New Arrivals
YMCA
YMCA is guitarist Alan Licht's first solo release since 2003's A New York Minute double CD (on XI), and his first solo vinyl outing since 1994's long out-of-print Sink The Aging Process (on Siltbreeze). Largely recorded at a 2004 concert at a Cambridge Massachusetts YMCA by Keith Fullerton Whitman, YMCA documents Licht's solo guitar set of the time -- a three-part structured improvisation that moves from mournful, layered sustained tones that sound more like a reed organ than a guitar, to a gent…
Hyperborean Trenchtown
The album resonates a future sound vision that can only come from an old soul destined to further pave the paths laid by electronic & minimalist pioneers. Undeniably pure processes of creating & sustaining sound visually, sonically & otherwise brings a mathematical & scientific accuracy that hasn't been seen since the days of lovely music ltd. or GRM. Brilliant textures & audio hallucinogenic time/space wormholes create infinite listening possibilities
Always Wrong
f you're wondering whether record labels still matter, consider the case of Wolf Eyes. Their last two widely distributed albums, 2004's Burned Mind and 2006's Human Animal, came out on Sub Pop and got lots of media attention, even landing the band on the cover of The Wire. Three years later, Wolf Eyes return with Always Wrong, a follow-up of sorts after reams of smaller-run releases. It came out on Hospital in May, and I can't find a single review beyond a few blog entries and tweets. Even The W…
Shining Skull Breath
This ultra limited, and long out of print cd-r from 2007, finally available again, now as a super swank (and still quite limited) lp...Another gorgeous sonic transmission from right here in the Bay Area, from AQ fave Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, the man behind Tarentel, and the Root Strata label. Those familiar with Cantu-Ledesma's music know that he usually speakers in hushed whispers, breathy and breathless, soft sonic shimmers allowed to drift like billowy clouds into your ears. But here, C-L …
Live at Lelli's
Roy Brooks ! what can i say about one of the greatest jazz drummers ?! a man who paid his dues, who lived an hard life...who's Detroit Jazz ! started to play in the 50's with Yusef Lateef, spent 5 years with Horace Silver doing the hard and the bop, then with Dexter Gordon, Lee Morgan, Jackie McLean, two years with Mingus, played with Max Roach M'Boom... plus many others... in the 80's he formed The Artistic Truth & The Aboriginal Percussion Choir... the rec. on this album is even more precious …
Night of Purple Moon
Sun Ra was a innovative jazz composer, pianist, synthesizer player, poet and philosophiser who was fascinated by cosmic philosophy. Ra’s fascination with all things ‘cosmic’ combined with his instrumental ability lead to the creation of off-kilter, avant-garde and highly experimental music. ‘The Night of the Purple Moon’ originally cut in 1970 showcases Sun Ra playing the Roksichord (a then state-of-the-art solid-state electronic keyboard manufac…
Trop de pas assez
Salmigondis is a collective (born in 2006) of musicians and graphist designers. Free rock, psychedelic, noise Ludovic Renaud (keyboard, turntables, electronics), Jean-Pierre Barja (bass, keyboard, electronics), Jérome Declercq (saxophones, keyboard, basse), Mathieu Renaud (guitar, electronics), Jean-Noël Cognard (drums,objects, voice). Recorded in 2007. Limited to 150 copies.
The Black Dirt Sessions
Displays fully honed examples of all of Rose's various styles & themes - traditional, raga & ragtime. "Cross The North Fork" - a 13-minute revisiting of a track 1st laid down on the great "Kensington Blues" is a winding, thoroughly engrossing journey. It is a welcome neighbor to the album's other spendid joys ranging from the jaunty & infectious "Fishtown Flower" to the pensive & appropriate melancholy punch of "Box Of Pine." Limited to 2000 copies on 180g RTI vinyl.
Jumehniemi
"The Black Motor on Sagittarius (after their 1st qbico release) ! probably one of best & more respected free music outfit in Europe right now, for sure they rules in Finland and especially in their own town, Tampere where they even have i think a bi-monthly night called Black Motor Klubi at legendary Club Telakka... it's for sure one of the tightest group i know of, having the chance to play a lot together and this is clearly manifest when you hear their unfocused playing... their most mature wo…
More Moondog
2nd LP, originally released in 1956. Continues the NYC street performer's exploration of minimalist composition & field recording, mixing percussion & sparse melodies w/ piano solos, street sounds, & monologues. Surprisingly accessible despite it's avant-garde nature, bridging the gap between the familiar & the bizarre. Another all out masterwork from one of 20th century America's most unique minds.
Zones Without People
'Zones Without People' was released in 2009 on a highly limited vinyl run for Arbor. All seven tracks featured in his Wire chart-topping 'Rifts' compilation, predating his mindblowing 'Returnal' album (surely one of the best of 2010) and displaying its prodigiously gifted creator amidst some of his most affective synthscapes. From the outset we could consider this to be classic material, as the miniature 'Computer Vision' - one of his very earliest creations circa 2004 - plugs into a spir…
L\'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu
These sample-based constructions incorporated sounds from free-jazz, new electronic-generated sounds, classical modernism & vintage geographical recordings. Discordant segments of wailing, top-end violins give way to clunking rhythmic passages of metal marimbas & tuned percussion; free-roaming passages of rasping, low-end bass & the shuffle of free-jazz recall the work of Prestige-era Moondog, as well as aspects of Harry Partch's instrumentation via mid- to latter-day period Tom Waits. Atonal am…
6pezzi2009+lagodelnulla
Aggressive loop music based on sounds from photographic equipment and african field recordings. Besides being an early-Reich cheap imitation, ‘lagodelnulla’ is an italian expression (roughly translated as ‘lakeofnothingness’) found in an old Banda-Ngao lullaby (Central Africa, early ’60s). An ‘objet trouvé’ elevated as social commentary by the author. Volume encouraged. 35 minutes, transparent vinyl. Edition of 100 copies in recycled chipboard sleeve with silkscreened sheet (printed by Ped…
Tnt
1986 Release, original copy. Rolf Enström can look back on a fifteen year period as a composer. His list of works includes a number of very carefully crafted compositions of high artistic quality. Several of his works have become classics; one thinks especially of Directions (1979) and Final Curses (1981). Rolf Enström is a composer who unceasingly seeks new artistic paths and new means of expression and this is something which has led him to combine music with other art forms, primarily t…
The Remixes Part 1
Limited to 455 transparent vinyl copies, including remixes from Vatican Shadow, Roly Porter and Kangding Ray* Violetshaped is a collaboration between the enigmatic Violet Poison and Berlin-based artist Shapednoise. "Violetshaped Remixes Part 1" is the first of a remixes series divided into several parts. This first instalment features remixes from Roly Porter (formerly of Vex'd) following on from his acclaimed debut album for the Subtext label, Vatican Shadow - aka Dominick Fernow, owner …
Picture Disc
What's been described as a trumpet player trapped in a two dimensional universe is in fact the unique work of Justice Yeldham (aka Lucas Abela), a maverick musician with an unhealthy obsession with sheets of broken glass. In his infamous show that has astonished and bemused countless people in over 40 countries, yeldham ecstatically purses his lips against sheets of amplified glass whilst deftly employing various vocal techniques ranging from throat singing to raspberries, turning discarde…
Forever Falling Toward The Sky
Forever Falling Toward the Sky is the first ever release by Bay Area based Vestals, AKA Lisa McGee. A taught set of haunting electric ballads, these five tracks weave together a number of layered guitars and vocals into a smokey tapestry of blown electricity. Rather than the ephemeral drones McGee has been involved with recently, most notably the group-mind ensemble Portraits & the duo Higuma, Vestals retains the clarity of song, with these hypnotic gyms having been slowly carved out over…
Torment Of The Metals
Limited edition of 500 copies pressed on virgin vinyl. Guitar out-crunch hailing from the Bardo Axis. Alasehir is grounded stoner heavy-zen and the second in our four part Bardo Pond related vinyl set. Alasehir's 4th release, following a CD apiece for the Important, aRCHIVE and Siltbreeze labels, Torment of The Metals "continues their sonic exploration of dense, languorous, free expansion. Billowing and exploding like a cluster of hashish stars, they produce a cosmic energy akin to a quasar in t…
Split
Limited vinyl pressing of this excellent split LP self-released by Grouper in this scarce second edition* The music on this split release arrives remastered after its initial release via C40 cassette a while back. Likeminded souls Eva Saelens (inca Ore) and Liz Harris (Grouper) are in brilliant form on these recordings, so it's great to hear them in a cleaned up format - though of course with these two, it's fairly difficult to tell where the muddy cassette hiss ends and the foggy, dusty …
Ex Patris
The title Ex Patris (from the fathers) plays on the idiomatic baroque lute compositions presented here which emulate the classical repertoire. It also refers to this almost forgotten instrument, which was passed on by the fathers. The aim is to bring back and liberate the lute. The four compositions on Ex Patris form a circular narrative of interlocking repetitive melodic series. The follow up to Important release “ It is all that is made” kicks off with the pro apocalyptic track “The Day is Com…