Curses

Electric romanticism in the shadows

Between ghostly guitars, EBM-pulsing drum machines, and a sensibility inherited from new wave, Curses has built a recognizable identity within contemporary dark electronica. Originally from New York and based in Berlin since the mid-2010s, Luca Venezia brought the energy of his punk past, his years as Drop The Lime, and the memory of early Brooklyn and Manhattan raves to this project. His music functions as a friction point between club, song, and live performance: spectral vocals, physical bass, cinematic tension synthesizers, and a romantic aesthetic that avoids flat nostalgia.

Guitar, MPC, and body in motion

The project took on a fully defined form in Berlin, where Curses found a like-minded community to unfold the darker side of his sound. In the booth, he crosses EBM, new beat, italo-disco, post-punk, proto-house, and dark disco without losing a recognizable narrative; live, he adds guitar, vocals, and machines, with Dame Bonnet on bass and electronic percussion during his band tours. His repertoire includes albums such as Romantic Fiction, Incarnadine, and Another Heaven, the latter released by Italians Do It Better and co-produced with Johnny Jewel. He has also provided vocals for Âme on Shadow Of Love for Innervisions and has released or remixed material on labels such as Dischi Autunno, Oráculo, Bordello A Parigi, Running Back, Wrong Era, Ombra International, and Eskimo Recordings.

The living archive of Next Wave Acid Punx

His role as a curator has been consolidated with Next Wave Acid Punx, a series of compilations and parties that connects post-punk, industrial electronica, EBM, new beat, italo, proto-trance, and rave culture. From its first chapter in 2021 to Next Wave Acid Punx TROIS, the trilogy has functioned as a personal map of the music that marked his career, from late seventies and eighties electronica to current producers who extend that impulse. That archival gaze, far from being academic, is reflected in tense, romantic, and physical sets, designed for small clubs and large stages.

Residencies, festivals, and the present

Curses has taken that language to spaces such as DC-10, Convenanza, Nuits Sonores, and Grauzone, and maintains a strong connection with the Berlin scene through his residency at Pornceptual. His monthly show Together Alone on Rinse FM France extends the same aesthetic line to radio: dark, vocal, mutant, and emotional dance music. He currently occupies a unique place between DJ, band musician, and archival selector, with a proposal that links the memory of the New York underground with the European present of dark disco and electronic body music.