About
Iluso Records is an independent record label founded in 2013 by Michael Caratti and Álvaro Domene.
Our catalogue focuses on exploratory creative new music derived and informed by the fertile traditions of jazz, avant-garde metal, free-improvisation, western contemporary classical, and experimental electronic music.
We have featured works by artists who are dedicated to exploring the endless sonic possibilities that can be found within and beyond said genres:
Briggan Krauss, Colin Marston, Matthew Shipp, Elliott Sharp, Henry Kaiser, Mike Pride, Álvaro Pérez, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Colin Fisher, Lotte Anker, Pat Thomas, Eliane Gazzard, Ingebrigt Håker Flaten, Frode Gjerstad, Michael Bisio, Kirk Knuffke, Harvey Valdés, Ståle Liavik Solberg, Max Kutner, Terry Day, Sam Newsome, John Butcher, Dane Johnson, John Russell, Tom Rainey, Killick Hinds, Josh Sinton, Jason Ajemian, Chad Taylor, Rachel Musson, Chris Hoffman, Steve Beresford, Eli Wallace, Devin Gray, Brandon López, Aaron Quinn, Jason Nazary, Dominic Lash, Alex Ward, Ricardo Tejero, Javier Carmona, Rick Parker, Jeremy Carlstedt, Luke Barlow, Roberto Sassi, Santiago Horro, Sergio Mena, and Andrew Bassett.
Contact
For all enquiries including artist bookings and purchase requests please contact the team at info@ilusorecords.com.
Socials
Álvaro Domene & User FriendlyEXU3DC
In EXU3DC, Baltimore-based sound designer and electronic innovator User Friendly, and New York virtuoso guitarist Álvaro Domene come together to craft and embody a sound-world that is both strikingly intricate and emotionally resonant.
This four-track release is more than just a collaboration—it’s a masterful confluence of digital precision, creativity, and organic expression, where synthesizers and electronic instruments intertwine with live guitar performance to create a listening experience that strikes as cutting-edge, visionary, cerebral and palpably human, through a dense and immersive journey that feels like much more than its modest length might suggest.
The EP opens with Protostellar Core | E4XUDC, where jagged, metal-inspired rhythms collide with a chaotic, glitch-heavy space before expanding into a vast, harmonic landscape in a brilliant shift in tone, demonstrating the seamless flow between tension and release that defines the record.
In Proactive Consideration Of The Possible | EX2UDC, Domene’s blistering guitar solos take center stage, cutting through dense, asymmetric beats and sampled metallic guitars. The track pulses with super intense energy, creating an exhilarating, disorienting ride as the seemingly chaotic rhythms build and deconstruct in telepathic synchronicity with Domene’s frantic guitar lines.
Still Unfolding | EXU3DC, the title track, is simply a haunting, emotional centerpiece. Waves of distorted guitar chords and synths breathe in crystalline unison and consensual opposition, creating a mysterious and yet uplifting atmosphere. The track’s flowing shifts in texture and tone evoke a sense of unfolding revelation, pulling us deeper into its emotive landscape. It's going to be rough, but we're going to make it.
Closing with Luminous Sphere | EXUD1C, Domene’s guitar melodies and legato pirouettes slice again through User Friendly’s textural maelstrom with striking clarity, offering a lyrical touch to the mechanical intricacies and utterly infectious rhythms ingeniously generated and manipulated by the electronic mastermind, integrating what seems like acoustic drum sounds with synthesized percussive events and beyond. The EP’s closer is beautifully understated, showcasing the perfect balance of melodic constructions with almost tactile and ever-shifting rhythmic textures.
At just four compositions, EXU3DC feels remarkably expansive, with each piece offering a vast wealth of mature ideas and sonic detail that invite repeated listening sessions, moving fluidly between and through different electronic and acoustic music traditions, glitch, ambient, experimental jazz, and even post-metal territories, resulting in a beautifully unpredictable dialogue, a back-and-forth where tension and release feel like the album’s heartbeat.
At Iluso, we cannot recommend this music enough, and are eager to hear what comes next from this duo.
All music by Álvaro Domene and User Friendly
Eurorack, Elektron Analog Rytm MK2, and computer: User Friendly
Electric guitar and electronics: Álvaro Domene
Mixed and Mastered by Domene at Singularity Studio, Kingston NY
Published by Dometone Music BMI and User Friendly BMI
Album cover by Ed Keller