The Muscut and Shukai sounds of lost futures

At first glance, the sonic worlds of Ukrainian labels Muscut and Shukai sound very similar. While the aesthetics of both share the sound of the nostalgic allure of blurred, overdubbed tape loops, they diverge in their creative approach. Shukai delves into the archives, unearthing lost gems often banned and suppressed by the Soviets, while Muscut crafts new music that evokes the feeling of a lost vintage soundtrack to a picture promising visions of a brighter future.

The mood in which Muscut’s musical direction will be carried was revealed with the first release in 2012, the 7-inch compilation Test Pressing. The label’s catalogue is quite broad in terms of genre. From the surf-rock, funky and sometimes even dub aesthetic of Chillera, to the woobie jazz of Hennadii Boichenko and the dreamy drone-ambient of Bryozone, to work by the label founder Dmytro Nikolaienko, which mixes library music, muzak, easy listening 50s exotica and analogue sound. All released on vinyl or audiocassette, each visually treated in a DIY archival aesthetic: catalogue stickers, stamps, forms and poorly scanned lo-fi images.

Shukai began its journey in 2019 with the debut release of Ukrainian composer Victor Vlasov’s music for the anti-utopian sci-fi film Air Seller. This pilot album clearly outlined the future aesthetic and direction of the label, which in the following years often covered never-officially released music by Ukrainian composers. Volodymyr Bystriakov’s music for the surreal, almost psychedelic animated film Alice Through the Looking Glass, the tape archives of New Age experimentalist and violinist Valentina Goncharova, and the hidden treasure of Ukrainian avant-garde and neo-folk Cukor Bila Smert ’.

With hauntology as a leitmotif, Dmytro from Muscut and co-founder of Shukai unveils the relationship between art, politics, nostalgia and a future steeped in echoes of the past.

Read the interview with Nikolaienko here

Tracklist

A1. Muzak For Mesozoic Showreel (feat. Arthur Mine)
A2. Troglodytes (feat. Arthur Mine)
A3. The Ancient Musical Complex Of Mammoth Bones
A4. Glass Flowers
A5. Sacrifice I
B1. Misantropicalia
B2. Dark Archeo
B3. Sacrifice II (Curse of Snakes Valley)
B4. ExotiCon
B5. Yalta (feat. Amphibian Man II)

“At its best, the album sounds like the high points of ex-Skater Spencer Clark’s varied catalog (think Vodka Soap or Monopoly Child Star Searchers) and harmonizes with Christina Vantzou’s bizarre and brilliant “Multi Natural” full-length.” — Boomkat

“The natural and unnatural have rarely sat together in such perfectly unsettling harmony.” — Juno

“Nostalgia Por Mesozo´ica is an “exploration of experimental exotica.” ‘Troglodytes’, for example, reimagines the age of dinosaurs and their leaky cave-dwelling existence, through a distorted and nostalgic lens that evokes movie soundtracks from the ’60s and ’70s.” — if-only

“Great production and mix by St. Petersburg musician Eugenii Fadeev aka Flaty, author of a good album of electronica on the same label in 2018 (Wrong Water – Dozen LP)”. — Laurent Fairon

“Alchemical combinations of musique concrète, samples, synthetic parts with fairy-tale melodies (‘Muzak For Mesozoic Showreel’) and sound-art (‘Dark-Archeo’), produce a varied, fascinating and original music narrative”. — The Quietus, Jakub Knera

Muscut will release Nostalgia Por MesozóIca (featuring a Riso printed cover sleeve) on October 4, 2024