Silvia Fassler & Billy Roisz: Skylla (Editions Mego) - CD

Viennese girl duo who craft an incredibly detailed piece of contemporary computer music. Sourcing guitar and turntable through their custom built Max patches. It being on Mego suggests exploration of extremes, but not so. Sure, there are moments where it peaks into the red ('Schwarzchild'), but on the whole this is really playful stuff. Occupying the higher end of the frequency spectrum means everything sounds crisp and close to the ear. Industrial rumblings on 'Kirre' suddenly plummet the listener into sub-bass territory, whilst the beautifully ambient 'Syne' reminds me of Ryoji Ikeda. Tense, tactile and genuinely experimental.

Annette Krebs / Toshimaru Nakamura: Siyu (SoSEditions) - CD

Beautiful, if slightly impractical (CD always manages to fall out of its cradle) packaging suckered me into getting this from the racks of Sound 323. Not familiar with Kreb's stuff at all, but Nakamura is the shit. I remember his 'Vehicle' album being an engaging, accessible and surprisingly rhythmic piece of work. Here it's much more restrained, this is the sort of Electroacoustic improvisation that barely registers on the EQ. 'Wrr' is a narratively considered series of tones, crackles and clicks all still manage to get under the skin. The second ('Bsb') of the two tracks makes more of an impact. As if the hermetically sealed vacuum that occupied track one is slowly exposed to the environment and uncontrollable external forces.

Paul White: The Dragon Fly (One-Handed Music) - 7"

Aligned with the oh-so-current strand of dense, cinematic hip-hop being spear-headed by the likes of Flying Lotus. This almost outdoes the LA-based pioneer in terms of scope and execution. The A-side prowls street corners at night with a confident swagger, but its the gentler B-side that stands out. A searing Detroit Techno bassline holds together intense vocal choir and clipped rhythms. It doesn't do much else, but then as Karl from Soul Jazz pointed out to me "It doesn't need to...". Wise words.

Popol Vuh: Nachts: Schnee / Aguirre I (Editions Mego) - 12"

Popul Vuh were one of the most innovative bands to come out of the whole Krautrock movement during the seventies. And whilst a lot of their later output could be deemed as New Age rubbish, it was their frequent collaborations with legendary filmmaker Werner Herzog that resulted in their best work. 'Nachts - Schnee' (taken from the soundtrack to 1987's 'Cobra Verde') is gently manipulated by Pan Sonic's Mika Vainio. He allows the undulating orchestral ambience to provide the canvas, whilst he alters the flow with digital interrupts and echo.

Computer music terrorists Haswell & Hecker rework the stunning 'Aguirre 1' from the 1972 film of the same name. A benchmark ambient classic and thankfully H&H avoid mangling it beyond repair. They let the haunting original run for a while before the laptop-emitted mayhem starts to run riot. Strangely enough the mix of lambent chords and harsh algorithmic noise works. An inspired collaboration if ever there was one.