Novel 23 Reconstructs 1997 Debut ‘Biogenes Resources’ With Original Soviet Gear

In a time when Russian electronic music faces real barriers to international distribution, Roman Belousov has chosen to look backward — not with nostalgia, but with a deliberate return to the instruments that started it all. Biogenes Resources, originally released as a cassette on Art-Tek in 1997, has been fully reconstructed using the same Soviet-era machines Belousov first acquired at label co-founder Solar X’s urging.

Art-Tek was a nerve centre in the mid-’90s wave of homegrown Russian electronics. Founded by Roman Belavkin (Solar X) and Yura Moorush, the label attracted a generation of artists — Ambidextrous, EU, Fizzarum, and Belousov’s Novel 23 — whose work later reached City Centre Offices and Lo Recordings. The original Biogenes Resources captured that early promise: playful, inquisitive electronics made on an Electronica EM-25 and other analog gear.

Belousov has now dusted off that same equipment to re-animate the album’s eleven tracks. The results are subdued rather than nostalgic. Opener “Dawn Without Hope” drifts through soft synth-lines, brittle beats, and acid traces, while “Clear Sky” bends an off-kilter melody with a fragile touch. Track titles like “Transparent Brook” suggest a nature theme, but the mood remains inward — less Bochum Welt brightness, more muted reflection.

In a country where expression has again retreated into silence, the decision to recreate these early works reads less as a throwback and more as a quiet assertion. The sound of a young artist discovering what his machines can do, heard again now, carries a different weight altogether.