Experimental / Free Improvisation

On A Cold Night in Rome, Gregorio Bardini turns a 2007 Cold Spring event into a ritual of noise, flute, voice and historical residue. Ezra Pound’s metallic ghost, bagpipes, violin, distorted guitar and ethnic percussion converge in a live document that feels both industrial and archaic - a harsh, deeply human soundscape outside category.

On Nouvelles Ethnologiques de l’Obscur Museum, NEO Museum forge a fierce, finely cut collision of free jazz, radical rock and European avant-garde composition. Born in mid-80s Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, the trio turns saxophone, guitar and drums into a compact laboratory of fractured forms, bristling improvisation and volatile collective invention.

Solo percussion by Sven-Åke Johansson, recorded at his SÅJ Studio in Berlin in March 2010: fifteen short pieces named after Swedish surnames, rolls, cymbals and a towel flicking on the drum skin.

Lummer is the Swedish name for the now protected family of vascular plants (Clubmoss/Lycopodiaceae). Lummer grows slowly and the spores with which it reproduces can take 12—20 years to develop. These spores, known as Nikt in Swedish, were once ground into an extremely flammable light yellow “old woman’s gunpowder” that was used for early theatrical pyrotechnics. Volatile and explosive, Lummernikt requires careful handling. There is something of the small scale dangerous in Finn Loxbo’s Lummernik…

On Untitled (Solo for the Building of a Museum), Tony Conrad stages an unseen encounter between amplified violin and his self-built Long String Instrument. Recorded in 2002 behind a concealing sheet, the performance turns drone, friction and physical resonance into an act of radical listening - music whose hidden actions remain inseparable from its vast, exposed sound.

Descending from the first volume, Variierende Töne vol.II retraces the essential threads of the label, this time through two parallel perspectives: membranes + machines. A continuity of path, where past and future blur into new readings, into sounds that move between repose and tension, between presence and absence. The work is divided into two movements. Side A: an immersion in organic matter—field recordings, acoustic research, surfaces shaped by Hanna Maria & Mattia Onori, Marco Ragni & Leona…

First CD re-issue on Spalax from 1988 of the debut album by one of the weirdest and most radical groups linked to krautrock, the free improvising duo of Paul and Limpe Fuchs.

In The Infinite Garden, composer Dario Calderone joins Aurélie Nyirabikali, Naomi Sato and Gareth Davis in live exchange with Amstelpark’s weather, wildlife and human traffic, turning a cloudy January day into a shared, porous instrument for expanded listening.

Rare 1983 album on the tiny Lumina Records of solo music for saxophone, clarinet and ocarina played with extended techniques bridging contemporary classical music and free jazz. Copy with authograhed inscription.

Rare canadian album released by Music Gallery Editions in 1979 of improvised experimental music played on self-built instruments with occasional use of electronic sound-modification techniques. With insert.

Great and beautifully packaged first uncompromising album of solo violin improvisation and electronically-processed violin tracks by Hideaki Shimada, self-released on Pico in a limited edition of 300 copies in 1986.

Great and beautifully packaged second uncompromising album of electronically-processed solo violin improvisations by Hideaki Shimada, self-released on Pico in a limited edition of 300 copies in 1989 and never re-issued on either LP or CD.

First edition of the CD-only third album of uncompromising electronically-processed violin tracks by Hideaki Shimada, self-released on Pico in 1991.

1994 CD on Odd Size with the experimetal/electronic improvisations of the Cologne supergroup composed of C-Schulz, Frank Dommert, Georg Odijk, Hajsch, Marcus Schmickler and Monika Westphal.

First LP of live electronic improvisation by British super-group featuring Adam Bohman, Clive Hall, Fred Sansom, Michael Prime, Roger Sutherland and Ron Briefel, released by Pogus Productions in 1989 and never re-issued on either LP or CD.

1998 CD re-issue of the 1991 cassette with live electronic improvisations by British super-group featuring Adam Bohman, Clive Graham, Michael Prime, Roger Sutherland and Ron Briefel.

On Die Dritte Ebene, Emilio Gordoa and Sven‑Åke Johansson let vibraphone, drums and accordion run in seemingly parallel lines until a mysterious “third layer” appears - a ghost‑music of overtones, pulse and texture that neither player could summon alone.

Fabu and Teche extends HeghL’s “camera mista” into two impersonal, semi‑ghostly surfaces, where language and technique rebound, hybridise and thin out into fragile, flickering forms that are neither one thing nor another, yet stubbornly refuse to disappear.

Du Jeu Idéal turns HeghL’s philosophical play into sound, as Tekelerobutor (op.el) stages Luca Pedeferri’s piano against works by Lisa Baume and Francesco Trabattoni, treating Deleuze’s “game without rules” as a constantly mutating musical event.

Mise extends HeghL’s mythography of the “Outside” into an invented archive, staging the rediscovery of anonymous scores as an excuse for a radical piano‑led reconstruction of the imagined oeuvre and unfinished world of the elusive Andrea Firewell.

L’Entretien Infini finds HeghL translating a philosophico‑theatrical chain of voices into sound, as clarinet, violin, piano and double bass improvise around Maurice Blanchot’s “infinite conversation” and the elusive “Thought of the Outside.”

*In process of stocking* Since his Beat Diary debut (a 12xLP box set comprising 365 beats recorded daily over the course of a year), Julian Sartorius has immersed himself in unique and ambitious projects - trekking the path not travelled to arrive at rhythmic life forms through found objects and prepared instruments. Equally as mighty are his two other escapades, the most recent being Locked Grooves - 112 beats cut as endless loops on vinyl spanning 56 dense 1.8 second compositions per side. Pre…

*150 copies limited edition* Headlights Recordings presents Manuel Mota's new work 1-7. Manuel Mota is known for the personal vocabulary he has developed for the guitar. His music draws inspiration from a multitude of references loosely rooted in the blues tradition to craft a sound which was highly regarded by Derek Bailey. Actual but transmitting an enigmatic sense of timelessness. The moment of creation- composition, and the instrumental execution- playing, are to him indistinct, and that's w…

*150 copies limited edition* Zulaqrex, named after a mythical being that only exists in Richard Youngs’ head, is the album sequel to the now practically sold out Zerkelus LP and once again features themed artwork and is limited to 150 copies. Like its predecessor, Zulaqrex consists of two side-long tracks both given the same name as the title and once more charting a course into the beyond via a hypnotic approach that even some fantastically stumbling percussion cannot offset. Also employing shi…

Duo improvisations for shakuhachi and ney recorded in Ealing, west London, July and October 2007. Clive Bell (shakuhachi) and Bechir Saade (ney) - two deeply committed improvisers working at the intersection of traditional practice and contemporary exploration - unite for their first recording as a duo. An entirely acoustic affair. Both instruments are made of plants from the same grass family - the shakuhachi from bamboo, the ney from reeds - and share fundamental similarities in timbre, breath…

condition (record/cover): EX/VG+. One of the rarest artifacts from Italy's most radical composers collective! Formed in Rome in 1964, the Gruppo di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza brought together extraordinary minds - Franco Evangelisti, Ennio Morricone, Egisto Macchi, Mario Bertoncini, Walter Branchi, Giovanni Piazza, and Jesús Villa Rojo - in unprecedented experiments with collective improvisation. This 1975 release, their fifth album, captures the ensemble at their sublime best. Delicate ac…

Fantastic 1979 recording by the duo of Eddie Prevost and Keith Rowe under the AMM III moniker. Original 1979 edition on Japo.

One of the best ever recordings by the mighty AMM, here composed of Eddie Prevost, Keith Rowe and John Tilbury. Original 1992 CD on Matchless Recordings.

Superb 1996 triple-CD set on Matchless Recordings presenting 3 exceptional full live recordings spanning 25 years (1969-1994). AMM: Cornelius Cardew, Christopher Hobbs, Lou Gare, Keith Rowe, Eddie Prevost and John Tilbury in different combinations.

Original 1974 UK edition of the first solo album of adventurous guitar explorations by Henry Cow member.

Original 1979 LP on Metalanguage, the first encounter by the two giant guitarists.

Original 1980 LP on Metalanguage of adventurous solo guitar explorations. Never fully re-issued on either LP or CD.

Original massive 2LP set with gatefold sleeve on Metalanguage from 1981 of adventurous guitar explorations featuring Magic Band's John French a.o.. Never fully re-issued on either LP or CD.

Molly Raben's In the Kingdom of Flowers arrives as one of the year's most revelatory debuts - a breathtaking collection of solo organ improvisations that reimagines one of music's most ancient instruments through the lens of contemporary experimental practice. Released by Pennsylvania's Love's Devotee label in a limited edition of 300 copies, this remarkable album showcases Raben's extraordinary technical prowess alongside her deep understanding of the organ's mechanics, history, and social cont…

Massive 1985 3LP box set documenting the activities of this German experimental music theatre group from 1971 to 1985, with echoes of MEV and Nuova Consonanza. With insert and never re-issued on either CD or LP.

1993 white vinyl single, the first volume in Table Of The Elements' limited edition Guitar Series 7"s, deservely dedicated to solo guitar improvisations by the AMM member.

Landmark release on Deutsche Grammophon from 1974, an amazing 3LP box set with booklet with the cream of European improvisation: New Phonic Art (Carlos Roqué Alsina, Jean-Pierre Drouet, Michel Portal, Vinko Globokar), Iskra 1903 (Barry Guy, Derek Bailey, Paul Rutherford), Wired (Karl Heinz Böttner, Mike Lewis, Michael Ranta, Conny Plank). Fundamental and ever re-issued on either CD or LP as a set.

Original first Italian edition on Caroline from 1978 of the second volume of the Guitar Solos series featuring Derek Bailey, Fred Frith, G.F. Fitzgerald and Hans Reichel. With original innersleeve. Never re-issued on either CD or LP.

Original first US edition on Red from 1979 of the third volume of the Guitar Solos series featuring Henry Kaiser, Chip Handy, Peter Cusack, Keith Rowe, Fred Frith, Eugene Chadbourne, Davey Williams and Akira Iijima. Never re-issued on either CD or LP.