Electrify Me

Rheinzand's second album Atlantis Atlantis is one of this year's favourites at Bagging Area. Rheinzand (Reinhard Vanbergen Charlotte Caluwaerts and Mo Disko) are from Ghent, dance/ house/Balearic/ nu disco pioneers. Earlier this year Mo and Charlotte appeared at the northern launch night for Disco Pogo, the new revived and updated version of the legendary Jockey Slut magazine, published twice yearly. The event was at Electrik in Chorlton and Mo was DJing. At one point I caught him as we passed each other in the bar and I told him how much I loved the album- he broke into a massive smile and gave me a huge hug. 

Rheinzand have just released an expanded version of Atlantis Atlantis with two new extra songs- this one, the nine minute dark disco odyssey of Electrify Me is a stunner with a bouncy, ascending bassline, dark synths and twin vocals. Buy the album and the new songs here. 

Our boiler packed up last night leaving us with no radiators while the temperature dropped to minus five outside, and little hot water. Despite my best efforts at defrosting the condensate pipe (standing in the garden alternating between pouring hot water on it and aiming a hair dryer at it for two hours), it remained resolutely un- defrosted. So either it was too frozen or I didn't do it for long enough. Or the boiler's broken. One of those moments where you think everything's against you. 

High Tide Low Tide

This song came out a year ago, the first taste of Rheinzand's second album. Written as a tentative celebration of emerging from the two years of Covid and lockdowns, a burst of optimism drenched in Rheinzand's signature Balearic dance pop, We'll Be Alright was the group's way of saying 'we made it through, we will be alright'. 

The second verse, sunny positivity tinged with sadness, sees Charlotte singing, 'To live without regret/ a chance to reset/ to live and fade to black/ take your moment back', and then soars upwards with, 'A little bit of fun/ Never killed anyone// High tide, low tide/ We'll be alright'. 

It's become a song that runs through my head often, one that lifts and cheers me, and admittedly leaves me a bit rueful on occasion- can you live without regret?- but which has become one of 'my songs'. I played it in the Golden Lion on Saturday night as the pub was filling up and things were heating up a bit in the evening and had a little internal moment. 

'This no man's land/ needs a footprint in the sand/ waves erase the shore/ time for letting go'. 

We'll Be Alright

Where Do We Go On A Saturday Til The Morning Light?

Back in February I started writing some guest posts at Ban Ban Ton Ton, Dr. Rob's one stop shop for all things Balearic, electronic and dance music oriented. I haven't posted any links here since I wrote about Richard Norris' February Music For Healing, a twenty minute long ambient track called Chrome, and Nina Walsh's Music To Fall Asleep To and then in March the new album by Belgium's Rheinzand, Atlantis Atlantis, a record shaping up to be one of 2022's best. Last month I went to the launch party for Disco Pogo, the relaunched Jockey Slut magazine. Mo and Charlotte from Rheinand were one of four people scheduled to DJ in Electrik in Chorlton. At an opportune moment I spoke to Mo and told how much I like the album and that I'd reviewed it for Ban Ban Ton Ton. In response he gave me a big hug. 

Since March I've written a further six reviews, hopping around Europe and the world musically, with more in the pipeline. In chronological order then, with links to Ban Ban Ton Ton where you can listen to many of the tracks from the albums- 

Field Works- Stations

An album in two parts, the first a set of recordings done by Stuart Hyatt (in association with The National Geographic Society and The Anchorage Museum) where Hyatt used microphones and ground recording devices to record the sound of the earth. He then added human voices to create a found sound/ ambient ten track album that is frequently beautiful. The second part sees the ten tracks (Field Stations) remixed. My review at Ban Ban Ton Ton is here. 

Société Étrange- Chance 

French instrumental three piece cooking a storm- there are references and comparisons to A Certain Ration, King Tubby, Tortoise, Adrian Sherwood, Can and Jah Wobble in my review which you can read here. Six echo laden, post- punk/ cosmic instrumentals.

Andreas Kunzmann- Album

Austrian 90s IDM/ techno made for home listening. Lots of fun and very engaging. Read more here. 

The Balek Band- Medicines

Back to France, Nantes to be more exact, and some delirious, open minded dance music, a melding of synths and electronics with live instruments to make some lovely, exuberant, shape shifting Balearic/ cosmische/ nu disco/ house/ whatever else you can think of. Read and listen here. 

BSS (AMS)- Bredius

Mysteriously titled artist and EP from Amsterdam, Dutch ambient techno with splashes of Detroit and Blade Runner and more besides. Four track EP, my review is here. 

Rich Ruth- I Survived, It's Over

Nashville ambient/ instrumentalist Rich Ruth made the excellent Calming Signals back in 2019. His new album builds on the sounds on that album and the trauma of a carjacking outside his home to make one of 2022's most far reaching records, righteous drone/ ambient/ spiritual jazz. Read more here. 

For those of you who'd like a Bagging Area meets Ban Ban Ton Ton uptown primer/ sampler I put this together, a forty minute mix featuring one song from each of the albums reviewed above. 

Bagging Area Meets Ban Ban Ton Ton Uptown 

• Field Works: Station 2
• Field Works: Station 4 (Afrodeutsche Remix)
• BSS (AMS): De Regenboog
• Andreas Kunzmann: Sputnik Rave
• Société Étrange: La Rue Principale Grandrif
• The Balek Band: Cosmic Barry
• Rich Ruth: Doxology
• Rheinzand: Atlantis Atlantis

There will now follow a break in transmission until early August. School finished yesterday and we're getting away today, off on our holidays for ten days in the sun in the Canaries. See you all when I get back. Adios amigos. 

Elefantasi

People used to joke that you couldn't name five famous Belgians* as if that somehow marked the country down. Fame is overrated anyway isn't it? Belgium has a rich musical history from New Beat to the present day and is especially influential in dance and electronic music. I've written quite a few times before about Rheinzand, a three piece from Ghent who make fantastic dance pop spliced with Balearica and disco. Multi- instrumentalist/ producer Reinhard Vanbergen, singer Charlotte Caluwaerts and producer/ DJ Mo Disko cook up a shimmering, unapologetic dance floor oriented storm. The single We'll Be Alright was one of my favourites from last year. Their 2020 self titled debut album was a wall to wall treat, from the cover of Talking Heads Slippery People to the nagging electronic bliss of Fourteen Again. They also roped in all and sundry to remix it, a slew of outstanding remixes from the likes of Red Axes, Scorpio Twins, Chris Coco, Pete Herbert, Skylab, Superpitcher and so on. This one, Obey (Hardway Bros Stereo Odyssey), as remixed by Sean Johnston's Hardway Bros is utterly sublime and seductive leftfield dance music.

Part of the recent cross blog pollination between this blog and Dr Rob's Ban Ban Ton Ton led to me reviewing the forthcoming Rheinzand album. You can read that here. The single Elefantasi has been recorded and released digitally in five different languages- English, French, Dutch, Italian and Spanish- and at Bandcamp you can download a Make Your Own version (that's Belgian for instrumental). Elefantasi is sumptuous, trippy Nu Disco with an imaginary Peter Hook on bass. 

* Obviously it's not even that difficult- Eddy Merckx, Herge, various footballers (Enzo Scifo from the 80s and several current modern ones such as Romelu Lukaku, Eden Hazard and Kevin de Bruyne), Adolphe Sax, Magritte- and that's without resorting to Google. All men I've just noticed however. 

We'll Be Alright

Rheinzand's new single appeared at the end of last week, the first taste of their second album. We'll Be Alright is a perfect slice of mellow, optimistic pop, drenched in their house/ disco/ dub production with a bubbly 60s bassline and a sitar solo- what else could you ask for? The first play left me a little unsure but it's a grower and repeated plays bring repeated rewards. Lovely sounds hitting all the right notes, We'll Be Alright is a dancefloor gem and has arrived at the exact point where autumn looks beautiful, the trees a riot of greens turning to oranges, bronzes and reds (just before we get plunged into the gloom of November).   

Quarterfinals

It's Friday and it's July. There are Euro 20 quarterfinals on over the weekend, including England Marxists taking on Ukraine tomorrow night, and the Tour de France is well under way. The sun has been shining and the summer holidays are within touching distance. 

Here's some music for tonight's Italy versus Belgium clash, a real heavyweight quarterfinal between a Belgium side packed with talent and well placed to win their first international trophy against a young, revitalised Italian team. In the Belgian end there's Rheinzand, Ghent's top of the table Balearic/ house/ disco outfit and a slice from their recently released remix album which features versions from the likes of Superpitcher, Skylab, In Flagranti and Chris Coco and this funky delight, a remix of Queen Of Dawn by Pete Herbert.

In the the curva sud for Italy we have Pop Will Eat Itself, the Black Country's grebo sampling kings who made the still fantastic sounding piano house tribute to Italia 90 and porn star turned politician Cicciolina. New Order get all the plaudits for making a credible/ good football record in the summer of 1990 and there's no doubt that World In Motion was a sign that things were changing, but Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina is that summer's secret weapon, the supersub who scores the winner in injury time. 

Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina (Extra Time Mix)

And for further extra time/ Friday fun Lorde's new single, Solar Power, has been spliced together with Loaded to make Lorded. It's the from Joe Muggs and it works. You can find it here . The original's no slouch either. 

Cosmic Silence

This is yesterday's long song, delayed to Tuesday by my daughter's birthday. Reinhard Vanbergen has become my go to Belgian musician over the last year with 2020's bumpity- bumpity Balearic/ house/ disco Rheinzand album, this year's album celebrating a restaurant in Ghent with Charlotte Caluwaerts and now this eleven minute instrumental.

Cosmic Silence is out on Kenneth Bager's Music For Dreams label, a digital compilation called Copenhagen 21. Starting out slow and ambient and bringing a gently rippling synth sound in before a violin drifts in, long keening sweeps of the bow against the strings- I have to be say that the violin is not my favourite instrument usually but here it is very special indeed, all the pieces in place building gradually and filling the room. Quite the trip. 

Copenhagen 21 is at Bandcamp and Cosmic Silence, one of nineteen tracks on the album, is here. In 2019 Rheinzand remixed fellow Belgian Mugwump's No Trepidation, a very swish piece of electronic music with a couple of unexpected turns. 

No Trepidation (Rheinzand Remix)

Strange World

It turns out that Ghent, Belgium is the actual centre of the dance/ Balearic/ electronic/ indie/ disco world, the place where all the lines converge. Rheinzand, a trio from that town, made one of last year's best albums, a cross pollinating, shiny, slinky record, vivid, alive and brightly coloured that pushed all the right buttons and sounds equally good played through headphones while walking, in the car while commuting or on your home stereo system at volume. Strange World is a builder, growly and insistent with some Spaghetti Western whistling and a red hot slow motion glow. 

Strange World

A four track remix EP came out recently with four different songs from the album tackled by four different, sympathetic remixes- Hardway Bros, Red Axes, In Flagranti and Richard Sen. Sen's version of Strange World is here at Bandcamp, a ten minute odyssey built around an acid house sequencer and drum machine, making the song more streamlined but just as out there. Bells ring, strings swoop, the bassline hypnotises, drums pad away.

Monday's Long Song

Isolation day eight, over half way through now. 

Rheinzand released one of 2020's best albums back in the spring, a delicious blend of Balearic, disco, house and pop from Ghent, Belgium. The song Obey has been remixed and Hardway Bros manage to improve on something that was already close to perfect. Long, deep, sultry, dancing grooves. Lifts the gloom a bit I have to say. Buy the whole remix package at Bandcamp. 

The Live At The SSL Dub is even further out there, messy and murky.

Isolation Mix Eleven

This week's mix is made up entirely of songs released during lockdown, since mid- March 2020. Some of them have been written and recorded during this period. I could easily have doubled the length of this so maybe I'll come back to this and do a part two. This one has the trippy psyche of Sonic Boom, dusty funk desert blues from Ess O Ess, some dubby jazz (or jazzy dub) courtesy of Jah Wobble, Number's post- punk dance stance, yet more excellence from Weatherall and Walsh's Woodleigh Research Facility, Justin Robertson and Sofia Hedblom's blend of Nigerian rhythms and electronic dub, Dan Wainwright's pagan chug and some Balearic bliss from Joe Morris, Rich Lane, The Long Champs and a cover by Rheinzand. There's one segue which is a bit of a mess but it'll have to do. Life has surface noise and all that.



Sonic Boom: Just Imagine
Ess O Ess and Saul Richards: Totem (Swamp Crawl)

Jah Wobble: Lockdown 5 (Forbearance)

Number: Red Flag

Woodleigh Research Facility: Karra Mesh

Formerlover: Correction Dub

Dan Wainwright: A Blessing

Joe Morris: The New Dawn Will Come

Rich Lane: Barry Island (The Long Champs Dub)

Rheinzand: All By Myself

Ghent

More Belgian music. This album has been working its way into my life and has become a current favourite, a kitchen disco album and a real treat. Straight outta Ghent, Rheinzand are a trio making modern 2020 electronic dance music, covering a range of sub- genres from house to nu- disco to Balearic to indie funk. The squelchy, juddering funk and timbales of opener Blind kick things off in a very upfront way, Charlotte Caluwaerts vocals coming in eventually, snapping at how 'an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind' with steamy, whispered early house backing vocals raising the temperature again.



The kickdrums and snares of Kills And Kisses are immense, Charlotte's isolated, heavily treated voice on top, creating strange distorted dance music. The pulsing Fourteen Again, with a low throbbing whooshing sound and a splashy cymbal, builds for ages, layers of Morodor synths and keys, before the 'I wish I was fourteen again'' chant enters, low and insistent in the mix.



It's followed by a cover of Talking Heads' Slippery People, a slow, sticky and unhinged take on the song that is quite superb. If we were allowed to dance in dark basements in close quarters with other people, this would doing the trick



There are disco influences are all over the album too, sweeping strings and syn- drums. From start to finish it's a complete album, that can be consumed in one sitting and works equally as twelve individual songs for dancing too. Buy it at Bandcamp. From Belgium with love.