Helena Hauff is 1 of the 5 artists playing for our 20 Years of Blueprint Records on April 16th. Here’s a spotlight on her, looking at the music typifying her career so far & the mixes we can’t do without.
If a producer that studied fine art, then physics, then systematic music science doesn’t catch your interest, then we don’t know what will. She also rejects using a computer to produce – each track is a one-take, fully analog, recorded to tape apparition, and guesss what?
It’s an absolute bomb 💣
Action Reactio
This was Helena’s debut EP on Werkdiscs back in 2013. It’s mesmerising and it’s raw. You can listen to the full EP here. Break Force is a stand-out track on – get your chops around it – b e l t e r!
RA 373.
Acid and electro from the docks of Hamburg. Helena cut her teeth in the Golden Pudel – an infamous, unassuming club amongst the fishmarkets of Hamburg, where she runs her night ‘Birds and other Instruments’. This mix is a great cameo of this night, showcasing her varied style flexing between ‘neck-snapping electro, new wave and EBM (Electronic Body Music)’. Give it a whirl.
A Tape
Although only producing since around 2011 this actually isn’t her first album – if you’re digging her sound then don’t gloss over her second album ‘Discreet Desires‘, with synthesizers tested to their max and tempos randing from 90 – 140bpm. So, A Tape – which was literally that – the label Handmade Birds asked, and she dug back and found a tape of her jams, which they released in 2015.
There’s several utterly amazing tracks on it and some very esoteric, experimental stuff too – making for a great listen and a journey of an album. For this reason it’s tricky to pick just one track from this album to tempt you. You can listen to the whole album here, but if we’re forced to pick one, give c45p a go.
Return To Disorder
“There was an art movement after the First World War called Return to Order. They were a very conservative art movement, they basically wanted to go back to having nice pictures of trees and stuff [laughs].. I did the record for Bunker last year, it was 2014, so it was 100 years after the First World War started. I wanted to find a name for the record that referred to that somehow, so I thought, ‘Okay, I’m going to start an art movement that’s called Return To Disorder”. Here’s what that sounds like.”
Some final words from Helena Hauff:
“What club culture is about is going crazy together all night long, drinking some, getting up to some nonsense, and feeling shitty the next morning. The idea is to do what you are not able to do all day long: letting your hair down.”
