New Arrivals
The System of Objects
Silentes presents a new collaborative effort between two prominent artists of Italy's electronic and experimental scene, Corrado Altieri (Candor Chasma, Monosonik, Uncodified) and Gianluca Favaron (ab'she, Under The Snow, Z'been). Inspired by Jean Baudrillard's essay of the same name, "The System of Objects" offers seven compositions combining field recordings, analogue textures, computer music and concrète sounds. Altieri e Favaron dig deep in the unconscious of the french philosopher, devising…
Colorful Disturbances
'Guitars warped so hard they dissolve into pure consciousness ! Seriously, this record had to happen because these two are the NOW of transcendental guitar weirdness. In families like ours where deformed music of one kind or another pours out of the speakers all day long, Toronto's Aidan Baker is a household name. He is no doubt one of the most imaginative experimental musicians of the new generation, quickly creating a universe of limitless sound with his bursting discography. He offers …
Red Sugar
Restocked, reduced price 'winter family are the brooklyn based duo of ruth rosenthal and xavier klaine. alt.vinyl is proud to release this double vinyl ltd edition edition (300 copies only) of their latest intensely atmospheric work. artwork by franz vesolt, layout by fabien lehalle. audio mastering by patrick klem. review: a rare and unique audio worldview expressed by the singular approach of brooklyn based duo ruth rosenthal (spoken words) and xavier klaine (harmonium, organ etc..). fro…
Red Sun
What makes the music of Kasia Głowicka special? First of all space. Deep and extensive. As in ambient music. Built by reverbs, echoes and electronics. Against this background - a piano. Flickering , rippling . Cascades of repeating notes and rhythms. As in minimal music . Tonal associations, but with different development. Clear sounds, distorted, appear then re-appear hear and there as whispers and crackles. As in glitch music. But clearly you hear the skills of a seasoned composer –…
Making real
Making Real, an exercise in creating reality. Created by Gerritt Wittmer in 2012-2013. Mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi. Featuring the artwork of painter Nicola Samori. Gerritt Wittmer is a sound and performance artist based in Oakland, California. His work often articulates abstract narratives through vocal expression, body performance, and intense theatrical lighting. He has performed and recorded as Gerritt, Ginnungagap (with Stephen O'Malley and Tim Wyskida), Deathroes (with Sixes), and has perfo…
Amaranthine
Every new Richard Youngs LP is in some way an event – his modus is so restless and yet his muse remains so distinctively personal that it’s always a thrill to see where he’s gonna dive in next. Amaranthine puts his vocals way up front for a series of four ecstatic bardic/future folk classics that ride in on wave after staggering wave of free form percussion, clanging household objects, shakuhachi and fuzz guitar. The vocals fall into the classic post-Summer Wanderer style of endlessly rep…
Ship Chop
Ship Chop is a celebratory cut-up of far-flung musics. Edited, collaged and re-arranged by Daniel Padden from original vinyl sources to create impossible collaborations between musical ghosts. It is both reverential and sacrilegious, giving the music its full praise whilst also subjecting it to playful subversion. Some of the editing is obvious and transparent, but some of it much less so, where sounds from different recordings and continents overlap into an unlikely whole.
Daniel Padden …
Brombron 27: Nijmegen pulse
Korm Plastics is proud to present the twenty-seventh release in the Brombron series (missing numbers will follow later this year). Originally a co-production between Staalplaat and Extrapool, it is now hosted by co-curator Frans de Waard. In the year 2000 Frans de Waard and Extrapool started the Brombron project. Two or more musicians become artists in residence in Extrapool, an arts initiative in Nijmegen, The Netherlands, with a fully equipped sound recording studio. These artists can work in …
Dream Seeds
Extra Life’s first record for Northern Spy, Dream Seeds marks a dramatically new creative direction in the band’s still-young but prolific career. It is perhaps Extra Life’s most clearly-defined concept album : seven songs dealing entirely with the twin themes of dreams and children. In a lyrical left turn away from the morbid sexuality and black humor of Made Flesh, these songs look to the subconscious in search of innocence, morality and meaning. According to principal songwriter and e…
Gongs of Cambodia and Laos
A compilation of gongs of ethnic minorities in Ratanakiri and Mondolkiri provinces of Cambodia and in Champasak and Attapeu provinces of Laos, recorded between 2003 and 2007, released for the first time on a double vinyl, mastered by Rashad Becker at dubplates Berlin. Georges Condominas had released end of the 50s on the french label Ocora a vinyl containing recordings of gong ceremonies 'musiques Mnong gar du Vietnam', in between so much has happened and more than 50 years later it's tim…
Wooden Veil
This Berlin-based group combining the talents of artists Marcel Türkowsky, Hanayo, Christopher Kline, Domink Noé and Jan Pfeiffer, who each seem to spread themselves between a number of different projects. Interestingly, Noé is credited as a member of "krautrock legends Lustfaust", which is the fictional band created by conceptual artist Jamie Sholvin for the 2006 Beck's Futures exhibition, which might prompt you to think that Wooden Veil re made up too. There's definitely some sort o…
Palimpsest
It’s no secret how much we’ve loved Stephan Mathieu’s sublime drones and Sylvain Chauveau’s delicate compositions in the past, so to see these two pillars of experimental music collaborating has got us hot under the collar. But that’s not the half of it – not only did the two decide to work together, they had a very specific concept - ‘Palimpsest’ finds the duo reframing the timeless songs of Bill Callahan (aka Smog). Those familiar with Callahan’s writing might struggle to work out just how two…
Pink pearl
Frans de Waard (1965) has been producing music since 1984. First as Kapotte Muziek, but throughout the years, he also worked as Beequeen (with Freek Kinkelaar), Goem (with Roel Meelkop & Peter Duimelinks, both of whom are also a member of Kapotte Muziek these days), Zebra (with Roel Meelkop) and such solo projects as Freiband, Shifts as well as his own name. He played various solo concerts as Goem-FDW in Japan, as part of a package tour with Pan Sonic. Frans de Waard also likes to play sets of i…
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…
Fever Logic
Ensemble Economique has emerged as an unusually globe-trotting creative valve for Arcata, CA, beachcomber Brian Pyle. The last year alone has seen him backpacking through Scandinavia, Europe and Russia—twice. Maybe his spirit’s too absorbent, ’cause he’s brought back some deeply heavier moods and ancient world weariness since his last outing on Not Not Fun, 2010’s demonic tribal monsoon Psychical. Recent splits with similarly instinctual psychedelic unclassifiables like Lee Noble and Her…
Time Banking
Korm Plastics is proud to present the twenty-fourth release in the Brombron series (missing numbers will follow later this year). Originally a co-production between Staalplaat and Extrapool, it is now hosted by co-curator Frans de Waard. In the year 2000 Frans de Waard and Extrapool started the Brombron project. Two or more musicians become artists in residence in Extrapool, an arts initiative in Nijmegen, The Netherlands, with a fully equipped sound recording studio. These artists can work in a…
Ablation
Welcome return for Robert Hampson with the first Main album in seven years, new on eMego. Hampson founded Main with Scott Dawson upon disbanding Loop in '94, and while their initial releases still bore traces of their space-rock origins, the goal was always total ecstatic abstraction, and by the time of the Hz series, completed in '96, they'd pretty much achieved it. Main's music has been called many things: industrial, noise, isolationist electronica, dub, drone; the truth it, it's all a…
100 Moons Hindustani Vocal Art 1930 to 1955
Amazing sounds from the subcontinent – a selection of mid-century recordings that focuses on the incredible vocal range in Indian music, served up by a set of singers we might never have known otherwise! The voice is almost the lead instrument here – usually just supported by a bit of percussion or sitar, and set free in open space with these insane inflections and cascading tones that really leave us breathless! Mediative and exciting vocals from the masters. Great liner notes and master…
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 actually the same setup that I still use nowadays, consisting of an old Phillips analogue tone generator and a selection of effects pedals. The Stroomtoon album still feels like an accomplishment. It's layered, subtle and considered, but I wanted to see …
Lines Describing Circles
Over the past year as Peder Mannerfelt has shed the skin of The Subliminal Kid, we've only had small samples to taste of his new brand of musical sorcery. Lines Describing Circles changes all of that. Ten tracks deep, this is not so much an album as it is a declaration. From the opening, harrowing crackle of "Collapsion," Mannerfelt's intent is to crush the listener into a perfect metal cube. Lines Describing Circles displays the sound of a man fully in control of his machines. Throughout th…