Dreamweapon I
Mostly unheard tape-recorded, Eastern-influenced drone material from MacLise, Tony Conrad and Jack Smith, as a sonic companion to the recent exhibition dedicated to MacLise "Dreamweapon: The Art and Life of Angus MacLise (1938-1979)". Totally stoned out stuff! In a silkscreened sleeve. Second LP Edition of 500.
Eight Studies for Automatic Piano
Inspired by the work of James Tenney, György Ligeti, Charlemagne Palestine, and Conlon Nancarrow, Seth Horvitz’s Eight Studies for Automatic Piano makes use of simple, computer-aided compositional processes to test the limits of human perception and machine precision. It relies on a bare minimum of technical means to explore notions of temporal distortion, iterative process, and elegant complexity. Presented in an immersive concert setting without the presence of a human performer, Eight Studies…
Transparency (Performance)
In 2010, sound artist Richard Chartier was awarded a Smithsonian Institution Artist Research Fellowship to explore the National Museum of American History’s collection of 19th Century acoustic apparatus for scientific demonstration. Chartier focused on the works of the German physicist Rudolf Koenig, including the Grand Tonometer (c. 1870-1875). This beautiful and precise set of 692 tuning forks expresses the frequency range 520 v.s (vibration simple)(260 hz) to 8192 v.s. (4096 hz). The p…
Objects of Memory
These works occupy a position between an expanded notion of composition and a gallery-based art practice. The content of the works presented on this disc produce a slow series of gestures that give the illusion of stillness amidst a texture of continually developing material. The central concern in all of these pieces (the three fully scored works, the installation documentation, and the live-performance) is the construction of a sound world that is able to be environmental rather than tempora…
Sostrah tinnitus - Stain
Warm, involving, deep and penetrating sounds... Flowing sounds patterns, vibrating drones permeated by a discreet sense of tension, evolving in dark, obscure, foggy, nocturnal atmospheres, violated by raven voices, mysterious noises and sounds of metal objects in motion... And then concrete noises, confused and elusive melodies, feeble light flashes, buried echoes of human voices, distantr whispers, sudden passages of rough sounds, undefined nuisances, subliminal and hypnotic sequences, just lik…
Rekviem MB-JMI
A "classic" minimal ambient album; just one long track, a bit obscure, of a static nature but unarrestable as a matter of fact and slowly developing, built with layers of soft and “round” sounds, heavily processed and effected, whose origin seems to be an organ... "Atypical" for sure, if confrontated with the huge and widely diversified productions of Maurizio Bianchi, this new album is probably one of the last and not to be missed releases signed by “M.B.”, since he has already announced his de…
Hibakusha
Cyclic loops agglomerates resting on static drones intertwined by flashes of electronic frequencies; algorithmic manipulations of undefined sound materials moved by bouncing delays and recurring panoramic space variations; a sequence of metallic waves in continuous tonal variation, heavy dissonances and sonic stratifications in progressive and pseudo-randomic composition/decomposition; desolate silences corrupted by resounding echoes of entangled electric rhythmic impulses... Longly awaited re-e…
Krungthep Archives
"After the post-industral / power-electronics 'diversions' of his recent collaboration with Pierpaolo Zoppo / Mauthausen Orchestra in From Unhealthy Places, and Forgotten Realm, the 'second chapter' of the Hall of Mirrors projects with Andrea Marutti / Amon in dark ambient 'territories', Nimh (Giuseppe Verticchio) returns as a 'solo' artist in his newest Krungthep Archives, rediscovering the sounds of his oriental ethnic instruments, collected in he Far-East, mainly in Thailand. The recordings o…
The Disintegration Loops IV
And then, the man remained alone with more doubts than ever before. Music had flown through the years, the tapes definitively gone. IV draws the final line in this groundbreaking 'disintegration' cycle and it does it with a high grade of acute intensity and a totally developed loop aesthetic...moreover, the final track is sort of a reprise of the first segment in I, like putting an end to a whole giant texture. Basinski's repetitions are truly addictive; I could listen for days, each repe…
The Disintegration Loops II
Finally officially released, the next three volumes in Basinski's incredible Disintegration Loops series. Each volume is totally mesmerizing, in the realms of general organic drone and aesthetic decay. Basinski has become a cult hero of sorts for the quality of his works (previous releases on Raster & Three Poplars; forthcoming on Idea) and the release of II, III, & IV will solidify that forever. "The second Disintegration Loops consists of two long segments, both strikingly beautiful; the …
The Disintegration Loops
First widely available release on Basinksi's own label (other releases on Raster, Idea, Durtro, Headz, etc), from early 2003. This series of 4 Disintegration Loops has become one of the true phenoms of post-9/11 experimental music -- totally legendary stuff at this point. "William Basinski is a musician, composer, auteur who has worked in experimental media for over twenty years in NYC, expanding the boundaries of the aural landscape. In 1978, inspired by minimalists such as Steve Reich…
Every live is problem solving
A suggestive gallery of abstract images, confused fragments of life and real living experiences, sights of urban landscapes... Noisy and electronic interferences, mechanical machines movements, concrete noises, low frequences fluxes, hissing sounds, interferences, but also melodic acoustic guitar pieces, human voices and other field recordings... A brave, uncompromising and heterogeneous "decomposed" mosaic of avantgarde sound art beyond time, beyond any point of view and any geometric coordina…
El Camino Real
Hypnotic new electronic ambient recording using another recently discovered loop from the archive. Premiered at Bleeding Edge Festival, Montalvo Arts Center, August 2006.
Variations For Piano & Tape
Comprised of one 44 minute track, Variation #9 'Pantelleria,' this archival release is one of my all-time favorites of the piano and tape variations from the early eighties. Using a lilting piano melody on a small loop, the requisite magic happened in the recording process when this particular loop would randomly slip along the play head revealing an extraordinary counterpoint (in reverse) on the other side of the tape. To me, this piece evokes a lazy Arcandian summer idyll, and will alwa…
Watermusic II
Volume II. Originally issued as a limited CDR in 2003, now reissued as a fully pressed CD. "A certain flavour of composition puts emphasis more on what could be considered 'hang-time' than 'narrative'. Some pieces don't necessarily have to 'go' anywhere in particular, their existence is simple enough in that it presents a mood, a moment, a place and encapsulates it. Think of still-images for the ears as opposed to moving-pictures for the eyes. As an audio exploration into this hovering su…
In V. Tro
A highly intriguing set of live recordings and "extreme aural mixes" capturing, for the first time, the disciplines of Larsen and Z'ev in collaboration. 'In V. Tro' was conceived as the soundtrack to a series of micro-cinematic images created between 1935 and 1985 at Bologna's Instituto di Anatomia Umana Normale (Basic Human Anatomy Institute) and assembled by professors Dario Cantino and Antonio Barasa. The images pay tribute to the maestro of anatomical discipline Giuseppe Levi, and there's a …
Cool Cruel Mouth
"Cool Cruel Mouth" is Larsen's 9th full length studio album and marks 15 years of activity with a fine collection of textural, cinematic, haunting, nocturnal songs. Written and recorded in 2010. "Cool Cruel Mouth" finds the band as a 5 piece with the full time addition of lyricist Little Annie "Anxiety" Bandez as the official voice of Larsen. Also featured on "Cool Cruel Mouth" is inimitable Baby Dee playing piano on one of the two featured instrumentals as well as on her own composition "Unhear…
Some Days Are Better Than Others
We have waited with eager anticipation to release Matthew Cooper's spellbinding soundtrack to Some Days Are Better Than Others since before his creative breakthrough album, Similes (released under his more widely known Eluvium moniker) was even made. The film stars James Mercer (Broken Bells, The Shins) and Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia, Sleater-Kinney) as strangers whose lives occasionally intersect as they navigate their way through the struggles of personal attachment and disconnection. When …
Kreisel.Dreidel
'From a cirlce Kreis to a spinning top Kreisel. From german Kreisel to yiddish Dreidel. To make this LP turn creates a constant movement of a meaning and a place which spins and can never be caught hold of. The LP condenses various elements of the exhibition Memory Wheels by Elise Florenty and Marcel Türkowsky, presented at the Art Center Synagogue of Delme, curated by Marie Cozette, in March 2009. Objects, drawings, films, language and sound were echoing different characters of Franz Kaf…
ToTheOtherSideΔ
BeMyDelay is the solo project of Marcella Riccardi (Blake/e/e/e, Franklin Delano, Massimo Volume), singer and guitarist. Her interest in archaic blues and adventurous music is the ground for building a song collection which tastes of experimental blues, vocali drones, acoustic pareidolia. "ToTheOtherSide" is another piece of the puzzle of that female psychedelia that goes from Grouper to US Girls, Valet and many more. The sound here is more shaped and definite than Liz Harris’ or Honey O…