New Arrivals
Strings
“Strings” documents the long awaited first encounter of David Maranha and Stephan Mathieu, taking place in the Tennis Court of the Parque de Serralves, in Porto, on a sun-drenched yet gusty late-afternoon in July 2011. Having discussed in advance which instruments, tuning and notes to use, the piece was accomplished as an improvisation on the violin, shruti-box and virginals, reflecting both players love for classic minimalism, but also their ability to transform this language and make it their …
French Antarctica
probably the most anticipated record of the year for this household. the clip below has been on repeat for a couple months. Kye is proud to present 'French Antarctica', the debut LP by Good Area. Drawing from a palette of guitar, rhythm box, cornet, shortwave radio and room activity Good Area have crafted the ultimate stand-alone testament to instantaneous expression. Bypassing such obsolete concepts as dexterity and restraint 'French Antarctica' cuts loose with a raw unbridled rush of creative …
My Brother The Wind
A pretty darn incredible record from Sun Ra -- with a soulful, spiritual approach that's missing from most of his other albums of the time! The album features Ra playing a good deal of organ (dubbed "intergalactic organ" in this case!) -- grooving soulfully on some short tracks that almost hit a soul jazz mode, and which recall the late 60s experiments of organist Freddie Roach.
Prince Of Truth
Beginning with her first Constellation release in 2006, Carla Bozulich’s Evangelista project has steadily been gaining recognition for its complex beauty and fierce, raging appeals. Bozulich has been knocking these and many other ideas into form for two decades (Neon Veins, Ethyl Meatplow, The Geraldine Fibbers, Scarnella). Evangelista is the best and the brightest, filled with adventurous risk taking that sometimes whispers and licks, sometimes pulls the listener so close that it is hard to bre…
Palimpsest
It’s no secret how much we’ve loved Stephan Mathieu’s sublime drones and Sylvain Chauveau’s delicate compositions in the past, so to see these two pillars of experimental music collaborating has got us hot under the collar. But that’s not the half of it – not only did the two decide to work together, they had a very specific concept - ‘Palimpsest’ finds the duo reframing the timeless songs of Bill Callahan (aka Smog). Those familiar with Callahan’s writing might struggle to work out just how two…
Kugeln / Wallerfangen
Here's the 2nd part in Dekorder's brand new series of highly limited Hybrid-Vinyl 12“ releases to celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the label. It comes out simultaneously with parts 3 (Ensemble Economique) and 4 (Kemialliset Ystävät). The 1st part by Pye Corner Audio has been a massive success and sold out within two weeks (remaining copies are only available to subscribers).
Future contributions will feature new & exclusive recordings by Leyland Kirby, Excepter, Sonic Boom (EAR), Bill…
Penpals Forever And Ever
Expanding Erik Skodvin's extremely limited 2008 cassette edition Penpals Forever, this vinyl release remasters the original content and adds a whole extra side's worth of new material, all of which is exclusive to the LP. You wouldn't necessarily discern this straight away from the Deaf Center member's elusive and teasingly enigmatic music, but apparently 'Penpals Forever And Ever' is an "imaginary tale of a long dead baroque painter and his telekinetic correspondence with a flightless b…
Era
"Era is the fourth annual report from Chicago powerhouse quartet Disappears. It was formed during the gloom of the Chicago winter at Electrical Audio by now regular foil John Congleton. Insular and dark, the album sees the band further refining their love of dub, minimalism and repetition into their most original and stark set yet. It harks back to the early 80's post punk period, when almost anything seemed possible with the classic two guitar, bass and drums lineup, and exploration and…
Blooming The Ena
Continuing on from last years reissue of the first Aritomo LP, here we have Aritomo's second LP, 'Blooming The Ena' which was previously issued on his own private Hakanairo label in 2007. It was housed in a brown card sleeve with paste on artwork on the front and back with an insert in an edition of only 200 copies. This original pressing is impossible to find now. This reissue has a pro printed cover reproducing the original cover art as the private press edition and a 4 page insert printed ont…
Format
In Format, Sarah Crowner's first widely distributed artist book, the artist creates a roving collage of source material culled from a diverse range of previously distributed print material: magazines, books, posters, newspapers, postcards, etc. This publication provides a rare insight into the artist's working practice, demonstrating Crowner's concerns with visual formulations hinged on historical investigations, particularly in the overlap of art, writing, fashion, and design. Crowner's gracefu…
Centralia
Mountains’ music is defined by slow builds, and subtle transformations, textures and melodic lines that evolve in a variety of ways to create grand soundscapes and acutely detailed compositions. For Centralia, the duo of Koen Holtkamp and Brendon Anderegg wrote and recorded in a way that mirrors the pace of their music. While the current trend in experimental music is towards hyper-prolificity, Mountains have taken their time on Centralia, resulting in an album that is as precise as it is boundl…
Parallel / Grayscale
Parallel/Grayscale is the first collaborative work between Italian guitarist and composer Giuseppe Ielasi and French-Swiss composer and electroacoustic musician Kassel Jaeger. It is comprised of two different improvisation sessions. The first one took place in Paris, in October of 2011. The second happened in Oreno, in June of 2012, after the first concert Ielasi and Jaeger performed together. The first session was a pure analog device improvisation, whereas the second one was more laptop-o…
The Hebrides suite
How does history - past lives and past events - leave sonic traces and how can we hear them? The Hebrides Suite is the result of an attempt to answer this question and the culmination of composer Cathy Lane's three decade long engagement with the Outer Hebrides. The Outer Hebrides form a 130-mile long archipelago about 40 miles off the north-west coast of Scotland. There are more than 200 islands but only a few are now inhabited. In the 2001 census the total population of the islands was 26,502.…
Pan Am Stories
Tape-warped phantom band Rangers finally unleash the lush, soaring, expansive prog-pop opus we always knew was floating inside the fretboard (and imagination) of multi-instrumentalist mystery maestro Joe Knight. The north Dallas-raised, San Fran-residing head Ranger grew up taking classical guitar lessons from a dude who claimed to have 'toured with the Dead,' and some of that brain-wonked jam agenda obviously seeped into the young Knight, who began recording his own loose, lo-fi jangle s…
A Short Life of Trouble
"Compilation of truly great sorrowful American ballads recorded between 1927 and 1943. Songs mostly about murder, death, and broken hearted-ness. Lots of intense minor chords and stark gritty vocals. Artists include Emry Arthur, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Red Hot Old Mose, the DeZurik Sisters, Shortbuckle O'Rourke and Family, Jimmie Tarlton, Mississippi John Hurt and more. Mountain bluesmen and songsters presenting their darkest & most intense work. Old school 'tip on' sleeves."
Metz
Some will find it hard to believe that a glamrock band with a gritty urban veneer came from Texas and stuck together long enough to release this milestone record. Indeed, I was startled to learn that they're from Texas and not NYC or London. Clearly the underground music scene throughout Texas is fertile with talent and enough socio-cultural diversity to support any genre, including mid-70s glamrock. Metz take on glam includes some of the associated clichés like heavy chunks of chord strokes and…
Compositions For Geomungo and Gayageum
Sub Rosa reissues Belgian composer/violinist Baudouin de Jaer's Gayageum Sanjo (SR 347CD), with a complete new design and an additional CD of new compositions for another ancient Korean instrument: the geomungo ("black zither"). "Baudouin de Jaer chose a highly delicate musical instrument, the geomungo, and has drawn from it a marvelous creation; I can only congratulate him with all my heart for such an accomplishment, and for the release of this beautiful CD. I hope he will continue to make gre…
We Will Always Be
There's a disarming honesty to the way Michigan-based husband and wife duo Windy & Carl communicate with one another. A blog post from Windy, published in late 2011, describes the making of We Will Always Be, framing it in the context of their relationship. "Yeah, we have had bumps in the road, and on occasion it seems as if we may never recover from these bumps, but we do," she wrote. That type of candor doesn't stop at the written word; it also bleeds through into the duo's music. Often their …
Mirror repair
Gastr Del Sol emerged from the remains of Bastro in 1992 with the brooding, mostly drumless album, ‘The Serpentine Similar’. This represented an unlikely evolution from the fury of Bastro, but evolution was only getting started - and ‘unlikely’ was one of the ongoing principles in Gastr Del Sol’s approach. Before the sessions for the second album, Bundy Brown left the group and David Grubbs asked Jim O’Rourke to come play. 1994’s ‘Crookt, Crackt Or Fly’ tangled the clean lines of the original ba…
Ambient/Ruin
Gravetemple was formed in 2006 as a side-project of the band Sunn O))) by Oren Ambarchi, Stephen O'Malley and Attila Csihar. The group formed initially to tour in Israel in the summer of '06, creating several recordings which eventually became The Holy Down album, which was released on Southern Lord Recordings in 2007. At the time of the Israel tour, the Lebanon War started and was in action. In summer '08, the trio reformed together with the addition of Australian drummer Matt "Skitz" Sander…