If you are STILL stuck for things to do before Rapturization, why not try your hand at remixing the band Zombi? It seems rather apt, doesn’t it? Remix Zombi now, and get to meet a real live zombie later on today. If you are one of those people unfortunate enough to get left behind that is. Unlike me - it may have passed the 6pm deadline over here but I am hedging my bets on an EST ascension now.

Ok, enough of the rapture jokes.

Zombi are a most excellent doomy synth act from Pennsylvania comprised of the members Steve Moore and Anthony Paterra. I posted on Steve Moore a few weeks ago, as one of his numerous spin off projects is the equally excellent synth-pop act Miracle. Zombi take things in a much more John Carpenter direction, with arpeggios full of authentic late 70s B-Movie atmosphere and a vibe that brings to mind the work of Fabio Frizzi for Lucio Fulci, and some of Mororder’s earliest scoring forays. This kind of retro-soundtrack/space-rock thing seems quite voguish now (not that I’m complaining) but Zombi are one of the pioneers having been on this tip for almost a decade now.
 
Zombi - “Shrunken Heads” (from Escape Velocity LP)
 

 
Zombi - “Slow Oscillations” (from Escape Velocity LP)
 

 
Zombi - “Spirit Warrior”  (from Spirit Warrior LP)
 

 
Zombi - “Sapphire” (from Digitalis EP)
 

 
The band have just released their new album Escape Velocity on the respected metal label Relapse, and in conjunction with Self-Titled magazine and Soundcloud are giving folks a chance to remix “Slow Oscillations”. The prize is a Soundcloud pro-account for a year, your very own Steve Moore remix (boom!!) and a whole heap of Zombi-related goodies. And at the very least it’s a chance to hear all those gorgeous classic synths separated. To download the song, and the individual tracks, go here. To buy Escape Velocity and other Zombi releases go here.

 
Steve Moore is one half of the band Zombi, who create excellent synth-drenched soundscapes heavily influenced by prog rock and 70s/80s Italian horror movie soundtracks. But that’s not all he does—no, this incredibly prolific artist also records under a variety of names such as Lovelock, Titan and Gianni Rossi and has worked with a dizzying array of highly respected labels.  He now has another band to add to that list, Miracle, a more vocal-based, almost poppy project which sees Moore working with Daniel O’Sullivan of the band Guapo. Their latest release is the Fluid Window EP on the House Anxiety label (who have previously released music by The Big Pink). Miracle recently made a video for the EP’s lead track “The Visitor” (below) and have made another track, “Sunstar”, available as a free download via Pitchfork.

As synth-pop goes, this is good. I mean really, really good. In the age of lots of pretenders to the synth-pop throne (La Roux, Hurts, Mirrors, Villa Nah, etc) Miracle sound like the real deal. It’s not just because of the synth fetishism on display here (giving Miracle an instant edge over most modern producers’ software based production), but because their music is positively soaked in atmosphere. It’s very easy nowadays to download a free analog synth emulator, sing over an arpeggiator and pretend to be Depeche Mode. What’s much harder is to capture the melancholy longing in those seminal 80s records—the longing to escape gray modernity into a better future, but with a tinge of fear for the darkness that future might hold. Miracle obviously know what they are doing because “The Visitor” sounds like the best Depeche Mode single since around 1988.
 
Miracle - “The Visitor”
 

 
The Fluid Window EP is available to buy here. You can listen to the whole EP on Soundcloud.