Discreet Desires

Making her recording debut just two years ago in 2013, Helena’s first release was a 3-track EP – Actio Reactio - on Actress’ Werkdiscs imprint. She has since partnered with PAN (as Black Sites alongside F#x), Lux Rec, Bunker sublabel Panzerkreuz and Texan cassette imprint Handmade Birds to share her overtly analogue excursions into techno’s shadowy fringes, improvised and recorded in her bedroom studio in Hamburg. Fully embracing her love of hardware, Helena joined James Dean Brown’s legendary electronic improv outfit Hypnobeat (founded back in 1983) in 2013, blazing a trail across Europe with their intense polyrhythmic jam sessions on the TB-303, TR-707 and TR-808. “I have the feeling it’s more one-to-one – you do something and then the machine reacts. The machine has its own mind too, so it gives something back.” Ten tracks deep, Discreet Desires is the embodiment of Helena’s deep-seated beliefs about music as a radical force and unifying movement. Something that is evident from her growing stature as a selector and her enthusiasm for musical subcultures from punk to nu wave, industrial, krautrock and avant garde electro – all of which were rooted in raw experimentation and existed in polar opposition to the perfect, polished mainstream. “Perfection is pretty boring. It doesn’t really exist anyway… only in death. Death is perfect.”

Hamburg-based DJ and producer Helena Hauff began releasing records in 2013, making stripped-down, monochromatic techno and acid house tracks in line with releases on labels like L.I.E.S. (Long Island Electrical Systems) and The Trilogy Tapes.

It’s little surprise that Helena Hauff's first full length effort for the Actress-helmed Werkdiscs is an intense listen.

Helena Hauff's tidy back catalogue is one that's full of raw intrigue and delightfully artless hardware-driven recordings. Simple loops, one...