These are the shownotes that go with this episode:

Earth Song – Riki (2022)

Riki, the artist name of LA-based artist Niff Nawor, is a dark-pop fusion artist on Dais Records. “Earth Song” hits just the right spot for me as it whirls around post-punk and darkwave’s ’80s inspirations.

Lyrics unfold like blooming flowers: “Realise truth lies in part of another / Moving lines in space and time, we feel it deep within each other / Love life in time, truth lies in another / In the air, part of the earth, the world is just a small part of it all.”

The song is from Riki’s 2020 debut album and feels like an instant classic. With a captivating video, Riki emerges as one fresh and inspiring artist. Actually, this is not her first rodeo, but Riki adopted a new identity to allow for growth while leaving past work behind.

A musical background led to playing cello and bass before exploring synths. She started playing fretless electric bass when she was only nine years old after falling for its unique sound; there is nothing quite like it. Her early influences include Billy Idol, David Bowie, and Gary Numan, leading her into heavier bands such as Bauhaus later on.

Riki’s debut album features an enigmatic cover born from a photoshoot with Nedda Afsari, where she combined her favourite elements. Amanda Siegel directed the music video for “Earth Song.” Their connection blossomed into friendship over time, and resulted in a colourful clip that is a tribute to natural authenticity. Check it out; it complements the song quite nicely.

The Modern Lovers – Road Runner (1976)

The Modern Lovers were an American rock band led by Jonathan Richman. The original band existed from 1970 to 1974 but their recordings were not released until 1976 or later. They are known for having trouble finishing an album.

The sound of the band owed a great deal to the influence of the Velvet Underground and bands like the Stooges. These days The Modern Lovers are sometimes classified as one of the first post-punk bands ever. They sing about dating awkwardness, growing up in Massachusetts, love of life, and the USA.

The Sex Pistols covered their song “Road Runner” and Echo and the Bunnymen covered their song “She Cracked” as did Siouxsie and the Banshees.

Despite the original group’s early break-up, many of the members found considerable success elsewhere. For instance: The drummer David Robinson (later joined The Cars) and keyboard player Jerry Harrison (later joined Talking Heads).

Space Age Love Song – A Flock of Seagulls (1982)

In an interview, Mike Score, the Flock’s maestro, unravelled this song’s essence. The piece symbolises intimacy – it is all about that electrifying moment when gazes lock across a bustling room, igniting chemistry. ‘I saw your eyes, and you made me smile.’

The title is unspoken in the song. It came from a remark in the studio when the song did not have a name yet about its space-age sound. “Space Age Love Song” became its working title, but it stuck.

That’s exactly what I like about this song; I love the futuristic blend of synth and guitar of A Flock Of Seagulls. They were big fans of sci-fi themes. The American versions of their self-titled debut album start with “I Ran (So Far Away)”, an alien-abduction tale. That song was their first American hit, bigger than Space Age Love Song, which didn’t get a lot of MTV airtime and only made it to #30 in the US. Contrastingly, in their native UK, Wishing was the chart-topper while I Ran lagged behind.

Space Age Love Song has a modest and relatively simple video clip – just the band shrouded by fog performing amidst haunting echoes. Although it missed the mirrors and rotating camera treatment that “I Ran” got, it did showcase Mike Score’s iconic hairdo. Do you remember? His hair sort of resembles a bird in mid-flight.

The video clip was directed by Tony Van Den Ende, a legendary director who also recorded video clips for Guns & Roses, Joe Cocker, Lenny Kravitz, The Cult, Killing Joke, Manic Street Preachers, Social Distortion, The Pretenders, Thom Yorke and Transvision Vamp. What a legend. Here is a link to his music videos!

Parade Ground – Gold Rush (1987)

I thought let’s throw in another industrial/EBM track. Again made by Belgians. What is it with our neighbors from the south that they excelled so much in this genre..

Parade Ground are a Belgian band from Brussels, created by two brothers, Jean-Marc Pauly and Pierre Pauly in 1981.

They were pioneers of cold wave and EBM and they are still active to this day. Although they did not realease anything between 1988 and 2007. So quite a long break of 15 years in which they focused on other things like making art and writing.

Their style evolved during the 1980’s from an icy and cold sound to more danceable music with stressed rhythmics and more melodies. This song is from 1987 and was featured on an EP.

They regularly collaborated with members of Belgian band Front 242, have worked with English producer Colin Newman from Wire and they have written and composed on two Front 242 albums in 1994.

Men I Trust – Billie Toppy (2022)

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Men I Trust is a Canadian indie dream-pop band with a distinctive music style from Montreal, Quebec. They were founded in 2014 by high school friends Jessy and Dragos. The band found their groove in the music department at Université Laval. They released their self-titled album in 2014 and soon were on stage at renowned events like the Montreal Jazz Festival and Quebec Summer Festival.

Their second studio album, “Headroom”, in 2015, showcased a range of singers. Among them was Emmanuelle Proulx, who later joined the band permanently as the lead vocalist and guitarist. The band started touring internationally and churned out some great tracks. Check out singles “You Deserve This” and “Tailwhip”. In 2019, they broke through in the United States and played Coachella and Lollapalooza.

They released a few more albums, but the best one is their latest, called “Untourable Album,” from 2021. Men I Trust kept the momentum going with the release of new singles like this track, “Billie Toppy.” The song is apparently about a girl in a rather destructive relationship. The video clip, which we’ll include in the show notes, is kind of weird, featuring a smiling blonde girl on a swing high up in the sky… anyway, go check it out.

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L’Avenir – Dead Flowers (2015)

This is a bonus track on the album Etoiles (Stars) from 2015. L’Avenir is the cold synth project of veteran electronic musician Jason Sloan. A musician that has been active for over 25 years but in the Ambient domain with 20 albums out under his own name.

He’s also a video artist and professor teaching music at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland. He founded L’Avenir in 2012 to explore his long time love of dark synth and minimal wave music created purely from analog and vintage equipment.

In the mid 2000′s this genre of music, which has since been coined “Minimal Wave” by Veronica Vasicka, has seen a revival in the underground music scene in the States and Europe.

Having grown up in the 70′s and 80′s as a huge fan of synthpop and darker 80′s electronic music, a diversion down this path made sense to him within the context of where his ambient music had been headed over the past few years.

L’Avenir releases on limited edition vinyl, cd, cassette and digital formats are available almost everywhere.

(Not really a video)

Pip Blom “I Can Be Your Man” (2023)

If you regularly listen to our podcast, you may have noticed that we consistently feature the same tune at the end. The song is by a band called The The, and rather fittingly, it’s titled “Infected.” What you hear at the conclusion of our show is a remix of this track – an instrumental short version crafted by someone who has inspired us in several ways: Erwin Blom.

Erwin Blom holds quite some renown within the Dutch internet community as an early pioneer who stays abreast with all the latest trends. He has also lent his expertise in helping us create this very Podcast through his Online Community and course for beginning Podcasters. We owe him much gratitude for our outro music which, even after four seasons, still ends each episode.

In addition to being a digital trailblazer, Erwin is father to Pip Blom – part of a band named after herself with her brother Tender and friends.

To thank Erwin for inspiring our podcast journey thus far, but also because we really dig this well-produced track by Pip Blom; before traditionally closing out today’s show, we shall play their latest single, Pip Blom with “I Can Be Your Man”!, followed by Erwin Blom’s mix of Infected by The The.