I have to sheepishly confess to not being very tuned in to my local music scene. If we meet in person and you ask me where I live, I’ll say Seattle, but in fact I live on the other side of the lake (aka the Eastside) about a 25 minute drive away and I don’t get into the city nearly as often as I’d like. Back in the late 80s when grunge and Sub Pop were on the rise I was more in touch, if only because there was less going on1 and I could rely on publications like The Rocket and a visit to Cellophane Square Records to give me the gist. Today with the internet it should actually be easier, but sometimes I think the sheer volume of information makes me even less likely to seek it out (the so-called Paradox of Choice), so in reality folks from outside Seattle often know way more about what’s happening here musically than I do, especially within specific scenes.
Which is perhaps an overly-long preamble to introduce the Seattle-based electronic music collective and label Basement State. Basement State first came on my radar late last year with Herr Shield’s brilliant Patch Memory. It was the label’s fourth release2 and first on vinyl. Prior to that, Basement State put out three compilation cassettes – Basement State Vol. I (2021), Basement State Vol. II (2022), and Basement State & Friends (2023). The first two are still available on the label’s Bandcamp page HERE, while I had to track down a copy of Vol. I on Discogs, because of course I had to have all three.
It feels a bit trite to write that all 28 tracks spread across these three cassettes are enjoyable, but it’s also true. That being said, I find myself drawn to some of the stylistic outliers. The A side of Vol. I provides some dreamy, trance-like techno and house that got me into a groove, but then What We Talk About opened the B side with “Coordinates”, a synthy number separated by light years from the A side and one that would feel right at home on the soundtrack of a 1970s sci-fi flick. Not one of those action-y movies like Star Wars, but more along the lines of 2001: A Space Odyssey or the original Russian version of Solaris, something with long dialogue-free stretches allowing the music and visuals to create the mood. And if you thought that was going to define the B side, Planar Drift comes up next, kicking that assumption to the curb, merging techno and noise elements on the gritty “Rats Out”. Harsh Realm closes out the side with some hard techno beats and sharp industrial edges on “Tyvek”, making both my foot tap and my jaw clench with its barely restrained aggression. That B side absolutely destroys all comers with its disparate styles and approaches.
All seven artists from Vol. I are back on Vol. II, along with one newcomer, Also Loud, whose slow buildup on “Shielded From Deadlines” gets punchier and edgier as it progresses before slowing back down for a near-ambient finish. Planar Drift once again comes in strong, this time layering techno elements over an ambient bed with “Slow Ramp”, while Project 32’s pulsating “Oxide” takes us back to outer space as we move through a starship’s confined passages, the only illumination the red emergency lighting letting us know that we’re in deep, deep trouble. Basement State & Friends introduces 13 new artists to the series, opening with Ybot’s groovy “Neurons,” its sample of a narrator describing the skull and spinal cord in a way reminiscent of 1970s school filmstrips setting the stage for a tape that is edgier than the first two. Other highlights include DNcrystal’s “IBGH” taking us all the way to the edges of industrial dance and Sherman C’s languid purple-drank-dreamy “Secret Weapon”.
Basement State definitely earned a spot on my labels-to-watch list and I’m looking forward to hearing what they put out next.
- This is certainly not entirely true, as there were plenty of underground scenes happening, but you had to know where to look. One of my best friends was deep in the goth scene and would routinely tell me about bands and shows and venues that I’d never heard of. ↩︎
- There are four releases show on the label Bandcamp page and Discogs, though the cassette catalog numbers are 001 through 003, and the Herr Shield record is 005… so there may be a 004 release of some kind. ↩︎