Computer Students house their vinyl records in heat-sealed aluminium pouches of the sort that NASA uses to package an astronaut’s lunch. But there’s more to the label than its ambitious production values. On the contrary, Computer Students’ stark industrial design and laser focus on a particular strain of heavyweight, rhythmically complex avant-rock is giving the genre a sense of conceptual rigour it hasn’t seen in years.

Located in Pescara, Italy, but with nodes in Amsterdam and New York City, Computer Students came into being in 2018 as a successor to founder Julien Fernandez’s previous label, Africantape. As well as new releases from groups like Big’n and New Brutalism, the label also pursues extravagantly produced, expanded “excavations” of lost or overlooked albums by underground rock groups like Cheval de Frise and Drose. The unifying factor is a fastidious attention to detail and a raw, in-the-room recording fidelity that Fernandez says is intended to make each release feel “engineered as much as designed”.

Chat Pile & Hayden Pedigo
“Behold A Pale Horse”
From In The Earth Again (2025)

The breakout Oklahoma noise-rock group Chat Pile were in the ascendant when Fernandez reached out to them in 2022. But it turned out that bassist Stin was already aware of Computer Students, and with the blessing of their label, The Flenser, they hit on the idea of doing something a little different. That turned out to be a collaborative record with another Oklahoma musician, the fingerstyle guitarist Hayden Pedigo. “The pairing felt unexpectedly perfect,” says Fernandez, and the resulting In The Earth again feels distinct from either party’s extant music. Take a song like “Behold A Pale Horse” – equal parts bucolic prettiness and toxic oil slick.

Cheval de Frise
“Songe de perte de dents”
From Fresques sur les parois secrètes du crâne (reissued 2023, originally released 2003)

The Bordeaux duo Cheval de Frise were one of a spree of two-piece groups – see also Lightning Bolt and Pink And Brown – that emerged at the dawn of the century. But Cheval de Frise’s quicksmart blend of electroacoustic guitar shred and scattershot drum improv still sounds fresh 20 years on – see this highlight of the duo’s 2023 swansong. Computer Students’ reissues of the group’s two albums expanded them with new artwork and photography. “Julien has an extraordinary eye for detail, and he showed great perseverance in pursuing the most beautiful result possible,” says guitarist Thomas Bonvalet.

Big’n
“South Of Loathsome”
From End Comes Too Soon (2024)

The influence of the late musician and recording engineer Steve Albini casts a long shadow across Computer Students – some of the label’s albums were recorded by him, more still were put to tape at his Chicago studio Electrical Audio. One such album is End Comes Too Soon, the first full-length in 28 years by Albini’s old Chicago noise-rock hombres Big’n, which landed on Computer Students in 2024. Listen to “South Of Loathsome”, and you hear a take on rock music of the sort that Albini particularly prized – tightly wound, full of emotion, and conducted with a controlled brutality.

C’Mon Tigre
“Fédération Tunisienne de Football”
From C'mon Tigre (reissued in 2025, originally released 2014)

The Italian duo C’Mon Tigre are seasoned collaborators with a global purview, having worked with names as scattered as Arto Lindsay, Seun Kuti and the Brazilian vocalist Xênia França. TEN is an expanded version of the duo’s self-titled debut, originally released on Fernandez’s label Africantape in 2014. The root sound is a curious avant rock that opens up to reveal all sorts of influences – Afrobeat, tropicalia, soul, and on “Fédération Tunisienne de Football”, the horn-powered African jazz of figures like Mulatu Astatke.

Drose
“The Unravelling”
From Boy Man Machine (reissued 2019, originally released 2016)

One of Computer Students’ most ambitious releases to date is their expanded reissue of Boy Man Machine, a 2016 record by Columbus, Ohio noise-rockers Drose. Frontman Dustin Rose composed and recorded the album – a concept piece following the story of a boy’s metamorphosis into a machine – while designing and building a race car at the Center for Automotive Research in Columbus. Recording sessions took place in a hidden subsurface room in the facility, and on tracks like “An Idol”, you can hear the hiss of pneumatic systems and robotic welding: a literal industrial rock.

Chevreuil
“Tartarus”
From Stadium (2026)

Computer Students’ first release of 2026 marks the return of Fernandez’s band Chevreuil following a 15 year absence. Live, the pair – Fernandez on drums, Tony Chauvin on guitar – seek a physical-spatial quality, surrounding themselves with four amplifiers to create a quadrophonic soundfield. “When Tony and I reconnected, the plan was modest – maybe record a 7" or a short EP,” says Fernandez. But things quickly spiralled, and before they knew it, they had a sprawling double album, inspired by magnetism, radioactivity and the music of the spheres. “Tartarus” is both an album highlight, and emblematic of the duo’s approach – a rhythmically oblique art rock with a groove that seems trapped in a perpetual cycle of decomposition and recomposition.