[Read in full on NHAM]

If you are a music nerd like me, you may or may not have come across the term ‘Bonk Wave’.

If you also are as curious as I am and actually did come across the term, you may have asked yourself, ‘What the Bonk is Bonk Wave?!’

Here’s an attempt at an answer, from the makers of the bonkwave.org website: ‘If you don’t know what Bonk Wave is, don’t worry, we don’t really know either.’¹

It could be an ‘experimental omni-genre or a style-agnostic genre,’ but quite certainly it is ‘an open and inclusive community, promoting freedom of artistic expression.’

That sounds intriguing, doesn’t it? Right! So, let’s dig deeper. Because, there’s a new compilation called ‘Not Bonk What I Call Wave: Remixes Vol 2’.

First impression: wow, almost all of the artists are Fediverse-adjacent with their own Mastodon account, several have a Faircamp or Bandwagon or Mirlo page.

Next, the entire album can be listened to on the site. No Linktree, no Spotify, no Amazapple, just click play.

Well then, let’s play!

1. ‘Genus’ by C. Circo (Socool Remix)

Sweet! Opening with airy, atmospheric chord layers, this quickly grows to a shouldn’t-we-dance track that sucks you in with its glistening synth arpeggios. Very reduced, wide open, with nods to chill-out, drum&bass soundscapes, even some electronica pioneers vibes.

2. ‘C’est quoi (le bonkwave)’ by sknob (Reverb 10000 Mix)

Ah, now I know what they mean when they suggest that Bonk Wave could be an ‘experimental omni-genre’. This one opens with a campfire acoustic guitar, joined by layers of straying, meandering synth bits, like little spiders weaving a collective web. Throwing in a clean, prominent melody and adding a vocal line and several voice snippets, asking but not answering the age-old question, ‘what is bonk wave’, finally dropping a dry, straightforward snare, this track holds enough surprises for twice its length.

3. ‘Bonkitty’ by Mighty Mousers feat. Rubia (n3wjack’s bonkers catnip remix)

Don’t judge a book by its cover! The first few seconds of this could develop into a proper Doo-Wop performance, when Rubia plays with the word ‘Bonkitty’. But no, in comes a completely unhinged, unleashed drum&bass/jungle-ish highspeed beat. Aphex Triplet? Squarepusher’s cousin? With lots of humour, at any rate, certainly when Bonkitty starts meowing. The remix title ‘bonkers catnip’ seems quite apt. In a very good way!

4. ‘La sieste/Don’t Mind Me’ by sknob (Reverb 10000 Chausettes et Chaussons Mix)

Let an indie band and two or three electronica afficionados take a trip in a time machine back to the late fifties, early sixties and get hired by an independent French Noir film producer to compose a score for a flick that tells a sad love story with a twist — et voilà. Sounds improbable? Well, to this day there are no time machines, I’ll give you that.

5. ‘ion’ by Socool (C. Circo remix)

Wait a minute, wasn’t there a Socool remix of a C. Circo track just now? Indeed, there was, and boy, is this a fruitful collab, no matter which remixes which! A demure drum&bass beat trickles twinkle-toed through warm, embracing, dreamy yet vibrant synth lines and soundscapes, flowing and ebbing like a long breath. This one almost demands to be put on loop.

6. ‘Bonkwave Bouillabaisse’ by Ordos Mk.0

Wikipedia tells us that ‘Bouillabaisse (/ˌbuːjəˈbɛs/) is a traditional Provençal fish soup originating in the port city of Marseille.’ Or, minus the fish, a mix soup made of ten different tracks out of the BonkWaveVerse (or hoewever else you might call that realm of musique extraordinaire). Smoothly simmering, very yummy, very tasty!

7. ‘You’re Diamonds’ by XymMusic (Default Media Transmitter remix)

Something resembling an 80s track (think Joy Division, Cocteau Twins) lingers in the early morning air after a sweaty party. Suddenly, out of the dawning blue, it gets torn apart in a furious rage by digi-tribal drums to churning shreds of vocal and synth lines. The pure, relentless energy is breathtaking.

8. ‘Transistor Heaven’ by Traiken (n3wjack’s broken circuit remix)

Broken does not necessarily mean kaput. What’s broken can be repaired. But this track, as broken as it might seem, does not need fixing. Its distorted synths, the otherworldly voices from an old tube radio, the sacral, hymnic organ chords, all together form a five-minute journey into the inner spaces where electrons live. I can see sunrays fingering across the horizon, and if I was a transistor, I might very well feel like being in Heaven!

9. ‘All Around’ by Secret Deal (AxWax Remix)

History not always repeats itself; sometimes it comes back in several bits from various eras to fuse and show up fresh and shiny to the party. In this particular case, it gets revived by synth cords with strong eighties vibes, arpeggios from the aughts, a funky bassline and guitar licks that could even have been relocated from the seventies, beats that have parents in nineties French house, and a lot of vocoder (which is somewhat timeless). Kind of a best-of-all-worlds scenario, and certainly great dancefloor charge!

10. ‘C’est quoi (le bonkwave)’ by sknob (C. Circo remix)

One very appealing aspect of this compilation (and possibly the Bonk Wave community, too) is the strong sense of collaboration it underlines. Of course, those are all remixes, so, duh! But on top of that, it’s a select group of artists who seem to inspire and nurture one another, almost like a cooperative, which I think is beautiful. Here we have sknob’s track again, remixed by C. Circo who also participated with the album opener ‘Genus’ and did a remix of Socool’s ‘ion’. ‘C’est quoi…’ has all the fine features those other tracks do — taken to yet another energy level by a very prominent, forward-pushing drums/sub-bassline combination.

11. ‘かにの歌’ by 魚, or yú

DeepL, the translation algorithm that works best and also fuels many Mastodon instances’ translations, says that the title of this track means ‘song of the crab’ or ‘The Crab Song’. And the liner notes on bonkwave.org invite us to ‘feel the bonk vibe coming from a dark and smoky underground venue somewhere downtown Osaka.’ It is another one of those mash-up, merging remixes that combine more than one source. Three tracks in this case, and quick first impressions of those tell me that 魚 has created an entirely unique piece of music that seems to take inspiration, but not much actual material from the originals. Imagine crabs talking (yes, really), a coffee machine running, and Japanese vocoder lyrics meeting with a humming, droning synthscape and some reduced, serene chords. Possibly not everyone’s cup of matcha or sencha, but a stunning and compelling work of art for sure!

12. ‘The Snag in Your Makeshift Cape’ by Traiken (AxWax Remix)

The original track is an upbeat dance track that draws us in with its surprising and sometimes unusual chord progressions. The remix takes those, performs them with string samples, strips away the beat and sends the strings through various effect processor worlds — but what sounds simple, mechanical even, when you put it like this, in actuality brings forth an emotional depth that keeps you on you toes. Think Samuel Barber being played on board the Deep Space 9. Take a look outside the window and marvel in awe at the vast infinity around you.

13. ‘Is it really bonk dust if it is animated by strange data?’ by XymMusic

‘We’re born from the Bonk. We live in the Bonk. And when we die, we will return to the Bonk. In the end, we’re all just Bonk dust.’ Proclaims a neutral yet sonorous male voice over a sinister synth drone, accompanied by a female choir singing Japanese words of a meaning unbeknownst to me. Five tracks by four different artists are the sources for this mash-up/remix/recombination that evokes images of processions, dark corners in horror films, flashing screens of TV announcements and interviews. Do we really want to go down that path? Well, do we have a choice? ‘We’re born. We live. We die.’

To complete this — well, is it an actual review? Or rather, a stream of consciousness? — anyway, to complete it, let me add links to the Fediverse profiles of all the artists involved, in order of appearance:

@CCirco
@socool
@sknob
@yonder
@rybson
@n3wjack
@ordosmarkzero
@defaultmediatransmitter
@Traiken
@SecretDeal
@axwax