Wavelength
First Lady of Winds and Stars Samara Lubelski returns to her once and future label home for her sixth album, Wavelength, and the spheres harmonize at the news. Wavelength comprises a dozen new arrowed whispers, Samara's feathery touch on guitar and microphone now so at balance with the elements that the whole, her music and the air it enters, become inseparable. Don't be fooled by the persistent "psych-folk" labels she gets -- oh, they may be accurate as far as modern usage goes, and that scene …
Still In Your Pocket
Still In Your Pocket, an arrangement of piano pieces by Karla Borecky, is at once humble and profound. As this is Borecky’s first solo LP (away from her Idea Fire Company membership), the piano is allowed full prominence and discretion. Revolving melodies contract and expand across the seven vignettes presented here (recorded from 2007 to 2010). It reads as a withering novel, lush with romance and mystery. And although Borecky’s restrain and delivery imply a certain poise, there is an undercurre…
Arcana en Cantos
2010 Release. Anahita is the first release from the duo of Tara Burke (Fursaxa) and Cellist Helena Espvall (Espers) a first vinyl edition fully remixed for wax from the cd masters that first appeared on a ltd cdr from deserted village in 2006. plaintive semi abstract vocals strain and wind over ecclesiastical notes held so long that your head becomes the organist’s domain. Rarely have vocal harmonies been this ethereal or perfectly held. Not the glottal gymnastics of Joan la Barbara but rat…
Arrebato
On Arrebato, Asheville's Ahleuchatistas embellish their trademark intensity with a more pensive and existential amble. These six pieces channel recollections of a natural kinship the band struck up with a number of communities they played to on an Iberian tour in early 2014. The resulting story threads together a suite of lyrical instrumentals showing a deepening meticulousness for structure—elastic and labyrinthine.
Spanish for "passionate outburst," Arrebato aptly evokes a rapturous rising fro…
Memory Fragments
Pierce Warnecke presents a chasmic solo debut LP with Memory Fragments for Room40 offering his most expansive, personalised vision of electro-acoustic abstraction. Nine tracks cover a broad spectrum of tones within his chosen subset, from doomy keys and cinematic drone panoramas thru curdling dissonance and prickling glitch textures subtly playing with notions of deferred gratification and unpredictability. One to check if you’re into Tim Hecker or KTL. “Based in Spain, composer and visualist Pi…
Fruhruin
Asmus Tietchens and Thomas Köner exercise a collective marketing genius with their decision to end a fruitful collaborative series in brute, anticlimactic style, issuing this limited, (naturally) expensive box meant to house the duo's previous four discs. Such closure is especially disappointing as it arrives just behind last year's n, Kontakt der Jünglinge's most dense and engrossing work to date, a haunting deepspace symphony of icy gleam and relentless sprawl, one of my late-year favorites. F…
Water Beetles of Pollardstown Fen
What is presented in this CD is a very alien world, a hitherto unheard aural environment that breaks with all our preconceived notions of what underwater life should sound like. All our traditional conceptions and inherent cultural conditioning are overwritten, deemed void and deleted. The work contained in this CD redefines our notions of underwater life and presents a world of alarming sophisticated communication; a myriad of signal generation, perpetuated by a plethora of intelligent species.…
Mekong Morning Glory
"The Mekong River is one of the world’s major rivers. On its more than 4.000 km long way from its source in the Tibetan Plateau to the Delta in South Vietnam it passes an altitude difference of 5.000 km, travels through seven countries, three climatic zones and three different culture areas. On an extensive journey Eva and I followed the lower course of the Mekong River and travelled downstream through Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. On its way the Mae Nam Khong, the „Mother River of All Things“, cr…
Drape
Tom James Scott's two previous CD releases for Bo'Weavil Recordings both featured acoustic guitar as primary voice. His first LP -- while maintaining similar melodic sensibilities and a feeling of hushed expanse -- sees piano become the main focus, with the title "Drape" (defined in literature documenting past and present dialect native to what is now Cumbria, as, "to speak slowly") determining pace and durations across the four pieces presented. Strings of single notes become humming, shadowy r…
Mary Never Wanted Jesus
* 2005 release * Art project Christmas the fourth. Fluxus rooted artist John Armleder's Villa Magica label showcases Christmas record obsession: festive music conceptual, kitsch and literal. John invites invites Genesis to contribute. Disarmingly charming.
Approaching Nothing
Lawrence English’s response to one of his favourite concrète works, Luc Ferrari’s Presque Rien. Relational listening provides a systemic framework through which artists and other concerned practitioners can explore the conditions of their listening, specifically in the context of the desire to transmit those listenings", writes Lawrence English in an essay entitled Relational Listening: The Politics of Perception. He describes relational listening as a creative process intended to make one'…
Seconds Late For The Brighton Line
“Seconds Late For The Brighton Line” finds the band in familiar territory; pulsing Krautrock, dark and sinister pop and epic post-industrial soundscapes. The album invites the listener to put on head phones, close their eyes and embark on a technicolor journey. Stand out tracks include the epic electronic groove of “Russian Roulette”, the pretty naivete of “Someday” and the chilling goth-pop of “Endless Time.” The recent departure of long-time band members Niels Van Hoorn & Martijn De Kleer has …
RX22: Two RX11 Drum Machines, Nine Suspended Speakers, A Microph
“RX22 combines the sounds of two RX11 Yamaha drum machines. Built in the early 1980s, these drum machines have independent outputs for each element of the drum set — hi hats, rides, claps, shakers, etc. I connected a wireless transmitter to each output that sends the signal from each element to a different mini speaker (a total of nine is suspended from the ceiling). I used the main out- put to simultaneously send the combination of all the elements to a stereo PA. The wireless transmission has …
Stretcher
Medical Records presents it's 60th release with the much needed reissue of Australia's Severed Heads and their 1985 release - Stretcher. The Severed Heads story continues with the expanded and Stretched 2LP reissue. After personnel changes in 1985 (Garry Bradbury and Paul Deering left the band), Sev was now down to a 2 piece (Tom Ellard and Stephen Jones). Stretcher was originally released to be a compilation to introduce the band to an American audience, but it was ultimately sold in three vers…
Spinhead Sessions 1986
" The slow-burn sounds of Sonic Youth’s 1986 rehearsals to score Ken Friedman’s spooky highway film Made In USA are yet another mile marker in the band’s long and varied existence, now being issued as Spinhead Sessions (named for the North Hollywood studio used by SST label acts like Black Flag and Painted Willie). These jams were later built upon for a full-on (and quite different) soundtrack production, but the rough sketches here find the band taking time with truly new and introspective so…
EVOL
"EVOL" was Sonic Youth's fourth album, significant for one fairly obvious reason: the addition of Steve Shelley behind the kit. Steve joined the band in mid 1985, and this is the first album he plays on. EVOL also features the first real "guest appearance" on a Sonic Youth album -- Mike Watt, who contributes bass to "In The Kingdom #19" and the non-LP bonus track "Bubblegum". "Shadow Of A Doubt" became their second music video. At some point circa June 1985, after the first European Bad Moon Ris…
Ipotesi
Another great italian avantgarde progressive rarity from 1972! Complex and excellent album, with classic moments, jazz-rock influences in the Canterbury vein, acoustic parts, sudden rhythm changes and complex arrangements, in a few words everything we love from vintage italian prog! "Part of the charm of the Italian progressive rock is undoubtedly due to its inner presence of many bands who were able to release just a single LP, often overshadowed by the 'big' names: therefore, the album and i…
Home of the Blues
Kye is proud to present Home of the Blues, the latest LP by Dan Melchior, and his sophomore effort for the label following 2012's now legendary Excerpts (& Half-Speeds). For Home of the Blues Dan agreed to undergo a series of exercises aimed not only at destabilizing his natural songwriting process, but also testing the durability of the blues idiom when placed under stress. As one would expect, Dan met the challenge with aplomb, hoisting the project beyond some one-dimensional art-school pr…
Heureusement Que le Sang Seche Vite
5599 is a new duo featuring France's electronic improvisation giant Jean-Marc Foussat on EMS Synthi AKS and current golden boy Augustin Brousseloux on electric guitar and alto saxophone. Heureusement que le sang seche vite features 3 tracks where guitar and saxophone interplay with analog synthesizer to create psychedelic, dense and textured soundscapes of aggressive noise onslaughts and moments of bliss.
Born in Oran (Algeria) in 1955, Jean-Marc Foussat played in several experimental rock g…
Modern Journal of Popular Savagery
Porest's fourth long-player, Modern Journal of Popular Savagery is a damning collection of parallel realities told in song and sound. Following 2006's masterful Tourrorists, MJoPS pits post-globalized hate pop, cabalistic text-to-speech drama and violent tape music against soapbox anthems and swirling barbed-wire psychedelia -- sometimes within the same track. The result: a terrifying and ridiculous audio shakedown that both avoids and completely indulges the inherent trappings of art and po…