Aural Aggravation

5th September 2025

Christopher Nosnibor

Bandcamp Friday or nay, September is always a busy month for releases, presumably in no small part due to the fact that the festival season is over, and artists can get to the job of plugging material to fans they may have picked up along the way, while music listeners are back home rather than in fields in front of stages, or on holiday, so are placed to listen to, and maybe purchase new music.

Sometimes, it can take a while to sift through it all, and there’s a real danger that some great stuff will slip through the cracks, especially from lesser-known artists. This, in many respects, is where the music press, such as it is these days, has not only a role, but a duty, an obligation, to seek out and highlight the acts who aren’t going to be pushed into the ears of the masses by algorithms, or by labels with hods of cash for promo (who aren’t necessarily averse to insidious campaigns claiming a ‘grass-roots’ story for an unknown group of middle-class posers who’ve barely played a gig or had more than a handful of streams / likes before landing airplay, huge support slots and going stratospheric overnight… and there are a fair few of these).

Moons in Retrogtrade is Kara Kuckoo, a German artist who does a nice line in dark alternative / gothic electronic rock, and who isn’t likely to be getting algorithmic / big label backing any time soon, not because her work isn’t good, but because, well, it’s a bit arty, and in the current climate of anti-intellectualism, it’s a hard sell to the mass market.

Take, for example, this, the lead single from her upcoming debut album The Third Side of the Coin. Released as a video single, the song is accompanied by highly stylised visuals, which feature an almost Tim Burton-esque ‘Mad Hatter’s Tea Party’ scene. It’s fitting that this shimmering dark pop gem should present images offering a twisted alternative reality, given the subject matter (again, a hard sell for commercial channels), as Kuckoo explains the concept behind the single:

“Carl Jung said, ‘Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.’ ‘Mirror Obscura’ is about facing one’s own darkness through the infinite mirrors of other people… The video portrays the perceived duality of black and white and the madness within us as we avoid our own darkness. The elements of color are glimpses into the spectrum of wholeness… I especially wanted to shoot at sunrise because those moments of dusk and dawn are the magical spaces between day/light and night/dark.”

On the project’s broader intent, she adds: “Moons in Retrograde is about digging up and reflecting on buried emotions… MIR weaves a soundscape which shines a light into the deepest corners of the mind and exposes the truth about the dark side of humanity while simultaneously discovering the core of the human soul.”

It’s one of those tracks which takes its time with a slow build (another thing which goes against the grain in our attention-deficient world, where intros and verses have got shorter and shorter to the point that most chart pop is seventy-five percent chorus), building atmosphere, Kuckoo’s vocals emerging through cavernous reverb and washing waves to arrive by stealth to an meet with an enticing beat and subtle instrumentation before a strong chorus that goes big on the final run, a burst of bold, even epic proportions.

You’re welcome.

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