New Arrivals
The Buried Stream
For the better part of the past decade, Loren Chasse has been refining his compelling sonic approach, which generally involves "activating" the latent sound-making qualities of natural / commonplace objects, such as pine cones, leaves, stones, or paper. This approach will seem immediately familiar to fans of John Cage, although Chasse's work has always felt more humanist to me than Cage's—driven less by theory and more by a romanticism that isn't afraid to get muddy or wet. You could also align…
Unit
A journey to the Chinese Qinghai province (Tibetan culture region of Amdo) was commissioned by the Goethe-Institut China. Its purpose was to experience the province and to produce art works to be presented at The Third Guangzhou Triennial, subtitled 'Farewell to Post-Colonialism' in the same year. The sound installation Unit and a series of photographs called Cutting Qinghai resulted from this journey, during which I took photographs and made audio recordings. The installation was presente…
Grand Electronic Suite
Recorded at the Roundhouse 1972, during the ICES Festival."For this show we rehearsed a week in a small village in the south of Holland. The repertoire of the first part was a kind of "frozen improvisation". We made some written plans about the form and structures and then rehearsed it for the whole week. So during these rehearsals things moved from improvisation into fixed form, just by remembering what we have played, and polishing it. This is a working concept that …
Book of Beyond
"Ben Reynolds is one of the newer voices from the same UK scene that includes Ashtray Navigations and many of the VHF celebrities (Sunroof!, Vibracathedral Orchestra, Richard Youngs, etc.) It should be of little surprise then that Book of Beyond fits very nicely among the recordings of those other artists -- noise/junk drone. As in his previous recordings, this at times dissolves into more acoustic offerings, but the Fahey influence appears to be mostly gone, and what remains in the quie…
All Aboard!
For more than 15 years, Tokyo, Japan's Tenniscoats have been keyboardist/vocalist Saya and guitarist Takashi Ueno. The duo have brought equal parts meditative intensity and whimsical humor to a series of acclaimed psychedelic albums, beginning with 2000's The Theme of Tenniscoats. But Tenniscoats have rarely released music without collaborating with others. Most famously, they teamed up with Scottish indie-pop legends The Pastels in 2009 for the wonderful Two Sunsets album on Domino Records…
Homunculus
Debut disc from the new collaborative project between Nathan Bowles (Black Twig Pickers/Spiral Joy Band) and Lisa Cameron (Venison Whirled). A real odd one this, lots of rattling and scraping of percussive objects creating 3 tracks of abstract improvised surreal sonic explorations. The sound is matched by what I can only describe as the weirdest sleeves I have every had the joy of releasing (and we've had some weird ones), but this one is far out, the guy at my local print shop looked baffled wh…
Peace Conference
"Mountain Ocean Sun is a project fronted by His Name Is Alive main man Warren Defever, who collaborates with three like-minded drone artists for an hour-long recording of shruti box, harmonium, bells, gongs and violin. The group's first performance was at a 500 year old Buddhist temple in Osaka, and that pretty much sets the tone for the quartet's quasi-mystical approach to soundscaping. Defever himself continues to mythologise, describing the recording as having been made "on a mountain, in the…
Primal Communication
One straight track, no over dubbing or editing. Recorded on July 2007, at H&H Production studio, Easton, PA. Recorded by Tatsuya Nakatani. Mastering by Johan Vandermaelen. Alongside NY percussion improviser Sean Meehan, Tatsuya Nakatani's approach to percussion uses alternative methods of interacting with traditional percussive instruments. The sounds here are subtle, resonant, introspective, and always interesting. (metamkine.com)
Organ
This is Jun Konagaya (a.k.a. GRIM )s first solo album. GRIM released collection of complete sound sources from hanng niap records in 2009. and insanity live performance was resumed after it. And having been released this time is not GRIM but a solo Jun konagaya name. Atrocious feedback/roaring cannot be heard there. "Organ" The malformed story about floating folk song of malformation, such as "Message" of GRIM. Inner surface of the universe is filled with deep sorrow of Jun konagaya, has been ex…
Zwitzerland
Ursula Maehr, recorder. Carles Peris, saxophone, flute. Francis Petter, saxophone, bass clarinet. Valentin Vecellio, basset horn. Marco von Orelli, trumpet. Sabine von Werra, voice. Christoph Baumann, piano. Markus Fischer, double bass. Jacques Widmer, drums. Recorded 9-11 November 2007
Scope
The disc is a recent release on the Monotype label by a group named LHZ+H, who are the semi regular trio of Thomas Lehn, (analogue synth) Carl Ludwig Hübsch (tuba) and Philip Zoubek (piano) augmented on this 2008 occasion by the trumpeter Franz Hautzinger, who on this occasion added a delay pedal to his instrument. The release contains four improvised tracks, and is named Scope. Now, I have been known to describe some improvised music as brooding a good few times before, perhaps trying to …
How Day Earnt Its Night
"Ben Reynolds is an English solo steel string guitarist and songwriter. In his solo instrumental works he draws upon the vast well of musical inspiration native to the British Isles as well as that found across the Atlantic and beyond. Ben's 2008 recording Two Wings was released on Portland, Oregon label Strange Attractors Audio House and focuses upon sprawling, meditative improvisations and concludes with the track 'Here Toucheth Blues' which appeared on Tompkins Square's Imaginational An…
s3d (Ear & Eye)
s3d presents a world of fresh sounds from invented and unconventional instruments with names as curious and evocative as the sounds they produce: mothics, shimsaw, kyurukyuttsu, gloopdrum, corrugahorn, sprong, sundrum and many more. An international collaboration. Twelve experimental instrument builders/improvisors in an inspirational world-first.
The backside suite
'Created and performed by Christian MUNTHE. Upside-down steel 6-string arch top acoustic guitar. Touched by: guitar-pick, palm of hand, fingertips, nails, lips, tongue, teeth, breath, saliva, beer bottle, whiskey tumbler, plastic ball-point pen, paperback book, legs Christian MUNTHE is a Swedish free improviser that since the 1980's concentrates on the sonic possibilities offered by the acoustic guitar in solo as well as various ensemble settings. He has released recordings in his own name and …
(hail satan)
Carlos GALVEZ Taroncher (bassclarinet)-Magda MAYAS (piano)-Koen NUTTERS (acoustic bass)-Morten J. OLSEN (percussion). Recorded on 28 August 2006, Berlin.
Hello
Takahiro Kawaguchi: tuning fork. Shinjiro Yamaguchi: guitar. Composed by Takahiro Kawaguchi. Edited by Shinjiro Yamaguchi. Recorded by Takahiro Kawaguchi at 102 Studio, Tokyo, November 9, 2008. Mastered by Taku Unami. Takahiro Kawaguchi began making field recordings and performing improvised music in 2000, and in recent years has attracted a great deal of attention as a sound artist. In January 2009 he released, on Taku Unami's label Hibari Music, the solo album, on which he uses several remodel…
Cristallisation
Over 4 hours of improvisations were recorded over these two days in april 2010. We then trimmed the sound sequences and the silence, while keeping our specific interactions and phrasing of sounds between us and with the location. But sound is a flexible material and what remains of this session are frequencies that are like vestiges to be reinvented. To help this there is some 'presence'. The acoustic character and the intense immobility that fill the air of the chapel of Las Planques, in the da…
Sublunar
Sublunar is the first full-length release from Kane Ikin who is also known as one half of the duo Solo Andata. Sublunar follows Kane’s solo debut Contrail (7”, 12k2022) picking up where that EP left off and pushing the boundaries outward in every direction into denser, deeper, wetter and more decayed terrain. The word “sublunar” can be read to contain many conceptual layers important to the album. It is music about moonlight, darkness, the faintest hint of light and shadow.... Moons locke…
Honeysuckle
Honeysuckle is the new solo album by Alio Die.. trance & drones,acoustic and electronic sound-effects, melt together in five tracksthat are characterized with a touch of grace that expand consciousnessin new and unforeseen dimensions...after a few seconds the music absorbs the listener under induction into the internal space that vibrates and resonates..A lovely sensible experience is just close to be discovered and to spread its fragrance.Like the hummingbird that suck the honeysuckle's nect…
The headlans
CD version housed in a Digipak following the immediate sell out of the LP version. Released to coincide with Ellen Fullman's new full length for Important titled "Through Glass anes." Full length collaboration between Ellen Fullman, Theresa Wong, and Barn Owl produced by The Norman Conquest. Barn Owl's extended drones and Theresa and The Norman Conquest's strings are the perfect accompaniment to Fullman's Long Stringed Instrument; a product of her own invention. This is an album of deep mater…