Experimental / All styles

This legendary Austrian beat/mod/psychedelic band existed from 1978 to 1982. The album A Doll Spits Cubes was self-released by the band in an edition of 300, gone in days, once repressed as a bootleg and heavily sought-after in the years to come until today. The song "Frozen Seas of Lo" made it to #2 in the Austrian charts. With insert.

I don't know when this music was recorded, why it was composed, what for, when... I know it is me playing and I know it is only my bass, I know there is no other sounds (as I never use pre-recorded sounds). I found this recording on a blank CDr, at home. nothing written on - what is this? Yes, it is me, for sure and it was obviously a composed piece - the structure is quite unusual. I did not touch, edited or mixed it in any way. And not being able to remember what it was, I called it "mystery b…

In italian language. The so-called Numbers stations are shortwave radio transmissions, broadcast in many different times of day, and with varying lengths, available on many frequencies and observed and studied for decades by amateur radio operators around the world. These transmissions consists in mysterious voices reading groups consisting of numbers or letters in the international phonetic alphabet, or Morse code signals or pulses of sound, and are often preceded by "callsigns" consistin…

In “Resorts & Ruins”, a set of three recent sound works, Kyriakides deals with several themes in both a physical and narrative sense. All the pieces use source material that highlight specific vocal traditions, namely Turkish pop music, Cypriot epic song, and Baroque opera, but they also all make extensive use of other forms of speech and vocal acts. In “Varosha (Disco Debris)”, a narrating voice is our tour-guide in the ruins of the Cypriot ghost town Varosha; the many fragm…

Agitation Free's 2nd stands as one of Germany's finest instrumental rock albums of the 1970s and a classic for fans of progressive rock and Krautrock. Despite the fact that the group had problems keeping its cohesion at the time, these troubles never affect the music. 2nd presented a daring blend of Krautrock-type extended jams, laid-back attitude, and experimentation. The music remains very psychedelic in nature, more early Can than Faust. The presence of acoustic guitars and bouzouki emphasize…

First release from this duo of Tokyo-based guitarist, Tetuzi Akiyama, and New York's Che Chen. Akiyama is in rare "Don't Forget to Boogie" form here; his heavily distorted, locomotive guitar lines chugging away as Chen's electrified fiddle drones, screeches and scrapes. Sine wave generators and a modified tape delay round out the mix. Sidelong live track on one side, studio jams on the flip. Released on Jozef Van Wissem's Incunabulum Records.

Bill Nace (Guitar) and Kim Gordon (Guitar, voice). "So much more than a 'likely pairing,' this is a group which manages to illuminate the best of both players while simultaneously pushing them into fresh territory. Live shows have been accompanied by slowed films, and the pair's obsession with cinema comes across in the music itself. The pieces exist as vignettes in and of themselves, all the while presenting a full-bodied emotional narrative over the course of the record's 20 minutes. It…

In the spring of 2011, Michael "Powderfinger" Morley was in the U.S. for a short visit. There had been some talk of doing a Gate show or two, but when he visited Western Mass., Feeding Tube Records decided to put use to his collaborative talents. He played one night at the Yod space in Florence with Kim Gordon and Bill Nace, then at Feeding Tube with Spencer Yeh and Meg Clixby. Both sets provided jumbo pleasure, and Michael managed to record the Yod set for our presentation to you. Kim and …

Decibels of Gratitude is the eighth full-length studio album by this long running Massachusetts ensemble. The roots of Major Stars go back to the 1979 formation of Crystalized Movements, through to their early 90s successor, Magic Hour. Upon that band's breakup, guitarists Wayne Rogers and Kate Village formed Major Stars, which kept Magic Hour's tendency toward songs spiked with lengthy instrumental excursions, but added a hard rock angle not usually present in the Hour's hazier sound. Major Sta…

Overhang Party is criminally overlooked. From the heavily psychedelic noise-rock of their first album to the piano-rock anthems of 4, Overhang Party was somehow impossibly consistent and seamless. This box set flows as an even, open document of this fearless and inventive Japanese rock group. For a quick reference of the sonic distances this group has traveled (and the skills they possess) stream Bass Oscillations from the first record and then skip straight to Kizashi on 4. The Complete Studio …

The six songs that comprise Jon Mueller's Death Blues are each their own doorway to both a bold new musical statement from the renowned drummer/percussionist and an unprecedented journey into a conscious contemplation of death -- and the life that surrounds it. Released in tandem with a multi-part manifesto, Death Blues transcends its own existence as a 34-minute, earth-cracking rock album. Much like Mueller, whose landmark solo work stands alongside his role in notable bands Volcano Choir…

greay-area LP reissue, Lux Aeterna, was originally composed to celebrate a friend of William Sheller's wedding, thematically driven by concepts of union and togetherness, and ostensibly based on the Catholic mass, this is far from any sort of religious music you've ever heard. Following in the footsteps of other iconoclastic composers, like Serge Gainsbourg, Jean-Claude Vannier, Lee Hazlewood, David Axelrod, Scott Walker and of course Magma (more on that in a second), Sheller conjured up w…

To Live and Shave in L.A. -- Illustrative presentations of critics'lipsticks and protagonists' stills; tangential bruises, ephemeral knots; an inter-generational installation view; the gulf between conscious quotation and subjective arrangement of cabinets of parasitic methodologies; tolerance and idealization via dirty electric documentation; staged symposia with supplemented acoustics; subtle modifications of unconcerned expressions; a formal repertoire in characteristic rasps; interventionist…

Two of the greatest bands of the present day, each composed of two guitarists and a drummer. Every member's name carries its own legendary status. Richard Bishop. Ben Chasny. Chris Corsano. Michael Morley. Bruce Russell. Robbie Yeats. Fabricated empires have risen and been destroyed by the vast output of any one of these guys. Finally, they come together on one release: a split LP between two supergroups. The Dead C's tracks are a gem of a find. The band uncovered recordings nestled in th…

Extremely rare recording of Can performing live at Aston University in Birmingham, on March 4, 1977 and featuring the new addition of Rebop Kwaku Baah (the Ghanian percussionist well-known for his work with Traffic, Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, etc.) and Roscoe Gee (a Jamaican bassist who had also recorded with Traffic). Holger Czukay, now freed from bass duties, began experimenting with an array of electronic sounds, which he also began adding to the mix in part to counterbalance Can's …

Vocalist Damo Suzuki’s departure from CAN in 1973 had forced the band to re-evaluate their sound. Now with Michael Karoli and Irmin Schmidt sharing vocal duties, the band had also begun drawing on influences from disco and glam. While still remaining staunchly outside the mainstream, they undoubtedly became more accessible to a wider audience, and soon had a huge fan base in the UK. In fact, just a few months after playing the live show found on this double LP (recorded in Lyon in January …

During the seventies writer/poet/essayist Peter Lamborn Wilson traveled extensively in the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Nepal. He spent several years in Iran where he translated Persian Sufi poetry and worked for the Shiraz Festival of Arts. In the early eighties Wilson went to Southeast Asia studying Javanese mysticism, Kebatinan. He published numerous books on topics as pirate utopia’s, Irish soma and Islamic heresy and his philosophy is influenced by anarchism, situationism, …

A rare chance to hear Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore reading (and accompanying himself on zither) from his classic collection of shamanic poetry ‘Dawn Visions’, originally published by City Lights back in 1964, when the author was in his early twenties. The poems were written during explorations of mind and space in Mexico and California. As Moore describes it, a period of “immersion on the ocean of poetic inspiration, my near drowning in a sudden flood of imagery and pushing further and further, almos…

We had been talking about this tape for a couple years now: a buncha killer livejams by the great Swedish band Den Stora Vilan (which supposedly translates something as ‘The Great Rest’). Long mellow West Coast influenced psych jams (think ‘American Beauty’ era Gratefuld Dead) meets Neil Young with a bit of Trad Gras Och Stenar thrown in. 200

People Like Us & Ergo Phizmiz composed 45 minutes of music that is simultaneously whimsical & poignant. Once the soundtrack was in place, visuals were assembled around the audio in order to create a stimulating assault on the mind that evokes a sense of the surreal and fantastical. These two cuts are pressed on limited edition 7-inch vinyl containing audio from "The Keystone Cut Ups" DVD on Illegal Art.