Blake Karlson says that when he founded the label Chicago Research late last year, he’d been thinking about building “a more cohesive platform for the current state of postpunk, electronic, and industrial music. This city is too often overlooked as a musical hub. Great things are happening right now.” This wolf couldn’t agree more—and those great things have helped Chicago Research leave the gate firing on all cylinders! Karlson describes the label as a “collective, with a solid group of musicians, artists, designers, and writers that all collaborate,” and its initial batch of releases includes a vinyl version of the first single from Death Valley (aka the chilly synth-wave solo project of Ariel Motto) and the plodding, hooky postpunk of Bruised, whose LP Rotten Codex includes the neck-snapping “(Beneath A) Heap of Glass.” In June, Chicago trio Product KF drop the LP edition of their April album, Songs of the Groves, which features rigorously scrambled industrial noise, murky bass, and depressive vocals.
It didn’t seem possible that Chicago Afrobeat Project‘s stomping 2017 album, What Goes Up, could get any funkier, but then Latinx DJ crew Future Rootz dropped the killer full-length What Goes Up Remixed late last month. Gossip Wolf has a feeling that these cuts—remixed by the likes of Ron Trent, Maga Bo, DJ Sound Culture, and Jose Marquez—are heating up dance floors already.
12″ e.p. by The Pornography Glows
