Metatron [Artist Profile]

February 4, 2025 metatron

Metatron is a pseudonym used by Christoph Fringeli mainly on early Praxis releases, but also on some compilations and remixes. Two 12″ EPs came out under the name of Metatron in 1993 and 1994, featuring industrial hardcore, broken beats and acidic noise.

Christoph Fringeli moved from Basel, Switzerland, where he’d been running the Vision label, co-ran a record shop and worked for the independent music distributor RecRec, to London in late 1991. There he started the Praxis label in 1992. He released his first work on Praxis under the name of Scaremonger.

Most of the Scaremonger material Christoph had already programmed and recorded in Basel in ’91, before he started his new projects Metatron and Noface in the months after his arrival in South London. While Noface was definted by a gritty and distorted acid sound, Metatron focussed on industrial hardcore, but also included elements of experimental hard acid and noise.

Metatron: Speed and Politics EP (Praxis 4)

The first appearance of Metatron was on Praxis 4, the Speed and Politics EP which came out in 1993. A combination of industrial hardcore, experimental techno and hard acid. Check out more information about this release HERE.

Speed and Politics downloads from Bandcamp:

Stream Speed and Politics on SoundCloud:

Praxis Records · Metatron: Speed and Politics

Speed and Politics YouTube playlist

Metatron: Seduction EP (Praxis 8)

The second release was the Seduction EP (Praxis 8) from 1994. This EP features six tracks composed with the same set of samples and explores both hardcore and more experimental avenues. Check out more information about this release HERE.

Seduction downloads from Bandcamp:

Stream Seduction on SoundCloud:

Praxis Records · Metatron: Seduction EP

Seduction YouTube playlist:

Metatron: Twisted With Hate

Kind of a remix of the “Men Who Hate the Law” track from Metatron’s Speed and Politics EP (Praxis 4) recorded by Christoph Fringeli in DJ Scud’s studio in South London in 1999. This was featured on the Adverse Records CD compilation called Misanthropy which was never properly distributed. We are still planning to release the track see the light of on vinyl on the elusive Praxis 15 triple 12″ compilation. To help us release this project please consider donating to our ongoing Vinyl fundraiser campaign HERE.

Praxis Records · Metatron: Twisted With Hate (semi-unreleased, planned for Praxis 15)

The name Metatron was inspired by the 1985 book Behold Metatron, The Recording Angel by Sol Yurick, which describes and speculates on the “Great Transition into what is called the Information Age, or Post-Industrial Society”. The book was published by Semiotext(e) in their Foreign Agents Series. Semiotext(e) – originally a magazine – published many books much read in the scene at the time by authors such as Jean Baudrillard, Paul Virilio and Félix Guattari.

“The old philosopher’s stone could convert base metals into gold. Now humans, real estate, social relations are converted into electronic signs carried in an electronic plasma. The dream of magical control has never been exorcised. Perhaps, after all, modern capitalism is a great factory for teh production of angels.” – Sol Yurick, Metatron

Beyond the 90s

While mostly working under the Base Force One moniker in the 2000s, I repeatedly was toying with the idea of reviving the Metatron project. It has a decidedly different aesthetics from the other project(s) which (I think) could be greatly developed and expanded.

When Boris Domalain from Les Enregistrements du Cavage asked me for a track for Cavage 15 I suggested – to his delight – to produce a Metatron track. Tragically he died soon after and that track ended up on the Memeto Mori EP from Hijos de Puta records.