Karen Gwyer – a US-born Londoner – makes slow-burning and sexy “bath house”.

‘Needs Continuum’ – her debut album, following a 2012 EP on fellow No Pain In Pop artist patten’s own Kaleidoscope label and an exclusive track on NPIP’s ‘The Bedroom Club II’ vinyl only compilation – is a thrillingly unique and intuitive experience. Composed and recorded in the months before the birth of her first child, the record is both a product and champion of immutable, organic cyclical rhythms and disorientating psycho-physical disequilibria. Amongst idiosyncratic, treacle-thick reinterpretations of classic house and digital-psychedelia there are elements of Fuck Buttons or Cabaret Voltaire, fellow Ann Arborite Laurel Halo’s deconstructed-Detroit King Felix project, and Arthur Russell’s emotionally excavating avant-disco.

February 2014′s ‘New Roof’ EP is a weighty, more mechanistic exploration. Both vocal-less 15 min+ tracks are built from a tough analogue-techno template, with Gwyer’s distinctive impressionistic synthstrokes sitting above the pulsing rhythms.

RELEASES:

‘Needs Continuum‘ 2013 LP

‘Cowboys (For Karen)‘ 2013 EP (with Torn Hawk)

‘New Roof’ 20014 EP