The Wire, May 2025

A must for any underground music fan, The Wire reports on alternative, underground and non-mainstream musics, ‘waging war on the mundane and the mediocre.’

In this issue:

On the cover: aya: New album hexed! explores sobriety and neurodiversity through radical tunings and transformed instruments. By Chal Ravens. Inside: Satch Hoyt: The one-time Burnt Sugar member’s Un-Muting project opens museum archives of stolen instruments. By Francis Gooding; Ailie Ormston: The Glasgow composer moves away from the conservatoire to conduct the sounds of the city. By Abi Bliss; Joke Lanz: At 60 years old the Swiss improvisor still takes a punk approach to the turntable. By Daniel Spicer; Bios Contrast: Kolkata musician Nilotpal Das cooks up the concept of brahmancore. By Misha Farrant; Laura Cocks: Chamber music is the site of connection for the flautist. By Stewart Smith; MIC: Grime provides the setting for sci-fi storytelling in the hands of the London MC. By Lucy Thraves: John King: The composer playing the blues for Palestine’s lost communities. By Kurt Gottschalk; Trân Uy Đúc: The Vietnamese multidisciplinary artist curates the self-scape. By Daryl Worthington; Invisible Jukebox: Alvin Curran: Will the Musica Elettronica Viva member read maritime rites over The Wire’s mystery record selection? Tested by Julian Cowley; Global Ear: Experiments and activism in Danish capital Copenhagen. By Josh Feola; Unlimited Editions: Meticulous design and sonics dovetail in New York new music label Greyfade. By Philip Watson; The Inner Sleeve: Seymour Wright on Anne Gillis’s Lxgrin; Against The Grain: VAN magazine Editor Hugh Morris can’t stand that jazzy sensation; Epiphanies: Surgeon gets all cut up by William S Burroughs and Brion Gysin. Plus 40 pages of reviews including Gryphon Rue: State of nature. By Abi Bliss; Ed Kuepper & Jim White/Kim Salmon & Masami Kawaguchi: Pacific old masters. By Byron Coley; Strata-East reissues: Black unity. By Daniel Spicer; Music under Stalin: Utopian dreams and nightmares in the USSR. By Andy Hamilton; Borealis: Nordic operations. By Robert Barry; 160 Unity: Footwork on the floor. By Joseph Francis; and much, much more.