New Arrivals
Active recovering music
Active Recovering Music (ARM) is a slide whistle ensemble led by sax player Masahiko Okura. All of the members play the slide whistle. Okura debuted ARM in concert with a five-member formation in 2008. He's since continued the group's activity (though their live performances are infrequent) with changing numbers of players. This is the recording of a performance by ARM--this time with eight members--which took place at Ftarri, Tokyo, in February 2013. Each of the three pieces was composed by Oku…
African Songbird
Matsuli Music is proud is announce the re-issue of African Songbird, the masterpiece from South Africa's greatest jazz singer, Sathima Bea Benjamin. Originally released in 1976, African Songbird was a debut long overdue. The splendid vinyl reissue of African Songbird opens with a cavernous, spacious, enormous sound, Bea Benjamin’s voice is introduced by Dollar Brand’s plangent, lingering electric keyboards before the ensemble joins in like rolling thunder. The vibrant plucked bass (provided b…
Danse Sacrale
A cherry-picked compendium of EDM prototypes circa 1956-1971 by Pierre Henry, Jean-Claude Vannier, Igor Wakhevitch, Henk Badings and more "The roots of Electronic Dance Music" (EDM) by definition. An unlikely combination of early recordings by international electronic and avant-garde composers as well as infrequent collaborators retrospectively unified by their commitment to the musical enhancement of 20th Century ballet and the evolution of modern dance. Presenting key exponents of the musique …
The Blackout
Thrill Jockey seem to be snapping up lots of underground faves, Barn Owl, Eternal Tapestry, Wooden Shjips, Sun Araw, and now Tunnels. For several years, Tunnels has been the moniker for the solo output of Nicholas Bindeman. Over time Bindeman's sound has evolved from the slow, breathing landscapes of his earlier ambient/drone releases (Colour Seance, Vexations) to completely fried-out bedroom psych explorations (Astral Collage, In Between Dreams). The Blackout delves into a world of sound un…
Lines Describing Circles
Over the past year as Peder Mannerfelt has shed the skin of The Subliminal Kid, we've only had small samples to taste of his new brand of musical sorcery. Lines Describing Circles changes all of that. Ten tracks deep, this is not so much an album as it is a declaration. From the opening, harrowing crackle of "Collapsion," Mannerfelt's intent is to crush the listener into a perfect metal cube. Lines Describing Circles displays the sound of a man fully in control of his machines. Throughout th…
Live in Japan - Part two
Two seperately released live albums form Fenn O'Berg, featuring recordings taken from their 2009 Japanese tour. It features Christian Fennesz, Jim O'Rourke, and Peter Rehberg. Both recorded during the group's 2009 Japanese performances.
70 Years of Sunshine
In 1943 a Swiss chemist accidentally absorbed through his finger-tips a tiny amount of a compound he was researching. Later, he recorded the effects in a journal - a document of the world's very first LSD trip: 'Last Friday, April 16,1943, I was forced to interrupt my work in the laboratory in the middle of the afternoon and proceed home, being affected by a remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness. At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant intoxicated-like condi…
New Ear
With this new album, Melmac reveals a new maturity gained in the course of three French and european tours that have enabled the group to initiate a major part of the ideas presented here through extensive improvisation sessions on stage in the spirit of the instant composing sessions ran by Kraut Rock bands during the psychedelics years. These new experiments have opened the artistic spectrum of the band to new horizons clearly rock, heavy, trippy or noise reminiscent of bands like Sleep or Sku…
Relief
Once more Chicago’s finest delivers another devastating slab of emotionally charged noise. Its been 10 years since the epic statement that was ‘Sheer Hellish Miasma’. Since then Drumm has trawled through the depths of the global underground with a back breaking speed, adding many masterful releases to his oeuvre for labels the world over. Armed with his distinctive palate of audio tactics, Drumm returns to Editions Mego to deliver ‘Relief’, a 36 minute hypnotic roller coaster ride through…
So sorry
A meeting between Japanese sound artist Takahiro Kawaguchi and two american improvisors, Nick Hoffman (head of the Pilgrim Talk label) and Aaron Zarzutzki. Recorded by Brian Sulpizio at The Chateau, Chicago, in September 2011 and then edited and mixed by Giuseppe Ielasi in Oreno.Numbered edition of 250 copies. Black vinyl (cut at SST), screenprinted cover on heavy grey stock.
Another temple of the great beast 666
K11 is a project of Italian sound artist Pietro Riparbelli and lives within the world of radio signals, transcommunication and other invisible phenomena, to create a dimension where the main sound sources are signals from shortwave radio receivers. Another temple to the Great Beast 666 has been composed from said sound sources recorded during an Instrumental Transcommunication Action realized within the Temple of Diana in Cefalù, Sicily. The temple is famously known for its association wi…
The car boot sales
A recent collaboration between these sound experimentalists consisting of both musicians’ passionate relation to found objects and recycled material treated as instruments. Devoted solo performers of free improvised music, also members of the London Improvisers Orchestra, Tasos Stamou (modified electronics, prepared zither, found violin) & Adam Bohman (amplified objects, prepared balalaika and prepared violin) create layers of “instant” musique concrète which balances between narrative structure…
Music for Earbuds
Music for Earbuds is composed entirely from headphone feedback which makes some surprisingly organic (as well as electronic) sounds, Stephen Cornford writes to introduce his new CD. A collection of sounds stark and stubborn, as a listener you hit against their form, slide on their surfaces. These sounds so alien yet alluring call you to spend time with them, attend to them. They mark the edges of hearing and understanding. The edge here is the ear that hears as listening encounters nothing but i…
(no thing-ness)
"(no thing-ness)" comes hot on the heels of Brian Pyle’s latest highly acclaimed Ensemble Economique album on the Not Not Fun label. While "The Fever Logic L.P." saw him head diving into a sort of ambient goth pop this brand new 12“ appears to be more influenced by industrial, almost EBM-ish textures. The atmosphere seems more aggressive with an almost militaristic touch, and titles like "New Banking System" hint at the source of this anger. Combined with Pyle’s cinematic tension this makes for …
In Search of the Lost Divine Arc
Deluxe double LP pressed in an edition of 1000 copies, housed in a gatefold sleeve.Acid Mothers Temple\'s In Search of the Lost Divine Arc heads in a completely different direction from 2012\'s Son of a Bitches Brew. Harder, faster, and more riff-rock oriented, this record is here to slay. AMT skews their vibe between Zeppelin and Beefheart, coming out with another classic Acid Mothers ripper in the process
Gills cut into woman
"Terrifying monster of the ages raging with pent-up passions! ...with every man his mortal enemy ...and a woman's beauty his prey! Could only her beauty tame its savage fury?""...forbidden depths!" Creature libertinage; voyeur of the women's legs enveloped in dark waters. The hosiery has been cast aside in exchange for a one-piece to enter the watery depths, setting the stage for obsessive creature tendencies targeted toward the shapes of Kay Lawrence, Helen Dobson, and Marcia Barton. Sam McKi…
Toxic Cosmopolitanism
Kassel Jaeger is a Swiss-French artist based in Paris, France, and is a member of the GRM (Groupe de Recherches Musicales). Toxic Cosmopolitanism is his second full-length release for Editions Mego -- a release which explores and questions the very nature of the material experiments contained within. Each side consists of two clearly-defined sections based on the same material. Side A comprises of "Toxic Cosmopolitanism," a large-scale work based on distinct sounds of different cultures, …
Probability A: three studies for compositions of infinite lenght
Probability A collects three pieces composed by William Hutson between 2009 and 2012. Over the past seven years Hutson’s project Rale has evolved to incorporate more negative space into the music. The three pieces herein contained were recorded as proofs-of-concept; they are tracks that Hutson made to loop indefinitely in his house as he built up the courage to use long silences in what is supposed to be a noise/drone act.
William Hutson began recording and performing as Rale in 2006. He …
Orilla Oscura
Heavyweight, tip-on style gatefold jacket printed on uncoated Stoughton stock includes download code redeemable from the label. Vinyl mastered by Lupo at D&M** In swift succession to his excellent Vallens 12", Barn Owl Jon Porras presents his third solo side under his birth name. Inspired by a book on the San Francisco Tape Music Centre, Jon creates expansive atmospheres from slowed down tape manipulated with analogue FX to complement the hazy grain and shapes of his signature, plangent g…
Bandits of Stature
LP edition, sold out at source: Darla is pleased to offer a new record of string quartets by Harold Budd. Bandits of Stature is a first as it comprises 14 compact Budd composed string quartets played by the Formalist Quartet. Harold Budd is a one-of-a-kind, modern neo-classical artist with a career spanning 40 years. Bandits of Stature has the characteristic Budd minimalism one may expect, yet in new, or classical, form. On Bandits of Stature, he has created 14 elegantly simple, av…