EXILE

EXILE represents one of the roughest edges of Hardtool Vision’s beginnings. “Stolen Memories” arrived on our first Trash-Free Tracks compilation carrying exactly the kind of quality we never wanted to polish out of schranz: chaos, dirt, pressure and that feeling that the record might fall apart at any second while somehow remaining completely functional.

There is very little value in inventing an elaborate story when the music already says enough. For us, “Stolen Memories” remains memorable precisely because it refuses to feel domesticated. It carries a rawness connected to classic schranz while still belonging completely to the moment in which HTV began. EXILE helped give our first release teeth, and that alone gives the project a permanent place in the history of the label.