Little Skull

  Outstanding new release on the legendary Elica records, a lovely LP record housed in hand-made unfolding pop-up sleeve in a limited edition of 150 copies only. It cannot get more mysterious than Little Skull's (sometimes spelled Li'l Skull) output so far, a small series of privately produced lathe-cut singles, plus the odd mini-CDr, released in tiny editions of a very few dozen copies and with basically no names or notes, just a consistency in their astonishing packaging. In fact, the music of Little Skull's spooky and playful world, often evoking haunted Arthur Machen-like atmospheres, is inseparable from its presentation, which has included sleeves constructed as spectacular dioramas, die-cut books, private letters and other extravagant ways. This album, the first real 'public' Little Skull release, is no different in the singularity of its packaging, as the record is contained in a beautiful hand-made sleeve unfolding into a pop-up diorama mini-theatre, and presents hauntingly evocative solo music in which organs, guitars, string instruments, synthetic sounds, drones, percussions and possibly other assorted instruments are combined in different fashions, creating a variety of atmospheres ranging from cavernous and mysterious soundscapes to more song-structured (but no vocal) pieces with a distorted vaguely folky feel.