For the third and perhaps final installment in my series of electronic music mixes (preceded by Unruly Electronics and Lifeless Electronics), I’ve focused on tracks with such boundless, infectious energy that one feels as though they’re about to burst if they don’t start moving to the music. There’s plenty of peace and joy here, but there’s also intensity, surreality, intoxication, hedonism—everything that seems to blur into a single, seamless mass of life when many become one on a sweat-soaked dance floor.

still from music video for Arca’s “Mequetrefe”

00:00. Faxada – “Month” from Paraa (Darling, 2018)

01:57. Nonturn – “Evidence” from Territory (Audiobulb, 2018)

06:15. Fuck Buttons – “Phantom Limb” from Tarot Sport (ATP, 2009)

11:04. RXM Reality – “Climateric” from Advent (Orange Milk, 2021)

15:07. Paszka – “Terakota” from Gluon (Noumenal Loom, 2020)

18:11. Arca – “Mequetrefe” from KiCk i (XL, 2020)

20:33. Black Dice – “Glazin” from Repo (Paw Tracks, 2009)

24:24. Stab Something – “French Love” from Stab Something (self-released, 2012)

27:02. John Object – “RPG” [excerpt] from Pre-Heat (Bio Future Laboratory, 2018)

29:42. Exploited Body – “Threnody” [feat. APEAK] from Threnody (self-released, 2019)

33:17. Herbarium – “Herbalife (Gem Tree Recycle)” from Свежесть (Eco Futurism Corporation, 2018)

35:18. Dan Deacon – “Never Do That (Mars)” from Meetle Mice (Standard Oil, 2004)

“The tender gesture says: ask me anything that can put your body to sleep, but also do not forget that I desire you—a little, lightly, without trying to seize anything right away.” —Roland Barthes, A Lover’s Discourse: Fragments

The microscopic unutterables of a doomed love: first the curious, tentative, beautiful pirouettes of fingertips tracing new territory for the first time; next the invisible buildup of stagnancy, doubt, uncertainty, fear, sabotage, still with fleeting spots of light; then the loneliness, despair, longing touches meeting only empty air; and finally the idealistic but ultimately futile look toward something new. Never let go.

00:00. soft tissue – “glass master” from soft tissue (Penultimate Press, 2019)

02:28. Nathaniel Young – “exploit_01” from Stringed Exploits (_phinery, 2016)

04:32. Ivan Palacký – Sanctuary [excerpt] (piece for Amplify 2020 festival)

06:29. Peter Lenaerts – fourth part [excerpt] of Serbian Orthodox Church of the Prophet Elijah (Very Quiet, 2013)

09:16. Kim Cascone & Scanner – “Behavioural Sink” [excerpt] from The Crystalline Address (Sub Rosa, 2002)

10:33. Porcje Rosołowe – “Metua Tympanis” from Insects 4-7 (Crónica, 2015)

13:00. Klaysstar – “Right” from More No Place (Outlet Archival, 2020)

14:52. Sachiko M – Salon de Sachiko [excerpt] (Hitorri, 2007)

20:14. Takamitsu Ohta – “cqicx,qikcco.cqqico,,” from Three Ways to Output from a Recorder (Careful Catalog, 2019)

24:35. Dominique Vaccaro – “05” from Close Distances (Dinzu Artefacts, 2018)

26:09. Massimo Toniutti – “Scraps upon Tempered Fields” [excerpt] from antidocument/groundwork (Vitrine, 2016)

28:54. Shirt Trax – “crtL” from Good News About Space (OR, 1999)

31:49. Climax Golden Twins – fifth untitled track from Dream Cut Short in the Mysterious Clouds (Anomalous, 2000)

35:24. Daphne X – “Yoga” from NaCl (self-released, 2018)

No humans allowed. Screaming terminals with corroded circuits, samplers and toy keyboards caught in merciless error cycles, malfunctioning alarm systems and tactile glitch maelstroms and mind-numbing trash-frequencies. Do we really deserve anything else?

00:00. Su Sous Toulouge en Rouge – “Of Course We Play Basements, We’re the Underground… Duh” [excerpt] from Byte 0FX0 (Poor Little Music, 2016)

03:44. Chris Fratesi – “247” from Red Lead (Anathema Archive, 2020)

05:57. Archival Frequencie – Death of a Tax Collector [excerpt] (7Form, 2020)

09:52. Ashcircle – “Delusion” from Off the Cliff Edge (Fractal Meat, 2020)

14:37. Network Glass & Christian Mirande – B side [excerpt] of Arbuckle 7/28 (A R C H I V E, 2018)

17:40. Wetkoff – “Nuke Ranks” from He Is Lying (self-released, 2020)

22:59. Hardworking Families – “A Frog in September” from A Room and a Frog (Invisible City, 2020)

25:25. Glia – “gaderffii-i_ii” from Totokia (Dasa Tapes, 2021)

27:17. UVC – first untitled track from Mixed-Control Interpretations (Born Physical Form, 2020)

32:02. C. R. Odette – second untitled track [excerpt] from Castle Two (Chocolate Monk, 2017)

33:44. Rich Teenager – “Sardanapalus” [excerpt] from Sardanapalus (self-released, 2020)

35:56. Cabrita – “OIESHI” from 1 (self-released, 2018)

37:17. Mindload – first untitled track [excerpt] from Different Plug (Scumbag Relations, 2009)

38:38. Peea – “My Acl0nium” [excerpt] from Ins0lemnia (self-released, 2021)

My favorite tracks from artists who find beauty in the mangled, dying sounds of electronics and computers.

00:00. Dungeon Crawler – “nghtsft_zet.LOG” from Outside Earth (Trax in the Snoe, 2017)

02:07. Network Glass – “2” from Network Glass (No Rent, 2015)

05:52. Jeff Carey – “1001” from [3:30] (Forwind, 2013)

09:36. Hecker – “C 04 05 I_μdd” from Recordings for Rephlex (Rephlex, 2006)

14:18. Yasunao Tone – excerpt of “AI Deviation #2” from AI Deviation #1, #2 (Editions Mego, 2017)

20:03. Eris Alanna Reese – “Cord Distance” from Ciramak (Psalmus Diuersae, 2015)

22:40. Random_Inc – fifth track from Jerusalem: Tales Outside the Framework of Orthodoxy (Ritornell, 2001)

25:28. Porcje Rosołowe vs Łukasz Podgórni – “Domino” from Skanowanie Balu (Pawlacz Perski, 2013)

28:36. Mads Kjeldgaard – “874uHD” from States of Emergency (Conditional, 2018)

32:48. Frank Bretschneider – “Crisis? What Crisis?” from Sinn+Form (Raster-Noton, 2015)

Michel Waisvisz wasn’t the first to explore primitive electronic textures in improvisational music, but his 1978 album Crackle (whose title track gives this mix its name) signified more than that. The record was produced using Waisvisz’s self-invented cracklebox instrument, a notably personalized version of the plundered circuits used by so many (including myself). In my opinion, it’s just as important to seek out new sounds in everyday things as it is to make them using instruments with which we are already familiar. The piercing squeaks and grainy electric sputters of circuit bending have also become a recognizable and defining texture in modern electroacoustic improvisation.

00:00. Michel Waisvisz – “Crackle” from Crackle (FMP, 1978)

02:28. Voice Crack – “Red Square” from Taken and Changed (Falsch, 1999)

08:27. English – “Senator Bustamente” from English (Copula, 2005)

14:24. Alexei Borisov & Phil Durrant – “Part 4” from In the Wood (Zeromoon, 2018)

19:37. Jazzkammer – “Bullets for Breakfast” from Timex (Rune Grammofon, 2000)

25:26. Yoshimitsu Ichiraku – “Machine Headz” from The Music of Surround Panner (Zero Gravity, 1998)

29:25. Takahiro Kawaguchi & Utah Kawasaki – “4:17” from Amorphous Spores (Erstwhile, 2015)

33:31. GOD – excerpt from Anti-Sex Anti-Wiretapping (Made in Taiwan) (Little Enjoyer, 2005)

36:40. Joe Colley – “Untitled Unstable Stereo Circuit” from Disasters of Self (CIP, 2010)