Reviews

OnderStroom

Nine Circles The Early Days 2xLP

NINE CIRCLES formed in the early ’80s after all the men in a broken-up band formed new bands with their girlfriends to compete for a radio station competition. NINE CIRCLES won, and listening to this you can see why. Awkward, dark, damaged monotone art wave synth oscillations that sort of hover in the space between paranoia and irony and dreams… Lidia has a cool voice and this has an ominous, doomed feeling, that decay-of-the-cities style of the era encapsulated in sound. NINE CIRCLES became a minimal synth cult long after they broke up, and this reissue has a ton of never-properly-released stuff. I think if you are into synth-tinged damage from an underground/DIY punk perspective this would very much work for you…

Siglo XX Siglo XX LP

A vinyl reissue of SIGLO XX’s 1981 demo tape originally came out a decade ago; that pressing is long out of print so a new edition should please budget-minded post-punkers. JOY DIVISION is the primary influence here, though while SIGLO XX replicates the prominent baselines, skeletal guitar work and overall depressive ambience of Unknown Pleasures, the claustrophobic intensity of Factory’s finest is absent. (OK, it’s rather unfair to hold up a four-track demo recording to probably the greatest post-punk band of all time; SIGLO XX’s proper vinyl releases during this era were more more fully-formed.) Worth investigating for completists, but don’t hold off for too long as this repress is limited to 500 copies.