Paul and a few others recently asked me when I was going to write about the upcoming Festival Kinetik, and I am happy to oblige. For those of you who haven’t heard about Festival Kinetik, it’s a new electro/industrial/noise festival that is replacing the C.O.M.A. Festival which ran from 2004 until 2007. It will take place in Montreal, Canada from May 15th to the 17th and will feature dozens of bands and DJs from North America and across Europe, including 5 from Germany. They are Funker Vogt, Kiew, Noisuf-X, Feindflug, and Xotox. Also worth noting, this will be the first North American appearance by the latter 2 bands.

Tickets and other info for attendees
Tickets to the festival are available in the Kinetik Store at various prices depending on what the package includes. The festival website also has lots of information for anyone who might be travelling from a distance about hotels, places to eat, and lots of other stuff about the city of Montreal.

Listen to the bands of Festival Kinetik
ArtOfFact has a 2CD compilation that has music by most of the bands that will be performing at the festival (plus a few extras) called Festival Kinetik Volume 1. While this is a great mix for fans to pick up, it’s also a terrific sampler for anyone who wants to learn more about the festival’s bands before making the decision whether to go or not. You can actually listen to every song from the compilation right there on the website. Just click on a track name and then look to the left side of the screen and click the play button. If you like it, the 2CD compilation is just 12.99 CAD to purchase.

Are you going?
Is anyone planning to go to Festival Kinetik? Leave a comment if you plan on attending, or if you just have something to say about one of the bands.

Mark your calendars! Xotox is scheduled to play at the Kinetik Festival which takes place on May 15th through the 17th in Montreal, Canada. Xotox’s performance is on the 17th, and it will be their first (and only, so far) concert appearance this side of the Atlantic. If you like their music and you’re in the area, heading to the festival would be a great way to show your support. You’re sure to see some other cool industrial bands playing there, too.

For those of you not familiar with Xotox, I would suggest downloading some MP3 samples from their site or listening to some music on their MySpace page. Xotox plays a really cool combination of electro-industrial bordering on noise. If you’re into that kind of style, I think you’ll like it.

FabrikC is another industrial band that has a new record coming out on October 26th. Impulsgeber will be released on Pro Noize Records (part of the Dark Dimensions label group) with 16 tracks in total. The first dozen are all original and are followed by 3 remixes and another bonus track.

Impulsgeber is definitely towards the harsher, noisier end of industrial. Combichrist comes to mind when I listen to the samples on their MySpace page. I really like it. One of my favorite bands, Feindflug, isn’t too far away in terms of the sound, either. MusicNonStop has a few other MP3 samples that you can download to try it out. Isotank will also have the CD available.

FabrikC - Impulsgeber tracklist
01. Impulsgeber
02. 100% Elektronik
03. Chinese Food
04. Klangaktiviert
05. N.H.N.S.
06. X³
07. Andere Welt
08. Parasit
09. Schalltod
10. Folter
11. Exorcism
12. Machtpolitik
13. N.H.N.S. (Remixed by Noisuf-X)
14. Klangaktiviert (Frosted by Xotox)
15. Schalltod (S.A.M. Remix)
16. Absolvo Te (In Memoriam Francisca)

Herz Jühning is a new musician who was recently signed to the label Galakthorrö and will be presenting his debut release tomorrow, September 24th. Faces is an EP of 4 “angst pop” tracks (so says the label description) but there’s really nothing “pop” about it. I would call it something more like dark minimalist electronic, bordering on powernoise. The “angst” part of their description fits, though. I would say if you like Jühning’s more well-known labelmates Haus Arafna, you’ll like this music, too. It’s basically the same style.

Check out some songs from the EP on Herz Jühning’s MySpace page. If you like it and don’t already know about Haus Arafna, check them out, too. I recommend their album Blut, one of my favorites of this harsher sound.

Getting back to Herz Jühning’s new EP Faces, it is available only as a 7″ vinyl record. No CD version is available as far as I can tell. The release is also limited to 510 copies. The label’s site says they are all already sold out, but you can easily find a Faces EP on a site like Infrarot.de.

Herz Jühning - Faces tracklist
01. Anorexia
02. I Deserve
03. Faces
04. Rituals

Rustblade Records is releasing their latest compilation Schlagstrom, Volume 2 on Friday the 14th. 2 discs feature 21 tracks that vary in style from industrial to powernoise to outright sonic chaos. This isn’t exactly music for the faint of heart… definitely an aquired taste. While I do like some of the tracks I’ve sampled, (thanks to the audio player on Infrarot.de) I can’t say I’ll be jumping up out of bed on Friday to order this compilation. I know people who would, though…

Also available at Isotank for my fellow Americans.

Schlagstrom tracklisting

CD1:
01. 1979 - Stromschlag
02. Dazzling Malicious - Hell, whores high heels componist
03. Proyecto Mirage - Catecismo Electrico
04. dr.nexus - Medicine
05. Empusae - Nilfheim (godlike)
06. Sonar - Chrome Intruder
07. Insekt - Where is the party?
08. P.A.L. - Agentenfister (fist faster rmx)
09. Muckrackers - Monoton (abrasiv blast mix)
10. Monokrom - 1610
11. Mono No Aware - Minikui Ni Natta mit Chor

CD2:
01. Hybryds - Ulunda
02. Bahntier - Dispute wormix
03. Detune-X - Erosion2
04. Adam X - Tooth&Nail
05. Norm - Jog
06. Yann Keller vs. Hecate - Freeimprovisation
07. SCReeningIPT - Shooting lips Invation (remix)
08. Desdemona - Garage minimal
09. Sandblasting - Breaking Rules (2007update)
10. Mezire - Corrosion Effects (Oxidation Mix)

The Danish duo of Arzt+Pfusch has always gone against the grain for as long as I can remember. Their official biography is a quaint little story that describes how the 2 musicians started recording music as 7-yearold children at an all-night drinking session, intending to create “some kind of sexy country western music, but accidently it turned out to be like a mixture of medicine, hell and pubescent belches.” The artwork in their albums is filled with bizarre diagrams of the human anatomy. They have song titles like “Anal Toothbrush”, “Hippie Doctors From Outer Space”, and “Cthulhu Supermarket”. Yeah, they’re out there. So it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that they decided to release their latest album S.I.C.K. entirely for free on their website under a Creative Commons license.

Under this license, Arzt+Pfusch is giving away their album to anyone who wants to download it. There are several versions available including a CD-quality version, a high quality VBR (variable bitrate) MP3 version, and a 64-bit MP3 version. The complete album artwork is also available in full 300-dpi printing quality if you feel like burning the album onto a CD and putting it in a jewel case to have the complete package. As of August 15th, you can download all of the files from arztpfusch.com underneath the player.

You may share the album S.I.C.K. with anybody you want as long as you don’t profit from it or change it, so go ahead and infect your friends. If you still want to hear a few tracks before downloading the album for some reason, you can visit the Arzt+Pfusch MySpace page or right on the band’s site.

S.I.C.K.
01. Hippie Doctors from Outer Space
02. Cthulhu Supermarket
03. Plus, und Oder Kaufmannsund
04. Better Than You
05. Soul of Intestinal Wit
06. The Wheelchair Kommando Ate My Sheep Loving Baby
07. Shove It
08. No Evolution
09. Bombs Over Bag-Dad
10. Pop

Just a quick update about the new Mezire album I told you about a few days ago… It seems that the release date discrepancy was caused by the band’s distributor which pushed it to August 31st, but the band has been selling the album since the 17th. I guess that means both dates are correct. Either way, you’ll be able to get the album without a problem.

Also, Mezire just uploaded 3 songs from the new album Corrosion Effects to their label’s site (look under the Audio link in the menu). They are also available on the band’s site in the Media page.

Thanks to Dirk and Frank from the band for letting us know about the changes.

There seems to be some confusion about Mezire’s new album Corrosion Effects. Both their site and their MySpace page say the album was already released last week on August 17th, but all of the major retailers are saying that the album isn’t out until August 31st. (Does it matter what the band says if nobody is selling it yet?) It looks like only the Zero01One shop via their site actually has the album for sale yet. This is a poorly managed CD release, for sure.

OK, so what about the music? Mezire is described as “a very extreme and perfect balanced mix between power electronics, industrial and dark elctro sounds” according to their label. You’ll have to travel to the Media page of their site to find out what this combination sounds like. But I’ll give you a hint, it’s very harsh and noisy. Actually, it sounds a lot like what I’ve been working on with my own music project. But we run into a problem again. You still won’t find any music from their new album on this Media page. How do they expect to promote their new album without giving anybody a clue about what it sounds like. I’d love to hear something from it, but they don’t seem to want to sell any music. Shame.

Corrosion Effects
01. Corrosion Effects (Initiation-Mix)
02. The Last War
03. Penal Colony
04. Gun
05. Instincts
06. Waiting
07. Dirty Bomb
08. Blast Furnace
09. Suffer (Edited-MMS-Mix)
10. Corrosion Effects