[engl] Here is Delirik – album number six from Freak Genes. Created between Andrew Anderson (Proto Idiot, KAKE?) and Charlie Murphy (GAMMA, Life Forms), it’s their third release on home-of-the-weird-hits Feel It Records. Delirik keeps the electronic melodic hooks of previous work, but now backed by a base of dark industrial sounds. See artists like Coil, Fad Gadget, This Heat and Front 242 for common ground. Recording destinations included Sofia, Bulgaria and Falmouth, England. Mikey Young returns again for mixing and mastering details. As for the title, that’s derived from Delirium, a glitching, cut up fever dream. Disorientating, exhilarating…you’ll want to do it again.

[engl] How much longer can we (LIVE)…if we’re only an (IMAGE)? That’s the question Freak Genes (FG) pose in their new album Hologram. Put down your electric scriber. Answers on wax only. Discover the difference between manifest and (MIRAGE), solid and (SHAPELESS), real and (INFORMATION_REDACTED). But here is what we actually know: Freak Genes are Charlie Murphy (LIFE_FORMS, GAMMA, FRESH_SPECIMEN, ISOLATION) and Andrew Anderson (PROTO_IDIOT, KAKE?). Hologram is their (FIFTH) album. The (LABEL) is Feel It Records. The playing length is (INFORMATION_REDACTED). There are (THIRTEEN) tracks.

[engl] 3rd LP from Freak Genes, they make cleverly deranged punk music for freaks, by freaks. Whether it's in their genes or acquired from years of dysfunctional ideas gone awry playing in bands, this album is a synth in your face. For their third LP, Freak Genes have unearthed 12 more sort-of-pop sort-of-not songs for your ears to enjoy. Making use of a synthesiser found in a skip and a guitar that won’t stay in tune, III is garage rock meets Gary Numan. There are some hit tracks, weird stuff and almost intentional accidents. If you like making functional use of dysfunctional ideas, this is for you…and if you love DAF, The Units, Lodger-era Bowie, 154-style Wire or The Flying Lizards then so much the better. Freak Genes III was made by Charlie Murphy (Red Cords) and Andrew Anderson (Hipshakes / Proto Idiot) and mixed/mastered/made good by Mikey Young. Strictly not for norms. "The always wonderful Freak Genes are back with what is already their third album in 20 months. On Qwak Qwak, you could hear Andrew and Charlie flirting with electronic instrumentation. III (out on Drunken Sailor Records) finds them all-in on synth-pop. Think more 154 era Wire, less Pink Flag. That's quite a leap for inside of two years, but in my business we call that a "natural progression" (Wire themselves did the same thing!). Everything that was charming, wonderfully weird, playfully non-conforming, and non-conventionally hooky about the duo's first two albums remains fully in tact. Perhaps the more cohesive synth-pop sound makes this particular album feel less all over the place. But I can assure you that it is still somewhat all over the place! The one-sheet promises "garage rock meets Gary Numan", and tracks like "Get Ready To Go" and "Strange Light" deliver exactly that. You can pick up the influences immediately yet still recognize distinct qualities of these guys' other bands. They are never afraid to experiment, but they always come back to writing memorable tunes with hooks. Meanwhile songs such as "Breach" and "Now It's Done" demonstrate that even synth pop era Freak Genes have not totally left post-punk behind. And if your favorite part of every Freak Genes album is coming across a song that makes you go "I don't know what the hell this is, but I sure like it!", "Stitches" and "Close Up" are oddball tracks that you will surely enjoy. There will never be such a thing as two Freak Genes songs that sound the same. Is it just me, or could "Nothing In Between Us" pass for one of The Cure's "poppy" songs?! I can't fully put my finger on what delights me so much about Freak Genes. I think it's that they've made me fall in love with post-punk and new wave again. This was music I grew up on, yet I've been mostly lukewarm on its modern adherents. Charlie and Andrew take those influences and actually have fun with them. Even if there's a dark turn or two on III, it remains a joyful musical creation that's an absolute pleasure to listen to. Originally inspired by the idea of recording misfit songs, Freak Genes have become a misfit band (and that's a lower case "misfit"....these guys are probably 20 albums away from attempting horror punk). And I hope that's what they continue to be forever." Fast and Louder blog.

[engl] England's FREAK GENES are Andrew Anderson (HIPSHAKES, PROTO IDIOT) and Charlie Murphy (RED CORDS, HOLIDAY GHOSTS). With a crazy six-teeeen songs this could almost have been a double LP, but instead you get two A-Sides full of witty-gritty power pop, savage bar rock that has the distinctive flavour of musicians gone thru the class of LoFi with no false pretences. Sharp, cohesive songs that are so good you doubt they're all originals. The next debut album on ALIEN SNATCH! in 2017, your true purveyor of new bands with low predictability and almost *** listening pleasure. "Playtime" has tons of attitude, adrenaline and pop sensibility, sitting on the end-of-the-70´s borderline between punk and pop that we love to death here. Some insistent WIRE tempos, some intense post-punk rockers, always clocking in at two minutes or less. Imagine if ELVIS COSTELLO had only an hour of studio time to boil up an album and he wants the middle seat between SWELL MAPS "New York" and NICK LOWE "Heart of the City". Nuff said, chew on this. Sun-soaked mastering by Mikey Young (EDDY CURRENT SUPPRESSION RING).

[engl] Freak Genes continue their descent into angular electronics with Power Station. Musicians are replaced by machines, natural sounds are swapped for noises. The result is synthetic pop for problem times. Charlie Murphy (Internal Credit / Isolation) and Andrew Anderson (Proto Idiot / KAKE?) orchestrate affairs, wrangling synths, drum machines, guitars and found sounds. Think 154-era Wire but with a reduced budget, or DAF minus the disco. The album was recorded in bedrooms and borrowed spaces from 2018 to 2020. It was mixed and mastered by Mikey Young. Formed in 2016, Freak Genes previous albums are Playtime, Qwak Qwak and III. They’ve performed in both shitty and swanky venues across Europe. They’ll be on stage again in 2021, pandemics and other global catastrophes depending.

[engl] If you distilled the late-’70s explosion of punk rock into a single mixtape that incorporated the pop side, the garage side, and the experimental noise side, Freak Genes would be that mixtape made flesh. Freak Genes is the child of Andrew Anderson and Charlie Murphy, brought into this world to make fun music. Charlie has survived bands like Red Cords, Holiday Ghost and M.Rutt, while Andrew is a veteran of Proto Idiot, the Marble Vanity and the Hipshakes. The idea behind Freak Genes is to take all the weird ideas deemed too dysfunctional for their other outlets and create something interesting. Their original inspiration was the Raincoats LP Odyshape. So far, they sound nothing like that. In 2017 Freak Genes released their first 12” LP Playtime on Alien Snatch records. That album has 16 tracks, and throws together all kinds of garage rock crappola to make quick, catchy songs. Live shows followed in the UK and Mainland Europe, featuring an all-star band of best pals from the Black Tambourines, the Hipshakes and the Be Positives. Since then, Charlie and Andrew have discovered synthesisers and drum machines. The result is Qwak Qwak, a bumper collection of 17 songs, which, if we’ve done our maths right, makes it 6.25% better than their debut. Its angrier and more awkward but still has hooks. They hope you like it.