Sound as research, selection and a living archive.
01 / PortraitIceland, 2017
OriginPanevėžys, Lithuania
PracticeSound / Curation / Visual art
ArchiveSecret Thirteen / Since 2010
Publications252
01 / Biography
Sound as archive, matter and memory.
DJ S13 is the artistic identity of Justinas Mikulskis (b. 1986), founder and editor of Secret Thirteen, an independent music journal established in 2010. His work as a DJ, sound artist and curator operates between audio archaeology, journalism and visual art.
01
Origins & atmosphere
The sonic identity of S13 was formed in the post-industrial landscape of Panevėžys. Brutalist factories, material decay and the quiet pressure of a post-Soviet city sharpened an early sensitivity to texture and darker sound. At ten, with help from his engineer grandfather, he constructed his first DJ mixer. An uncle’s record collection — black metal, punk and 1970s rock — opened a route toward anarchism, philosophy, science fiction and a life built outside conventional cultural structures.
02
The evolution of sound
Early roots in jungle and drum’n’bass, including productions for Liquid V and Vampire, quickly expanded into a more abstract language. S13 sets move between industrial rhythm, ethnographic field recordings, new wave, drone and academic composition. Each performance is treated as research: material is not repeated, but reorganised into a new narrative of pressure, space and time.
03
Performance & curation
S13 has appeared at Berlin Atonal, Arma17, Norbergfestival and Unsound events, sharing programmes with Mika Vainio, Esplendor Geométrico, Demdike Stare, The Soft Moon and Fennesz. Mix commissions include Electronic Explorations, Headphone Commute, Seek Sick Sound, Cashmere Radio and other independent platforms.
04
Across disciplines
Mikulskis approaches sound as both a physical and visual entity. His wider practice includes abstract industrial assemblages made from metal waste, lectures on musical narrative and industry context, and sonic installations such as The Energy System of the Užutrakis Manor Orangery as a Sonic Negative. He continues to build Secret Thirteen as a durable resource for future listeners.
02 / On stage
In the room.
Performance footage and selected posters from the archive.
Audra Festival / Kaunas, 2022Photo by Vytenis Sidabras
Digital Tsunami / rotating frameSūpynės Festival / filmed performance, 2019
Berlin Atonal / 2014Holotone Showcase / Berlin, 2016Space Love / Arma17, 2014Polar Inertia / KablysUMBRA / Kablys, 2014Undogmatisch / Berlin, 2015Audra Festival / 2022Sūpynės Festival / 2019Digital Tsunami Camp / 2022
03 / Personal archive
External transmissions
Documented mixes and radio shows, 2008—2024. Recent recordings open a listening page; earlier recordings remain in the original download archive.
Justinas Mikulskis as a guest: conversations about making music, listening and building Secret Thirteen. DJ sets and his own editorial work are archived separately.
Spoken fragments and transformed field recordings pass through shadowy ambience and industrial percussion, as a semi-live collaboration draws theatre, poetry and techno into one densely layered composition.
Fourteen records trace the electric guitar through suspended drones, pedal experiments and resonant rooms, bringing together the players and influences behind an album of collective, slowly evolving sound.
Sixteen records connect psychedelic guitar music with post-punk tension and industrial shadows, moving between worn voices, motorik rhythms and walls of distortion without losing their live, restless energy.
An imagined film takes shape through fifteen records of hollow rhythms, processed instruments and shifting atmospheres, with unreleased material threading a quiet sense of suspense through the sonic collage.
Thirteen records draw psychedelic drone, African rhythms and experimental jazz into a fluid journey, where shifting pulses and meditative spaces carry the listener between markedly different musical worlds.
Fifteen pieces set intricate electronic rhythms against expansive cinematic melody, moving from Kraftwerk and Drexciya to Autechre and Aphex Twin through carefully timed overlaps, muted tension and sudden detail.
A continuous hour of noise and drone reveals fine movement beneath a dense surface of static, drawing attention to changes in pressure, texture and distance as its slowly shifting layers absorb the room.
Reggae, hip-hop, funk and psychedelic rock pass through twelve named chapters, with echoing voices, sirens and loose rhythmic patterns sustaining a communal, unhurried flow between dancefloor and daydream.
Colin Andrew Sheffield opens the Elevator Bath circle with eight rare or unreleased pieces. Static tones, field recordings and fine-grained textures form a quietly unstable soundtrack, with contributions from Rick Reed, Tom Recchion, Matt Shoemaker and Sheffield himself.
Seventeen records move between film scores, improvised jazz and industrial experiment, drawing together spoken fragments, field recordings and the cinematic imagination of the 1970s and early 1980s.
Recorded live from vinyl without added effects or edits, eighteen selections move from field recordings and beatless electronics into gradually gathering rhythms, holding an open dialogue between texture and pulse.
Seventeen dark electronic records connect industrial origins with the first Beläten releases, binding archaic synthesizers, ritual voices and insistent rhythms into a stark, emotionally charged sequence.
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