STROOM

Musical Keyboard System by MKS Sometimes in life, a certain incentive is needed to convert talent into productivity. As for the case of MKS, the enigmatic and musical disguise of Nicolas Aubard, it was a merely coincidental encounter at the end of the 80s that set the stone rolling. For Nico, it all began in his hometown of Saint-Quentin in Northern France. At a young age, he got obsessed with Japanese and American cartoon culture. Being a devoted collector of cartoon-related toys and widgets, he spent hours watching anime series on TV and creating scale models of science fiction and horror-related sceneries. Growing up in a musical household, young Nico took on stringent training in classical and jazz piano. But, frustrated with the fact of not being the technical virtuoso he wanted to be, he turned away from his training at the age of 16. “I had no choice, as I felt as if my creativity got limited by my piano. That’s when I got drawn into the world of synthesizers.” Not long after, Nico put together a home studio and started to experiment with ambience and sound-inserts. Despite years of experimentation and music making, all Nico’s productions stayed between the 4 walls of his modest home studio. Something that would change in 1988, when Nico bumped into Emmanuel “Manu” Prevost.

"This is an anthology, a selection of old and new. It's a collection of the past but moving forward. It's past and future." Dark Arts is one of those bands that for some reason got lost in the shuffle. It was founded in Columbus, Ohio, by a man named Bob Katt, the "cool, older guy" who went to all the concerts in town and had been in a bunch of other bands. Initially there were five members: in '83 there was Bob on bass and percussion, singer Sue Ann Mason, drummer Dave Green, Bill Bruner on guitar and Stephanie Payne on keyboard. Katt is the one who brought everyone together and came up with the name: they were the 'art' band and they were 'dark'. Keyboard player Stephanie Payne, just like Katt, was also present at every musical happening.  Reflections In A Rear View Mirror by Dark Arts

“Benjamin Lew was an enlightened amateur, in the noble and almost Renaissance-like sense of the word: he dabbled with equal grace in photography, writing, visual arts ... and worked part-time as a cocktail mixer in a tropical bar which was one of the favourite watering holes of Brussels’ thriving artistic community of the early ‘80s. Le personnage principal est un peuple isolé by Benjamin Lew

“No one can tell for sure that a sound of love actually exists, but love and any other emotion can be reverberated by some musical colors always capable to make emotions resounding here and there during a song, ten songs, a thousand ones...” A1 Elegant ShoutA2 AloneA3 You're Like A CigaretteA4 Skeleton In LoveB1 Fit Of NervesB2 Boys And GirlsB3 Everybody Knows MeB4 It's Not Too Grand

More than anything, Pablo’s Eye is a temporary atmosphere, like a taste or a dream. Last one in the trilogy... A1 Worship & Passion A2 More Hesitant Than Before A3 Different Observers A4 She Would Stand Alone A5 He Closed His Eyes A6 When You Were Asleep B1 L.A. DesertB2 She Told Him The NewsB3 Tamil NaduB4 A Pagan UseB5 Out Of The Corner Of Her EyeB6 Loisaida Dub

This album is the result of some musings on what drives us in life and how we come to terms with our place in the world. I wrote it around the time I was finishing my philosophy degree. I had also come to a point where I wanted to make music that was more personal, emotional and conceptual than before. A1 Prologue A2 A Date With The Zone A3 The Night Sky Is Falling (Sixth Seal) A4 This Concerns You B1 Hardness And Strength Are The Companions Of Death B2 Artemiev’s Dream Or: The Metaphysical Horror Of An Unpredictable World B3 A Quiet Place B4 Consolation For Martiška

"“Als das Kind Kind war, wusste es nicht dass es Kind war” the opening words of “Himmel über Berlin (Wings of Desire)” by Wim Wenders are so incredibly simple and innocent that they strike you down like the most murderous thunderbolt: “When the child was a child, it didn’t realize it was a child”. Are these words the fantasies of an adult or are these words the adult cogitations of a child’s brain? A1 Under A Steelplate SkyA2 ParsiA3 Life In TransitA4 LearA5 CageA6 Pagan LitanyB1 Le Petit ChatB2 Of Things GoneB3 Daddy-BearB4 TwilightB5 In Darkness I DwellB6 The Party Is Over