The seventh studio album from Belgian EBM group Front 242, “05:22:09:12 Off,” reached shops on 23 August 1993, so 2026 marks its 33rd anniversary. Red Rhino Europe issued it in Europe, while Epic handled the US edition that November. The curious name is a simple number cipher: swap every letter in “evil” for its alphabetical position and you land on 05:22:09:12.
On the Alfa Matrix side, the farewell-tour live album “Black Out,” released on 19 June 2026, is available now on the Alfa Matrix store as a 2CD with three bonus tracks or as a 2LP on solid silver vinyl. You can also stream it on the label’s Bandcamp page.
Studio team, guest singer and chart run
Daniel Bressanutti and Patrick Codenys handled production and mixing together with John Dubs and Eran Westwood, and Bob Ludwig mastered the album. What sets it apart in the band’s catalogue is the voice: Kristin “99” Kowalski, from the New York group Spill, fronts most songs, while Jean-Luc De Meyer is heard solely on the remix “Melt (Again).”
Sixteen tracks fill the CD, among them “Modern Angel,” “Junkdrome,” “Crushed,” “GenEcide” and “Animal (Cage).” It reached No. 27 in the CMJ Radio Top 150 listings.
About Front 242
Aarschot, a town near Leuven, is where Front 242 started out in 1981. Its founders were Dirk Bergen, who handled graphic design, and Daniel Bressanutti, in charge of electronics and production. Keyboardist and programmer Patrick Codenys arrived in 1982 alongside singer Jean-Luc De Meyer, and Richard “23” Jonckheere, a percussionist who also sang backing vocals, came on board in 1983, when Bergen’s focus turned to design and management. The 1984 album “No Comment” is cited as one of the first records to print the phrase “electronic body music” in its sleeve notes, and the group struck a US deal with Wax Trax! that year. “Tyranny (For You)” (1991, Epic) became the act’s best performer on American charts; Red Rhino Europe/PIAS had earlier handled “Front by Front” (1988) and “Official Version” (1987).
Studio-wise, the latest chapter is still “Pulse” (XIII Bis/Metropolis, 2003). On stage, Tim Kroker has been the drummer since 2008. A “Black Out” farewell tour was announced in March 2024 and finished with three nights at Brussels’ Ancienne Belgique on 23–25 January 2025, with Bressanutti, De Meyer, Codenys, Richard 23 and Kroker as the final line-up. More than forty of those shows fed the live album of the same name. For more, see the Front 242 tag here and the Alfa Matrix Bandcamp.