Track Listing: Overture, A Twisted Shadow, Crawling Towards the Maid, Necrophile, Chicken Stomp, String Trio For Male Oppression With Leeches, Jaded Blues, At The Sound Of The Bell, Asylum, Cures and Violence, Lobotomy, Hypnosis, Caclios, Climacteric Melancholia, Caclios II, Woman As Object, Teacher And Pupil, Undefined Consciousness Of Mystical Impropriety, Finale.

This soundtrack comes from a multi-narrative film adaptation of Richard v. Krafft-Ebing’s book of sexual case studies. Although I have not yet seen the film, I can certainly hear the delicate teasing, the master directing his slave, the boot heel being deliberately placed...

A neo-classical soundtrack composed of violin taunts and sighs, delicate percussion, eerie toy piano and other instruments that lend to the bittersweet mood. A haunting and perfectly Victorian fetish soundscape composed by The Changelings’ very own Paul Mercer.

Available through Middle Pillar.

Track Listing: The Lost Son (Phoenix), Now’s The Time, Wanderers, Dynamite, Good Times, True Love, Underground, Animal Life, The Crusade, Can Love Survive, Feel My Soul.

Phoenix is the aptly named album from this 80s German band; this is a new album of new material, as opposed to the last release, Re-Union, which featured songs from their earlier catalogue. These Berlin-based artists keep their musical integrity; Pink Turns Blue hasn’t modernized their sound a bit, which is great in that there’s no trip-hop hybridization happening here. Brings Xymox and The Cure with a harder edge to mind, yet it distinctly stands on its own.

For more information, check out www.pinkturnsblue.com

Track Listing: Love Is All We Have - Blind Divine, Khundas - Shiva In Exile, Sins Of Salome - Angels Of Venice, Black - The Shroud, Prana - Karma Sutra, Cold Room - Knossos, Cask Of Alban - Tim Rayborn, Karakas - Maduro, Pandora’s Box (Opened Remix) - Collide, Honeysuckle Vines - Blind Divine, Bon-Syo - Ruben Van Rompaey. Blood Oil Gold - Solace.

This compilation comes from the same label that has brought the Raqs Gothique scene Knossos, Solace, and Maduro. Strange Flesh is geared towards the darker side of bellydance and is a fantastic combination of Middle Eastern grooves and cyber electronic rhythms with the gothic twist. I have to recommend this musical must-have for both the gothic bellydancer and fans of spicer, dark ethnic-style music.

It’s very difficult to pick my favourite, or the stand-out track here, although I have to say The Shroud has been getting a lot of repeats on my iPod.

Available through Eventide Music Productions.

Track Listing: Shroud (Exordium), Straight to the Light, New Gold Dawn, Requiem XIII-33 (Le veilleur silencieux), Xiberia (Seasons in the ice cage), She, Mourning Sun.

It’s been fifteen years after the band parted ways, yet Mourning Sun, in its epic glory, still rocks out, very much in the vein of classic Nephilim. Dark, dense rock layered with the right kind of spooky. The tracks are quite long, clocking in anywhere over five to seven minutes, but they have this storyline quality that builds from start to finish. Fans of Dawn Razor will be pleased.

For more information, check out fields-of-the-nephilim.com

Track Listing: Sons Of The Burgess Shale, Bodies Rest and Motion, Secret Key, Shukriya Moon.

Post-punk meets shoegazer; this album would have fit on 4AD very nicely back in the day of Xymox and Wolfgang Press. This Brooklyn-based outfit touts in their biography that they make “atmospheric rock to burn love letters to” and I am prone to agree. My complaint is that Sons of the Burgess Shale is too short and I look forward to hearing more.

For more information, check out www.bellhollow.com

Track Listing: Lena, Angry Young Woman, Dusty Typewriter, Shadow Of A Doubt, Shrink Wrapped, Undercover, My Fish Is A Fender, Alaska.

Betty La Gachette, vocalist, and Renault Shubert, musician, are not be confused with cover band Nouvelle Vague; apparently there was a naming conflict, so they are now known as Film 2. This is an electronic-tinged album that brings Ladytron to mind fronted with female vocals that are sometimes in French, sometimes in English with a lilting French accent.

This album is fun, and borders on a little Eurotrashy on some tracks. There’s a really nice range here, but what really grabbed me was the very last track, “Alaska”. Its sparse, creepy ambience, sans lyrics, painted a bare winter snowscape in my mind with skeletal black trees against the pale of the earth. A really simple but beautiful piece.

Released by Berlin-based label, Pale.

Track Listing: The Glow, Shadow and Shadow, Let It Go, Like Hearts, Back Up Slow, All That You Want, Forever Again, Before We Are, Infection, Untitled.

Portland-based gloomy post-punk pop outfit from ex-husband and wife team David Frederickson and Mistina Keith. This is their second full-length release, which feels very much along the lines of Joy Division meets Slowdive with its very rich, layered guitar. “All That You Want” has easily been stuck in my head for days.

For more information, check out www.theprids.com