WL//WH Weekly Post-Punk // Darkwave // Dark Synth Tips

• Italian post-punk /darkwave /synth-driven pop trio (formerly known as Le Officine Di Efesto) of Donato Dozzy, Lino Monaco, and Nicola Buono (Retina.it), aka Men With Secrets “The Tower” from the forthcoming second album “Sand Clock” [CITITRAX]

The trio of longtime, well-respected Italian electronic musicians explore late-80s and early-90s darkwave and synth pop patterns with a meticulously crafted modern sound design in the forthcoming second album. As usual, deftly balancing hypnotic rhythmic precision with synthetic emotive tension, the first foretaste builds a driving, pulsing, murky off-beat continuum that feels both nostalgic and edgy, to anxiously simmer under softly sung, gloomy male vocals, praying for the sun to shine on the tower architecture of the mind.

• Knoxville, Tennessee 80s cinematic New Wave /Synth-Pop DIY project of Brandon Biondo, The New Romantics “My Condition” single
  

Powered by epic, sparkling and dark retro synth-pop sound, the Knoxville musician grips with stuttering and wobbling bass lines, alongside metronomic thumping beats, droning murky swells to build a shadowy, high-flown aura lit by resonant, emotional tinkly leads around wistful, haunted baritones, lost, suffering, and powerless to be freed from wrong choices and self-abandonment.

• Düsseldorf, Germany minimal analog synth wave duo MNGLXMPLR “KONTRASTE” 2nd single from the upcoming album “NEUE ZUKUNFT” [Carisma Studios]

Düsseldorf die-hard analog electronic duo balances space and mechanics with swirling synth-driven dance high-energy through a spinning, twisted obsession of steady thumping beats, high-pitched, glittering and tinkling sequences, insistent buzzing oscillations, woven with achingly soaring epic melodies, cast in ice-cool synth tones, while dry, downtrodden male vocals turn into robotic layers of conflicting hope and doubt with dazed female back-ups, to evoke anxiety and confusion.

• Lithuania-based drone /psych /post-industrial neofolk group founded by Ian Campbell in Western Canada in 2012, Crooked Mouth “When the Sun Married the Moon” from the 7th full-length album “Cosmic Folklore”
  
• New Zealand-based lo-fi /ambient /drone /ethereal /dark wave /folk /electronic /experimental artist Alicia Merz, aka Birds of Passage “Mercenary World” single [Denovali]
• Anglo-Irish seminal world music /darkwave musical collective founded in Melbourne, Australia, in 1981 by Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard, Dead Can Dance “Our Day Will Come” single
  
• Rotterdam-based Dutch Minimal Synth /Darkwave act HALFMACHINE “F.i.c.p.” single
• Miami, FL dreamwave /synthpop /synthwave musician, Trevor Something “Electricity” single
  
• Belgium-based cold analogue synth music project (aka Cape Sidereal), Cryptochroma “Rising Towers” single 
  
• Brooklyn, NY minimal synth /new-wave /synth-pop solo project of Arjun Bhaduri, aka EISHA “Golden Age” single
  
• Gothenburg-based shoegaze /post-punk /electronic solo project of musician, singer and composer Andreas Lind, D4RKSTAR “We Were The World” (backing vocals by Sister Electra) single
  
• French/Italian new wave /coldwave /darkwave /post-punk trio I Woke Up Chinese “Reach for a shadow” single
  
• Paris-based, French/German post-punk /coldwave /dark wave trio COLD CAUSE “City of Firmaments” from the upcoming debut LP “Cold Cause” [Manic Depression Records]
• Germany-based new wave /synth-pop /post-punk duo of Minsk, Belarus-born Arthur Tsymbal and Augsburg‘s Julian Riegel, Violent Youth “noch`” from the new LP “tsvety” [Artoffact Records]
• Northampton, Massachusetts dark electro /synth-pop /darkwave solo project of Boy Harsher‘s singer Jae Matthews – “Man On The Beat” EP 12″ [Heartworm Press]
• Switzerland post-punk /coldwave /synth wave trio Crying Vessel “Forgotten Time” single [Cold Transmission Music]
• Gatineau, Québec synth-pop /darkwave duo Menthüll – “Backup Plan” off “BACKUP PLAN” [EP]
• Brussels, Belgium EBM/dark electro /techno /coldwave duo Ultra Sunn “Flirt With Death” single [Artoffact Records]
• Indianapolis-based industrial /techno /EBM new project fronted by Jared Birden, aka Absolute Form “Repetition” from the EP “Form & Function” [Jinglhaus Records]
• Spanish EBM /Cyberpunk /Synthwave /Darksynth /Electronic music producer Nightcrawler “Shark” single
  
• Berlin-based industrial/dark techno producer Michael Wollenhaupt, Ancient Methods “Burn the Frame (feat. Night In Athens)” from upcoming “Society of the Spectacle” EP [Persephonic Sirens]
• Italian witch trap /hard wave /witch house /dark electro music project Haunted House “Spectral Dance” single [Cold Transmission Music]
• London-based indie dance /synth-wave /synth-pop /dark disco DJ-producer VELVET VELOUR “Heart Obey” single [Blush Signal]
• Rome, Italy wave /synth-pop /darkwave duo Les Longs Adieux “Totally Unable To Fly” from the new album “Arousal”
  
• Madrid, Spain EBM /industrial /noise /synth-pop /minimal wave /electronic /synth-punk duo AZOTEMENTAL “Vidas Heladas” off of “Tara” EP
  
• Gothenburg, Sweden EBM /synthpop /electronic, political music project Proletarian Poetry “The Greatest of Thieves” single
  
• Berlin industrial /post-punk /synthpop duo WHOLE “Air Vent (Way In)” from “Air Vent” EP [Blackjack Illuminist Records]
• Italian cyber-punk /darkwave /post-industrial solo project Kurs “Weapon” single [Swiss Dark Nights]
• New Jersey gothic /darkwave /dark electronic artist Mike Daimon “Dream Haunting” single
  
• San Diego-based Mexican synth electronic /post-punk /deathwave producer Vestron Vulture “I can’t feel” single
  
• French dark electro-goth duo of Ulrika and Ferdinand Legendre, Une Vraie Gothique “Une vraie gothique” from the upcoming LP “R.D.V. au Cimetière” [Manic Depression Records]
• Northeast Ohio Goth-Rock /Post-Punk /Darkwave duo Annul Noir “215 (Wraith of the Moonlight)” from the debut cassette Mini-LP “Inexistence”
  
• Chilean deathrock /darkwave /post-punk duo Diavol Strâin “11 Ecos” single
  
• Prague-based darkwave /gothic rock band Cathedral In Flames “Push The Fire” single
  
• Chicano Goth Rock / Post Punk trio from Chicago, Grave Love “Scorched Earth” single
  
• Albuquerque, New Mexico darkwave /coldwave /post punk solo act Slow Danse With The Dead “You Only Need Me Sometimes” single
  
• Philadelphia-based goth /post-punk /darkwave duo Doza Crypta “She Falls” from the debut “Final Prayer” EP
  
• Yeovil, UK-based early 80s post-punk band centred around the All the Madmen zine/label, Bikini Mutants “Empty” from the album “Let’s Mutate” archival collection of 1982 demo recordings [Sealed Records]
• Phoenix, AZ EBM /post-punk /darkwave duo Silent Cities “Becoming the Void” from the debut LP “Body Verses”
  
• Pamplona, Spain post-punk /coldwave trio BRIS “Gure Dorreak” single
  
• Genève, Switzerland indie rock /post-punk /wave duo Pistache Bitume “Dormir, manger être bizarre” from title track of the EP “Dormir, manger être bizarre”
  
• Nottingham, UK Goth Post-Punk trio Bloodworm “Alone In Your Garden” single
  
• Cleveland, OH noise pop /indie rock /post-punk band Suitor “Model Actress” off second LP “Saw You Out with the Weeds” [Feel It Records]
• Helsinki, Finland shoegaze /post-/punk band Giglinger “Holy Gasoline” from the debut LP “Kasåkern”
  
• Ghent, Belgian crank wave /post-punk band The Rats “Won’t Stand For It” from the debut full-length album “Boxing Days”
  
• Indonesian dreamy/electronic pop duo (Fka Brokenchains), OH! MIDORI “Hymns for the Rubble” single [Satelit Asmara Recs]
• Munich, Germany noise rock /post-punk 3-piece collective Ushi “Hibernation” single [Schaufel & Besen Records]
• Netherlands-based no wave /post-punk /art pop outfit MAGASIN “Re cuerdo” from 2-track s/t debut single
  
• Montreal, Canada alternative rock /riot grrl punk band Poolgirl “Money” single
  
• Austin, TX proto-garage /proto-punk /new wave /synth outfit (former members of Riverboat Gamblers and Rise Against), Drakulas “Singin’ With My Tongue Cut Out” from upcoming third LP “Midnight City” [Wild Honey Records / Dirtnap Records]
• Toulouse, France hardcore punk band NIGHTWATCHERS “La Loi Du Marché” from “Qu’Importe La Mort” EP [stonehengerecords]
• Germany new wave /post-punk /indiewave solo project A TRANSITION “Intro” single
  
• UK Dark Winter Ambient /Noise Dungeon Doom project Gravfrost “IV: Eulogy” from “My Heart Bleeds Into Black Abyss” LP
  
• Raleigh, NC black ambient /doom dungeon synth project Rune Soldier “Forever Lost, Beyond the Seas of Fog” from LP “Lacrymosa of the Funeral Kingdom” [Oakheart Productions]
• Kazakhstan dungeon synth project Warlock Corpse – “Mirror Labyrinth” from the cassette album “Prophecy of the Bleeding Bloom” [Out of Season]
• Fort Wayne, Indiana synthwave /fantasy /dungeon synth project Gloamwalker “A Soliloquy Amongst Silent Spheres” from “AMARANTHINE” LP
  
• Los Angeles dark ambient /medieval /fantasy /dungeon synth project Moonglow – “Skyward Rumination” from the second cassette album “The Wanderer” [Dungeons Deep Records]

photo by Rocky Schenck