Alfa Matrix launches a polling contest were YOU get to vote for your favourite ‘up and coming’ band ! This contest is a big part of the preparation for the 5th edition of the cult Endzeit Bunkertracks 4CD box compilation series for which Alfa Matrix is still accepting submissions until 15th October 2009 (send your material to endzeit@alfa-matrix.com ).

So I get my favorite (or favourite) local band to make a submission to AM for the next Endzeit Bunkertracks compilation and maybe they’ll get signed to the label. Cool.

Oh, wait.

Alfa-Matrix has already selected the 5 best up and coming (and still unsigned!) bands to appear on the new Endzeit Bunkertracks sampler. Now it is YOUR turn to make your voice heard ! You have the power to cast your vote and elect the best from these top 5 bands. Vote wisely, because the stakes are high! Top Prize is a record deal with Alfa-Matrix. Yes, that’s correct, the band that receives the most votes in the contest will have the opportunity to release their album on Alfa Matrix in 2010.

So I have absolutely no say in which bands are nominated. The choice has already been made for me by…someone at the label. Ah well. I wonder who these bands are.

The 5 bands are:

FREAKANGEL
ANTYTHESYS
STAHLNEBEL VS BLACK SELKET
TRIMETRICK
THE LUDOVICO TECHNIQUE

Horribly unfortunate names aside, a couple of these acts are pretty good. Antythesys is really fun though there seems to be a juvenile over-reliance on the word “bitch” with song titles like “Always Been My Bitch” and “Hellectrobitch” (ugh). Of course, Trimetrick has a track called “Bitch From Hell (extended).” Ludovico Technique seems to want to be Das Ich pretty badly. I dunno, these choices don’t really add up to much promise. I could have done better with our own local pool.

If you want more info on these acts and are intersted in participating in the vote you can do so right here. And may goth have mercy on your souls.

We love giving away free stuff.  It makes us feel warm and fuzzy, like a lizard with a poodle cut.  Today we have 10 tickets to  a preview screening of The Collector on July 30 (next Thursday).

We’ll be giving them out in pairs today via our Twitter feed so follow us at http://twitter.com/darktwincities

Do the math!  You could be one of five lucky wieners winners!

The movie is in theaters July 31, but you can beat the sheep and do it with our blessing.  Plus we get to feel like we did something good for once.  Like helping an old lady cross the street, but without the cheek pinching and the lingering scent of Ben-Gay.

All the other important stuff is here:

WHERE: Mann Theaters, St. Louis Park

WHEN: Thursday, July 30th at 7:30pm

And if you aren’t sure you want to see the movie, here is the tasty promo text.  If this doesn’t sell you, nothing will… er, just remember we didn’t write it.

For handyman and ex-con Arkin, a quiet home and a family on vacation is an “opportunity”.  For inside his new employer’s country home lies a safe, and inside the safe is a gem – his only hope for repaying a debt to his ex-wife and keeping what’s left of his family intact.

Unfortunately for Arkin, inside the house is also a box containing the latest addition to a collection catalogued in blood, bone and tears. As the seconds tick down to midnight, Arkin becomes a reluctant hero trapped by a masked “Collector” in a maze of lethal invention – the Spanish Inquisition as imagined by Rube Goldberg – while trying to rescue the very family he came to rob.

From Marcus Dunstan and Patrick Melton, the twisted minds behind Saw IV, V and the upcoming Saw VI, THE COLLECTOR emerges as a real-time game of cat-and-mouse, melding primal horror with suspense thriller. The film stars Josh Stewart, Daniella Alonso, Michael Reilly Burke, Andrea Roth, Madeline Zima, Karley Scott-Collins, Robert Wisdom and Juan Fernandez.

I’m plugging this particular update, because there’s interviews of two of my favorite new artists, Neon Cage Experiment (website) and Lucidstatic. One of the podcasts this week is very martial/power electronics heavy while the other one is more synth/ebm friendly. You can also enter a contest to win the new album by A Wake A Week (side-project of David Dando-Moore of Detritus).

So if you’re sitting bored, at work, go check it out — it’ll be fun and exciting.

Anyway, I gave them a deadline and they balked. They were having a difficult time deciding a winner after narrowing it down to two. And while 433‘s offering; “Aeon Flux – The Later Years,” was largely admired the submission made by +jamison+ was pretty clever even if it referenced a long-dead cartoon series.

“Fabulous, secret powers were revealed to me the day I held aloft my magic beer and said, “By the Power of Grain Belt!”

As promised, +jamison+ will be receiving a copy of SAM (Synthetic Adrenaline Music)’s latest album, Destruction Unit, in the mail courtesy of our friends at Vendetta Music.

We have many more CDs to give away so keep reading. I also have many more reviews to write. We’ve gotten a little backed up here as of late so next week I’ll probably be focusing on catching up. Have a great weekend.

All you have to do to secure your claim on the CD is to come up with the funniest/most clever caption for the photo below. The winner will be selected by our panel of cloaked judges and announced a week from today. Now get to brainstorming because I can’t guarantee our stash of free music is going to withstand P_machine’s boots much longer.

Now it seems that every city in the US with a population of over 100,000 has a industrial(etc.) club night. Everyone is a DJ, or potentially a DJ. There’s more bands then anyone could count. I realize it’s a hard task to keep track of all this, but I’m just surprised that no-one is even attempting to do it.

“Scene” cohesion would improve ten-fold if there was just a list of DJs and club nights in the US (and possibly the world). Maybe a place where DJs could post playlists. This would make promotions for labels easier, it might also increase attendance and support for various events.

Why hasn’t anyone created a website like this?

In the true spirit of consumerism, I ask the humorously cliche question “Why hasn’t someone else done it?”

Answer in the comments. Most creative caption will be chosen by the judges here at CastleDTC. Pay no attention to the men behind the curtain. Good luck!