New Arrivals
Flora
Born in Japan and a resident of New York since 2001, Aya Nishina is a very special and beautiful spirit whose work touches upon nature, spirituality and the deepest human emotions. Five years in the making "Flora" is a brilliant suite of pieces for the human voice. At times layering hundreds of voices at the same time, the music is lush, orchestral and healing. Meticulously written, rehearsed, guided and recorded, this is a fabulous debut CD by a unique composer who has worked with Ryuic…
S/H
Autre membre du groupe Emeralds, Steve Hauschildt nous offre une sélection de son travail solo entre 2005 et 2012 regroupée sur un double vinyl. Comme on pouvait s'y attendre, c'est une musique électronique planante, autant marquée par la niaiserie new-age que la méditation du drone. Les amateurs du genre seront plus que ravis.
Hacia Aquellos Bosques De Inmensidad
This third release from the Peruvian spiritual collective (roughly translated as Mountain Community) continues to deliver deeply personal devotional music honouring their natural surroundings in the river valley outside Lima. As with previous releases, much of the music was recorded and composed on the spot, making them truly unique improvisational journeys to inner peace. Like 70s krautrockers Amon Düül, with a communal vibe with religious overtones to their soothing, meditative music. Nature i…
Grain
"The new Zs lineup (Sam Hillmer, Greg Fox and Patrick Higgins) sounds very much like a new band, at least as evidenced by the Grain EP. The two side-length tracks (coming in at a total of 42-minutes) bear the marks of Zs' sound - repeated phrases, looped or played in situ; buried drones and harsh electronic tones - but it does sound very much like a new band.
There's an extended ambience to the album that trick perceptions of time. Glitches and waves that last only a minute or three somehow…
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…
F/C
Michael Mantra creates Ambient music. But more than that, he creates audio tools for "brain hemisphere synchronization": going beyond the synchronization of mind and body, Mantra's techniques are a mean to release endorphins, which are part of the human body's natural pharmacy and work at the same level of opiates. Michael creates his soundscapes mixing modulating high and low harmonic synthesizers tones (low deep drones and high resonating harmonics) with didgeridoo, ocean waves, rain, water, …
Along the way
Former Emeralds member Mark McGuire has planned a new album following his 2011 albumGet Lost. Along the Waythrough Dead Oceans. On Along The Way, McGuire writes in the liner notes: "€œThis story is an odyssey through the vast, unknown regions of the mind€¦the endless unfolding of psychological landscapes, leading to perpetual discoveries and expansions, in a genuinely emergent and infinite world of worlds. Further he writes “[the new album] is not a critique, it is not inst…
Revelation
The Black Jazz recordings of Doug Carn are always a revelation – some of the most powerful, progressive work on the American underground of the early 70s – music that got Carn into way more record collections than you might expect! The sound here is a perfect summation of Doug's early genius – his own work on organ and keyboards, never overdone and mixed perfectly with a righteous array of acoustic sounds from Rene McLean on alto and tenor and Olu Dara on trumpet – both players who soar to the s…
Hassaniya Music from the Western Sahara and Mauritania
In 2006, Hisham Mayet returned to West Africa to continue his search for an unknown musician he had heard six months earlier on the radio in a Morocco hotel room. Knowing only that it was Sahrawi music -- music of the south -- he headed down through the vast and remote desert landscape of the Western Sahara and Mauritania in hopes of finding someone who could identify these revelatory recordings. The story of how he finally found this elusive artist is the stuff of ethnomusicological legend. But…
2nd Wave
In a fair and reasonable world, Roland Haynes would have compelled more attention than he did when his jazz-funk record 2nd Wave appeared on Black Jazz in the mid-1970s. Not to say the keyboardist was totally neglected back then, but he and other plugged-in pianists of his stylistic inclination (such as label-mate Doug Carn, Hampton Hawes, Don Grolnick, Larry Willis, and Gordon Beck) existed in the deep shadow cast by jazzman-turned-jazz-funk powerhouse Herbie Hancock, whose records with the H…
El Pianista del Antifaz
LP version with CD. French-Catalan musician Pascal Comelade's world is atypical and his inspirations come from many different sources -- from contemporary music to The Cramps -- making him one of the most creative and original artists of our times. At the crossroads of many different arts, never where he's expected, he never ceases to surprise his audience, taking the listener on poetic paths of primitive perception. El Pianista del Antifaz is the latest album in Comelade's galaxy. The artwor…
Drawn and Quartered
"A selection of rarities from 2008-2009. Track one originally released on an OPN/Outer Space split CS (Arbor, 2009). Track two originally released on Ruined Lives CS (Young Tapes, 2008). Track three and four originally released on Transmat Memories CS (Taped Sounds 2008). Track five and six originally released on A Pact Between Strangers CDR (Gneiss Things, 2008). Track seven originally released on Young Beidnahga CDR (Ruralfuane, 2009)." Includes a digital download code.
Russian mind
"2012's Rifts compiled Oneohtrix Point Never's (aka Daniel Lopatin) first three full albums alongside a crop of rare and out-of-print CDR and cassette material in a deluxe, five LP vinyl box set. Following the success of this sold-out one-time release, we are pleased to present all five LPs for sale individually. Each LP includes a digital download code. Original Russian Mind LP released in an edition of 500 by No Fun Productions, November 2009."
Betrayed in the Octagon
"2012's Rifts compiled Oneohtrix Point Never's (aka Daniel Lopatin) first three full albums alongside a crop of rare and out-of-print CDR and cassette material in a deluxe, five LP vinyl box set. Following the success of this sold-out one-time release, we are pleased to present all five LPs for sale individually. Each LP includes a digital download code. Betrayed in the Octagon was originally released on cassette by Deception Island in 2007. Subsequently released on LP in an edition of …
Scott 3
2013 repress. "Scott 3, originally released in 1969, marked a big change in Walker's approach to albums as, for the first time, the record is dominated by his original compositions. In fact, the only other songwriter that makes it onto the album is Walker's idol, Belgium's legendary singer/songwriter Jacques Brel. Scott 3 again features string heavy production courtesy of Wally Scott, though it occasionally moves out of pop ballad territory into a more cinematic feel influenced by Ennio M…
Scott 2
2013 repress. "Originally released in 1968, Scott 2 made it all the way to number one on the UK pop charts, perhaps the strangest number one hit in pop history. Continuing with his orchestral obsession, Scott 2 features over-the-top string and horn arrangements, occasionally veering into dangerously schmaltzy territory. This production style is in drastic contrast to the lyrical content, songs of despair, prostitution, homosexuality, and brutal honesty, indicting the same glamorous and gli…
Music Of Group Ongaku
"Group ONGAKU, founded mainly by students at Tokyo National University of Fine Art & Music, was the 1st collective musical improvisation group. The group began their activities in 1958, & from the naming of the group in 1960 onward continued until somewhere around 1962. They attempted to create acoustics corresponding to actual time & space by means of collective improvisation. Although methodically different, the music that they pursued incidentally shared common directions with contemporaries …
Fa 2012
Fa 2012 + Fa (Mark Fell Remix). Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates and Mastering, Berlin, July 2012. Layout by Tina Frank. Special 12' featuring new versions of the track Fa, taken from the debut Fennesz solo album ÔHotel Paral.lel' (1997). 15 years after its initial release, Christian Fennesz gives this throbbing monster of a track a new seeing to, extending it and adding more of that magic he is so well known for. The album was always an exercise in exploring alternate means o…
Birth/Speed/Merging
The Pyramids' psychedelic Afro-jazz masterpiece finally lands thanks to Disko B. Originally cut in 1975 before they disbanded, 'Birth/Speed/Merging' marks a highpoint of the group's production values and was their last recording together. Since then the LP's achieved cult status for its celebratory fusion of carnivalesque groove with Sun-Ra-like cosmic vibes and progressive values; a worldly and entirely enchanting sound blessed with a real tangible sorta magic. The one to check is 'Black Man An…
Re-Engineering
Steven Warwick aka Heatsick cocks a unique and compelling perspective on contemporary dance music with his bold follow-up to 'Intersex', a gorgeous, layered work that those of you into DJ Sprinkles should check out without delay. Now woven with leaner dancefloor muscle, the deeply funked views of 'Re-Engineering' are characterised by the artist as a "cybernetic poem". We can take this quite literally in his use of spoken word in pieces such as 'Re-Engineering' with its Chris Morris-esque wordpla…