of shimmering soup, and while the intoxicating “United” has a similarly vaporous quality, that song—which closes out the record—pulls liberally from the drum & bass playbook, its low-end thrum sounding like something Roni Size might have cooked up in the mid ’90s.
Paul St. Hilaire & Mala “Like It’s Always Been” (Kynant)
Paul St. Hilaire & Cousin “Back Inna Business” (Kynant)
Paul St. Hilaire & Priori “Send Them On” (Kynant)
Paul St. Hilaire & Azu Tiwaline “Let the Night Start” (Kynant)
It’s not often that First Floor recommends four separate tracks from a single release, but the new w/ the Producers album is a triumph of both craft and curation. Inverting the concept of Rhythm & Sound’s 2004 masterpiece w/ the Artists, on which Mark Ernestus and Moritz von Oswald teamed up with a slew of different vocalists, this new LP pairs dub techno icon Paul St. Hilaire with beatmakers from across the electronic spectrum, including Batu, Gavsborg, Aurora Halal & DJ G, Shinichi Atobe and Russell E.L. Butler. Under normal circumstances, having this many cooks in the kitchen would almost surely result in a painfully disjointed listen, but St. Hilaire—or, more specifically, his buttery voice—is such a powerful unifying force that the record’s flow never feels anything but natural, even as the tempos and genre parameters (subtly) shift from one song to the next.
The highlights are numerous, but w/ the Producers opens strong with “Like It’s Always Been,” where dubstep don Mala slows things to a crawl, his chunky bass notes and percussive smacks echoing into the darkness before a horn procession adds some dramatic flair to the proceedings. Cousin takes a more minimal approach on the hypnotic “Back Inna Business,” combining St. Hilaire’s heady register with a subaquatic strain of free-floating trip-hop, and while “Send Them On” is one of the album’s brawnier offerings, Priori ensures that its corpulent thump unfolds at a satisfyingly relaxed pace. “Let the Night Start” broadcasts a similar sense of confident cool—St. Hilaire’s meditative vocals have a lot to do with that—but thanks to Azu Tiwaline’s sturdy drum patterns and spine-tingling sound design, it’s also one of the most spellbinding tunes on the record.
Sam Prekop “Font” (Thrill Jockey)
I sometimes wonder if Sam Prekop is perpetually annoyed that people—including music journalists like me—still tend to think of him as “the guy from The Sea and Cake who also does some modular stuff.” As beloved as his work with that band may be, the veteran Chicago musician has been exploring synthesis since 2010’s Old Punch Card album, so it’s weird that his forays into electronic music are often treated like a stylistic detour or a creative flight of fancy. Prekop has logged his 10,000 hours, and his latest full-length, Open Close, is a testament to that effort, as the LP is not only impeccably crafted, but also emits a kind of radiant glow. There’s a welcome lightness to the music on offer, and the bubbly standout “Font” practically glides through the air, its crystalline tones and wiggly melodies glistening in the sunshine.
Sakura Tsuruta “Euphorique” (Third Place)
On her new What Are You Drinking? EP, Sakura Tsuruta displays a consistent affinity for two things: playful beats and pastel colors. Light but never limp, the Japanese artist’s music seems to defy gravity, her restless rhythms—which bounce between house, techno and classic IDM—ensuring that even the record’s most introspective moments are infused with an almost childlike sense of enthusiasm. “Euphorique,” which opens the EP, is a particularly spritely tune, and one whose effervescent melodies have been bolstered by a potent—but not overpowering—low-end chug.
Kelly Moran “Prism Drift” (Warp)
One wouldn’t automatically assume that Kelly Moran and techno raving would go hand in hand, but back in 2019, when the classically trained NYC-based pianist was touring extensively around the globe, she apparently spent many of her post-gig nights on the dancefloor. Those experiences are at the heart of her latest full-length, Don’t Trust Mirrors, and while it’s not an out-and-out dance record, it is a decidedly electronic effort, and one with an undeniable sense of momentum, despite the fact that no drums are involved. Moran’s piano playing is still the main attraction here, and on euphoric LP highlight “Prism Drift,” she fully transcends the boundaries of the concert hall, her fluttering keys and resonant chords taking flight and encouraging everyone in earshot to cast off their inhibitions.
Early Fern “Teasel” (sound as language)
New York City takes up a lot of space in the music discourse, and in recent years, as more and more artsy types have flocked to the countryside, even Upstate New York has crept into the conversation. But what about Central New York? The region is rarely discussed in any context, which makes Early Fern’s new Wetland Interiors album a rather intriguing proposition. Inspired by the region, and what she describes as the “emotional experience of being in gorgeous semiaquatic places,” it’s a deeply organic listen, weaving the sound of babbling brooks and buzzing insects into new age synths and Fern’s nods to the magic of early music. The standout “Teasel” might be the LP’s most pastoral tune, lacing patient chimes with distant birdsong and sonorous melodies that mimic the falsetto sounds of a children’s choir.
Claron McFadden & Emanuele Wiltsch Barberio “Lasciatemi” (Cosmogram)
Recorded in a deconsecrated church on the Italian island of Giudecca, there’s something undeniably devotional about Lagrimae, the new full-length from Claron McFadden and Emanuele Wiltsch Barberio. The former, an acclaimed soprano, provides much of the spiritual lift, her otherworldly vocal acrobatics serving as an angelic counterpoint to Wiltsch Barberio’s ethereal drones. Informed by sounds and rituals that date back centuries, the operatic album—whose title is Latin for “tears”—does maintain a sort of mournful dialogue with the past, but with McFadden’s elegant voice leading the conversation, it never feels like a stale trek through arcane history. LP highlight “Lasciatemi,” in fact, is downright vibrant—and, more importantly, profoundly human, as its tangled vocal tendrils and exquisite multi-part harmonies offer a potent reminder of what kind of beauty people are capable of creating.
Scanner “Riser Beam Connection” (quiet details)
Many ambient releases tackle big-picture issues and life’s grand questions—and that’s totally fine!—but Forces, Reactions, Deflections, the latest album from Scanner, is focused on something much smaller: a metal staircase in the veteran UK artist’s home. Using no synthesizers whatsoever and relying entirely on the “resonant clangs, echoes and whispers” he could coax from the aforementioned staircase, he’s constructed something that’s somewhat minimal, but also a bit haunting, its various creaks and crackles flanked by drones that ominously loom in the background. Close listening is definitely recommended, and on the standout “Riser Beam Connection”—where Scanner has managed to manipulate some of his captured sounds into something that resembles a softly cooing female vocal—those who surrender to the song’s slow burn will find that the music’s underlying tension gradually melts away, leaving behind a sense of low-key bliss.
That brings us to the end of today’s First Floor digest. Thank you so much for reading the newsletter, and, as always, I do hope that you enjoyed the tunes. (Don’t forget, you can find them all on this handy Buy Music Club list, and if you like them, please buy them.)
Until next time,
Shawn
Shawn Reynaldo is a freelance writer, editor, presenter and project manager. Find him on LinkedIn and Instagram—and make sure to follow First Floor on Instagram as well—or you can just drop Shawn an email to get in touch about projects, collaborations or potential work opportunities.
Love your column, very glad I became a subscriber. Wanted to say thanks for all the great work you do and the amazing music you've exposed me to. Also flagging that your book is 'Backordered' at Bookshop since I ordered it a few weeks ago. Doubt there's much you can do and I'll read it whenever it arrives but for lack of knowing how else to let you know, there it is!