Two very different worlds collide and lead to minimalist dark wave deconstructions that are equal parts brutal and erotic. This duality is reflected in the name Skemer, which next to its obvious English meaning of 'intriguer' also stands for ‘dusk’ in Mathieu’s native tongue West-Flemish, as well as in their debut album. How to talk about the problems faced by men in the right way ? Without becoming misogynist, without blaming women and also being against the problems faced by women ? The artist Marcella Dvsi has been compared to other experimental musicians like Björk and FKA Twigs.

I have been attempting to present myself in a way that is proven to be successful or attractive, much like how people seek out and buy magazines. The book’s epigraph comes from Germaine Greer: “The tragedy of machismo is that a man is never quite man enough.” In these stories, that’s a state of affairs to be observed from afar, worthy of satire or karmic comeuppance (all those accidents). Steve Hollyman’s brash new novel, Lairies, takes a different approach. Not for him the comforts of irony; instead, he gets uncomfortably cosy with his violent and bigoted cast to deliver an insider critique of masculine bravado. Meanwhile Skemer took the time to let all sides of their personality grow and eventually explode. You remember their minimalist cold wave deconstructions equally made of brutal and erotic components. Overall, the song is an introspective portrayal of the dark side of popularity and conformity, and the internal struggles faced by those who are willing to do anything to fit in. You can tell some skinheads are involved here because the outcome is so tidy and neat, without losing one inch of atmosphere or enchantment.

Recipient of the Roger Deakin Award and first published by Bluemoose Books, Myers' novel The Gallows Pole was published to acclaim in 2017 and was winner of the Walter Scott Prize 2018 - the Benjamin Myers was born in Durham, UK, in 1976. Naturally drawing inspiration from the Californian goth tradition ( 45 Grave, Christian Death) and the Canadian post-industrial brood ( Skinny Puppy, FLA), as well as the best UK synthpop ( Depeche Mode, The Human League), Male Tears emphasizes the most glamourous, and at once, gruesome aspects of the whole gothic subculture, bringing everything to the next level, resulting in a contemporary and cutting edge album.

Based in Los Angeles, Edward describes Male Tears as “the result of a goth’s love affair with 1980’s new wave” and a pop experiment flirting with themes of morbidity, sexuality and self-destruction. Eyes so bleak in hair and makeup. Face so white in fear, shaken up. Beauty crawled from head to mark. She comes out to play in the dark. Her arms wrap around her frame, she replaces the fear with pain. She wipes away the tears again and every night she feels the same. I know her eyes remain.

Lyrics of 'Male Tears – Domin8'

Myers’s project – letting air out of ideas of what it means to be a man – often requires his protagonists to be killed or maimed, but not always. A story in which a male music journalist interviews a feted female folk singer highlights the journalist’s self-absorption by telling the story from both points of view so that we see how little he understands his subject (there’s probably an element of self-deprecation here - Myers was once a staff writer for Melody Maker). His novel Beastings (2014) won the Portico Prize For Literature, was the recipient of the Northern Writers’ Award and longlisted for a Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Award 2015. Widely acclaimed, it featured on several end of year lists, and was chosen by Robert Macfarlane in The Big Issue as one of his books of 2014. He is an award-winning author and journalist whose recent novel Cuddy (2023) won the Goldsmiths Prize.