New Arrivals
A Year In The Kingdom
Since Joshua Tillman had his profile raised by association with Seattle folk favourites Fleet Foxes, whose drumsticks he wields, he hasn't exactly been making an attention-seeking racket in his solo career. In contrast to Fleet Foxes' dawn-chorus harmonising, Tillman favours a spare style, and his sixth solo album may be the year's most subdued record. "I possess a taste for blood. I have numbered mankind's days," the 28-year-old murmurs on "There Is no Good in Me", throwing in a reference to fi…
Pressure
just wild and free. virginia genta (golden jooklo age, etc.) on tenor saxophone and andrew barker exploding drums. paste-on cover art. edition of only 115 numbered copies.
Atlantis
One of the key but underappreciated episodes in avant-garde jazz, Sun Ra's Atlantis sounds far out even today. Rather than a full-on assault on the senses, Atlantis is an exercise in build-up, with long, almost forlorn passages of Ra on electric keyboards setting a vast echo chamber for his Arkestra to spring forth within. Captured during one of the most adventurous periods for Sun Ra, *Atlantis* features the orchestral perfection of the best big bands of the century-and then proceeds towards mu…
Man Leaving Harbour On a Ship (In a Room)
** Private edition, only a handful available. ** Man Leaving Harbour On a Ship (In a Room) is the title of a sound installation (for record player, vinyl record, speakers, found photograph, steel wires) by Vittorio Santoro to be presented in June 2010 at La BF15 Contemporary Art Space in Lyon. For the art installation of this sound piece, side A of the LP record (titled 'Commencement') is played over and over for a whole day. The organizers will take care that the side B (titled 'Conclusion') is…
True Breath
Stunning five-song debut EP by this young Tokyo producer. Ghost-in-the-drum-machine rhythms layered with her exquisite Cocteau Twins vocal haze, but impeccably crafted into nuanced multi-movement compositions. Will be doing a full-length later in 2012 as well. Our fave new female artist
Danza Meccanica - Italian Synth Wave 1982 - 1987
Gorgeous collection of rare and early italian wave releases from 1982 - 1987 selected by Danza and with intro text by Fred Ventura in a limited run of 500 vinyl albums (hand numbered) it includes 2 inserts, LP cover on hand-made serigraphy. Highly recommended.
New Sky Dragon
Top flight three man cosmic research team further investigations on galactic flux and refraction with two transmissions of synesthetic mind-fold. Lift off with skyward string stasis cutting through buffeted drum-clouds and synthesiser atmosphere, cosmic forever vision peaks at warp-speed rocket drone, anti-gravity percussion accents and star scraping rainbow universes. Saturating feedback zones spread webs of dimension amidst asteroid belt orbits, where two-way trips initiate zero g shimm…
Big shadow Montana
"After producing their frozen trilogy of intoxicated dronemuzik for the Agency, these Scandinavian gentlemen have ventured into more absurdist territories through fictionalized soundtracks for imagined Mondo films and science fiction serials. It is in this context that BJ Nilsen & Stilluppsteypa present the apparitional Big Shadow Montana, an album of slow-motion delirium manifested in occluded smears, nocturnal gasps, and arcane tones from a variety of analogue synthesizers. Amidst the n…
Pachyderm
Revered, veteran guitar maverick, Michael Chapman of Cumbria, England, presents the hushed, radiant 24-minute improvisation 'Pachyderm', alongside an electronically tempered remix by Robert Antony. It's the 2nd in his more recent series of improvisations, making a move away from the structured songwriting much loved by the likes of John Peel, Thurston Moore and Jack Rose, to an absorbingly patient, simple and meditative style exploring the potential of a single ambient chord. Robert Anton…
Henzai
Tokyo-based guitarist/singer Hisato Higuchi presents his fourth full-length and first LP release. Henzai is Higuchi at his most bare. Each song appears like a spectral poem -- sewn together with hushed electricity and whispers. This recording is wholly intimate, recorded in seclusion, and washes over the listener like a hazy, day-break dream. Higuchi splits these 12 torch-songs between slow-motion improvisations and the composed, yet each is sung with a mix of beautiful wordless/Japanese languag…
Asleep On The Floodplain
Ben Chasny has spent many years at this point perfecting his very personal vision of the American landscape. With his early LPs he managed to grab a groundswell of support for his distinctly lo-fi recordings, and since hitting the Drag City label with the breathtaking 'School of Flower' he has managed to extend his vision to countless others. 'Asleep on the Floodplain' continues his exploration, and while it doesn't change up the formula too much (apart from the odd analogue synth blurt here and…
Human Taste
Portland, OR-by-way-of-Michigan garage gang Little Claw first tripped our radar with their self-released Why Not 7 inch, which was/is raw and physical and swingin’ in all the ways you want a 7” to be. Their LA live shows proved even more ripping and charged; we were sold. So we sprung at the offer to enshrine their latest (and best) album, Human Taste, on vinyl for the world’s turntables to adore. Packed with classic, cracked anthems (“Frozen In The Future,” “Colors You Drown”), basement weirdo …
Group: Xex
Xex were an all-synthesizer band from South River, New Jersey who recorded their debut album group:xex in 1980. Formed when a trio of high school misfits with funny names (Waw Pierogi, Thumbalina Gugielmo and Alex Zander) teamed up with some friends from Rutgers CollegePerformed entirely on then-state-of-the-art Arps, synths and electronic drums – no guitars anywhere – group: xex aims for the future, but comes across now like a time capsule from the deepest, darkest Reagan years. Each song burro…
Weighted Ghost
It's no secret that Aaron Dilloway is one of the best around. Opening with some seriously demented synth growl, Weighted Ghost gets down to business in no time at all. Stoically repetitive sequences build and build until the pressure in your skull reaches the breaking point. Dilloway pushes past the point of no return, scowling all the way until each layer is sufficiently soaked in dirt and brine. This isn't pretty and it isn't meant to be. The flipside fakes you out in the beginning,…
Spirits
After a few years spent living in Sweden and touring with Cecil Taylor's Jazz Unit, Ayler moved to NYC to begin imposing his revolutionary style of jazz on the world through a number of groundbreaking records. Spirits, recorded at Atlantic Studios in New York City on 24 February 1964, was his first effort. Recorded a few months prior to his landmark album for ESP-Disk, Spiritual Unity (but only released in Europe on Denmark's Debut Records), for the occasion Ayler recruited Norman Howard …
Heartland's Suite
More cosmic psychedelia on Aguirre now, this time from Stellar Om Source, which is the project of Dutch visionary Christelle Gualdi, who also designed the album's crazy neo-psych nightmare of a sleeve. Tripped out stuff. As for the record itself, we're in synth central here, drinking a synth and coke and sucking on a syntharette. The first side is largely based around motorik drone workouts with simple melodies and immersive textures. There's no percussion and the whole experience is quit…
Spectrum 008
A new collection of killer, tempered synthesizer workouts from Darren Ho on Spectrum Spools. The seven tracks featured have are have the kind of fragile beauty - and playfulness - that we associate with the early electronic music of Wendy Carlos, Daphne Oram, Raymond Scott and their ilk. There's a strong narrative arc to the album, but each track explores distinct territory: 'Slow Sum' parts one and two' are playful agglomerations of phased analogue patterns, 'In Peru' a Budd/Roedelius-style amb…
Stars Explode
When Cold Cave embarked on their first UK tour in 2009 one of the most sought after pieces of merchandise was an exclusive split release with Prurient limited to just 100 copies on Cassette. Hospital Productions have mercifully pressed up the tracks from the tape - plus one additional cut exclusive to this LP to satisfy the vinyl vulture's appetite. In stark comparison to the glam-electro melancholy of 'Love Comes Close', this is a collection of incredible bleak and isolated dark ambience…
Akashic Record (Events: 1986-1990)
Outer Space is a rapidly evolving sound entity headed by John Elliott and joined by a constantly rotating cast of midwestern U.S. electronic figures. Akashic Record sees the project grow in many different directions from the self-titled Arbor album created throughout 2008 and 2009 while retaining similar aesthetics of synthesizer experimentation and it's esoteric relations. Recorded over the course of a year with close engineering assistance and compositional contributions from Andrew Ver…
Camoufleur
Along with fellow Chicagoans Tortoise, Gastr Del Sol has managed to create an indie-rock audience for progressive music. On this release, the last with multi-instrumentalist and producer Jim O'Rourke, the group's music is more melodic and concise than in the past. But at the same time, the group retains its dedication to experimenting with song forms and production techniques. Augmented by friends and hired hands who play a variety of instruments, Gastr aims for the grand pop of Van Dyke …