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ROVELLASCA / UNFEELING

Textured, hissing tones give way to the sound of slowly dragging a cassette recorder behind you that is playing the recordings of slowly dragging a cassette recorder behind you.

Rovellasca is the prolific solo presence of sound and visual artist Craig Stewart Johnson, also of Death In Scarsdale, Liminal Haze and the curator of the impeccable Invisible City Records label.

Half-slept soundscapes succumb to the resonant rumblings of an unsettled sense of self on Derek Rush’s second release as UNFEELING, the first for Modern Tapes. The title NEUROBIOLOGICAL TRAUMATOLOGY, refers to actual physical changes that can occur in the brain due to emotional trauma. The music stirs misfiring synapses, pulsating blood vessels, and woozy sensations into the kind fog you can only remember in the moments just after you wake up.

mt039 SBTDOH- ‘Kill; We Care Not’ c25

16 tracks of disjointed and relentless harsh noise. From cut up to chaos this frenetic collection of blistering sentence fragments does not let up. SBTDOH is a prolific artist with a deep catalog and Modern Tapes is incredibly grateful to have this release, its silences are just as powerful as it is at full blast. Limited edition with silkscreened jackets and photocopied insert.

V/A – ‘Flirting With The Noise Floor’ 3xC30 box

3 tapes. 6 projects. an hour and a half of minimalist sound. 15 minutes each from:

Sergey Pakhomov, James Shearman, E.F. Stoermer, Dosis Letalis, PTRKLLR, V.H.

The phrase “flirting with the noise floor” has been floating around my head since the mid 1990s. I’ve even said the phrase out loud a few times. Mostly in reference to silence, incidental sounds and space used in improvisation and composition. I spent a good part of the early 2000s focusing on variations of this idea in both what I was making and listening to. Years later, I became aware of a renewed interest in what had by then become known as ‘lowercase sound’ coming from people in the Harsh Noise Wall community. The overlap made sense to me considering HNW’s approach to the other pole of extreme minimalism. It was only a matter of time before the extremes would cross over to one another. This is a collection of artists who are doing just that; coming from a harsh noise background exploring nuance and texture with extreme focus and intensity but not necessarily the relentlessness normally associated with HNW.

VIOLETIGER ‘Transformation’ 12″ and video

The debut from this Vienna based duo finds Violet Candide aka Peppy Pep Pepper, also from Mitra Mitra teaming up with the enigmatic Tigerlilly to bring us 5 tracks of stark, hook-filled, DIY, minimal synth greatness. A stellar introduction to this new project.

vinyl released on Sept 30, 2020 go here to order it
for EU friends, it will be available from Kernkrach as well so you can save on shipping

Staring Problem ‘Eclipse’ pre-order

Early goth overtones, proto-shoegaze allure and raw DIY production have informed this incredible collection of songs. With themes ranging from love and loss to science fiction as well as flora and fauna, Chicago’s Staring Problem give us their strongest work to date in celebration of their and Modern Tapes’ 10th year not only in collaboration but in existence.

pre-order here

Here’s the video for the title track.

HUMAN ASPIC + CLOSING

Harsh noise expose of the unspoken usage of human originated meat (HOM) as a part of the american food supply since 1942.
cassette is pro-dubbed and printed in a two color silkscreened cardstock jacket with photocopied booklet.
download includes pdf booklet of notes including an excerpt from FDA depositions on the history of the Human Salvage Program and a video edit (mp4) of “The Whistle Is Blown” which can also be viewed here: youtu.be/TnKDBA6FnZE

Dissonant drones and a hissing, murky ambience. The sound of isolation, slumber, depravity, rebellion, lonliness, whatever you want to project onto it. Grim minimalism for weary ears.
cassette is hand dubbed with a silkscreened jacket and photocopied insert.

Dosis Letalis “surroundings” and Verhalten “corrupted structures v.3”

mt035- Dosis Letalis Surroundings c60
this prolific serbian noise wall artist goes understated for his modern tapes debut. static and what feels like the hum of living are buried underneath the textures, ambient in an uncomfortable way.

mt034- Verhalten Corrupted Structures v.3 c40
third in the series of releases focused on humanity’s obsession with designing its own obsolescence. This time the focus is pointed inward. Electromagnetic field recordings from various points in the town where this transient sound mangler was raised. Chopped up, spit out in misaligned patterns and clipped beyond recognition.

there will be/are copies available from Scream + Writhe in canada and Skeleton Dust in the states if you’d like to stock up on these releases as well as tons of other stellar noise and experimental releases.

DOSENÖFFNER and SCHOLL

NOW AVAILABLE! two brand new tapes from the mangled mind and electronics of Peter Keller (Unser Verhängnis, Bacillus, Condo Horro, etc.).

Mt030 Dosenöffner “Push For Signal” c60 + download

the duo of Peter Keller (aka Unser Verhängis, Scholl, Condon Horro, Bacillus) and Casey Chittenden Jones creates evolving textures of modular noise ranging from the harsh to the understated. an intriguing collection of improvised sounds captured live.

mt031 SCHOLL “Angesichts Konstanter” c60 + download

augmented debut release by this new project from Peter Keller (Unser Verhängnis, Condo Horro, Dosenöffner, Bacillus, ad infinitum). repetitive noise for a paranoid dancefloor that doesn’t exist.

NEW RELEASES for fall 2018. Rien “the grey tape” and Verhalten “corrupted structures v.2” PLUS a new batch of “This Machine Kills Fascists” tshirts with more sizes!

mt028 and mt029 header

Hello everyone! Here’s a doozy of an update for you. TWO new releases as well as “this machine…” shirts reprinted and in more sizes (XS and XL)!

mt028- RIEN “the grey tape” c40
the sound of implosion, of sound eating itself. we hear what is left behind.
stellar static noise (and sub sonic) minimalism from this prolific swedish provocateur.

mt029- VERHALTEN “corrupted structures v.2” c60
Second in a continuing series of releases for Verhalten. Distorted rhythms are woven with crackling walls of noise and syncopated sine waves pushing the further reaches of the audio spectrum. An exercise in tonality, texture and repetition. A minimalist exploration of the structures humanity creates to its own detriment.

Cassettes, downloads and shirts are all available now from Modern Tapes.

artist copies are enroute and will be available at live performances and online from them soonly.

ANOTHER new Verhalten cassette!

hot on the heels of last month’s release of Number, Verhalten returns with a brand new two track, 22min EP that will serve as the first in a series of releases called Corrupted Structures. Based on inconsistency and a sense of chaos as much as it is based on repetition and the build of inertia, Corrupted Structures v.1 crumbles and hisses all around us just like the people, movements and institutions we feed daily.

mt027 vh cs1

limited edition of 15.