The Beauty of Gemina Retrospective II: Disruption
Ahead of their 10th studio album, «Songs of Homecoming», we explore The Beauty of Gemina’s history, development, and sound in a three-part retrospective.
On November 23rd, 2012, my perception of The Beauty of Gemina was shattered into a million pieces. The cracks opened wide and revealed a new future for the sound. It was a tender revolution spearheaded by a single show.
As The Beauty of Gemina is about to release the band’s 10th album, Songs of Homecoming, I am listening to the previous albums again, revising firmly held opinions, and sharing past experiences with the band.
For this retrospective series, I went through old backup drives and folders and recovered some material that is no longer available online or has never been published.
Negative WhiteJanosch Troehler
Returning from their acoustic show tour with the band Diary of Dreams through Germany, The Beauty of Gemina also played an acoustic show in Michael Sele’s home base, «Altes Kino Mels».
By then, Negative White was already in full swing, and my brother Nicola and I drove to this small city lying in the shadows of towering mountains. It was the landscape that inspired Sele to write Suicide Landscape.
Grew up in this shadowland
With a Suicide Landscape
Where the black birds are singing
Where the black birds are falling down
We arrived around 5 p.m. while the band was undergoing soundcheck. We immediately started documenting everything for a backstage report that would be published, unlike the first attempt at «Z7» three years prior.
The band and crew are extremely focused. There is tension in the air. The old cinema is often a rehearsal room for the band, and many memories are revived here. That’s why perfectionism goes down to the smallest detail when choosing the microphone: «Doesn’t the other one sound a bit better?»
Photos: Nicola Troehler
The concert then marked a significant change for The Beauty of Gemina and everybody familiar with the band. It was an experience beyond what words can express. It was nothing short of a reinvention, a rebirth of their music, their sound. The band intentionally or accidentally shattered their image and trajectory into pieces.
Golden Age trots away, drawing the concert onwards with feather-light leaps and unusually bright sounds. This is followed by Hunters, an unconventional and, above all, very unwieldy piece of music from the debut Diary of a Lost. In the acoustic adaptation, it approaches with heavy, pounding piano steps. The hunter approaches slowly, but there is still no escape! Where rock shows are characterised by a virtuoso guitar solo, a long instrumental now captivates. Even now, the fear that the song conveys can stretch its cold, thin fingers into the room.
The musicians on stage are experts, and violinist Rachel’s stress has evaporated. The fresh guise of the songs makes the concert particularly exciting and varied. It’s as if you’re seeing the band for the first time and don’t know what’s coming.
However, what was foreshadowed by this acoustic concert should grow into a full-blown disruption culminating in The Myrrh Sessions, the album with acoustic interpretations released in February 2013. Even today, this album is phenomenally good with this one flaw I already pointed out in the initial review: The already acoustic-heavy Stairs is an unnecessary addition to the otherwise flawless record.
Otherwise, I still stand by my conclusion:
Edition #122
Today, we recommend the new songs by Mayflower Madame, Little Element, Palinstar, Baby Smith, and Vanarian. Discover here.
Demonic Violins
RAVAGE premiere their new track «Demon Lover» today. It is a daring, haunting sound.
The sound is like a hellish abyss—noisy, loud, and chaotic. A swirl of sound, a dance of two devilish violins whipped by an unforgiving drum.
Demon Lover by French trio RAVAGE is an experiment exploring the wild, sometimes dark underbelly of noise and doom. And, frankly, it is not for everyone.
Bastien Pelenc and Mathieu Werchowski extract a range of haunting sounds from their violins that sound as loud and bulldozing as a post-rock band. Adding Anthony Laguerre's daring extended drums, their song becomes the soundtrack of an ungodly ceremony. Archaic, blasphemous, but highly intriguing.
The track celebrates its premiere today with Negative White:
The video, recorded in May 2023 by Pierre Veyser at the band's first residency at La Fonderie du Mans in France, feels like uncovered footage of a ritual where the band conjures these extreme sounds—growing more unstable with the musician's relentless escalation.
But as contemporary and maybe weird Demon Lover seems, it is nothing but captivating in its ferocious delivery—and an appropriate teaser for what might come in the future of RAVAGE.
The Beauty of Gemina Retrospective I: The Goth Years
Ahead of their 10th studio album, «Songs of Homecoming», we explore The Beauty of Gemina’s history, development, and sound in a three-part retrospective.
The Beauty of Gemina. It is the band I have seen the most on stage. And I have interviewed their creative nucleus, Michael Sele, eight times in the past 16 years. Ever since I heard their song Shadow Dancer on a compilation CD bought in 2008, they have remained a source of fascination.
In recent years, this platonic relationship between The Beauty of Gemina and myself cooled off slightly. As the band is about to release their new album, Songs of Homecoming, I decided to listen to all of their albums again as unbiasedly as possible, revise firmly held opinions—and stroll down memory lane and share past experiences with the band.
For this series, I went through old backup drives and folders and recovered some material that is no longer available online or has never been published.
I was writing short artist biographies for Cornelius Fischer, then a concert photographer, who captured many bands in the goth subculture. One day in Spring 2009, he asked me if I would like to interview Michael Sele and The Beauty of Gemina’s new bass player, David Vetsch, for an online magazine called «imScheinwerfer».
At the «Kammgarn» in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, I met the band for the first time, having never conducted an interview before. And suddenly, this fabled world opened up. I was granted access to the exclusive—and, as I soon realised—very boring—backstage area. But for the time being, everything was new and exciting—like the first day at school. Even the soggy pasta for dinner tasted great.
The interview is no longer online, but I found it printed out and stored in a folder.
The Weekly5 Anthology
After almost a decade of music curation, it is time to revisit Weekly5's history and gather an anthology playlist.
On September 11, 2015, the nucleus of what would eventually grow to become Weekly5 was published. It was a mere draft of a concept, somewhat unpredictable, if not to say amateurish.
How little thought—or, let's call it inspiration—went into the format is apparent by its title: «Songs of the Week». Never heard that before. It lacked clarity. There was no limitation on the number of songs. I vaguely remember it being a sort of desperate decision: So many songs were published that I needed a vessel to collect them in a reasonable way.
Revisiting the first edition is like travelling back in time to a moment shortly before the rise of music streaming and playlisting. Despite its absent focus, the «Songs of the Week» would survive for 126 editions—and even had its own internet radio show at one point at the now defunct «Radio Meltdown». The last edition was published on November 24, 2018.
Discoveries for Life
The «Songs of the Week» weren't only around at the changing of the tides regarding mainstream music consumption but also the predominant styles—just catching the fading glory of indie-rock.
Regardless of its random recommendations, there were first contacts with bands that remain dear until today: from the scrappy-snotty punk vibe of the Hinds or Dream Wife to the gloomy notes of Holy Esque or Lea Porcelain.
Attending the «Kaltern Pop» festival in October 2018 sealed the long-overdue fate of «Songs of the Week». It was music promoter Frank Lenggenhager, who inspired me to rethink the format.
And on January 12, 2019, the first edition of Weekly5 saw the light of day with a clear promise proudly proclaimed in its title. Compared to the first «Songs of the Week», this selection—featuring the White Lies with Tokyo and Ten Fé's Coasting—holds up world's better.
While the cap in songs every week created more predictability, the genres featured remained an, at times, intentionally wild mix. Weekly5 was and still is designed for the curious minds open for experimentation and true discovery. Less algorithmic «More like artist xyz…» but a human «hey, I think you should listen to this».
But it wouldn't last for as long—initially, at least.
In May 2020, I felt burnt out. Amidst the pandemic, life and music stopped happening and demanding work left me with little time to push a volunteer-run project like Negative White. And so, one day before the magazine shut down after a decade, the 53rd edition was published on June 6th, 2020.
Six months later. I spent New Year's with friends in the Swiss alpes. One of these friends, Elia, said to me that he really misses Weekly5—and unknowingly nurished a feeling: I too missed curating music.
And with little doubts, I headed on. Weekly5 made a return in January 2021—for something you might call a second season.
So here we are, about nine years and a combined 300 editions of «Songs of the Week» and «Weekly5» later. Maybe it is a random moment to create an anthology, but who really cares?
For each year, I chose ten songs that would make it to the «Anthology», resulting in a 100-track playlist that celebrates years of curation, but mostly highlights some of the great artistic works I had the honour to recommend.
Enjoy on Apple Music or on Spotify.
Edition #121
In today’s Weekly5, we recommend the new songs by EMPIRICAL, British Murder Boys, Potochkine, Gurriers, and Kraków Loves Adana.
EMPIRICAL – LETZ GET IT
A flickering flow of synthesisers awaits you in LETZ GET IT by Julien Bracht, aka EMPIRICAL. It is not your traditional dance track but an atmospheric stream of electronic consciousness, emphasising the melody and details over hard-hitting, danceable beats. A dreamlike summer vibe.
Potochkine – Endorphines
The sirens wail through the night, whipped on by dangerous beats. Welcome to the world of Potochkine, a French EBM duo. The all-encompassing beats almost distract from the dark abyss that opens up underneath. Endorphines sounds uncompromisingly hellish and dangerous.
British Murder Boys – Killer I Said
Birmingham’s British Murder Boys are at the forefront of the UK’s avant-garde techno acts. In Killer I Said and—by extension—their album Active Agents and House Boys, the duo demonstrates an enticing approach to electronic music—weird, unexpected, yet constantly captivating anew.
Gurriers – Approachable
Rock is dead? Dublin’s Gurriers beg to differ. They remastered their 2023 single Approachable without killing the song’s essence: a raw, punkish track reminiscent of bands like the IDLES. The shouted lyrics pogo-dance with the relentless jackhammering rhythm. And the guitars cut like knives.
Kraków Loves Adana – Break My Own Heart
Announcing their new album, I Saw You I Saw Myself, Kraków Loves Adana deliver Break My Own Heart as a first glimpse. The Hamburg-based outfit presents a sparse composition, highlighting an 80s-inspired synth hook accompanying Deniz Çiçek’s vocals. R&B meets synth-pop.
You can listen to today's curation on selected streaming services:
Spotify • Apple Music • YouTube Music • Bandcamp
Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys present video for «Virtual Muse»
It is a droning, detached affair.
«Assume. Consume.» — Virtual Muse explores the intangible reality of the digital space and a subsequent feeling of detachment from our human nature.
Isolation is the theme of the intimate yet expressive 13 songs on Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys’ latest album, A Human Home. On this record, South African-born and Berlin-based artist Lucy Kruger explores the feeling of home, heavily influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic.
One of these songs, Virtual Muse, was treated to a new visualiser video, which celebrates its premiere here today:
Kruger expands on the influences in A Human Home:
«Berlin was the place that I was living in the moment that a virus stopped the world in its tracks, but I wasn’t quite sure if it was home. There was a sea between me and my family and no way to cross it. Except through the telephone, the computer screen, and a body, heart, brain full of memories, feeling, thought, and imagination.»
The sound of Virtual Muse—a desolate soundscape of droning guitars—palpably reflects digital dehumanisation. It evokes a sense of eerie detachment, yet Lucy Kruger’s whispered monologue injects a poignant, intimate touch into the minimalist composition, creating an emphatic emotional resonance.
Virtual Muse is also a perfect example of the band’s developed sound on the album, which seems far from what the noise and art rock group displayed on last year’s record, Heaving.
Lucy Kruger abandoned the guitar at the beginning of her songwriting process for the first time: «I promised to let go of judgment in the process. A naive and feeling-based exploration of sampled drum sounds and synths, along with some more familiar guitar-based songs.»
While wandering uncharted sonic paths, they remain deeply committed to their signature depth and eccentric atmosphere.
Edition #120
Today, we recommend the new songs by nothhingspecial, Spell Trouble, Jake Isaac, Violence, and Rikas.
nothhingspecial – catacombs
Taken from the utterly brilliant sophomore EP, Where Do You Wanna Go?, the song catacombs displays German artist nothhingspecial's velvety, sombre voice. Accompanied by an addictive and anticipating rhythm, the track beautifully amalgamates melancholy and a euphoric indie-rock spark.
Spell Trouble – Thorn Armor
In his first of a series of single releases, Maximilian Seifert, aka Spell Trouble, lets gloomy post-punk collide with a filter of electronic post-modernism. As a result, Thorn Armor feels like the despairing soundtrack to a cyberpunk goth movie—dramatic in its shift of tempo, colourful in its darkness.
Jake Isaac – Black Or White
Black Or White by London's soul upstart Jake Isaac spreads a warm and tender vibe. The authentic communication at the heart of the song's message is mirrored by the composition: a human effort, composed with touching passion and created with sophistication at the fingertips. Exquisite.
Violence – Colour Decay (feat. T A K E R)
After their captivating debut record, Area Sub Rosa, Copenhagen's Violence went from a 5-piece band to a duo. Their sound became more experimental as also their collaboration with T A K E R demonstrates: Colour Decay welds together post-punk and euro-trance elements. It works surprisingly well.
Rikas – Barcelona (Learning to Love Myself)
New beginnings, a new path in life at its core, Barcelona (Learning to Love Myself) is Rikas' latest dance-provoking single. The German quartet delivers a catchy track tailored for a verified summer hit without letting cheap allegory take over. This song drips like the condensation on your chilled drink.
You can listen to today's curation on selected streaming services:
Spotify • Apple Music • YouTube Music • Bandcamp
