We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

XIIIIIIII (18)

by Vlimmer

supported by
DJ Southpaw
DJ Southpaw thumbnail
DJ Southpaw All the tracks are outstanding! Favorite track: Vorwehen.
sound obscura
sound obscura thumbnail
sound obscura Fantastic album. Another Vlimmer masterpiece. Favorite track: Mängelexemplar.
Propuesta Cultural
Propuesta Cultural thumbnail
Propuesta Cultural The ideal soundtrack to see how a sunset turns into a night full of stars. Favorite track: Nacktheit.
preciousken
preciousken thumbnail
preciousken This latest release “VIIIIIIII” has his textured emotive stark imagery. Opening with an urgency and seamless blend of guitar slush with cascading keyboards. It’s gorgeous, immersive, and never disappoints. I am always shocked by how far from the previous concept each release leaps. This one highlights the vocals and has a brighter indie rock sensibility. I’m in awe, how does he have so many ideas that always sound so fresh. Favorite track: Nacktheit.
more...
/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      €4 EUR  or more

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    "XIIIIIIII" (18) on CD EP with handwritten release title on CD + lyric sheet and art print

    Includes unlimited streaming of XIIIIIIII (18) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 4 days

      €5 EUR or more 

     

  • Cassette + Digital Album

    15 copies on black tape with handwritten "XIIIIIIII" by the artist
    Includes lyrics

    Includes unlimited streaming of XIIIIIIII (18) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 4 days
    edition of 15  4 remaining

      €5 EUR or more 

     

  • 18 chapters, 128 pages
    "Jagmoor Cynewulf" is the narrative which Vlimmer's 18-EP series is based on.
    ATTENTION: Only available in German.
    Includes download of "XIIIIIIII" (18)

    Includes unlimited streaming of XIIIIIIII (18) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 5 days
    7 remaining

      €12 EUR or more 

     

  • "XIIIIIIII" (18) (Limited edition box set including book and signed print)
    Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Includes:
    -handpainted wooden box limited to 20 copies (designed to store parts 16-18 of the EP series)
    -signed print (randomly chosen out of 20 different photos) with random lyric fragment from a song of the EP series - both signed and written by the artist
    -"XIIIIIIII" (18) on CD EP + lyric sheet and art print
    -18-chapter "Jagmoor Cynewulf" book (ATTENTION: written in German!) which Vlimmer's 18-EP series is based on

    Includes unlimited streaming of XIIIIIIII (18) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

    Sold Out

  • "XIIIIIIII" (18) (Limited edition box set including signed print)
    Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Includes:
    -handpainted wooden box limited to 20 copies (designed to store parts 16-18 of the EP series)
    -signed print (randomly chosen out of 20 different photos) with random lyric fragment from a song of the EP series - both signed and written by the artist
    -"XIIIIIIII" (18) on CD EP + lyric sheet and art print

    Includes unlimited streaming of XIIIIIIII (18) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

    Sold Out

1.
2.
Nacktheit 06:13
3.
Vorwehen 06:10
4.
Vorfreude 04:23
5.
Kern 10:36

about

PRESS

"8/10 - Sounds like a perfect twist between Dark-Wave and Dark-Pop music. Vlimmer held the best of his work for the end. “XIIIIIIII” is a cool production featuring a great opener “Mängelexemplar” and a few other cool cuts like “Vorwehen” and “Kern”. The last mentioned song has been progressively built up, holding on the listener’s attention for more than 10 minutes and featuring a scary, haunting final part. I also enjoy the melancholic touch of the work, which in a way became this artist’s trademark. [...] If this is the last Vlimmer-EP from this impressive series I hope it will not be the last Vlimmer production ever." - Side-Line (BEL)

"The icing on the cake [...] perhaps the best part of the [EP series]. Characterized by his electronic approach which is vast and multifaceted, with this new EP Vlimmer consolidates his unstoppable motivation in the production of sound elements that drink influences from the dark environments of darkgaze, the camouflaged environments of dream pop and the fun trends of synthpop. XIIIIIIII is additive, luminous, yet invaded by a vein of black textures. [...] "Nacktheit", "Vorwehen" and the incredible closing theme "Kern" are the strongest." - Threshold Magazine (POR)

"8/10 - An ambitious grand finale for a decidedly multifaceted artist. A worthy ending for a wonderfully accomplished project. [...] We can only thank an act in many ways absolutely unique like Vlimmer" - Darkroom Magazine (ITA)

"Certainly the ultimate escapism of the past year. Vlimmer represents a well thought-out work of art [...], in particular "Mängelexemplar" and "Vorwehen" [...] have their own artistic signature. Especially "Kern", a ten-minute monster of a song, breaks with the previously atmospheric, attractively catchy post-punk. Everything falls apart and it seems as if Vlimmer finally arrives at their own stylistic "core" after this auditory marathon, which started in 2015." - UNTER.TON (GER)

"XIIIIIIII" is a fertile belly which by reworking synth-pop and new-wave structures, allows a new seed to sprout. [...] There is a human darkness that has nothing to do with hellish darkness, it is more of a tantric and reflective path that allows our innermost perceptions to come out. [...] Vlimmer's sounds move in a territory that is only apparently glacial and dark, because under the ambient, artificial and electronic textures, there is an incandescent and luminous magma that is waiting for nothing but to find the fracture, the crack, the wound, through which reveal itself on the outside, under the guise of shoegaze, gothic and post-punk-inspired textures, rhythms and passages, which in a certain sense also represent a sort of emotional link between the present and the past, between what we were and what we can become, between what we have done and what we can still do." - Paranoid Park (ITA)

"Alexander has done it again. His ability to crank out albums at the highest quality in record speed leaves me speechless. This latest release “XIIIIIIII” has his textured emotive stark imagery. Opening with an urgency and seamless blend of guitar slush with cascading keyboards. It’s gorgeous, immersive, and never disappoints. I am always shocked by how far from the previous concept each release leaps. This one highlights the vocals and has a brighter indie rock sensibility. I’m in awe, how does he have so many ideas that always sound so fresh." - Sounds and Shadows (USA)

"It is an exciting and impressive end to a long and compelling story. [...] Musically speaking, without really taking genre boundaries into account, [Vlimmer] is always in a kaleidoscopic way somewhere between gothic, shoegaze, post-punk, wave and indie rock. [...] The focus has shifted a little more towards the electronic and sometimes harder side. The vocals sound, perhaps prompted by the current malaise, a bit more plaintive and emotionally charged. He thus evokes associations with The Cure, Clan Of Xymox, Wumpscut and O.M.D. Although these are mainly names from the past, Donat knows how to give them a fresh, modern and idiosyncratic twist." - De Subjectivisten (NL)

"An exquisite approach to darker synthpop, heavily influenced by the great electronic classics of the 80s and the indie scene of the 90s. But Vlimmer goes beyond synthpop, playing with different styles and experimentations making a very interesting set that you can enjoy from beginning to end. A highlight is the vocal section with those nuances that run between dreampop and shoegaze." - Jö Claverie (ESP)

"Mixes dream pop, darkwave and post-punk with tremendous mastery in tracks like “Mängelexemplar” or “Vorwehen”, and they experiment easily during the ten minutes of the final “Kern." - El Garaje De Frank (ESP)

"Witness the exciting metamorphosis of Vlimmer as the protagonist within the project, Jagmoor Cynewulf, presents a half-hour of all flavours of wave (new/cold/dark), post-punk, dream pop, and shoegaze. You hear a very strong Robert Smith influence in Donat’s passionate German vocals, as well as shades of XTC, Human League, and Heaven 17. There are bizarre twists, surprises, and noodlings that take the listener on an aural journey into the deep recesses of the human psyche. The first four songs of XIIIIIIII are laden with dark, dreamy Gothic energy, with a bit of Hammer Horror thrown in for good measure. By the time we hit the closing 11-minute magnum opus Kern, the whole narrative descends into madness, as the rug is pulled from the protagonist’s feet." - post-punk . com (USA)

"Donat has a cleverly recognizable voice, which forms the leitmotiv throughout an album with different moods [...] pursuing its own sense with familiar frameworks. Five years ago, Vlimmer's style was referred to as "darkgaze". A dark wave of shoegaze, and that is still in it. Although after 18 EPs there is also a clear evolution or broadening and there are also a lot of elements of new, cold, dark post-punk and dream pop. Breaking out of the dark lab he lived in 5 years ago, we gradually heard a more glittering - still darkly upholstered - urban sound emerge." - Luminous Dash (BEL)

"[S]ounds like an early Cure single in being goth pop with synth edges, this has catchy lyrics (even if I don't understand them) on a song that's perfect to dance to at a proper old school Goth club while you hope that A Forest comes on next. Before the tune takes several detours and a few false endings including one that is like a very dark heavy interpretation of Fade To Grey." - Whisperin And Hollerin (UK)

"An escapist and elegiac track ["Mängelexemplar"] which merges eighties wave and electropop and is melancholic and melodious. With shimmering synths à la Stranger Things and vocals that plaintively sound like the German echo of The Cure's Robert Smith, Vlimmer takes us into a dark Gothic world" - TONSPION (Ger)

"Loving the moody electronica feels on this banger from Germany’s Vlimmer. “Vorwehen” is a dark and mysterious jam, with hints of 80s industrial flavor and modern dream-pop. It twists and turns through unique chord progressions, sparkly synth hits, and surprisingly melodic guitar leads. Vocally [...] it’s a deep, forlorn baritone that suits the aesthetic perfectly. This one is quite a journey and best heard for yourself" - BuffaBLOG (USA)

"Dominated by unusual catchiness and harmony. [...] But then "Kern" causes an apocalyptic disorder, implodes and causes an ecstasy and a benevolent ending" - Underdog Fanzine (GER)

"In a heady combination of 80s tinged swirling ‘wave’ synth progressions and ‘Robert Smith-esque” somber atmospheric ruminations, sad, eerie synth melodies emit icy, bright droning auras of nonconformist pain into warm organic keyboard chords soothing glow, while distressed, soul-stirring male vocals plunge helplessly into the ringing, mechanical wind of timeless oblivion, building bursts of anticipation that ebb and flow with the shivering effect-laden guitar string’s emotional intensity layering, the silent, enigmatic pounding beats, inside a hypnotic spiral of twisted reality." - White Light White Heat (ITA)

"The sky is bleak, in this intense, claustrophobic aural treat ["Vorwehen"], while Robert Smith‘s inspiration/influence is dispersed all over the place. Watch out for the atypical climax after the 3rd minute mark, but do not expect miracles. It’s gonna rain tonight….and wash it all away!" - Last Day Deaf (GRE)



INFO

English:
Almost exactly five years ago, Alexander Leonard Donat announced an 18-part series with the first two EPs of his project Vlimmer which back then was labelled “Darkgaze”. Now, with the release of “XIIIIIIII”, an exciting musical and literary journey of a young man getting lost in between madness and reality finds an end. There is an exciting metamorphosis behind Vlimmer as well as behind the protagonist Jagmoor Cynewulf - to be read in the book published at the same time, to be heard in a half hour of wave (new/cold/dark), post-punk, dream pop and shoegaze.
In the first few years, it appeared as if Vlimmer was operating out of the catacombs of an obscure laboratory in a centuries-old mansion that lay half-destroyed in the foggy gray-brown wasteland, while over the years the sound became more and more post-punk, urban, catchy and shimmering. The first four songs of "XIIIIIIII" prove just that, combining dark, dreamy, driving 80s mid-tempo wave and Gothic vibe with 70s horror chic and 90s indie. The interludes repeatedly suggest that the surface is breaking open threatening to uncover total madness, which is finally accomplished in the 11-minute closer “Kern”. It pulls the rug from under the protagonist's feet while life flashes before his eyes. The different states of mind merge and implode. Slide guitar and violins suggest an obituary in the very last minute. Whether the final state is reached, enlightenment is achieved, the cause for his broken being is found - or the "hero" hangs in a state of eternal floating? Nobody can say …


Deutsch
Fast auf den Monat genau fünf Jahre nachdem Alexander Leonard Donat mit den ersten beiden EPs seines damals als „Darkgaze“-bezeichneten Projektes Vlimmer eine 18-teilige Serie ankündigte, kommt nun mit „XIIIIIIII“ eine aufregende musikalische wie literarische Reise um einen zwischen Wahn und Realität nach seinen Wurzeln suchenden jungen Mann zum Ende. Dabei liegt eine aufregende Metamorphose sowohl hinter Vlimmer als auch hinter dem Protagonisten Jagmoor Cynewulf – nachzulesen im gleichzeitig veröffentlichen Buch, nachzuhören in einer guten halben Stunde Wave (New/Cold/Dark), Post-Punk, Dreampop und Shoegaze.
In den ersten Jahren agierte Vlimmer dabei gefühlt aus den Katakomben eines obskuren Labors in einem jahrhundertealten Herrenhaus, das halb zerstört im nebeligen grau-braunen Brachland lag, während mit den Jahren der Sound post-punkiger, urbaner, poppiger und schimmernder wurde. Davon zeugen auch die ersten vier Songs von „XIIIIIIII“, die düster-verträumt treibenden 80s-Mid-Tempo-Wave und Gothic-Vibe mit Siebzigerjahre-Horror-Schick und 90er-Indie kombinieren. Die Interludes deuten dabei wiederholt ein Aufbrechen der Oberfläche an, unter der das Abdriften in den Wahnsinn droht, das im 11-minütigen „Kern“ schlussendlich vollzogen wird. Dem Protagonisten zieht es den Teppich unter den Füßen weg und das Leben am Auge vorbei. Die unterschiedlichen Geisteszustände verschmelzen und brechen hinaus. Slide-Guitar und Violinen deuten in den letzten Sekunden einen Nachruf an. Ob der finale Zustand erreicht, die angestrebte Erleuchtung vollzogen, die Ursache für sein kaputtes Wesen gefunden wird – oder der „Held“ im Zustand ewigen Schwebens hängt? Wer kann das schon sagen…

credits

released December 4, 2020

Music and artwork by Alexander Leonard Donat
Photos by Ulrike Donat

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Blackjack Illuminist Records Berlin, Germany

CD/tape/vinyl label from Berlin, Germany

Post-punk/ Coldwave/ Shoegaze/ Industrial/ Dreampop/ Synth/ Dreampunk/ Indie/ Ambient /Drone

contact / help

Contact Blackjack Illuminist Records

Streaming and
Download help

Shipping and returns

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like XIIIIIIII (18), you may also like: