Masses
"Masses is an utterly unexpected, and utterly gripping, collaboration between the East London duo, Spring Heel Jack and a group of top-flight improvisers, drawn largely from New York’s ascendant free jazz network but also including Evan Parker and microtonal violinist Matt Maneri. If there are precedents for this particular mix, in which studio-processed audio environments are played back in real time as the triggers for, and fixed components in, a series of group improvisations, they feel few a…
Elements
Tip! Surface World is pleased to share David Lee Myers (aka Arcane Device) and Toshimaru Nakamura’s Elements, a remote collection written and assembled in tandem at the suggestion of the label. Sharing an idiosyncratic approach to feedback-based sound generation and a commitment to their signature instruments (respectively, the Feedback Machine and the No-Input Mixing Board), the pairing lands during an especially fruitful period in their individual discographies. Harmonically dense, energetic a…
jouent pour Stephane Guillaumon qui danse sans faire de bruit
Duo live electronic improvisation by Jean-Marc Foussat and Leo Remke-Rochard. Recorded at the Dojo in Villeurbanne, France, on January 7th, 2023.
Duo in Concert
Frozen Reeds is proud to present the only recorded duo playing of two legendary musical figures.
“This is one of those moments that we’re always hoping for, and it's so rare. And it's so hard to talk about, because it's so beautiful. It's like you're seeing some new species of plant that you never knew existed or something.” – Bill Frisell
Misting
Nice Music presents 'Misting' the first solo full length from MP Hopkins since 2016 and his debut release for the label.
Hopkins' solo work to date via the likes of Regional Bears, Penultimate Press and Thalamos fitfully caresses tape collage, found sound, speaker feedback and electroacoustic techniques. 7 years on from 'Blue-Lit Half Breath', 'Misting' immediately arrests with vibrant frequency and fidelity, yet no less fidgety or labyrinthine in its crypticised patterns of non-literal investig…
Unspeakable Visions
Michel Banabila returns with a second LP release on Knekelhuis. The renowned Dutch producer is up there among the stars when it comes to ambient music and the so-called ‘fourth world’ legacy. On this eleven-track album, we witness soul-wrenching, kraut-tinted, and early-yet-modernist electronics. Coming from his heart, these imaginative recordings center around otherworldly voices – fictional characters chanting in a made-up language, imbued with a captivating spirit, transcending linguistic bar…
Prove, Esorcismi
*2023 stock* Sampler of some iconic Italian experimental, electronic and jazz musicians active in the 90s (some of them up till now).
Some Kind of Telling
Providing the simple text 'Blowing into playback remembrances. Rescription. Some kind of telling.' Banana seem to improvise in space, with considered timing, to-hand objects and bursts of feedback, voice and hidden instrumentation. The tape rings of previous releases of theirs such as MP Hopkins solo LP 'Blue-Lie Half Breath' on Penultimate Press or Alexandra Spence's 'a veil, the sea'. I hear nods to the 'Onkyo' scene in the whistling feedback and stark spaces. Comparisons to works by Akio Suzu…
Abstand
*200 copies limited edition* "Abstand" was conceived to enhance the particularities of the combination of accordion and melodica, both wind instruments, one played with movement and the other by blowing. This dichotomy of difference and similarity resulted in intricate textures, not only thanks to the instruments’ particular timbres, but also through the natural microtonal distances in their fixed tunings, especially when it comes to old and worn out instruments like the ones used here.
These mi…
Gondolas
Erstwhile Records announces ’Gondolas‘ by Graham Lambkin and James Rushford. Two very unique voices, two hours of sonic magic.
Orpheus Prayed For Me
In 2021 The Weirdo From Another Planet, known to family and friends as The Craven Wizard, announced that he had been dead since 2017. Musicologists, concerned with what would become of the legacy of the polymath artist and winner of the illustrious "World's Saddest Turntablist" prize, sifted through the droves of recordings he left behind. Of the 900+ songs in The Weirdo's archives, the team in charge of the project decided to delete all but 11, which are gathered here. This material serves as a…
Origo
Big Tip! *50 copies Art Edition, handnumbered and signed, all copies are different* Audio dream directors Timo van Luijk (Af Ursin, Elodie) and Bart de Paepe (Sloow Tapes, Sylvester Anfang II) played as Ilta Hämärä on a MiMa night in Rotterdam (NL) in 2016. It was the day before Kraak fest, and they had a tour tape with them. A great night, as so many MiMa nights. Timeless Reality, featuring Family Underground, were also on the bill and on fire too: passport losing lo fi stoner garage. The toile…
Were Some Sound Days, One Separately Be Placed
*2023 stock. 200 copies limited edition* The recordings were made during January 16th to February 27th, 2022. Recording gear included a cassette tape recorder, a cardioid dynamic microphone and a cassette tape. After some operations, the recorder’s eraser function was temporarily removed so that the sound could be recorded overlapping again and again.
During these days, Zhao Cong and Zhu Wenbo did recordings every day. Every time they chose a random place on tape and recorded a very short length…
Gauche
*2023 stock* Alto sax/clarinet player Akira Sakata is a legend of Japan’s free jazz scene. Ken Ikeda is a musician who resided for many years in New York and London, and has been based in Tokyo since his return to Japan from the UK in 2020. In 2021, Ikeda released "Signal and Signaless," a duo CD with Rie Nakajima, on the Ftarri label. This album, "Gauche," is Sakata’s first release from Ftarri. On May 21, 2022, Akira Sakata and Ken Ikeda gave a duo concert at Ftarri, Tokyo. This CD consists of …
Águas
On 31st January 2022, Hydra Ensemble performed at De Pletterij in Haarlem (NL). It was a good one. Luckily our bass player Gonçalo decided to release the (newly mixed and mastered) recording on his label Cylinder Recordings. I'd say this is my favorite Hydra recording thusfar...
For Franz
*150 copies limited edition* "It starts very simply. March 1988. The birth of an elephant. Basically, not exactly. Hair and teeth, we were told, it’s like that, it happens more often than you think. He was hungry and he was dirty. There he sucks the vacuum cleaner. We couldn’t stop laughing ! There he purrs. Time flies so fast and he has grown. «Aggression, like love», he used to say, «is first projected onto an individual who then introject them». In the introjective phases, identification with…
End of Life
Latest LP for Darksmith of California on Second Sleep. Darksmith of California (Tom Darksmith) combines wilting electronics, floppy turntablism and sun-baked cassette protocols and destroys them in a claustrophobic void
Always I Gnaw
Heavy Tip-On jacket with large tri-panel insert, gloss film laminate and uncoated paper finishes. Over the past decade Sult has created a thrillingly dynamic and visceral sound world, forging a musical unity while also asserting the radically unique languages of its three core members, Guro Skumsnes Moe (contrabass) and Håvard Skaset (acoustic guitar) from Norway along with Jacob Felix Heule (percussion) based in California. Their raw acoustic improvisations crackle with an energy that makes ind…
Dissolvè / Scillions
Big Tip! Arbitrary presents Dissolvè / Scillions by Antoine Hubineau. Derived from the same series of compositions, Dissolvè and Scillions are drawn from modular synthesizer recordings which have been reworked, treated and composed in the computer. Dissolvè is a mosaic which is in constant motion. The inner details are guided by an outer structure which act as a kind of rhythmic subtraction. It is destabilised to the point where it fractures, from the macro to the micro level; abstracting a fili…
Substrata
*2023 stock . 300 copies limited edition* "Substrata" collects three extremely crystalline and immersive drone pieces based on prepared tapes, metals, strings, wires and electronics... imagine a forest glade in moon-light with cold white sonic radiations, half-frozen calyx are clanging at each other, liquid metallic forms appear and disappear, hypnotic slow motion pulses suck you into.. "something"... these are incredible strong, deep and complex drone compositions, drones with the spirit of the…