PRG/M – Assioma Geometrico [Spagiria] + Full Album Stream

Welcome back to our Review column, mostly featuring exclusive full album streams. Today we’re happy to share with you in its entirety the PRG/M’s debut record on Spagiria, the brand new Eklero’s subsection born and thought as part of the process of separation, re-aggregation and re-thinking of the Rome-based label’s peculiar features, which would provide a new musical pattern for the future releases to follow. The Spagiria division, as well as Eklero, has been founded by Daniele Crocenzi and Calogero Aquilina, and its name refers to the alchemic ‘spagiria’ procedure (literally meaning ‘to find the Divine’), a very complex set of operations through which the matter could be purified and remedies produced.

Right up here you can push the button and listen to ‘Assioma Geometrico’ (Italian for ‘axiom’, referring to Euclidean geometry) by PRG/M aka Pier Mariconda (Avellino, Italy, 1980). ‘Assioma Geometrico’ will be available January the 23rd (limited-edition CD or digital DL), containing four original tunes plus three reworks. The EP’s outstanding artwork was carried out by Eklero / Spagiria’s founders Daniele and Calogero and it’s aligned to the distinctive esoteric-ish label’s graphic outlook.

Discogs / Soundcloud / Eklero / Spagiria

Pier Giuseppe Mariconda, musician and multimedia artist from Southern Italy, already known as 1/4 of the super-group r2π composed of Lino Monaco, Nicola Buono (retina.it) and Ruhig (Luigi Cicchella), first appeared as Subion (together with Nicola Virnicchi) on Blackwater Label, which released the duo’s live set at Flussi.eu festival edition 2014; ‘Eliogabalo’ 12” saw the light on Pier di Sorte / Devianza’s outcome too July 2015, followed by several isolated tracks and remixes. Then, Concrete Records and Blackwater again hosted the debut tracks recorded under the 2016-activated PRG/M alias – respectively Ninsei EP, also including a rework by Matter / Fabrizio Matrone, and ‘Il Mare di Capalbio’ split 12” featuring Devianza and Phorm.

The PRG/M alias expresses the artist’s most dark and inward-looking productions, which have at their core obscure, evocative sounds, submerged pads and drain, de-constructed rhythms. The ‘PRG/M’ name, which should be read as ‘Program’, is a vowel-free word derived from Pier’s own initial name letters to make a joke about ‘codice fiscale‘-like monikers the current electronic scene is weighed down with, but at the same time refers to the Prophet analog synth’s abbreviation for ‘program’ (which is PRGM indeed).

Tracklist

  1. Apotema (9:25)
  2. Asymptota (5:11)
  3. Catheto (7:02)
  4. Hypotenusa (5:56)
  5. Hypotenusa (Hydrangea Light Vision) (6:21)
  6. Asymptota (Ruhig Woggle Interpretation) (6:59)
  7. Apotema (Kalos Shadowy Forms Edition) (8:06)

The four initial original compositions are named after geometrical entities somehow recalling a sense of ‘order’, a tight, minimal take on techno in which no sound component falls out of the producer’s control, and there’s no chance either for the listener to wander off the dense kick drum patterns. The opening track ‘Apotema’ is the quintessential representation of PRG/M’s program, being the longest and most relentless one appearing here (Kalos aka Calogero Aquilina himself provides a glitchy, ‘shadowy’ reinterpretation of it adding an extra-layer of thrilling synth pads). ‘Asymptota’ sounds almost as a techno brainwashing tour-de-force well-suited for nervous writhing rather than dancing, and Ruhig aka Luigi Cicchella (Midgar) puts additional bass elements in his own remix. ‘Catheto’ is seized by a sinister high-pitched motif, while ‘Hypotenusa’ masterfully ends the original version part – immediately followed up by Hydrangea’s brighter, hopeful rework.

This new challenging ‘rearrangement’ action called Spagiria couldn’t have started better, for the EP could be listed among the most captivating Italian techno records lately released. After publishing amazing albums by veterans such as retina.it, Yves de May, Acronym, Plaster (and many more), Eklero / Spagiria confirms its high-quality standards and offers a new, promising artistic path to be closely monitored. Grab your ‘Assioma Geometrico’ copy here.

An axiom is a statment that is not proved nor demonstrated but considered to be either self-evident, or subject to necessary decision. Therefore, its truth is taken for published, and serves as a starting point for deducing and inferring other truths. So the geometry of Euclid’s Elements is based on five ‘axioms’ that assert what may be – or not be – constructed in geometry.

 


Are you enjoying what you see on PAYNOMINDTOUS? If that’s the case, we’d like to kindly ask you to subscribe to our newsletter, our Facebook group, and also to consider donating a few cents to our cause. Your help would be of great relevance to us, thank you so much for your time!

PAYNOMINDTOUS is a non-profit organization registered in December 2018, operating since late 2015 as a webzine and media website. In early 2017, we started our own event series in Turin, IT focused on arts, experimental, and dancefloor-oriented music. We reject every clumsy invocation to “the Future” meant as the signifier for capitalistic “progress” and “innovation”, fully embracing the Present instead; we renounce any reckless and ultimately arbitrary division between “high” and “low”, respectable and not respectable, “mind” and “body”; we support and invite musicians, artists, and performers having diverse backgrounds and expressing themselves via variegated artistic practices.