Mika Vainio's Minimal Techno Classic Metri Gets Expanded 2026 Vinyl Repress

Boomkat is releasing an expanded 2026 vinyl pressing of Metri, the debut album from Ø (Mika Vainio), and the headline detail for anyone who already owns an earlier pressing is straightforward: the track "Lasi" appears on vinyl for the first time. The repress brings the full CD tracklist to wax under catalog number SAHKOLP006 on Sähkö Recordings, the Helsinki label that has been systematically putting Vainio's early-90s catalog back into circulation across 2025 and 2026.

The timing matters because a 2025 Sähkö double 12" pressing of Metri, mastered and cut by Rashad Becker, already claimed to include all tracks for the first time on vinyl and was listed on the Sähkö Bandcamp page before selling out. The 2026 Boomkat pressing builds on that expanded scope and specifically names "Lasi" as the notable addition, which suggests the two pressings are worth comparing track-for-track if you're deciding between hunting down the sold-out 2025 run or picking up the new one.

Becker's involvement is consistent across recent Sähkö reissues. His name appears on the Bandcamp listing for the Metri vinyl as "Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker," and the October 2025 repress of Aste (Sähkö-002.5), which retailed through Beatbox for €36, carried the credit "Mastered by Rashad Becker at D&M." The label has been leaning on that relationship across the catalog, and for material written and produced by Vainio in Turku between 1991 and 1993, the care taken with the lacquers is audible.

That catalog push is worth paying attention to. Alongside Metri, Sähkö has put out or repressed Aste, Kantamoinen, Kvantti, Röntgen, Eetteri, and Happi in recent cycles, with release weeks running through March and April 2026 on distributor calendars. The Kvantti and Röntgen EPs were already reissued with new artwork back in 2006; the current wave goes deeper, including material like the Eetteri EP, described in catalog copy as "a 1993 alltime minimal techno classic" appearing on vinyl for the first time. The Happi EP, originally pressed in a run of 300, has also returned. For anyone building a proper physical account of Vainio's solo work, this is probably the most active reissue period since those 2006 singles.

Bandcamp user kpierco put it plainly in the comments on the Sähkö page: "Ground zero, a blue print, a classic. Thank you Mika and Sahko!!" That's the consensus view, and it's held across thirty-plus years of listening. The original release year for Metri is cited as 1994 in some sources and 1993 in others, a detail Sähkö could clarify, but the music itself doesn't leave much room for argument about where minimal techno began its serious formalization as a language.

The 2025 Sähkö vinyl item is sold out on Bandcamp, where the digital version remains available at €9 or more in 16-bit/44.1kHz. The Boomkat 2026 pressing is where you go now if you want it on wax.