Legion Of Two is Decal's Alan Boyle and Irish drummer David Lacey. Don't expect electro coming out of this album though. This is some dark, experimental jazz meets dub meets IDM meets whatever depending on the minute. Riffs certainly recalls the earlier Mu release from the Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble with its eerie vibe and jazz influences, but this album is certainly more diverse than that one, as it brings in electronics for more than just noise, has a much more rock-oriented sound (its is called Riffs, after all), and adds a heavy dose of dub when appropriate. It's a pretty interesting mix of sounds and makes for a compelling and somehow tight listen as whole. Live drums carry the record through all of it. Industrial, metal, and postrock influences are all there to go with the "darkjazz" thing trailblazed by Bong-Ra's project, but there's a lot of dub and IDM influence sprinkled through here as well. The basslines are huge. Even though it's so dark, because of its diversity, I think it could have a lot of appeal for both hard rockers and electronic types. These songs are long, but thery are for a reason. They progress and add layers in a way that is realy quite remarkable for the sounds they're mixing. An excellent, dark album.

Floating Points caused quite a stir earlier this year with his remix of Real 2 Reel's "Love Me Like This". The tune was a classic house tune in the vein of the best Alan Braxe tracks. Now he's signed onto the Planet Mu roster taking instrumental hip-hop experiments akin to Flying Lotus and others and perfectly melding them into a house and techno framework. This is Planet Mu's second dance-oriented release this year (after the wonderful Few Nolder album), and it's a curious direction for what's traditionally been an IDM and experimental label. That's not to say that this 12" isn't experimental because it very much so is, but these are the first records from Planet Mu a DJ outside of a dubstep or jungle setting would ever consider dropping. Whatever's made Mike Paradinas step onto the dancefloor with his label, he's done it with a solid ear. The A side "J & W Beat" is a nice mix of competing sounds and styles that jostles along for a good six minutes and gets your shoulders moving and the synapses in your head bouncing. But the B side "K & G Beat" takes things to a new level with an immense intro and a Burial meets the Field type of sound (yes, that's as cool as it sounds) that should make anyone appreciative of this type of music turn their head. A stunning 12". I hope more is soon to follow.

Lithuanian producer Linas Strockis is a new style of producer. Coming from way north of any super-developed dance scene, his debut album picks bits and pieces of dance floor sounds from all over Europe and mixes them together. This is the type of record you'd expect from Kompakt on their best days, not Planet Mu, a label not known for releasing dancefloor-ready material at all. Mu first released the "No Mo/Brenn" 12", and the A side made our list of the best songs of 2008. Thankfully, those two tracks re-appear here and bookend the album for non vinyl collectors, but they are quickly overshadowed by some of the material in the middle. "El Snig", which also appeared on last year's Plan Mu compilation, is a major highlight. It features Lithuanian vocals over a minimal techno beat which eventually is replaced by a disco beat and then enveloped at the end by dubstep level bass. Rut's voice carries the tune, and Strockis' manipulaton of it into the beat at times works perfectly. "Fluttery" dips into late 90s IDM style with surprising ease, and some sparse vocals before the beat kicks in. "Chika" goes in a different direction. What starts as a haunted dub vibe gives way to African drums before warped flutes move this track into tribal house territory and keep it there. Fantastic tune. This is music where you categorize it as house or techno or trance based on the minute of the song you're listening to. Along with The Field's new album, this is some of the finest experimental dance music released in a while.

Planet Mu certainly has their ear to the streets. Across the globe this small label is signing up some of the most unique acts in electronic music. FaltyDL is the latest, a New York producer mixing in UK Garage, dubstep, acid, IDM, and a host of other influences for one of the most energetic albums so far this year. Vocal samples reminiscient of Burial populate the entire disc, with more upbeat tempo and acid lines and IDMish melodies mixed in. It's very interesting that this sort of sound is coming out of New York and not the UK. All of its influences seem to emanate from there. I guess this album speaks to how fast sounds and genres can spread with the internet. There's an assuredness to the blend of FaltyDL's sounds. He knows where's snatching these sounds from and how they should work together, something that's highly unusual for a debut album. Overall, this is one of the more polished debuts Planet Mu has put out in a while, and just a heck of a record. And I can certainly see why Mike Paradinas was impressed. Some of the more IDMish tracks (like "A Shape Has Come") could come straight off a Mu-ziq album.

Barry Lynn returns with his third album as Boxcutter, and this time he's dipping even further into the acid sound he explored on Glyphic. With Glyphic, some songs seemed to be acid and some seemed to be dubstep. With Arecibo Message, he seems to have been able to integrate the two sounds better, and it makes for a much better album. This may dissappoint those hoping for more IDM-infused dubstep, but Arecibo Message is new in the way Oneiric was and Glyphic wasn't, and it's exactly what Barry should be doing with this project. The single, ironically titled "A Familiar Sound", is a mix of vocals, acid synthlines, and dubsteppy bass. "Free House Acid" follows and sounds like it could have come straight from one of The Tuss records, which is no small compliment. "Mya Rave v2" is an absolute dancefloor stormer, with a sped up sample singing "Loving you was my mistake". Those three songs alone make the album worth the price of admission, but the album also round itself out with some of the jazz and IDM influences previous fans may be looking for. All in all, I think this is a nice step forward for Barry after (for me, anyway) a disappointing second album.

You have to hand it to Planet Mu. Sure, their taste can be questionable at times, but no label goes into more genres than them and no label pulls diamonds out of the rough like they can. Sunken Foal is just the latest in a long line of winners for them. Dublin's Dunk Murphy blends synthetic voices team up with gentle guitar, piano, and glitchy electronic work for a really impressive debut album. This is a lot more refined than what I'd expect from a debut on Planet Mu, but Murphy has created a finely tuned unqiue sound that is immediately grabbing, shifting in intensity, and very atmospheric. This is what The Gasman could sound like if he didn't realease so much unfinished material. The vocals may sound like a gimmick, but they blend in perfectly with the Sunken Foal aesthetic, are barely noticeable as such other than them being yet another sound in the mix, and again add to the uniqueness of what you're hearing. Another impressive new artist out of the Planet Mu camp.

Planet Mu always seems to have its ear to the ground searching for new sounds. The label is almost eager to re-define itself with each new release, starting from an IDM label, but then embracing indielectronic, breakcore, grime, and dubstep. Now, Planet is, to my knowledge, the first label to release a Skweee album, and the first label outside of Skweee labels Harmonia and Flogsta Danshall to even acknowledge the sound. For those that aren't aware, Skweee is a Scandinavian phenomenon that involves funky basslines and chiptune-esque synth sounds. Until now, all of its releases have been 7"'s, but Eero's trying to take it out of the Nordic lands with the genre's first full-length. This album contains a lot of the hits that have defined the genre's parties, including probably the most known Skwee track "We Could Be Skweeeroes", which could end up being the genre's own "Midnight Request Line". The premise behind Skwee is kind of silly, and the sound is undeniably cheesy, but anyone listening to this album can definitely see potential here. Whether this sound gains traction in the way dubstep has over the last couple of years remains to be seen, but if you're looking for something new, this is the freshest thing you're going to hear.

Jack Dangers is back! And on Planet Mu out of all the labels (for European distribution; Metropolis picked up the US release). What a perfect fit, seeming that Planet Mu is one of the established labels spearing the evolution of experimental and intelligent flavors of dubstep. Right off the bet, what's amazing is that unlike other classic electronic acts (ok, I'll say Orb and Orbital), Meat Beat Manifesto is _not_ locked into the past. Dangers is fresh with the times, embracing and re-inventing dubstep, as well as excelling in every aspect of the genre! He puts pretenders to shame! Dangers lays it on thick, heavy on the bass, exquisite on the intricate beats, bringing back familiar samples, with production skills of a seasoned master. Autoimmune is MBM's tenth studio album, whose discography spans over two decades of releases on a huge roster of labels, such as Wax Trax!, Elektra, Mute, Nothing, Run Recordings, and Play It Again Sam. For a full profile, history and discography you can reference the lengthy Wikipedia entry. The newcomers should be impressed by a true veteran of electronica. And the longtime fans will not be disappointed.

I was quite surprised to hear a proper IDM album on Planet Mu, a label which has veered into other genres as of late. In fact I was surprised to hear a proper IDM full-length at all, on any label; it seems that no one's really interested in 'classic' IDM anymore, perhaps because 'classic' IDM feels like a misnomer. The whole point of the genre, it seems, is to push the boundaries of what can be done with electronic instrumentation, and while this is all well and good, I still feel as if there should be a place (and there is a place, on some labels) for creative variations on the old themes; this is, after all, the bread and butter of virtually every other musical genre. While Mrs Jynx probably won't be making any top 10 lists, this is still a very listenable, playful, and straightforwardly melodic IDM album, and certainly worth a listen!

We can always count on Aaron Funk to punish us at least once a year. If you're not familiar with Venetian Snares, it's time for you to open up that hole and crawl out. Seriously. Winnipeg (Canada) based Funk is a prolific champion of the edgiest of genres - from modern-classical orchestral arrangements violated with breakcore to noisy IDM sprinkled with clicks and cuts. Among the collection of labels, he has managed to span some of my favorites - Zod, Distort, Sublight, Hymen and of course, Planet Mu. Detrimentalist is Funk's twentieth (!!!) album, in which he steps away from classical themes sampled and revisited in his last album My Downfall, and brings back the early drum'n'bass loops only the way Venetian Snares can. Planet Mu describes the release as "Venetian Snares' 332nd official studio album of disgusting ejacutronic rave horn." After a couple of rotations the intelligent design behind complex time signatures stands out from the imitators' attempts at making [whatever]-core simply for the sake of it. The first two tracks, Gentleman and Koonut-Kaliffee set the tone for the entire album, and the grind never stops. The cover art is sprinkled with an array of neon green aliens, robots, skulls, wingdings, guns, cassettes, and other demented and detrimental paraphernalia. And ducks. My favorite track is Eurocore MVP with ragga vocal samples, Funk's staple bass rips, drilling Amen breaks and an obligatory snare rush. This is breakcore at its finest. Keep it coming, Funk... We're listening...