Tim Gane (Stereolab) returns this year with another LP installment from his Cavern of Anti-Matter project. Hormone Lemonade is due out on March 23rd via the group’s Duophonic label, and it follows up on their previous long-players, 2013’s Blood-Drums and 2016’s Void Beats/Invocation Trex. Cavern of Anti-Matter began as a one-off recording project when Gane was commissioned by the artist Nicolas Moulin to produce the 2xLP Blood-Drums. When that album quickly sold-out, the musician was encouraged to further develop the project. Joining forces with the Berlin-based musicians Joe Dilworth, who had played drums in an early incarnation of Stereolab, and synth master Holger Zapf, the trio would go on to record some one-off singles for labels like Ghost Box, Deep Distance and Peripheral Conserve (run by film director Peter Strickland). In addition, the group would record 2016’s Void Beats/Invocation Trex, an LP that featured guest appearances from Spacemen 3’s Sonic Boom, Mouse on Mars’ Jan St. Werner, and Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox.
Hormone Lemonade finds the trio continuing to experiment with and explore their love for vintage synthesizers and drum machines. The album features Zapf’s homemade beat-making devices, the Taktron Z3 and Taktron Z2, as well as Hohner and Eko drum machines from the 70’s. Recorded to tape over three one hour sessions, Gane would eventually take these recordings and shape them into rhythmic ideas over which the group could continue to overdub and build upon. Dilworth would go on to add live drumming to the tracks before they were further fleshed out using vintage synthesizers from Oberheim, Arp and Roland, as well as Zapf’s modular set-up. In addition, the trio reports that the modular was used to produce chords on the album by tuning its’ five oscillators to specific notes and intervals.
“Make Out Fade Out” is our first listen in on Hormone Lemonade, and it displays the ominous buzz and hiss of the group’s vintage and homemade machines. The track’s initial blur of reverberating bell tone is interjected by a Latin-leaning rhythm before the cut dives nose down into a noir mystery of driving basslines and soaring synth work. A dark narrative prevails throughout the track, and it’s a white-knuckle ride complete with unexpected plot twists and harrowing turns of sonic action.
