New Arrivals
God Is Good
ground-breaking CD edition: God is Good is Om’s fourth studio album, and the first with new drummer Emil Amos (Amos made his first official recording with Om in the single “Gebel Barkal/Version” on Sub Pop last summer). It’s a big change, obviously, for a two-piece, and a fairly unqualified success. Amos, who also records with Grails, Holy Sons and Shrinebuilder, is far more flamboyant than Chris Hakius, less tethered to the steady chink of cymbals, more apt to range free-form over toms, rims an…
Grapes and Snakes
Grapes and Snakes is the first collaborative work of two of the most respected American underground experimental/noise artists, Aaron Dilloway and Jason Lescalleet. Using purely analog synths and tape manipulation, they build a foggy psychoacoustic mass that lies between dynamic yet patiently treated tape-music and industrial howl. Aaron Dilloway has been releasing and recording music since the age of 16. He was a member of experimental bands Couch, Galen and Universal Indians. He is a form…
Live from Festival au Desert, Timbuktu
Two days before the 2012 rebellion in northern Mali. Soldiers are everywhere. Guns mounted on pickups; low-flying surveillance planes. Several thousand people have gathered outside Timbuktu to celebrate the music and culture of the Sahara at the 12th edition of the Festival au Desert. Three months later, Sharia descends on northern Mali. A millennial history is suppressed. Shrines destroyed. Secular music banned. Before, the streets were alive with music. Weddings, baptisms, celebrations …
Solitaire
Beautifully presented reissue of classic archival electroacoustic works, within "Warszawa-Oslo" project, a recollection, phonographic documentation and reactivation of bonds between Polish and Norwegian electro-acoustic music, presentation of their individual character and unquestionable significance on the international scale. This beautifully designed set (with extensive booklet of note) collects some of the most exciting, shimmering and crystalline electronic sounds to be unearthed in quite a…
No Answer : Lower Floors
CD version. "No Answer : Lower Floors is the record of 2013 you need to be most worried about. No Answer : Lower Floors is further flesh to the shadowy silhouette cast by this Michigan art abstraction unit, perenially poised on the cusp of a precipice. Wolf Eyes will carry on forever but always remain mysteriously unfinished. The No Answer : Lower Floors material covers all bases: tough to toughest to tangled, all done in the Wolves' least convoluted smooth style. The vocals, delays, primit…
Fete galante et pastorale
There were several ‘firsts’ involved in my initial encounter with Zygmunt Krauze’s music: my first visit to Poland (1970), my first ‘Warsaw Autumn’ festival and its first concert (19 September), and the Warsaw premiere of Krauze’s first Piece for Orchestra (1969). The memory has stayed with me ever since, not least because here was a work that was distinctly different from the other new Polish music that had so far filtered westwards. I was familiar with some Lutosławski, Penderecki …
Paranoid Cat
Paranoid Cat is Philadelphia guitarist Chris Forsyth's third solo album and first for Family Vineyard -- a sprawling, harmonically-charged side-long suite backed by a clutch of compositions merging raw and delicate American roots traditions. After more than a decade trotting the globe and recording with a mess of today's avant garde greats, plus co-leading the brazenly absurd Peeesseye, Forsyth has arranged a full-band to accompany his electric six-string vision of interlocking arpeggios and max…
Nigeria Special Volume 2: Modern Highlife, Afro Sounds & Nigeria
Nigeria Special 2 is the second part to the best selling Nigeria Special album released to critical acclaim in 2007 and further extends the look at the most exciting period in Nigeria’s recording history. The range of styles vary from highlife to Juju and Nigerian blues in the languages of Yoruba, Igbo, Bini and Ijaw. With a peppering of ‘afro’ experimentation the same musical stew pervades volume 2 as it’s predecessor – some artists appear again alongside some new …
Pansophical Cataract
John Colpitts (aka Kid Millions) is a Brooklyn-based multi-instrumentalist, composer and writer who is perhaps best known as the drummer for Oneida. Man Forever, his vehicle for exploring the outer limits of drum performance, was created to overwhelm, to investigate the nuances that bloom in the midst of repetitive music, and to act as a pure sound experience.
Originally based on the idea of creating a sort of punk-infused Metal Machine Music for drums, Man Forever has evolved from a f…
Mobilisation Generale
Born Bad Records, the on-point French label that has brought you some of our favorites of the year, will release this week a compilation of French protest jazz from the 70s called Mobilisation Generale. The compilation, which you can stream below, is a fantastic look at a small slice of history that could use a little more attention. On BBR's Bandcamp, an entire oral history is written out to accompany the release, which features some truly innovative freeform jazz and poetry, and we've reprinte…
Record Store Record
If you cant come to our shop, then maybe our shop can come to you. no, this is not a collection of in-store performances, there are no bands or artists trying to impress you with their skillz and technique - this is a collection of location/environmental recordings made inside our record stores, just the sound of regular everyday customers looking at records, talking about records, buying records - oh yeah, and record store owners boxing up records for mail-order customers - audio verite, sound …
Cover Versions
Andrew Pekler selected 300 different covers from second-hand records and, using colorful geometric elements to cover over all titles, performer’s names, and label logos, removed traces of the covers’ original contexts. The sunsets, couples in silhouette, alpine panoramas, roses on pianos, female faces in close-up, and seascapes no longer serve as the packaging for easy listening and exotica. Instead, the romantic, bizarre and intriguingly bland images of the original covers are free to lend thei…
Dabke 2020: folk & pop sounds of Syria
Sublime Frequencies is pleased to present the second volume of Northeast Syrian dabke music from legendary vocalist Omar Souleyman and his group. This record was compiled by Mark Gergis to coincide with the Sublime Frequencies UK/European tour in May and June of 2009, featuring live performances by Omar Souleyman himself. Culled from dozens of cassettes recorded in Syria from 1999-2008, the music here is an extension of Omar's Highway to Hassake: Folk & Pop Sounds of Syria (SF 031CD) release, to…
Bamboo for two
"A Hypnagogic supergroup of sorts with a blast of hallucinatory and tropical rhythmic synth adventures - new on OESB! Comes with free download coupon redeemable from the label** Seductively heavy-lidded inter-species avian-eroticism from the hypnagogic allstars Spencer Clarke (Skaters), Lieven Martens (Dolphins Into The Future), Eva Van Duren (Orphan Fairytale) and James Ferraro (CEO Airhead Entertainment) on the ever-compelling OESB imprint. Monopoly Child Star Searchers is usually the reserve …
Strange Passion
Mindblowing comp of obscure, highest-calibre DIY Post-Punk and Synthwave from the archives, brilliantly compiled by Darren McCreesh and brought to you by Finders Keepers' Cache Cache sublabel - so damn good. There's been a deluge of post-punk reissues and rarity compilations in the past five years, and in turning their spades to the same ground, Finders Keepers have dug way deeper than anybody else, and come up with a cache lost classics that are both truly lost and truly classic - the quality c…
I am the Center: private issue new age music in America, 1950-90
One of the best things about Seattle label Light in the Attic’s new new age compilation I Am the Center is that it doesn’t try and pretend that new age music was something that it’s not. Look at the album’s cover illustration and you’ll see an angel-like creature carrying an orb of yellow light through the clouds; open the gatefold and you’ll see what appears to be a bird made of stars launching itself out of the ocean. Press play and be delivered into over two hours of mind-numbingly mellow mus…
First Burning Attraction
Formed in 2009, Damien Dubrovnik is the Danish electronic duo of Christian Stadsgaard (Sarah's Charity) and Loke Rahbek (Sexdrome, Var, Lust For Youth), founders of the Copenhagen-based record label Posh Isolation. In their day-job as label managers, Stadsgaard and Rahbek have been instrumental in establishing the city's prolific and exciting noise/punk community and outgrowing their humble beginnings in noise/industrial culture by attracting a cult/fanatical worldwide following. Working to…
Say God
The 2xLP version comes in an old-style tip-on gatefold jacket with 8” x 10” insert and MP3 download coupon. In recent years, Higgs has released a number of solo outings that can only be described as the ultimate in isolation, worlds away from the hypnotic, communal rock of his band, Lungfish. Higgs follows up the 2007 album/book release Atomic Yggdrasil Tarot with his new double album Say God. Say God is an album of gospel songs and poems as presently received by this Daniel Higgs. Recorded …
Mask of the Maker
Fuses deep kosmische moods w/ jet-propulsion lab experiments, classic galactic Italo, soaring starblood synth workouts, funky astral ragas, psychedelic dust coulds & rare mantric guest vocals
Stroomtoon II
"In December 2011 I recorded the album Stroomtoon, which was released by the French Nuun label the year after. The music was constructed using recordings from improvisations with a setup that I was trying out for upcoming live performances. It's the same setup that I still use nowadays, mainly consisting of an old Phillips analogue tone generator and a selection of effects units. When making Stroomtoon, it felt like moving into new territory that was worth explore more. While that album is very …