We’re celebrating our 700th podcast with a mix from Moin, the experimental rock project of Joe Andrews, Tom Halstead, and Valentina Magaletti. Andrews and Halstead are best known for their work as Raime, through which they present a uniquely bleak take on post-dub music, with each work grounded in live instrumentation, gloomy synth lines, and unsettling, abstract vocals. The pair met Magaletti, an Italian multi-instrumentalist, just before the project started out, and in 2013 they put out an EP on Blackest Ever Black. But with Andrews and Halstead consumed by Raime, and Magaletti working on myriad projects, they put the project on ice.

That was until the pandemic began. Suffering from writer’s block, Andrews and Halstead opted to take some time away from Raime, and Moin felt like the safe space to go. It was a way to refresh their creative palette. Linking up with Magaletti again, they entered the studio to explore whatever musical whims they had. With eight tracks under their belt, AD93 head Nic Tasker reached out and snapped the album up for the label. We’re told that it originates from a desire to explore the fringes of guitar music, and the priority was to be “direct at first and then change the edges perhaps.”

To celebrate Moin’s return, Andrews, Halstead, and Magaletti recorded an XLR8R podcast last week in London. The vibe is centred on a bunch of Mark Freedman (a.k.a Powerman) records and from here they delved into their collections of post-punk released by artists and labels based in New York, Europe, and Japan through the ’80s. “The outpouring of experimental but deeply enjoyable music on the underground around that time never gets old,” they tell XLR8R and, at one hour in length, this mix delivers just a few of their favorites.

01. What have you been up to recently?

Much the same as everyone really, keeping things local and pretty reserved. Lockdown was a break with the speed of normal life which has caused most things to operate at a different pace. Which, while frustrating at times, has done some good, too. Music is always central to our lives so that never changes. Moin has been a great way to switch up and refresh the creative practice. Re-visiting guitar based music has also been a real source of inspiration.

02. What music have you been listening to through lockdown?

We’ve been getting a steady stream of packages in the post to keep the spirits up covering a huge range of stuff. Highlights have been Still House Plants, Graham Lambkin, Bobby Would, Mosquitos, Maths Balance Volumes, and Mark Fell & Will Guthrie. We’ve also been listened to labels Regional Bears and Stucco. But that really just scratches the surface. Our shelves are stocked right now.

03. How did this new Moin album come about?

A slice of chance and spontaneity caused an old idea to be revisited really. We had put time aside to make music and due to some writer’s block with the Raime project we just decided to make a Moin record as an experiment. We had done a small EP years ago so it was always in the back of our minds to do something bigger at some point. As luck would have it the idea was a good one and a record came out pretty fluidly. Nic Tasker of AD93 then got in touch out of the blue to enquire about the project and its fate was sealed. Creativity seems best this way really.

04. Where and when did you record this mix?

At home. Last week.

05. What can the listener expect with it?

Listeners can expect the rhythmic and more positive side of post-punk with some choice oddities thrown in.

06. How did you go about choosing the tracks that you’ve included?

Recently we picked up a few Powerman catalogue releases from Commend in New York. We’ve been meaning to acquire them for a while so we were chuffed when they came up in that condition. We used them as a jump off point really, sticking to that time period and mainly New York, European, and Japanese productions. This isn’t a collector flex; there’s nothing on there that’s going to surprise the diggers but we just enjoyed the flow of tracks really. We wanted to keep things positive and bright in the main rather than leaning on the darker side of music from that era. The outpouring of experimental but deeply enjoyable music on the underground around that time never gets old. Or maybe it does and we are creatures of habit! Either way. Also shouts to Sean Canty for the EP-4 intro and Steve and Nat at the World of Echo record store for the hook up!

XLR8R has now joined Mixcloud Select, meaning that to hear the podcast offline you will need to subscribe to our Select channel to listen offline, or subscribe to XLR8R+ to download the file. The move to Mixcloud Select will ensure that all the producers with music featured in our mixes get paid. You can read more about it here.

Full XLR8R+ Members can download the podcast below. If you’re not an XLR8R+ member, you can read more about it and subscribe here.

Tracklisting

01. Ralph Dorper “Eraserhead” (Operation Twilight ‎)
02. Floating di Morel “White Nights On The Moon” (Play Loud!)
03. Bedtime For Bonzo “Dirty Pigs” (Teraswing)
04. NON baNd “あわのうた_Bap Pang” (TAL)
05. Powerman “P-Jam” (Battery Sound)
06. EP-4 “Elementary Poem” (Telegraph)
07. Powerman “Lost Tribe” (Battery Sound)
08. Phew “Closed” (Pass Records)
09. Steven Grandell “Burn My Eyes” (Straight Face Records)
10. Mick Karn “Lost Affections In A Room” (Virgin)
11. Gerry and the Holograms “Increased Resistance” (Absurd Records)
12. Golden Palominos “Clean Plate” (Celluloid)
13. Arto Lindsay “Let’s Be Adult” (Editions EG)
14. Daktari Lorenz “Die Fahrt ins Reich der Menschentrümmer Parts I to V” (One Way Static Records)