Monkeytown Records have announce that after 9 studio albums released on well established labels such as Domino, Thrill Jockey, Ipecac and Rough Trade, Mouse on Mars have now found a home on Monkeytown Records. After Siriusmo’s “Mosaik” and “Pearls & Embarrassment”, Modeselektor’s “Monkeytown” and eLan’s “Next 2 Last”, Mouse on Mars will release their 11th album, Parastrophics on February 27, 2012 as Monkeytown’s 5th artist album.
They also play London on Friday 25 November 2011.
Mouse on Mars & André de Ridder with musikFabrik November 25, 2011 London – Barbican
Mouse On Mars might have emerged as part of the great 1990s new wave of electronic music, but their restless, irreverent and wildly inventive work has always set them apart from their contemporaries. For Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma there is no division between the cerebral and the physical – they combine a connoisseur’s love of sonic texture with a hedonistic urge to dance. Even at its most complex, their music never feels too intellectual, and even at its most experimental it’s never forbidding.
An album with singing bass drums, screwed up beats, tinnitus synths and some of the deepest bass the universe has to offer, Parastrophics is a thriving vision of the other side of experimental music. Discordance turns into pop as Alice in Wonderland bounces her booty to laser bass sounds, the likes of which would make Walt Disney jealously ponder the question, “Why didn’t I think of that?!” Parastrophics is glamorous, funky and deep. No speakers exist that could display all the details of such grand production.
A series of 10 albums and numerous remixes has come off as primarily intent on dashing expectations, from the ambient-house ectoplasms of 1994’s Vulvaland and 1995’s slightly more structured Iaora Tahiti; to the flighty and funny electronics, spluttering horns and acoustic-guitar samples of 2000’s more “organic” Niun Niggung; to the forest of sonic porcupine quills that is Idiology. Radical Connector (2004)
further granulated the MoM aesthetic into nine vaguely pop-oriented songs, ever heavier on the beats and increasingly hinging the tunes on the vocals and drumming of longtime collaborator Dodo Nkishi. Varcharz (2006) entirely recorded at Mouse on Mars’ St. Martin Ton Studios in Duesseldorf has been their most live sounding and diverse studio album to date. 2012 will see a new Mouse on Mars once again. Their upcoming LP Parastrophics is a thriving vision of the other side of experimental music.
Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner have been more than busy in the intervening years since the release of their last studio album as a duo, Varcharz (2006). They collaborated with The Fall’s Mark E. Smith as s Von Südenfed and released Tromatic Reflexxions on Domino. Both Toma and St. Werner produce independently for their Sonig label. St. Werner has worked on solo records under several monikers, written pieces for classical instrumentation and electronics, did music for installations, and acted as the artistic director of the Amsterdam Institute for Electronic Music, steim. Toma has produced Moondog, Stereolab, Junior Boys and The Fall, amongst others. One of their most recent projects Paeanumnion has been as unique as the rest of their career – an orchestral piece which didn’t play by any of the rules. As St. Werner said, “it was a way for us to carry on being an electronic band, only without electronics”. As ever, he was not being entirely serious. Both Jan and Andi were on stage throughout this hour- long voyage, playing their own digitally-crafted sounds and processing the orchestra at the same time.
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Website Mouse on Mars: www.mouseonmars.com
Facebook Mouse on Mars: www.facebook.com/mouseonmars
Website Monkeytown Records: www.monkeytownrecords.com
Facebook Monkeytown Records: http://www.facebook.com/MonkeytownBerlin
Discography:
1994 – Vulvaland (Too Pure, Rough Trade, American Recordings)
1995 – Iaora Tahiti (Too Pure, Rough Trade, American Recordings)
1997 – Autoditacker P (Too Pure, Rough Trade, American Recordings, Tokuma JP)
1997 – Instrumentals (Sonig, Thrill Jockey, Rough Trade, Domino, Tokuma JP)
1998 – Glam
1999/2000 – Niun Niggung (Thrill Jockey, Domino, Rough Trade, Tokuma JP)
2001 – Idiology
2004 – Radical Connector (Sonig, Thrill Jockey, JVC)
2005 – Live 04 (Sonig, JVC)
2006 – Varcharz (Sonig, Ipecac Recordings, JVC)
2007 – Tromatic Reflexxions (als Von Südenfed) (Domino)
2012 – Parastrophics (Monkeytown Records)
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