We are proud to announce the premiere of our Sampler 11 compilation during the upcoming Castle Party Festival (16th-19th July 2026).
The physical CD has been manufactured by the festival and will be available on festival’s merch stall during the event.
If you happen to be at this year’s Castle Party, we strongly recommend to check Sampler 11 out. It is not only a good add to your dark electro CD collection but also a nice festival keepsake.
Sampler 11 contains music of dark electro projects from all over the world. The bands are active, they do play live and keep releasing new music.
All the bands on the compilation have been individually invited to take part, there was no open entries this time.
Sampler 11 follows the footsteps of our previous Sampler compilations that we ceased to release about 10 years ago. So it is a revival of kind and we pick up right where we left off.
Thus, some of the bands that featured on previous Samplers and survived on the scene were invited to take part.
Full list of bands taking part:
- Asseptic Room
- Cube-[x]
- Device Noize
- Diskonnekt
- Extize
- Frontal Boundary
- H.Exe
- Ira Noctis
- Larva
- Midian Dite
- Nohycit
- Nolongerhuman
- Pre-Emptive Strike 0.1
- Subliminal Code
- Synapsyche
- SynthAttack
- Viscera Drip
Cover artwork
To design cover artworks we used photos of Arachne Demon.
Arachne is an alternative model, performer, makeup artist, painter, alternative jewelry creator and graphic designer.
While the above may sound like a lot for one person, it actually is reflected in the photos:
Arachne’s photos kind of forced the red-gray aesthetics and gave the CD the look it has.
Arachne Demon is an interesting alternative scene’s personality – find out more about her reading our interview with her.
Here you can visit Arachne’s socials:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arachne_demon/
oraz https://www.instagram.com/arachne_demon_art/ (alternative jewelry and other creations)
All other platforms here: https://linktr.ee/arachne_demon
Photo on the left inside cover has been shot by BW Art Lab
Electronic release
Shortly after Castle Party Festival we are planning to release digital version of the compilation.
It will be our standard free mp3/flac download + our online player and sharing system.
We do not publish on Spotify or Bandcamp. We do not monetise the compilation electronically in any way. We do not make money off it – the compilation is music fans’ initiative backed by a festival.
By releasing this way we can have bands that are in labels or are worried about their streaming income.
We cannot hurt their bottom line because we are not on the platforms where they earn.
Halotan Records is a hobby, not a business.
Our new short video system
Today’s internet is ruled by short form video – tiktoks, reels, shorts etc.
Sampler 11 marks the experimental launch of our new system allowing to easily record short form videos using music from our releases.
In our player you need to click “Create Video” button, select short song clip you like, hit “Record” and record your performance.
A video effect of your choice is applied to the video.
Our video effects are our scene specific – this makes them stand out against generic capcut templates creators tend to use.
All the effects are created without using AI – so they won’t cause any problems on platforms.
The aim is to transform ordinary videos into something more interesting. During processing audio is replaced with high quality version of the clip so your video sounds excellent.
We turned the system on for Sampler 10 to test – and you can check it out now here.
Thanks for labels
We would like to thank Advoxya Records, Alfa Matrix and darkTunes for facilitating appearance of their respective artists on our Sampler 11 compilation.
Mastering
Mastering and full technical preparation of the CD have been performed – as usual – by Daniel Cichowski of Zowa Studio.
d.cichowski@interia.pl
www.facebook.com/ZowaStudio
As our cooperation spreads literally across decades now, we can wholeheartedly recommend his mix and mastering services.