New Arrivals
Sequitur
Emeralds co-pilot Steve Hauschildt follows up his 'Tragedy & Geometry' album for Kranky with the plush new age disco dreamscapes of 'Sequitur'. Arguably, Steve is the lazy one in Emeralds, conjuring only three solo album to date compared with the gazillion respective works from bandmates John Elliot and Mark McGuire. But, as evidenced here and previously, he's also the canniest and most pop-wise, honing a more concise, richly rhythmic and melodic style of composition still rooted in cereb…
100 Moons Hindustani Vocal Art 1930 to 1955
Amazing sounds from the subcontinent – a selection of mid-century recordings that focuses on the incredible vocal range in Indian music, served up by a set of singers we might never have known otherwise! The voice is almost the lead instrument here – usually just supported by a bit of percussion or sitar, and set free in open space with these insane inflections and cascading tones that really leave us breathless! Mediative and exciting vocals from the masters. Great liner notes and master…
Water mountain
On a personal note, I remember vividly when Hitoshi Kojo told me with excitement about a transhumance through UK with the specific purpose in mind of doing sessions with some of the great drone masters over there, namely : Colin Potter, Jonathan Coleclough and Paul Bradley...Retrospectively, I think I was as stirred as him.The resulting collected material has been shelved for years (7 actually !), and I began to fear this estimable musical heritage could get lost...this was not taking into accou…
Retro-2038
COH is the moniker used by Ivan Pavlov from Russia for more than a decade. COH is also the Russian word for 'sleep'. Yet, do not be deceived - RETRO-2038 is much more of a deep space than a deep sleep. The second COH release on Editions Mego is a true delight to behold, inviting as it does its exploration of electronic sound in minimalism, futuristic pop and the uncharted territories inbetween. Ranging from digital updates of Giorgio Moroder's pulse experiments to menacing lingering LF to…
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…
Drowning / Untitled #185
Back in stock in very limited quantity. 'Francisco Lopez is perhaps best known for his dynamic studio and live performances that sway between crushing silence and dynamic, shifting volume swells. Over the course of 25 years, Lopez has developed and honed a refined audio lexicon. Michael Gendreau entered the experimental sound community in the early 1980s with his project Crawling With Tarts. As a solo artist, Gendreau caught everyone s attention with the 2002 release of his CD 55 pas de la ligne…
Love God, Love One Another
Black Humor was an experimental rock band from San Francisco in the early 80's. (Not to be confused with "blackhumor," alias of noise artist Frazer Hall.) They released just one, very hard to find LP on Fowl Records in 1982. Only 1,000 records were pressed, each with unique handmade covers: thick slabs of paint, collage, parrot feathers, dirt, whatever else happened to be laying around their Tenderloin flat. Many of these have since gone for high, collector prices or ended up in oblivion.…
Graft
Graft is an album by Japanese noise master Masami Akita aka Merzbow. This LP album is pressed on lime-green vinyl in a "bootleg"-style sleeve and sealed with a sticker. Limited to 300 regular copies. According to the Merzbow blog, the design was inspired by a '70s Jethro Tull bootleg called My God, and the recording was inspired by the plant illustrations in the Voynich manuscript. Recorded in November 2009 at Munemi House, Tokyo.
Concredrones
M.B., also known as Maurizio Bianchi doesn’t need much introduction. In the early 80s he was responsible for a string of compelling electronic music albums in the first wave of ‘industrial music’. After a hiatus of many years he returned in the late 90s and since then has been very active with many new solo releases, but also on the side with collaborations. Here he works with Mario Costa, also known as Sostrah Tinnitus, from Italy, who has had a number of releases on labels as Umbra, Beyond, My…
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…
The Weight Of Accumulation
few copies available - creen printed & hand numbered mail-order only edition of 500, sold out at source. Weight Of Accumulation contains two long magnifications of a piece that has been performed, in various versions, in Berlin, Amsterdam, Brooklyn and Seattle. This work is based on John Coltrane's composition Living Space.
"Moving from minimalism to free jazz for inspiration, this new album by Eleh is inspired by the later period of John Coltrane’s career. Although elements of these two pieces …
Piece Of Mind
"As K.J. Gustin wrote, Piece Of Mind is a work of 'exotic psychedelic free-jazz-meets-rock, East-meets-West, progressive and smoky moment in late Twentieth Century music history'. Add to that a spice of jazzy brassed R&B and a touch of minor-key popsike sensitivity and you get an accurate description of the sounds contained in Roger Bunn's astonishing 1969 LP, originally released in the UK on the Major Minor budget label, but issued in some European countries (Ohr label in Germany or Phil…
Aoyama Crows
Aoyama Crows is the fifth album by Peter Brötzmann's Die Like a Dog Quartet. Saying the music can still surprise would be a lie. But that doesn't mean it lacks excitement, on the contrary. The performance, recorded at the Berlin Total Music Meeting in November 1999, contains all the elements necessary for an enticing free improv session. The rhythm section formed by Hamid Drake and William Parker is tried, tested, and true. The drummer can oscillate in and out of a pulse with incredible ease. He…
Tanz In Dem Himmel EP
"Superb cosmic and minimal synth/coldwave German underground masterpiece recorded in the early 1980s and released exclusively here on super-loud high quality 12" vinyl on Soul Jazz by popular demand! This is extremely limited (500 copies only) and contains three exclusive tracks of cosmic heaven by the cult German electronic group E.M.A.K. -- none of which appear on Soul Jazz Records' recent E.M.A.K. album. E.M.A.K. were a main feature on Deutsche Elektronische Muzik, Soul Jazz Records' j…
I am the Center: private issue new age music in America, 1950-90
One of the best things about Seattle label Light in the Attic’s new new age compilation I Am the Center is that it doesn’t try and pretend that new age music was something that it’s not. Look at the album’s cover illustration and you’ll see an angel-like creature carrying an orb of yellow light through the clouds; open the gatefold and you’ll see what appears to be a bird made of stars launching itself out of the ocean. Press play and be delivered into over two hours of mind-numbingly mellow mus…
Psycho-System
My Cat Is An Alien's most extreme work to date. The most advanced expression of their current creative method of composition through the brothers' brand new self-made strings and electronic instrumentation. A black swamp full of analog processing and whirling drones with Maurizio Opalio playing self-made double-bodied string instrument, handmade pocket harp, antique zither, drums, percussion, sticks, cymbals, bells, gong, space modulator, real-time loops. While his brother Roberto Opalio …
A Red Score In Tile
Composed way back in 1979, 'A Red Score In Tile' eventually surfaced as a vinyl-only edition in 2003. Made up of piano, this shows Basinski's patented tape-loop technique perfectly and still stands as one of his most affecting pieces of music. If you've heard 'Melancholia' you'll likely know what I'm talking about, piano notes are transformed into tones by the slowly disintegrating tape, and the loops become motifs all of their own. The beauty of Basinski's work is in its patience, and this earl…
Preplexure
John Oswald (Plunderphonics) returns with two fourteen-minute-plus tracks of sliced and diced audio assemblage. Pre and post versions of Plexure out in 1993 on Avant, 'PrePlex' (1982 - 1992) and 'Plexure concentrate' (1992 - 2009). Here some feedbacks: 'Highly recommended. Imagine playing Ôname that tune' at 5 times the speed of your ears' ability to recognize familiar sounds. This composition, made up entirely of pop music samples, deserves five stars because of its meticulous organizatio…
Nepenthe
Julianna Barwick returns with the successor to 2011's charming The Magic Place. Given how successful that self-recorded LP was, it’s surprising to see that the Louisiana-born singer has looked to an external producer to document and frame her work this time around, namely Sigur Ros associate Alex Somers. Barwick once again uses delay-pedals to build heaven-scraping towers of chorused plainsong out of her earnestly, achingly pretty soprano, placing them in what John Foxx - whose 90s’ ambient reco…
Teenage Tapes
Following on from releases from the likes of Powell, Mark Leckey and Merzbow, The Death Of Rave is buzzed to present the exceptional debut album from L.A.-based upstart Delroy Edwards. Combining combustible little noise sessions made with guitar pedals and reel-to-reel tape at Art school, together with shocking recent productions, 'Teenage Tapes' showcases a lesser-heard aspect of Delroy's highly aware and divergent tastes owing more to Minimal Wave, Noise, EBM and Black Metal than the Ch…