Folk /
Solo Acoustic Volume Eleven
"The godfather of alternative guitar returns with an all-instrumental album, Homages, in tribute to his influences and contemporaries. Summoning the spirits of some of the greatest guitarists of all time, Michael Chapman proves again that he stands among them."
Although not as well known as his peers (Roy Harper, John Marytn, and Bert Jansch), the name Michael Chapman is an important one in the linage of English folk rock guitarists and singer/songwriters of the late 60's/early '70s. For thos…
On Mande
Ever since her childhood Ogoya Nengo, baptized Anastasia Oluoch in about 1940, would excite listeners around her village with her singing abilities. Very soon she had received her stage name "Ogoya Nengo" which in Dholuo (language) means: the most precious and expensive singer in the region. Her debut album "Rang'ala" (Honest Jon's/London) came out in 2014 and was recorded and produced by Sven Kacirek and Stefan Schneider at various spots around Rang'ala Village, Siaya County, Kenya. Now "OGOYA …
Lost Train Blues: John & Alan Lomax and the Early Folk Music
"Lost Train Blues features 22 selections from the vast holdings of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, 13 of them have never been issued before. The record includes work songs, ballads, blues, political and union songs, guitar, banjo and fiddle music and Native American vocal music. These recordings were made between 1933 and 1950 and represent the birth of the folk music collections at the Library of Congress, now the largest repository of folk and enthographic holdings in …
Sacred Flute Music from New Guinea: Madang/Windim Mambu
Recorded by Ragnar Johnson, assisted by Jessica Mayer, in Papua New Guinea, April-August 1976. Tape-to-digital transfer by Dave Hunt at Dave Hunt Audio in London, July 2015. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering in Berlin, August 2015. Notes and photographs by Ragnar Johnson and Jessica Mayer. First combined release. Originally released as two distinct LPs on Quartz Publications (!QUARTZ 001 (1977) and !QUARTZ 002 (1979)) by David Toop with the assistance of Sue Steward, …
Chang Fo Ji - Buddha loops from China & Tibet
Chang Fo Ji are small, plastic, battery-powered soundboxes, available throughout China and Tibet, that play a variety of Buddhist loops, from poppy modern Chinese Buddhist prayers to ancient recordings of famous Tibetan Buddhist masters. They can be taken everywhere, offering the listener portable immersion into the hypnotizing, minimalist world of Buddhist prayers. Both sides of this record contain various loops from various Chang Fo Ji gathered in China by Laurent Jeanneau (Kink Gong) be…
Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill
Brand new edition of Grouper's breakthrough 2008 album which has been out of print on all physical formats for the last few years* Here's what we had to say about the album when it first came out on Type 5 years ago: "With the label's hiatus well and truly over, Type Records follows up Peter Broderick's amazing 'Float' with a brand new album of midnight Shoegazer classics from Portland's Liz Harris - and it really is one of the most special albums you'll hear this year. While the filtered, tape-…
The Man Who Died In His Boat
2016 reissue. Following a series of impossible-to-obtain releases for her own Yellowelectric imprint and a CD compilation of her gorgeous 'A I A' set, Liz Harris seems to have settled with Kranky who are re-releasing her classic Type album 'Dragging a Dead Deer..' and this new album of previously unreleased material drawn from the same period: 'The Man Who Died In His Boat'. It's not so hard to believe but we'll say this straight away - the material on this new set is just jaw-dropping, a …
Kattvals
2016 Reissue. Subliminal Sounds presents the band Kvartetten Som Sprangde (trans. "The Quartet That Blasted") and their album Kattvals (trans. "Cat Waltz"). First-ever vinyl reissue of one of the most sought-after and beautiful psych pre-jazz rock instrumental albums ever recorded in Sweden. Originally released during the summer 1973 on the obscure Gump label. Powered by a C-3 organ, Ludwig kit and 50-watt Marshall head with a home-built cabinet, the skilled three-piece band (not a quartet,…
Friends of Mine
Jill Cislaghi cut her one and only album in 1977, during her senior year at Regis College in Massachusetts. She recorded solely for friends, family, and as a memento for the members of her graduating class. Friends of Mine describes the loves and tribulations of Cislaghi's life with a mixture of naivetè and wisdom. With nothing more than her voice and (mostly unplugged) guitar, Cislaghi's folk sound is singular and resonant, bold yet humble. Friends of Mine's hopeful yet wintry vision should a…
This Song Was Borne
Allan Fraser & Daisy DeBolt met in the summer of 1969. They had both been working individually on the coffeehouse circuit in their native Canada; over the next five years, as the duo of Fraser & DeBolt, they created a sublime body of work that still sounds remarkably fresh decades later. They recorded two albums for Columbia which garnered rave reviews at the time, but saw little commercial success. Both have since become cult classics in psychedelic folk circles; the first, With Ian Guenther, b…
Music of Xinjiang: Kazakh and Uyghur Music of Central Asia
Limited-edition LP with full-size insert of text and photographs by compiler Laurent Jeanneau. Xinjiang (Eastern Turkestan) is China's biggest province. The musical landscape here is one of the world's richest. The Uyghur and the Kazakh are the two main ethnicities represented on these recordings made by Laurent Jeanneau and Shi Tanding in June of 2009. The Kazakh (nomadic) and Uyghur (agricultural) have multiple linguistic ties. Much of this music shares many influences from the Arab world, Tur…
Outlier: Recordings from Madagascar
Limited-edition LP with full-size insert of text and photographs by compiler Charles Brooks. This collection is an impeccable and crystalline assortment of beautiful music from the deep southwestern provinces of Menabe and Tulear in Madagascar, recorded and assembled by Charles Brooks. Brooks has made many friends in these lesser-travelled regions since the 1990s. Outlier: Recordings from Madagascar represents a compilation of his encounters from 2011-2012. "Madagascar is an island that wo…
Aria
A very important artist from Naples, Alan Sorrenti released his first album in 1972 on the legendary Harvest label. Aria is an absolute Italian prog classic, with two different sides: the first only contained the long title track, a dreamy psych-suite starting with acoustic guitar and based on the marvelous instrument-like voice of Sorrenti, and exploding in the final part with a memorable violin solo by Jean Luc Ponty. Side 2 was softer, with three tracks, two of which also appeared on …
Bahriye Ciftetellisi
In Istanbul, close to the city center, lies a district not often visited by tourists. It’s called Dolapdere, and it is populated by the Roma of the city, many of whom are originally from Thrace. They supply the music for the city’s weddings, circumcisions, parades and parties. Dolapdere is the home of clarinet virtuoso Cüneyt Sepetçi and the Orchestra Dolapdere—some of the greatest musicians of Istanbul. They specialize in a modern take on classic Turkish Roma (gypsy) music, as well as fol…
Bali 1928, Vol. V: Vocal Music In Dances Drama
Vol. V of the Bali 1928 recordings contains various emergent theatrical dance and dance-opera forms with translations of the dramas' texts. We hear the first recordings of women participating in dance dramas, making this disc a major cultural repatriation of primary Balinese art forms that had been lost for nearly a century. An extensive essay is included as a PDF (accessed by computer) with links to 1930s silent films and a photo library are hosted online by World Arbiter. Some of these …
A Study into 21st Century Drone Acoustics
Much of the discussion around unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) is directed toward its capabilities of surveillance and attack. However for those living in areas of conflict, it is the engine sound of the drones that has devastating psychological effects. Military drones fly at high altitudes and are more easily heard than seen. Even the origin of the word "drone" is rooted in sound, and comes from the sound of the male honeybee. The sound of drones in areas of conflict creates soundscapes of te…
For Letha
Four tracks of instrumental acoustic guitar from the master songwriter. Starting out in London as a devotee of various blues and old time country musicians (Skip James, Dock Boggs, Robert Wilkins, etc) Dan Melchior soon found that slavish impersonation wasn’t the right route for him. After a period of mainly re interpreting traditional material, Melchior found a way to express his own concerns and ideas lyrically, and set about melding them to a backdrop of over driven, buzzsaw rock, with variou…
Bob Frank
Originally released in 1972 on Vanguard Records, Bob Frank’s self titled debut album took elements of Dylan, Johnny Cash, and Ian Tyson and filtered it through a pot-smoked haze infused with Frank’s long-time friend, Memphis guru Jim Dickinson. Dickinson and Frank shared a mutual admiration that ran so deep that on Dickinson’s own 1972 debut album Dixie Fried (released on Atlantic Records) he recorded one of Bob’s songs, ‘Wild Bill Jones.’ Despite the Dickinson/Memphis connection, Bob Frank’s on…
Hexadic II
Several years ago, after tiring of the predictable patterns he sensed himself settling into as a guitar player, Ben Chasny of Six Organs of Admittance decided to design a theoretical framework that would force his hands into different positions. Chasny distributed a deck of poker cards in a circular array of sets of six, corresponding to the notes of the guitar. The relative positions of the cards gave Chasny a "tonal field" in which to operate, as well as a set of notes from which to pick, some…
Morning Meditation
Transcendental acoustic guitar mysticism from the VDSQ shaman of Western MA. Anthony Pasquarosa is an artist and musician whose need to create is like a never ending search. He shouts at the audience in HC/Punk bands, pays tribute to early eighties electro punk and late sixties psych, plays old time music and is an excellent player of all stringed instruments.