Loop - Twelves - VINYL LP

Style-wise, it's incredibly different, going back to thinking about guitars and guitar sounds. Obviously you have to take into consideration things like percussive elements such as drums, which I haven't been using in my other projects; but this is the mindset that makes up Loop. So says Robert Hampson, the indefatigable visionary behind inspirational sonic architects Loop, whose eagerly anticipated fourth LP Sonancy (Latin for Inchto create noiseInch) is the perfect document for these strange times. Dynamic, dystopian, righteously angry and unashamedly Loop-ian, it's an album that marks a vital re-emergence for Hampson and Co. Formed in South London in the mid-1980s, Loop blazed a trail with their potent mix of motorik beats and heavy guitar riffs, recording a trio of brilliant albums that set the indie charts alight before imploding in 1990 after the of album number three, A Gilded Eternity. As critics enthused at the time, Loop were the sound of Suicide jamming with the Stooges aboard a spaceship built by Hawkwind and piloted by CAN. They were post-psychedelic, pre-shoegaze figureheads in a world of anodyne pop jangle and baggy rhythms, and even their closest contemporaries like Spacemen 3 and My Bloody Valentine didn't plough such a distinctive furrow as theirs.

On March 20, 2020, Icelandic singer, songwriter and music producer Aslaug will her highly anticipated self-titled debut EP. Aslaug Vigfusdottir was born in Utrecht, The Netherlands. Taking inspiration from artists like The Japanese House, HAIM and Lykke LI, Aslaug blends dreamy synth chords, polyphonic drifts of vocals and emotive drum builds.'My grandmother, whom I was named after, was raised on a farm in the south of Iceland. She gave birth to her only daughter at the age of 21 and did not marry the father. My grandmother worked multiple jobs from a young age to provide for her daughter in the best way she could. Being the only child of a single mother, my own mother always had to rely on herself to get further in life. Making the choice to become a nurse, a profession that she chose because she wanted to be able to work in different countries, she made it her lifework to help other people. Meeting the love of her life at, what others would call the late, age of 33, she moved abroad with him to start a family and continued her work, building an international career. With role models like these I can't help but feel confident in my own resilience. Turbulence will come, and sometimes I might even cross my own boundaries, but that's part of life. My grandmother has said these all-encompassing words to herself, to my mother and to me

Born from the fractal innerworld of Vymethoxy Redspiders, better known as Urocerus Gigas from Leeds-based xenofeminist crisis energy rock duo Guttersnipe, The Ephemeron Loop's debut is a synaesthetic acid bath that cracks open the doors of perception to reveal a sonic landscape of ineffable beauty, divine femininity and continual transformation. InchPsychonautic EscapismInch sublimes Guttersnipe's teeth-gnashing spacegrind aesthetic leaving washes of dream pop ambience, dilated speedcore fusillades and shapeshifting psychedelic dub effects. It's an album that lodges itself creatively between Cocteau Twins, Arca, Basic Channel and Napalm Death, lysergically fluxing imperceptibly between seemingly contradictory sonics and philosophies. Miss VR took 14 long, difficult years to write the album, which developed cautiously as she broke through the misery of her pre-transition life with shoegaze music, rave and psychedelic drugs in Leeds' queer underground. An existence languishing in negativity, soundtracked by extreme music was replaced with the opportunity to experience euphoria, elation and ecstatic freedom, emotions that coalesce sensually on InchPsychonautic EscapismInch. These formative experiences are the album's initial building blocks, assembled between 2007 and 2018 as Miss VR came to grips with her reality as an autistic/ADHD trans woman and the multi-dimensional psychotropic experiences that assisted that realization. And as V's worldview expanded and shifted as she lived a fresh life, the music itself developed spiritually. In 2018, after being impressed with producer Ross Halden's work with Guttersnipe, Miss VR asked him to assist her with developing The Ephemeron Loop's fragmented songs and visions. InchI learned a lot about why people don't usually combine various kinds of sounds or styles in music,Inch she admits. InchIt is very difficult to get it to all w