As we crank 2024 into life, we’re delighted to be able to follow up our first Phase4our and Pope Jean Paul Van Damme releases with new music by Valley Lines.

’13_16’ arrives on Machine on 5 April 2024, a four-track follow up to Valley Lines’ 2023-released ‘i0’ EP. We love these new abstract electronic sounds, showcasing a highly structured minimalism that derives from new creative practices.

Valley Lines aka Cardiff’s Christian Gates first released music on Machine back in 2016, including as First Third in 2022. He is prolific under other names, most recently appearing in several guises on recent Wales Electronic Producers Network (WEPN) compilations.

We chatted to Christian about ’13_16’.

Machine: It’s great to have more new music from you coming out on the label. What’s the story behind this new release?

Christian: All these tracks were created using a sequencing system I created myself. I coded a sequencer that enables the user to change the relationships between the various functions within the sequencer.

Machine: That sounds like a logical progression from the way you described 'i0'. When we caught up to discuss that release last year, you talked about how “the components in each of the tracks are subtly asymmetrical, so that the patterns of each element of a track are not locked alongside each other, but very slightly shift around to different relative positions."

How does the sequencer you have coded work?

Christian: It allows you to control the timing, occurrence, pitch, and sub-sequencer pattern lengths on a step-by step basis. Each change instigates other changes, branching off in different sub-sequences. The execution of it is pretty crude by proper programming standards, but it has allowed me to mess around with time and musical events in a ‘playable’ way. It achieves something that isn’t really feasible on a X0X step sequencer or DAW piano roll, without resorting to shortcuts like chance and random generators.

Machine: That's fascinating, and the result sounds great. What has been the motivation for you to get into this space?

Christian: These tracks came from me wanting to devise an asynchronous approach to sequencing musical events. And to try to make those events contract and expand, rather than remain constant, while also adhering to a recognisable rhythmic sensibility.