Utility Fog

As we swiftly approach December, tonight is the second-last “new music” show of the year. There’s a lot of music coming out on December 5th! But then that’s it, the next 3 will be Best of 2025. Keen listeners will be surprised that I’m mixing up the structure tonight. Really, it usually goes the way it goes due to thematic and tonal segues, and this time round the jazz & ambient(ish) stuff just fitted best after our early songs, and the beats are the bulk of the second half. The Notwist – X-Ray The Notwist – Magnificent Fall Muyassar Kurdi – Child of the Sun (feat. Chris Williams) Peter Knight – The Coiling of the Tide Laura Jurd – Praying Mantis Má Estrela – Top Suki Girl BLACK HAUGE – Papiret (Radio Edit) Dina Maccabee – Outbreak Joni Void – Walker Joni Void – Lighters Samuele Strufaldi – Musica Invisibile Mac Seldom – ILUVU Om Unit – Lost Stories (Bok Bok Remix) Om Unit – The Chase (Alter Echo & E3 Remix) Ghost Dubs – Hope Fatwires x Atsushi Izumi – Ga UNTECHCIRCLE – Dying Light UNTECHCIRCLE – not just chaos Mattr – Tayl CHEAHDX – Earthbound dreadmaul – No Shade Low End Activist – Hope III (Demdike Stare Stressed Version)

HI PODCAST LISTENER! (I’m putting this note on the “missing” podcasts that I’m catching up – from Nov 30th onwards it won’t be included) You may have noticed how late I’ve been getting with these posts. It takes ages to write everything up, but I think it’s valuable. However, it’s been pointed out to me that people might want the podcast itself to be regular! So I’m now going to separate out the posts for the podcast feed from the main posts. You won’t get all the detailed review text, but you’ll get to listen sooner, and you’ll get the tracklisting itself still! Please let me know if this is good/bad/average. You can find a hint for my email on the website‘s sidebar. Tonight, one of the underground hip-hop albums of the year, some very unusual collaborations, two releases in the Frisian language of north Holland, solo drum kit, post-jazz, bass & breaks, human/AI collaboration and electro-acoustic sound-art verging into folktronica. Armand Hammer & The Alchemist – Dogeared (feat. Kapwani) Armand Hammer & The Alchemist – Crisis Phone (feat. Pink Siifu) Armand Hammer & The Alchemist – Longjohns (feat. Quelle Chris & Cleo Reed) HAYWARDxDÄLEK – Asymmetric YHWH Nailgun – Weaving (original by LEYA) Zea & Drumband Hallelujah Makkum – in lichem fol beloften Zea & Drumband Hallelujah Makkum – de Dea Joana Guerra, Maria Do Mar, Romke Kleefstra, Jan Kleefstra – Al Dy Kleuren Joana Guerra, Maria Do Mar, Romke Kleefstra, Jan Kleefstra – Kâlde Mage Chloe Kim – Ratsnake SML – Old Mytth Snorkel – Flash Flood Snorkel – Sirene Endless Mow – wattle and daub An Avrin – 4LYFE noRecall – The Machine and its Master Lakker – Hood Kassian – Ghost Dub Bad Ambulance – Zero Olivier Alary – Imagined Presence (preview clip 4) Rutger Zuydervelt – House of Strength Rutger Zuydervelt and Lucija Gregov – (Not) Not Three High Rutger Zuydervelt and Lucija Gregov – Euphoria (outtake)

HI PODCAST LISTENER! (I’m putting this note on the “missing” podcasts that I’m catching up – from Nov 30th onwards it won’t be included) You may have noticed how late I’ve been getting with these posts. It takes ages to write everything up, but I think it’s valuable. However, it’s been pointed out to me that people might want the podcast itself to be regular! So I’m now going to separate out the posts for the podcast feed from the main posts. You won’t get all the detailed review text, but you’ll get to listen sooner, and you’ll get the tracklisting itself still! Please let me know if this is good/bad/average. You can find a hint for my email on the website‘s sidebar. What a relentless year of new music… It’s getting that way every year mind you. The releases will run right through December and into January, mark my words… Anyway, tonight we have the surprisingest song of the week (year?) from two very different pop icons, plus experimental song and electronics of all sorts, blending with classical, jazz, field recordings and more. Charli XCX – House (feat John Cale) California Girls – Sorrowful Meat Alto Aria – Porous Heart Alto Aria – Fall Blossom anrimeal – 11. Chapter III – Source and time anrimeal – 5. Chapter I – SOFAR channel Meredith Monk – Lullaby for Lise (performed by Katie Geissinger, Allison Sniffin) Joachim Badenhorst – How To Hold Maarja Nuut & Ruum – Kiik Tahab Kindaid Romain Azzaro – Always Late Mauri – Aquest Any Si F¥eld Effct – Tst_009 Nadrisk – Cadere Data General – End with Rests Fracture & Neptune – Good Stuff Los Pulpitos – Cubozoa r hunter – Intra r hunter – Perfect Mirror Galina Juritz – Axolotl STREIKTHROUGH – Bleed Tight Earl Grey – Doss House Jack Prest – Dawn Jack Prest – Movement III Stefan Schultze – Judson Techno Stefan Schultze, boxn – CV RMX Perila – Apocalypta’s Dream upsammy – Ripple Bernard Parmegiani – Sadiquement Votre II Bernard Parmegiani – La Ville en Haut de la Colline II Lia Kohl – Walking Home, Chicago Lia Kohl – My Kitchen, Chicago Lia Kohl – Train, Antwerp to Amsterdam Lia Kohl – Basketball Court, feat. Macie Stewart

Huge thanks to Holly Conner for her great curation last week while I was playing at Essence Festival in Canberra. Tonight we've got mutant pop and folk, mutant bass, mutant classical and ambient… and beautiful slippages between genres. LISTEN AGAIN …Read more »

HI PODCAST LISTENER! (I’m putting this note on the “missing” podcasts that I’m catching up – from Nov 30th onwards it won’t be included) You may have noticed how late I’ve been getting with these posts. It takes ages to write everything up, but I think it’s valuable. However, it’s been pointed out to me that people might want the podcast itself to be regular! So I’m now going to separate out the posts for the podcast feed from the main posts. You won’t get all the detailed review text, but you’ll get to listen sooner, and you’ll get the tracklisting itself still! Please let me know if this is good/bad/average. You can find a hint for my email on the website‘s sidebar. Music from North Africa, West Africa, South Asia, East Asia, South America, North America, Europe and Oceania tonight… which covers most continents. Antarctica needs to pick up their game. Noura Mint Seymali – Bidayett Lehjibb Noura Mint Seymali – Lehjibb Noura Mint Seymali – Moughadim Karr Perera Elsewhere – Time Will Tell (feat. Andy S) Perera Elsewhere – Just Wanna Live Some Low End Activist x Tia Talks – Fake Idols Mala x Magugu – MILITANT DON AICHER – Constriction (andereBaustelle Version) AICHER – Possessions Bios Contrast & Nilotpal Das – FACADE06032020 Low End Activist – U Kno Low End Activist – Colin’s Golf Clark – 18EDO Bailiff Clark – Globecore Flats ZOiD – Day Eight (μ-Ziq Remix) ZOiD – Day Eight Nikki Nair, Foodman – Sorry I Lost My Glasses In The Public Bathhouse 銭湯でメガネを無くしてごめん Tawdry Otter – Alma, The River Flows Crimewave – 145/155BPM Crimewave – Misdemeanour Crimewave – 155/160BPM Crimewave – Haemoglobin toso toso – cLAcLAcLA Juana Molina – la paradoja CxBxT – Hoshi o Atsumete Starlight Assembly – Friction Starlight Assembly – Wait for the Word The Church – Sacred Echoes (Part Two) recur – hieroglyph Mark Harwood – Ein Gehirn Musik Mark Harwood – Welt Ov Pain – Kikorangi

HI PODCAST LISTENER! You may have noticed how late I’ve been getting with these posts. It takes ages to write everything up, but I think it’s valuable. However, it’s been pointed out to me that people might want the podcast itself to be regular! So I’m now going to separate out the posts for the podcast feed from the main posts. You won’t get all the detailed review text, but you’ll get to listen sooner, and you’ll get the tracklisting itself still! Please let me know if this is good/bad/average. You can find a hint for my email on the website‘s sidebar. Somehow it’s the second-last month of the year? And yet, this year has lasted about 3 years so far, so it’s not too surprising? We do have a surprise new album from Aesop Rock, new weirdpop of various sorts, trip-hop vibes, Halloween spookiness, sadcore/hardcore crossover, industrial sad-hop, experimental electronics both beat-wise and not, some jungle and some blissful ambient pop to take us out. It’s Sunday. Aesop Rock – Sherbert Aesop Rock – Crystals and Herbs Yunzero – B1 ŽIVA – Unrest celosiafields – Newletter ft. Raj Mahal Jerome Blazé – You Can Find Us Out Your Way Penelope Trappes – Bleed Bird Battles – Overgrown Hilary Woods – Taper Laura Moody – The Witch Chat Pile & Hayden Pedigo – The Magic of the World Chat Pile & Hayden Pedigo – Fission/Fusion Richie Culver – Curse Richie Culver – I Loved You Ship Sket – Casting Call (ft. S280F) Ship Sket – Mimikyu December – Stonemilker Synkro – Excursion San – Core of the Earth Dak – Triagen Julien Mier & thedieyoungs – Dolphin Tears Mattr – Fade xin – opening xin – trash dub Ipek Gorgun – Edgelord Ipek Gorgun – Exocannibalism Bridget Ferrill – What was the World to me IKSRE – karijini (iron. spinifex)

HI PODCAST LISTENER! You may have noticed how late I’ve been getting with these posts. It takes ages to write everything up, but I think it’s valuable. However, it’s been pointed out to me that people might want the podcast itself to be regular! So I’m now going to separate out the posts for the podcast feed from the main posts. You won’t get all the detailed review text, but you’ll get to listen sooner, and you’ll get the tracklisting itself still! Please let me know if this is good/bad/average. You can find a hint for my email on the website‘s sidebar. All over the place tonight, whether folktronica, percussive experimentalism, minimal dub techno, various drum’n’bass & jungle mutations, proto-postrock, or eerie sound-art… tunng – Anoraks Majken – Re-entering Lawrence English + Stephen Vitiello – with Brendan (Single Edit) Will Glaser – Theft JQ & Richard Pike – Free Paul St. Hilaire & Gavsborg – Confidential Paul St. Hilaire & Cousin – Back Inna Business Carrier – Carbon Works ealing – Down the Rabbithole Pushlock – Oblique Strategy The Untouchables – Rude Enforcer Disiniblud – Blue Rags, Raging Wind (Kerry McCoy Remix) PVAS – Terminal Igorrr – ADHD Obeka – A World No More Temp-Illusion – Hoax Haven Impérieux – Trampa seefeel – moodswing (demo) Nate Scheible – 02 John Wall – Construction I “Stat:Unt:Dist” Razen – hi-mawari Yara Asmar – to die on any hill (if it’s easy enough to climb) Nesa Azadikhah – The Wound Where The Light Enters

Experimental songforms, percussion, breakbeats, prepared piano, sound-art… LISTEN AGAIN to the art of sound… stream on demand at fbi.radio or podcast here. Not Drowning, Waving – Amaravot [Not Drowning, Waving Bandcamp] We’re starting with an Australian band who were really decades ahead of the ball with ambient pop, melding field recordings and live tapes with creative studio techniques, acoustic instrumentation, effects and electronics. Because of David Bridie‘s soft voice and slice-of-life lyrics, I feel Not Drowning, Waving were seen as less revolutionary than they really were – and yet when David released solo albums that emphasised songwriting over sonic creativity, the music media predictably celebrated his “maturity” and suchlike nonsense. I love David’s solo work, and the often-twee but always lovely work of the post-NDW acoustic ensemble My Friend The Chocolate Cake, but Not Drowning, Waving nevertheless hold a special significance. For many, their career higlight was the groundbreaking album Tabaran, much of which was recorded with musicians in Rabaul, Papua New Guinea including the remarkable vocalist Telek (now Sir George Telek MBE!). Their travels to PNG triggered the band’s strong sense of social justice, and they became tireless promoters of West Papuan independence. The song “Blackwater“, about the brutal suppression of independence for West Papua, is haunting and still as relevant today. Fast forward to now, and David Bridie & George Telek have been friends for more than half their lives. A concert performing Tabaran was put together early last year, celebrating 50 years of Papua New Guinean independence, and the band (including Telek) enjoyed being together so much that they created a whole album’s worth of new material. My dirty secret is that, despite the stunning highlights like “Blackwater”, I always preferred the albums before (Cold and the Crackle and Claim) and after it (Circus) in their catalogue because I wasn’t so into the Papuan stringband music. However, whether I’ve mellowed over the years (lol, lmao) or whatever it is, this new album feels wonderful from start to finish, and Telek is an integral member. What an achivement! I have no idea how it sounds to those who didn’t, to some extent, experience the band while they previously existed, but I hope they have an enduring legacy. On Diamond – It’s Me Calling [Eastmint Records/Bandcamp] Naarm/Melbourne’s On Diamond are the perfect example of indie pop done experimental. Frontwoman Lisa Salvo writes beautiful, touching songs that have slippery chord changes and deeply unusual arrangements created together by the band. Previous members, often involved in the more experimental end of Naarm’s music scene include the brilliant drummer/composer Maria Moles, drummer Joe Talia (who recorded & mixed the album), and guitarist/vocalist Hannah Cameron (who contributes backing vocals along with Aarti Jadu and others). Along with Salvo’s vocals, Jules Pascoe on bass, Myka Wallace on drums and Scott McConnachie on synths and those frequently demented guitar solos, the band itself now features the glittering harp of Genevieve Fry and the percussion of Australian legend Duré Dara, born in Malaysia to an Indian background, a celebrated restaurateur with Order of Austrlaia Medal as well as jazz musician and improvisor. That’s a loaded band, put in service of Salvo’s aforementioned songs, which take strange, sidelong looks at matters of grief, longing and the passing of time. In a better world we’d be hearing these songs on rotation all day, but you – yes you – have the power to fix that, in the palm of your hand. gushes – Game One [PTP/Switch Hit Records/Bandcamp] gushes – CUT [PTP/Switch Hit Records/Bandcamp] Trust PTP (aka Protect The Peace, fka Purple Tape Pedigree) to release one of the most bizarre & brilliant albums of the year (in conjunction with artist collective Switch Hit Records). Jennae Santos’ gushes presents an unrestrained amalgam of prog metal, psych rock, jazz & classical and electronic experimentation. But there’s more than just this: the album begins with voices talking in Tagalog, and influences from Indigenous Filipinx psychology and combat swirl around with land-sea ecologies, plant medicine and queer politics of decolonization… Delicious Collision is a fully-through-composed experimental rock opera, appropriately given Santos’ background (on top of everything else) in theatre, site-specific performance & dance. Agriculture – The Reply [The Flenser/Bandcamp] With The Flenser you know you’re going to expect dark, probably metal-adjacent music, and you know it’ll probably diverge from typical genre norms. Ecstatic black metal band Agriculture do indeed employ black metal’s tremolo guitars and blast beats to reach for altered states, but then the thunder gives way to a different kind of ecstasy at times – gorgeous harmonies and clean guitar? The last track on the album somehow combines it all together – blissful chugging blackgaze, and a fragile interlude of just voice and guitar. Channeling Zen Buddhism and social collapse alongside queer history & survival, The Spiritual Sound is easily among the albums of the year. sunn O))) – Raise the Chalice [Sub Pop/Bandcamp] So yeah, the southern lords of drone metal, sunn O))), have signed to Sub Pop, the little label that could. That’s the Sub Pop that was the centre of the Seattle sound, from Mudhoney & early Soundgarden to Nirvana – in fact Nevermind‘s profits, after their contract was bought out by Geffen, were what brought them back from early ’90s financial difficulties, and their (excellent) debut Bleach, which remained a Sub Pop release, was enough to keep the label chugging along for ages. The label pretty quickly expanded out of Seattle/grunge into all sorts of other areas, as diverse as Fleet Foxes, The Postal Service, and the greatest, Clipping. Still, the stentorian, rumbling noise of sunn O))) is an interesting step sideways, hopefully a great move for both parties. Their first EP for Sub Pop follows a 7″ (yes, two tracks under 6 minutes each!) back in 2023 for the Sub Pop Singles Club, but one side of this 12″ is the 14-minute “Eternity’s Pillars”, while the flip has 2 tracks each around 8 minutes – still pretty contained. The band for these tracks is the back-to-basics core duo of Greg “The Lord” Anderson and Stephen O’Malley, and the crushingly slow unison guitar/bass is by and large the totality of the sound, but I do love the disconcerting high-pitched flicker that rises through the last part of “Raise the Chalice”. Susannah Stark – Minor Gestures [Night School Records/Bandcamp/STROOM.tv/Bandcamp] When Utility Fog started back in 2003, folktronica was a genre of which I was very fond – but it was already pretty hazy as to what it was. Slightly glitchy hip-hop sampling acoustic instruments like Four Tet was what I thought, I guess, although when Tunng came on the scene literally later that year, it held a lot of similarity without quite being the same. And meanwhile The Books were doing studio-mediated music with acoustic instruments that somehow was something else entirely, despite arguably fitting the mould. So I love that in the years since, there have been untold different approaches to “folk” + “electronics”. On her new album Minor Gestures, Scottish musician Susannah Stark takes her Gaelic (Gàidhlig) folk music in experimental directions, which might involve drone passages on harmonium or modular synth, interpolated field recordings, or sample-based programming. The production touches only serve to heighten the sense of an arcane, otherworldly setting, as if being performed just out of sight or transmitted from a past-future. It’s quite a remarkable album. Haykal, Julmud, Acamol | هيكل، جلمود، أكامول – A'saab أعصاب [Bilna’es/Bandcamp] Cross-media artistic duo Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Ramme formed the record label & publishing platform Bilna’es along with producer Muqata’a as a space for artistic expression & criticism in Palestine & beyond. Along with the amazing productions of Muqata’a, a highlight was the 2022 solo album from Julmud, Tuqoos | طُقُوس. Now Julmud teams up with label founder Abbas, the latter under the name Acamol (Arabic for Panadol/paracetamol), along with Palestinian rapper Haykal on a new album Kam Min Janneh | كم من جنّة (How Many Heavens). The beats, produced by Julmud & Acamol separately & together, present a glitched version hip-hop drawn from the music & percussion of the MENA region, while Julmud & Haykal swap verses evoking the life of dispossession under occupation, colonization & genocide. It bears mentioning that while the killing continues in Gaza despite the so-called ceasefire, settlers continue to violently disrupt the lives of Palestinians in the West Bank with impunity – destroying property, beating and killing people and blocking access to their own land. In that context, this is a powerful work of resistance and solidarity (and some injections of humour). As I’m writing this late, you can read Emad Al Hatu’s excellent article on fbi.radio, as this was made album of the week at the beginning of November. Mohammad Reza Mortazavi – Zendegi [Latency/Bandcamp] Mohammad Reza Mortazavi – Silent [Latency/Bandcamp] French label Latency have no interest in following any kind of expectations – they’ll flip from chamber jazz to minimal techno to post-classical to percussive bass. In 2019 they released the album Ritme Jaavdanegi by Berlin-based, Iran-born percussionist Mohammad Reza Mortazavi, and now Mortazavi is back on Latency with his new album Nexus. The previous album showcased Mortazavi’s incredibly detailed and complex rhythms on traditional Persian instruments – the tombak and daf. On Nexus, Mortazavi’s playing is just as accomplished, but he extends the percussion with electronic effects and his own voice. The music is full of an otherworldly sensation, of suspension in time and place. There’s an incredible 25-minute remix by Ricardo Villalobos of the track “Swamp” from this album, coming out on December 5th – don’t miss it! IKI – Regenerate [IKI Bandcamp] IKI – Dance [IKI Bandcamp] It’s a sure bet that anything involving Danish singer Randi Pontoppidan is going to be something unique, challenging and beautiful. While she hasn’t been a member of Scandinavian vocal ensemble IKI since the beginning, she’s a perfect fit for IKI’s improvisational, electronically-mediated style. Pontoppidan joined Danish, Norwegian & Finnish singers Anna Mose, Guro Tveitnes, Johanna Sulkunen and Kamilla Kovacs four or five years ago, and BODY is their most intimate album. It can sound extremely electronic at times, but even at their most sharply edited & granulated, every sound comes from the voices of the five women. The recorded works reflect the group’s interest in how life extends past the body, and explores how the women become one organism when performing together. george-i & Older Brother – To Be A Man [GRACE/Bandcamp] Portugal-based MC Darius Rodrigues aka Older Brother has been working with London producer George Harris aka george-i for ages. Now the duo have finally come out with the Warm Skin EP on Berlin-based DJ Katiusha‘s label GRACE. And these four tracks of trip-hop-inflected bass music do walk with grace, holding Older Brother’s lyrics about the state of the world, and – on this closing track – seeking a new, post-patriarchy definition of maleness. Sun People – Herbie’s Delay [All Things Records] Austrian producer Sun People has released some creative and hard-hitting jungle & drum’n’bass that hybridizes with footwork and techno. His All Things Records provides an avenue for music of all kinds, so his new LP Look Within isn’t tied to any tempo – faster or slower than 160bpm, with a few beautifully-produced beatless tracks too. But as with “Herbie’s Delay”, there’s still some creative, syncopated jungle/d’n’b to be found too. Hyperfocus – Sentinel [Machinist Music/Bandcamp] For his fifth release (in two years!) on Canadian drum’n’bass master John Rolodex‘s Machinist Music label, Hyperfocus brings beats precision-tooled in the Machinist Music labs with evocative atmospheres and restless basslines. This is where the jungle revival bleeds back into the d’n’b mainstream, and I’m here for it. San – In Plain Sight [Rua Sound/Bandcamp] Appearing for a third time on Dublin jungle/bass label Rua Sound is Bristol’s San, a slightly mysterious individual who is apparently a techno producer working under a separate alias. This is dark stuff for haunting rave dancefloors and lying on your back with headphones on. Constantly changing cut-up breakbeats, deadly deep subs and spooky atmos, taking the cyberpunk ethos of mid-’90s drum’n’bass and applying it to contemporary jungle. POL100 – TRIBE [early reflex/Bandcamp] Turin’s early reflex label brings as usual cutting-edge experimental bass & club music as part of their Eyes series of two-track EPs. Here’s Italian producer POL100 mutating jungle and techno into strange new shapes – it’s half drumfunk and half electro maybe? Well worth your time. Hello Psychaleppo – Al Wa6an | الوطن [Fake Lines/Bandcamp] Joy Moughanni – I Can’t Seem to Find it At Home | مش عم لاقيه بالبيت [Fake Lines/Bandcamp] The first release from non-profit label Fake Lines has launched itself with a mega compilation – 36 tracks over 3 vinyl LPs – called Fake Lines: Sono Levant. It’s packed to the brim with excellent music, gregarious with genre – it may lean towards electronic music but there’s folk, hip-hop and rock of a sort. There’s an emphasis on Levant artists, but the tracklist also reaches further afield to other MENA countries and more. Montreal-based Syrian DJ Hello Psychaleppo contributes some stuttering samples and bass heft, while Lebanese producer Joy Moughanni combines jagged almost-rhythms and sound design to impressive effect. Lone – Ascension.png [Greco-Roman/Bandcamp] I’ve had an on-and-off relationship with Lone‘s music, but new single “Ascension.png” combines chromed cyberpunk and fuzzy vaporwave with jungle and rave bliss, and that makes a winner. Kelly Moran – Chrysalis [Warp/Bandcamp] A year and a half after releasing her last album, Moves in the Field, Kelly Moran returns to her more familiar territory of chiming prepared piano and electronics, with an album that’s complementary to last year’s. For Moves in the Field, Moran took her piano compositions and programmed them into a Disklavier, a physical piano that can be played via digital programming. So Moran was able to perform alongside her digital copy, with dazzling patterns climbing up and down the keyboard. On Don’t Trust Mirrors, the sound is more uncanny – synths and prepared piano melting into each other – but the performances are more clearly human. And those familiar with the previous album will hear echoes of those pieces throughout. Quartz Sand – Chemical Sedimentary (excerpt 2) [Flaming Pines/Bandcamp] I was lucky to get to see Kate Carr & Cath Roberts playing together at a gallery in Hoxton, London back in May. Carr is an Australian sound-artist who runs the impeccable Flaming Pines label and is one of our finest proponents of field recording, as well as music made from non-musical objects; Roberts is an improviser and composer who has been working with the Lyra-8 synthesizer, an “organismic” synthesizer, whose 8 voices interact in non-linear ways along with some effects. The duo’s name, “Quartz Sand”, suggests minerals and inorganic matter (quartz is silicon dioxide, perhaps the most basic inorganic molecule), and the idea of the album’s title, Stratigraphy, is to imply a vertical structure – rather than a typical horizontal time-based structure – as primary. But don’t be fooled: these two near-half-hour pieces aren’t static at all. It’s just that the action happens often between the crinkly, whistly high frequencies and the gurgling, grinding bottom end. It’s like listening to a cross-section of the earth’s crust – in a good way. Lea Bertucci – Two Way Mirror [Cibachrome Editions] It should be well-known and universally acknowledged now that Lea Bertucci is one of the best sound-artist/composers of the last decade and a half. Whether site-specific works exploring & exploiting – for instance – the resonance of a hollow bridge in Köln (2020’s Acoustic Shadows), myriad works live-processing her own saxophone and other instruments, or her work with reel-to-reel tape machines, she’s a master of her craft. Recent times have seen a number of incredible collaborations from Bertucci: in 2022, she operated tapes & electronics around Robbie Lee‘s baroque & medieval instruments on Winds Bells Falls, while on Murmurations, her tapes were as prominent, but she also brought various wind instruments and her voice to the table, next to Ben Vida‘s synths & voice; and on her tectonic collaboration in 2023 with Brisbane’s own Lawrence English, cello, viola and lap steel guitar emerge as well. Earlier this year Lawrence’s ROOM40 released an astounding work of Bertucci together with another masterful sound-artist, Olivia Block. So needless to say her new album The Oracle is a tour de force, engaging her many instruments, field recordings and, importantly, her own voice, all filtered through tape manipulation and digital processing. Only on the last track are percussionists from the Wesleyan University Taiko Ensemble enlisted for a booming – yet obscured – finale. Of course, it’s not just technially interesting or impressive (although it is those things) – it’s also music that will draw you in and move you, despite the vocals being twisted into non-textual shapes. It’ll easily be high on my albums of the year list for 2025. Alexandra Spence – Magenta (with Delphine Dora) [Students of Decay/Bandcamp] Back to Sydney to finish, Alexandra Spence is another brilliant sound-artist who works with field recordings and found objects to tell a story about place and memory. Her last two albums (from 2022) arose from a fascination with oceans and waterways; the scope is wider here, from mountains to backyards, but the ecological and geological also interact here with the personal. As well as recordings of places and non-musical objects, Spence (a clarinettist) here uses sounds from Serge Modular synths and a custom-built lyre, and on tonight’s track, Spence also brings in the voice and instrumentation of French composer & musician Delphine Dora. Listen again — ~222MB

Arabic trip-hop? Nordic jazz-inflected indie pop? Minimal drum'n'bass? Bees? Whatever you're looking for, we've got it. LISTEN AGAIN, with a vengeance! Stream on demand from fbi.radio, podcast here! Yasmine Hamdan – Vows سبع صنايع [Crammed Discs/Bandcamp] Yasmine Hamdan – Daya3 …Read more »

Like what you hear me play every week? Support fbi.radio, without which not just you & I but Sydney's music as a whole would be incalculably poorer. LISTEN AGAIN and feel the warm thrill of love… Stream on demand on …Read more »

It's the time of experimental pop at the moment – for very stretched interpretations of pop, perhaps. So we have many weird-ass songs tonight. Also some storming beats and some messed-up beats, some gorgeous acoustic sounds and some pretty messed-up …Read more »

Experimental song reaching out from all quarters tonight, in extremely different ways. A surprising South & Central American focus. We also have some experimental beats, some classical and jazz hybrids, and some sound-art. LISTEN AGAIN and sing yourself awake… Stream …Read more »

Tonight we're showcasing quite a lot of genre-bending songcraft, with metal, hardcore punk, electro-pop, hyperpop, Afro-Caribbean, post-folk and other tendencies melting together. We've also got percussive workouts, minimal techno, maximal jungle, unclassifiable rhythmic noise and glitched ambient piano in there …Read more »

Experimental pop hybrids, underground hip-hop, hip-hop-jazz hybrids, free jazz, free rock, dub, dub techno and industrial techno, experimental electronics of all sorts, North African electronic mutations, grinding drone, ambient-jazz Yolŋu, Norwegian folk-jazz… LISTEN AGAIN to some really good shit. Stream …Read more »

There's a lot of really interesting & strange pop, r'n'b, grime or even folk music tonight, proving perhaps that this is an era where flouting norms is the standard, and the paradox within that is celebrated. LISTEN AGAIN and flout …Read more »

Neo-classical electronic pop, contemporary jazz both electronic and acoustic, experimental metal, experimental beats. LISTEN AGAIN, experimentally. Stream on demand vai fbi.radio, podcast here. Darian Donovan Thomas – Microcosm Friend [New Amsterdam Records/Bandcamp] Last year, American violinist, composer and multimedia artist …Read more »

Another wet day in Sydney, a day on which an estimated 100,000+ of us walked across Sydney Harbour Bridge to protest Israel's starvation and genocide of Gaza, the occupation, the killing of children, and Australia's complicity. It was clearly more …Read more »

Uncanny simulacra abound through the music tonight. What is real? LISTEN AGAIN and just add to the confusion. Stream on demand via fbi.radio, podcast here. Mal Devisa – Next stop [Top Shelf Records/Bandcamp] Show Me The Body – Halogen (feat. …Read more »

As I was putting this show together, it felt like it was leaning heavily into bass & beats – and it is, to an extent, but it also has highly ethereal sounds, acoustic doom and acoustic prettiness, post-jazz forms and …Read more »

We have lots of miscellaneous experimental beats tonight, and different experimental versions of song, plus sound-art and noise, and kinds of ambient. I'm catching up on some stuff from when I was overseas, but also looking ahead to things not …Read more »

Experimental maneuvres in pop, hip-hop, jazz, rock and electronics, percussive approaches to musique concrète as well as jazz-rock-tronica, vinyl manipulations with dark electronics, spoken word, field recordings, ambient installation work and post-classical piano. LISTEN AGAIN to the percussion, the glitches, …Read more »

Beautiful songs and churning glitchscapes, accelerated hyperpercussion and sparse bass drops… A night of contrasts. LISTEN AGAIN to the song of life. Stream on demand from fbi.radio, podcast here. Herbert & Momoko – Calm Water [Strut/Herbert Bandcamp/Momoko Gill Bandcamp] Herbert …Read more »

Following Israel's unprovoked (according to all trustworthy intelligence) attack on Iran mostly as a distraction from the genocide they're still undertaking, Donald Trump unilaterally decided to bomb Iran today, bringing the world to the brink of… something, nothing good. Nobody …Read more »

He's baaaack! OMG. That was 6 weeks. A very full 6 weeks. So much to play you, so much to talk about. But I wanna extend HUUUUGE thanks to the seven beautiful people who filled in while I was away, …Read more »

Well! Tonight is my last show for 6 weeks. I'll be travelling in the UK & Europe, mostly touring with Black Aleph but with a bit of holiday time too. While I'm away, each Sunday will be covered by excellent …Read more »

Singles & tracks from forthcoming albums and new releases from hip-hop to doom, postrock to experimental electronic, breakbeat to techno, post-classical to post-jazz. LISTEN AGAIN, stick it in your pipe and smoke it. You can stream it on demand on …Read more »

Strange conglomerations of fluttery acoustic sounds, skittery electronic beats, seemingly-clashing cultural milieus… LISTEN AGAIN if you dare! Stream on demand from FBi, podcast here. Infinity Knives & Brian Ennals – A City Drowning. God's Black Tears. ft. The Lil Black …Read more »

Everything's off-kilter this week. It's not just the deranged tarrif-spewing orange menace… it's also the music? But… in a good way? Yeah. LISTEN AGAIN if you're off-kilter too. Stream on demand from FBi, podcast here. Infinity Broke – Snowdome of …Read more »

Lots of speedy beats tonight, whether underpinning grime vocals, post-classical synths, postpunk agitprop or… you name it. Plus contemplative guitars & strings, shoegaze and indie-jazz-pop. LISTEN AGAIN to capture all the details. Stream on demand from FBi, podcast here. Postcards …Read more »

Experimental song, guitar-triggered sample-mashing, electro-dub, industrial dub-metal, intricate percussion, ambient jazz… Just some of the well-known genres heard tonight. LISTEN AGAIN and invent some new genres. Stream on demand from fbi.radio, podcast here. Yasmine Hamdan – Shmaali شمالي [Crammed Discs/Bandcamp] …Read more »

Thanks so much to Amy Li for her fascinating selections last week while I was in Naarm with Zoe Jungist of FBi's own Variable Depth Audit DJing at the incredible Absorbed IV! That means I've got two weeks of new …Read more »

Your experimental fix for tonight has vocals sung and spoken and screamed, in a few different languages and in no language at all. Also jungle beats mushed into other genres, slapback echoes, manic electric guitars and soft piano. And that's …Read more »

Lots of vocals tonight, as spoken word, as songs, as cut-up textures… As usual we're already at a point where there's waaaay too much music out there. But hey, that means that everything here is rolled gold. LISTEN AGAIN, at …Read more »

Let me take you on a trip1… from lo-fi hip-hop to mutant jungle, dub techno to generative IDM, mushed free jazz to mutant harps and other acoustic instruments… It's just another week in the Utility Fog office. (there is no …Read more »

A lot going on in the world at the moment, dizzying amounts of WTF and it can be pretty anxiety-causing. But humanity continues to create great art, so let me share with you some of the boundary-pushing music of note …Read more »

One month into 2025… watching a country being dismantled is quite a horror story, so let's stay away from the news if we can, and listen to experimental music! LISTEN AGAIN via fbi.radio or our podcast here – it might …Read more »

Today is the day when so-called Australia is meant to celebrate its founding as a British colony. It's a day of sadness and contemplation for indigenous Australians, and should be for all of us. This always was, always will be …Read more »

Annnnnd we're back! Thanks heaps to Giulio for the last two Sunday nights' selections – fantastic stuff. I have complained before about how music doesn't stop being released, right through December and into the very beginning of the new year. …Read more »

It's the last Utility Fog of the year, but it's a doozy! A 2hr live DJ mix of as many of my favourite beats (and some other oddities) as I could fit. It's like a Utility Fog but with less …Read more »

Here we are at the end of the year. As is traditional, I'm doing THREE Best of 2024 shows, starting with “songs” tonight, instrumentals & sound-art next week, and a DJ mix of stuff with beats on December 29th. Of …Read more »

Last new music of the year! I mean, not the last new music to come out this year, but for me it is, as the next 3 shows will be my best-of round-up of 2024! There are a few mega …Read more »

Look, the year's coming to a close. What a fucking relief. Let it go, let it go. I mean, obviously 2025's gonna be a lot worse, but maybe it can also be better in some ways? Let's make it so. …Read more »

We're getting towards the end of the year and the new releases are refusing to let up. I take this as a personal affront. LISTEN AGAIN and get angry along with me at how much great music there is! Stream …Read more »

If you're looking for avant-pop, avant-Egyptian, sound-art, beat tapes, Iranian electronic, industrial bass, dubstep, idm, jungle, hit em, breakcore, drone, contemporary classical, electro-acoustic or just good ol'-fashioned postfolkrocktronica, you've come to the right place! LISTEN AGAIN and get your bearings. …Read more »

As we wake up to a world that's just a little (lot) more fascist that it was last week, there's some righteous anger, some despondency, and beauty for you tonight. Don't forget, everything is political: dancing is political, crying is …Read more »

Crazy mix of stuff tonight, music that somehow has beats when you wouldn't expect it, that has no beats when you might expect it, that's entirely acoustic when you'd think it was processed & edited… LISTEN AGAIN via the FBi …Read more »

Experimental sounds abound, wrong-song to maltreated beats, un-classical to dis-cordian. LISTEN AGAIN and nourish your soul. Stream on demand via FBi, podcast here. YATTA – MTV [PTP/Bandcamp] YATTA – Circle [PTP/Bandcamp] Last year, Sierra Leonean-American musician YATTA, who I've been …Read more »

Your weekly mix of experimental electronics, weird fusions, twisted acoustics and more. LISTEN AGAIN and rise from the murk. Stream on demand at fbi.radio, podcast here. Third Eye – Terminal 283 [Regular Records] This week brought the sad news that …Read more »

Some beautiful experimental song, and hyper beats, but lots of sound-art tonight. LISTEN AGAIN – you won't regret it. Stream on demand at the new fbi.radio, podcast here. Snakeskin – Homecoming [Mais Um/Bandcamp/Ruptured/Bandcamp] Julia Sabra and Fadi Tabbal (Snakeskin) – …Read more »

Covering ground from Iranian-American beats to English shoegaze-loop-pop, IDM, nu-skool-jungle, bass-heavy noise and noisy bass music, Middle Eastern-influenced electronic psych rock, the ever-cheeky Aphex Twin's ambient masterpiece orchestrated, postrock and sound-art. And that's just a taster! LISTEN AGAIN for the full flavour profile. Stream on demand @ FBi, podcast here. Maral - retrofit (feat. YATTA) […]

It's FBi's supporter drive right now - absolutely essential to keep shows like mine on-air (and in your feeds) each week! Please become a supporter or donate what you can by clicking here! LISTEN AGAIN to catch all the nuance. Stream on demand at the same place where you can support us, podcast here. Alan […]