{"title":"Shapednoise","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"absurd-matter","title":"Absurd Matter","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eAbsurd Matter\u003c\/i\u003e is a labyrinthine sonic conundrum that spirals around the two poles of extreme noise and hip- hop. It's Berlin-based Italian producer Shapednoise's first album in four years and confidently advances his narrative into the next chapter, building on the groundwork of his prior abstractions to emerge with a coherent genre-warped fusion of urgent rap, crushing bass weight and idiosyncratic sound design. After spending years scrupulously deconstructing club music, Nino Pedone has rebuilt it brick by brick in his image.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album arrives after a period of severe anxiety for the producer when he unexpectedly lost his hearing. For a professional sound designer it's a nightmare made flesh, and Pedone was suddenly left unable to produce music, DJ, or even attend events. Now in recovery, he was forced to reconsider his output, struck by the stress of mortality and his body's precarious materiality. So ‘Absurd Matter’ tells a critical narrative that's cut with visceral pain and panic, from the unsettling intro that features David Lynch's longtime collaborator Dean Hurley, through the cautious cacophony of the unstable 'Swash' all the way to the album's isolated but dizzying conclusion.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album is the first release on Pedone's brand new imprint Weight Looming, a multidisciplinary label platform that's set to explore the depths of bass music, textured noise and abrasive transcendence. It follows a slew of acclaimed releases for Numbers, Opal Tapes, Type and his own Cosmo Rhythmatic label, and forward-thinking collaborations with Kenyan beat alchemist Slikback and Hyperdub-signed Angolan producer Nazar. Pedone's most ambitious project to date, ‘Absurd Matter’ taps into kinetic energy from a hand-picked selection of collaborators, including New York rap duo Armand Hammer, French DJ\/producer Brodinski, Bruiser Brigade's ZelooperZ and vanguard Philly poet, musician, and activist Moor Mother.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOn ‘Family’, Billy Woods and Elucid weave a dismal, apocalyptic landscape with their razor-sharp anecdotes. The duo’s macabre imagery is given artificial life by Pedone's industrial scrapes and rattles that curl around their worlds like thick smoke. It's still rap, just about, but lodges itself in the back room of a factory, machines running themselves to an early death. Pairing with techno-rap trailblazer Brodinski, Pedone edges further towards the sound system, spatializing rhythms in four dimensions around Detroit rapper ZelooperZ's playful expressions. This is the Italian producer's sci-fi tinged liquefaction of radio echoes, a way to fire familiarity into the void and sublime the human voice into weightless mist. When Moor Mother arrives shouting \"me me me\" on the aptly-titled 'Poetry', it sounds as if all of Pedone's loose threads are being tightened into a knot. His misshapen neo-grime beats sound like a broken jet engine, but smartly cede power to Moor Mother's resonant rhymes. \"You can't cancel me\" she assures.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eAbsurd Matter \u003c\/i\u003eis a defining personal development for Pedone that not only appraises his career so far, but diverts its logic into frighteningly new sonic territory. From great loss, the producer has determined his work's cardinal themes, and sounds more strident and far heavier than ever before.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Weight Looming","offers":[{"title":"LP","offer_id":50506790043979,"sku":"2025837","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Absurd_Matter_d78809da_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727830175"},{"product_id":"absurd-matter-2-ra","title":"Absurd Matter 2","description":"\u003cp\u003eArriving two years after the first chapter, Absurd Matter 2 isn’t just a sequel, it’s an evolution, redrawing the boundaries established by its acclaimed predecessor. The Berlin-based Italian producer tempers his confrontational sonics with rare moments of introspection, shifting seamlessly between blown-out noise, warped hip-hop, mutant club experimentation, and weightless ambience. Perhaps the album’s most surprising moment arrives with “Viel”, which features vocals from Los Angeles-based composer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith. Together, Pedone and Smith chance upon their notion of dub techno, fogging synth stabs and ghostly vocal traces into eerie harmonic distortions. On some level, it’s almost pop music, a far cry from the bleak dissonance of Absurd Matter and a hopeful way to reframe turbulence as transformation. Absurd Matter 2 doesn’t simply document a process; it enacts one. It doesn’t offer clarity; it invites disorientation. It’s not a map of the labyrinth, but a foghorn piercing the darkness. Tinnitus-like feedback wails and noir-ish strings introduce “Repeater”, making it immediately clear that Pedone is painting a more delicately finessed image this time around. Fleshed out by raps from cult MCs billy woods and E L U C I D, the track is marked by subtle, sophisticated contrasts: the blurred, inverted rhythms that couch Armand Hammer’s haunted back-and-forth, and the glitchy interference that offsets the lavish orchestral phrases. Backwoodz associate Fatboi Sharif lends his Lynchian drawl to “Bandage Chipped Wings”, grounding Pedone’s lysergic rhythmic distortions with syrupy, horror-inspired couplets. Pedone also invites discomfort into “Crash Landing”, with droning, metallic tones that contradict South Central rapper CECOLDBISHOP’s elastic flow. “Bitch, I don't give a fuck about anybody,” he squawks over Pedone’s incongruous rasping textures and time-warped beats, “cash out at any party.” Working alongside London’s Loraine James on production, Pedone reunites with Moor Mother on “I Saw The Light”, blending James’ soft-focus atmospherics with soundsystem-damaging, overdriven bass hits and rusted percussive snips. Moor Mother’s assertive words hover over the wreckage, tightening Pedone’s themes of overstimulation and altered awareness as they stutter and veer off course, vanishing into the backdrop. Contrasting his more pensive experiments, Pedone’s dancefloor deviations are more concentrated on Absurd Matter 2 than ever before. He torches a stuttering dembow structure on “X”, obfuscating the rhythm’s familiar energy with disturbing audio hallucinations. On “Splintered”, he reunites with Kenyan prodigy Slikback, mangling neon-lit trance arpeggios with dissociated trap rhythms. He sharpens his skills to a fine point on “Oblivion Step”, observing 2- step through a lens of distortion and personal abstraction, shaking blipping synth leads over neck-snapping drums and counteracting the momentum with airless sci-fi soundscapes\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Weight Looming","offers":[{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":53015175790923,"sku":"R4674-1444","price":29.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/WEILOO02LP_2.jpg?v=1753462475"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/de\/collections\/shapednoise.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}