WRANGLER Schallplatten & CDs

Review: With a line-up that boasts Cabaret Voltaire's Stephen Mallinder, you know that Wrangler have got the chops when it comes to deviant electronics with experimental grit and synth-pop nous in equal measure. On their latest album they sound more vital than ever, skirting around a fizzing array of grooves where the human voices and synths speak with equal flair and personality. Craftily sculpted and joyously composed, this is a delightfully modernist twist on the blueprint Cabs helped define all those decades ago. The spirit of progress is alive and well across this beautifully bonkers record - all disco delinquents take note!

Review: While it has perhaps been slightly lost in the depths of time, and in the vastness of the ambient ocean, John Foxx's Metamatic label is a cornerstone of British leftfield and electronica. Since the late 1990s the label has released a steady and impressive selection of material that never truly fits into one genre or under one roof. This new collaborative EP is everything that UK electronic music is about, with five exploratory slices of machine noise that simply make perfect sense. Wrangler's "He's A Liquid", for instance, takes a mechanical industrial groove and spreads it over tight sci-fi sonics; Hannah Peel's "Tidal Wave" satisfies the pop fans with a slow and chimerical heart-stopper; "030" by LoneLady is a violin-led bundle of percussion and desolate vocal strips. The B-side flexes more muscle thanks to the head-banging pseudo trance of "No-One Driving" by The Soft Moon, followed by Xeno and Oaklander's nastier, more break-driven version of "He's A Liquid".