This month it's 38 years since Canadian industrial band Front Line Assembly released their first official album The Initial Command (December 1987) on the since discontinued Belgian cult label KK Records. In fact it was also the first KK record release bearing the catalogue number KK001.
Before this album the band released only two demo tapes called Nerve War and Total Terror. The music on this release was mainly composed by Bill Leeb, but also with help from his future partners in crime Rhys Fulber and Michael Balch on some tracks.

On The Initial Command we can hear a very dark and deep EBM sounding Front Line Assembly which may remind you of the sound of Cabaret Voltaire during their Crackdown era but even more deep and dark. The tracks Black March and No Control are certainly a sort of forecast of the harder tracks they were about to release in the following decades.

Since the 1987 release of The Initial Command, the album has been re-issued twice. The first re-release, in 1992 by Third Mind Records, contained no changes. The second re-release, in 1997 by Cleopatra Records, contained two new tracks and new cover art.

The Initial Command (1987)

The Initial Command (1997)

DISCOGS

Transcontinental darkwave duo, VOX UMBRA has unveiled their debut EP, Unchained; a collection of six songs that explore what it means to confront darkness and step through it.
Written and produced across two continents by Tiffany (Seattle, USA) and Florian (Amiens, France), the EP was born of late-night file transfers, dawn vocal takes, and a shared fascination with shadow and light. Each track exists in that liminal space - where longing meets defiance, and beauty is sharpened by melancholy. Thematically, the record traces a journey: from isolation with a track like “Cold Heart”, disillusionment with “On The Right” to moments of spiritual reckoning in “Iron Serpent” and release with the title track, “Unchained”.
Throughout the EP, water and fire imagery run like threads - rivers that carry grief away, candle flames that refuse to go out - creating a world that feels cinematic and intimate at once.
Unchained is a story about breaking cycles: of grief, of silence, of the walls we build around ourselves. It is both a mirror and a torch — reflecting the shadows we live in and lighting a path forward.
Unchained is available on all major digital outlets including Spotify and Bandcamp.

open.spotify.com/artist/5Nv12I5NUxf11w3ItcBJ3s

This month it’s 41 years ago Canadian industrial act Skinny Puppy released their very first EP Remission, a six track record, on Nettwerk Records (December 1984). In 1986, after their first full album Bites was released, Skinny Puppy released a cassette version of Remission with additional tracks expanding the release to a full-length album. In 1987 both albums Remission and Bites ended up together on one single CD album called Bites And Remission containing 17 tracks while the European PIAS version named Remission & Bites had only 14 tracks on it.

Besides the already recognizable and typical Skinny Puppy style the EP is filled with vocal samples taken from, amongst others, the 1943 Hitchcock movie Shadow Of A Doubt and even a sample of president Ronald Reagan’s speech about pornography as art.

The original release already contained some of Skinny Puppy’s classics songs like Smothered Hope, Far Too Frail and Solvent, tracks that still can be heard at many underground parties today.

Remission (original 12" vinyl version)

Back (Side A)
A1 Smothered Hope
A2 Glass Houses
A3 Far Too Frail
Side B -

Forth (Side B)
B1 Solvent
B2 Sleeping Beast
B3 Brap...

DISCOGS

BEHEMOTH and DIMMU BORGIR have announced a joint European co-headline tour for October 2026, set to run under the title In League With Satan. Dark Funeral are confirmed as special guests for all dates, rounding out a consistent three-band billing across the entire route. The tour spans 13 shows in mid-to-large European venues, covering Switzerland, Germany, Luxembourg, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Czech Republic, Finland, Sweden and Denmark.

Tickets go on sale December 3, 2025 at 10:00 CET.

Tour dates and venues:

Oct 09 — Zurich, Switzerland — Halle 622

Oct 10 — Zwickau, Germany — Sparkassen-Arena

Oct 11 — Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg — Rockhal

Oct 13 — Milan, Italy — Alcatraz

Oct 14 — Munich, Germany — Zenith

Oct 16 — Paris, France — Zénith

Oct 18 — Den Bosch, Netherlands — Mainstage

Oct 20 — Cologne, Germany — Palladium

Oct 22 — Hamburg, Germany — Inselpark Arena

Oct 23 — Berlin, Germany — Columbiahalle

Oct 24 — Brno, Czech Republic — Hala Vodova

Oct 27 — Helsinki, Finland — Ice Hall

Oct 29 — Stockholm, Sweden — B-K

Oct 30 — Copenhagen, Denmark — K.B. Hallen

On this day, 55 years ago, Kraftwerk released their self-titled debut studio album (1 December 1970). The album was produced by Konrad "Conny" Plank and is often refered to as 'Kraftwerk 1'.

On this album Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider used two drummers, Andreas Hohmann and Klaus Dinger. Their drumming provides the album a rock-ish edge, making it sound quite distinctive from Hütter and Schneider's previous work. The album contains instrumentals only.

The cover design, credited to Ralf Hütter, is a curious nod to the influence of Andy Warhol and the then contemporary pop art movement, featuring a fluorescent-coloured traffic cone drawn in a Warhol-esque manner.

No material from this album has been performed in the band's live set since the Autobahn tour of 1975 and, to date, the album has not been officially reissued. The band is seemingly reluctant to consider the album a part of its canon and in later interviews, Schneider referred to the first three Kraftwerk albums as "archaeology".

In 1971 the album peaked in the German album charts at position 30.

KRAFTWERK

All tracks are written by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider-Esleben.

Kraftwerk (1970)

• Ralf Hütter – organ, guitar, tubon, cover design
• Florian Schneider-Esleben – flute, violin, percussion
• Andreas Hohmann – drums on "Ruckzuck" and "Stratovarius"
• Klaus Dinger – drums on "Vom Himmel hoch"

DISCOGS