Abattoir
SEC_: Revox tape recorder, computer samples, no-input feedbacks manipulated on tape. Mario Gabola: feedback and acoustic sax, minitape, self-made electroacoustic chain of feed-drums and piezo-speaker feedback. Aspec(t) are SEC_ and Mario Gabola from Naples, Italy. Their music shares the timbrical research and the execution control typical of some radical impro music (Pateras-Baxter-Brown, John Butcher, Jim Denley, Bruce Russell), but meets the visceral intensity and the obscure poetic of …
La tentation de saint-Antoine
Another master piece from Michel Chion reissued by Nuun in this serie directed by Lionel Marchetti. 'Concrète series by Lionel Marchetti. A concrete melodrama consisting of a prologue and nine tableaux adapted from Flaubert. With Pierre Schaeffer (as St Anthony), Michèle Bokanowski (Ennoïa, the Narrator), Art Leroi-Bibbs (the Preacher), Korinna Rahls-Frisius (the Queen of Sheba), Michel Chion (the Announcer). Jointly commissioned by the French Ministry of Culture, the INA.GRM and radio Fra…
Body EP
You either loved or hated Autre Ne Veut's electrifying 2010 album for Olde English Spelling Bee, and we loved it - as we made abundantly clear at the time. Since its release, ANV has been reasonably quiet, most recently seen turning up on Mordant Music's Variables II 12"; but he's been putting his time to good use it seems, crafting this killer four-track EP for Hippos In Tanks. 'Sweetheart' finds our man warbling and whining in that unmistakable multi-tracked falsetto of his, against a r…
I Futuribili
**restocked** Egisto Macchi (1928-1992) has long existed in the shadow of his friend and famous collaborator Ennio Morricone. Founding member of the astounding ‘Il Gruppo Di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza ' Macchi was a busy film (LSD Inferno, Bandidos, The Assassination Of Trotsky) and TV (E.S.P, many commercials with Mario Bava) composer in late 1960s and 1970s Italy and France. Macchi also cut a number of highly desirable library LPs for the Gemelli, Sermi and other Italian labels in …
Agneta Nilsson (Heldon IV)
After our acclaimed reissues of the previous three LPs by Richard Pinhas' project Heldon, here is their fourth LP originally issued on Disjuncta/Urus in 1976. Agneta Nilsson is an interesting step in Heldon's development: it gives a twist to their classic sound, which was mainly built around Pinhas' Fripp-esque guitar work and ambient synth experiments to begin to explore a more rhythmic territory. Drums and bass take more presence here, offering a 'rockier' feel, but somehow retaining th…
Electronic Mind Waves
"Out of the mysterious mind of Andrea Centazzo came Elektriktus. Originally released on the PDU label in 1976, the LP Electronic Mind Waves offers a collection of eight synth-fueled songs that sound very close to what kraut/cosmische heads were doing at the time, think of Conrad Schnitzler, Deuter or Cosmic Jokers, and also other European experimentalists like Richard Pinhas' Heldon, Spacecraft, Didier Bocquet, Seesselberg, F.G. Experimental Laboratory, Roberto Cacciapaglia or Hydrus. Along…
Tragedy & Geometry
On Tragedy & Geometry, Steve Hauschildt, one-third of Cleveland’s neo-kosmische revivalists Emeralds, crafts an hour’s worth of instrumental synthesizer vignettes. His pieces tend to evoke thoughts of bygone eras of technological pop culture — many of these tracks could be placed seamlessly into Blade Runner, or into some lost Playstation-era (you know, when Final Fantasy VII was cutting edge) videogame. Hauschildt doesn’t craft wholly formed songs so much as he works with detached, technologica…
Overheard and rendered 2
At long last, and/OAR presents the second of a series of limited edition collections illustrating the various approaches to environmental sound art. These collections allow for longer format works to be presented within a multi-artist presentation. Also returning for the first time in five years is the custom card stock insert packaging housed inside clear vinyl sleeves. Yperiau, by French sound artist Eric Cordier, is a sonic exploration of the lower regions of the Maison de Radio France in Par…
Amateur Doubles
amateur doubles is the brand new solo lp by graham lambkin - a two-part improvisation recorded in a honda civic. dangerous, tedious, pointless and timeless, amateur doubles is a perfect snapshot of life on the open road. expertly mastered by jason lescalleet, amateur doubles arrives in a high gloss full color gatefold, on clear vinyl, in an edition of 500
Hiss Vol.1
The works included in 'hiSS [Synesthesia Sampler] vol.1' have been produced using only analogue devices and processing tools - such as no input mixers, analogue synthesizers and custom-built or hacked/reconfigured instruments. Without the use of computers or digital devices, the 4 pieces recall an era from the 1950s-70s, when most of the electronic music makers around the world had limited resources and quite primitive equipment.
Repaired/Replaced
Touch presents a 7" from Mike Harding as part of the Touch Sevens series. Recorded in West Wittering in Balham using DPA 4060s onto a Nagra Ares P-ll digital recorder. Cut by Jason at Transition. Artwork & photography by Jon Wozencroft.
Replica
Copies from copies of copies upon copies to copies through copies on copies of more copies. Daniel Lopatin was but a babe in the early '80s - the global time frame which stands central to his Oneohtrix Point Never project, where Russian TV advertisements, faded slow-jam hits, and forgotten futures all get misinterpreted, rewired, and misremembered through an android dream. Much of his past work revolved around the step sequencing and ambient swoosh that filtered through the kosmische aes…
Mysterier
7" vinyl was the quintessential format for popular music. Today, it is an undervalued and mostly promotional medium, used as a fetishistic signpost for a time of musical authenticity and a "healthy" popular culture. Two tracks from Biosphere originally recorded for Hågogaland Teater, Tromsø, Norway in 2006 and remastered in 2011. Part of the Touch Sevens series, cut by Jason at Transition. Artwork & photography by Jon Wozencroft.
Far Side Virtual
RESTOCKED, last copies around - The Wire's Releases of the Year!!!!!!James Ferraro paints a 21st century still life on his debut album for Hippos In Tanks. The record is called Far Side Virtual. Each song, a melodious reflection of the moment now, comes shrink-wrapped in HD fidelity as glossy as a 2012 Toyota Prius. Ferraro's muse is some enigmatic modern metropolis, where the streets are as slick as i-Pads, and where the symphonies ring with Macbook message alerts. Through the steam risi…
Decimus 9
*300 copies limited release* Seventh in a on-going series of twelve electronic meditations on the zodiac of Decimus Magnus Ausonius (310-395) as played by Pat Murano of No Neck Blues Band, K Salvatore, Malkuth and Key of Shame.This one is for sure the creepiest and most disturbing chapter of the series so far, with swathes of electronics melting with the highest tones of misterious lullabies from somewhere far away, keeping the listeners ear firmly at ground level.
Are You Going To Stop... In Bern?
"In fact, the art of O'Rourke and Connors lies in letting one feel the immobility withi n movement, and in instilling movement right at the heart of immobility. It's almost superfluous to say that this music belongs to the realm of dreams, it's music for the mind, abstract and yet wholly present to itself and therefore totally concrete too. The two guitarists set off in search of sound. Their quest is wildly raging now and then, but only for a brief moment, most of the time it's contempla…
Harmony In Ultraviolet
This is the first proper vinyl release for Tim Hecker's breakthrough 2006 album. At the time of original issue, there was a small run of a few hundred vinyl copies done by a small German label, but this was pressed on an inferior sounding single LP which was much too short for the length of the album, not to mention the wide dynamic range of the recording. This new version is mastered at 45rpm over four sides for maximum sound quality. Full color gatefold sleeve.
La Catacomb
La Catacomb, purloined from a great abyss of uncertainty, is finally among us. The fourth album proper from Steven R. Smith’s blisteringly psychedelic “power trio” guise, La Catacomb languished for a few years awaiting release from this label & that before landing at Soft Abuse HQ. La Catacomb is the perfect follow-up to Ulaan Khol’s Ceremony trilogy, offering more smoulder than flame, more rumination than provocation. Smith's meticulously-crafted heavy drones & dirges have rarely sound…
Light Cones
Root Strata present the first vinyl release of compelling and otherworldly electro-acoustic improvisation from the adventurous Golden retriever duo. Comprising Jonathan Sielaff's effected Bass Clarinet and Matt Carlson's analog modular synth and digital delay, the duo have thus far stood far out from the kosmische masses with their previous CDrs and cassettes including a beautiful eponymous debut on Root Strata and a stunner for NNA Tapes, but we'd have to say this is the some of the best…
Sonanze
Roberto Cacciapaglia had already gathered attention for his excellent work at the keyboards on Franco Battiato's legendary second LP Pollution before joining forces with krautrock mastermind Rolf Ulrich Kaiser for the release of his 1975 masterpiece Sonanze. Cacciapaglia self-produced the album in Milan for the Cosmic Couriers label, and it certainly brings echoes of some cosmiche kraut experiments like those of Popol Vuh, Klaus Schulze or Tangerine Dream, yet retaining a unique personality of i…