New Arrivals
End Line
Ottaven new LP issued in a tiny run of 100 copies only, a strong and puzzling mixture of tapes, electronics, varispeeding, and multiple exposures, carefully executed, with much precision and clarity. Flipping between noisily bristling electronic frequencies and blustery washes of oscillating tones, Ottaven sounds carefully programmed even in its most frentic moments, and offers several blasts abrasive enough to unclog the dirtiest pore.
Juv
Awesome release, stark, doom-laden ambience with an oppressive undertone. Sombre tones flow like lifeblood, underlying squeals of pain, abrasive bursts of metallic guitar drones, atonal meanderings, the occasional cosmic chant, all blurred by a rumbling dirge of noise...somewhere between Tony Conrad, Giacinto Scelsi and Sunn O
Novaya Zemlya
Novaya Zemlya (lit. "New Land"), also known in Dutch as "Nova Zembla" and in Norwegian as "Gåselandet" (lit. the "Goose Land"), is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean in the north of Russia and the extreme northeast of Europe, the easternmost point of Europe, lying at Cape Flissingsky on the northern island. The artwork, by Jon Wozencroft, includes an essay by Thierry Charollais, "Thomas Köner's Novaya Zemlya: towards a metaphysical geography"... Of course we find the unique Köneresque glow…
The love robots
Jim O'Rourke, guitar. Paal Nilssen-Love : drums. Lasse Marhaug, electronics. Recorded at Gok Sound Tokyo by Yoshiaki Kondo February 2011. Mixed by James Plotkin. Coproduced by Pica et PNL. Gatefold cover. 500 copies. Housing, parasites and hammering textures.
Old News 9
Jim O'Rourke's Old News series continues with this, the ninth installment. This new release is unique in the series in that it is the first to feature an all-new composition. The work here showcases the kind of experimental concrete drift which O'Rourke has been exploring for a number of years, resulting in a magical blend of musical abstraction. With the measured hand and alchemical technique of a François Bayle classic, Jim has us spellbound with A-side, transmuting spectral whistles in…
My Brother The Wind
A pretty darn incredible record from Sun Ra -- with a soulful, spiritual approach that's missing from most of his other albums of the time! The album features Ra playing a good deal of organ (dubbed "intergalactic organ" in this case!) -- grooving soulfully on some short tracks that almost hit a soul jazz mode, and which recall the late 60s experiments of organist Freddie Roach.
De proche en proche
Eric Cordier, amplified and live processed hurdy gurdy. Jean-Luc Guionnet, amplified and live mixed church organ. Recorded live in the Temple Neuf (Metz - France) in February 2004 - organized by Fragment
Molam: Thai Country Groove from Isan Vol. 2
Molam is a multi-faceted folk country music native to Laos and the collection of rural Northeastern Thai provinces called Isan. Molam is an umbrella term used for numerous Lam styles. It literally translates into "expert singer" or "expert song." Featured here on volume two of this series are Lam Phun, Lam Thuy, Lam Plern, Lam Dern, and Lam Sing styles of Molam recordings from the 1970s and 1980s. All of these forms are built from a tradition that is centuries-old. A few examples of Molam…
Re-Engineering
Steven Warwick aka Heatsick cocks a unique and compelling perspective on contemporary dance music with his bold follow-up to 'Intersex', a gorgeous, layered work that those of you into DJ Sprinkles should check out without delay. Now woven with leaner dancefloor muscle, the deeply funked views of 'Re-Engineering' are characterised by the artist as a "cybernetic poem". We can take this quite literally in his use of spoken word in pieces such as 'Re-Engineering' with its Chris Morris-esque wordpla…
Open Space
I've been composing graphical scores since 2004. Each score has been done for a particular group, and not just for a certain set of instruments but also for specific persons, each with their own personal sound and their own distinct approach to improvisation. The scores hover in the gray region between composition and improvisation. They create a situation where the players are free up to a point to improvise but in which they could also find themselves in juxtapositions with other player…
Dawn In 2 Dimensions
After the dark conceptual ambience of Beyond the 4th Door, the members of Eternal Tapestry decided the time was right to do an album embracing their live show - blistering psych rock filled with lyrical guitar soloing and a caveman approach to rhythm, an oddly euphoric state where melancholia is blasted by ecstatic noise. Compiled from a variety of sessions at Tapestry Space throughout the spring of 2011 (some of this material first found a home on the two fall tour tapes), this set of so…
Olympians
‘Experimental’ bands are never going to please everyone; a lot of them seem almost uninterested in being anything but show-offs and twats, and there’s occasionally no attempt to make a connection twixt music and listener. All we get is: ‘marvel at my amazing button-pushing skills.’ And then, suddenly and horrifically, you turn into your dad: ‘that’s not music, that’s noise!’ Despite the post-watershed name, Fuck Buttons have always been a more subtle and meditative addition to the experime…
Sane Men Surround
Following up their warmly-received 2011 Alter debut, The Letter (ALT 005LP), Sane Men Surround is the second album to emerge from Southend-on-Sea's Liberez. Like their debut, the nine tracks here continue to savagely EQ percussion, guitar, violin and electronics into abstraction with tracks like "A Warning and My Madness Offends," bearing the industrial and almost ritualistic atmospherics of its predecessor, while "Nema Te" and "What's Mine Is Mine" introduce a new style of composition and songw…
A Rebours
Depuis que Minizza existe (le groupe se forme en 2000), ses membres ont toujours eu dans l'idée, un jour, d'adapter un roman en musique. Lorsque France Culture leur commande un Atelier de Création Radiophonique, l'occasion est saisie, et le choix se porte rapidement sur A Rebours (1884) de Joris-Karl Huysmans, chef-d'œuvre séminal, manifeste du décadentisme, dévoré par les membres du groupe dès l'adolescence.Ce travail pour France Culture donne naissance au troisième album du groupe qui, bien qu…
'How Wheeling Feels When the Ground Walks Away
James Hoff’s “How Wheeling Feels when the Ground Walks Away” presents an audio landscape comprised of various historic riots, from the concert hall and music venue to the sounds of modern warfare. Presented in surround sound, the work relentlessly envelops the audience as the tumultuous panorama of over-layered riots travel around the gallery. Part of Riot Radio Ballad, which explores the performative and futurist aspects of spoken word, audio, and radio material. Curated by Mark Beasley.…
Rufen
Rufen is the second installment in a trilogy of Qluster music, following on from the Fragen (BB 076CD/LP) studio album. In four impressive live recordings, Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Onnen Bock unfold aural panoramas which can only be described, in the truest sense of the word, as fantastic. Had Claude Debussy not already composed 'Prelude To The Afternoon Of A Faun,' then Qluster would have been ideally placed to do so, their transparency and polymorphism so reminiscent of his high Impression…
Do You Love Me?
Do You Love Me? is an extension of Lutz Bacher's videos of the same name, in which Bacher interviews curators, artists, friends, and family about Bacher the person and Bacher the artist. Though Lutz Bacher is the starting point, the interviews often reveal more about the people being interviewed than Bacher herself. The publication takes the form of transcripts interwoven with images of Bacher's artwork from the 70s to the present as well as photos, letters, and ephemera.
Sounds Of The Indian Snake Charmer Volume 2
600 copies. Second volume of Aaron Dilloway's recordings of the Nath Family of snake charmers of Haryana, India recorded in Kathmandu in 2005.ÊThis second volumes recordings are a bit more raw, originating from video and cassette recordings as opposed to the first volume's hi-fi digital recordings (don't worry..they sound JUST as disorienting!) and containing a duo track as well as the full 4 piece. Originally released as a cassette in 2005, now on vinyl in an edition of 600 copies. House…
Era
"Era is the fourth annual report from Chicago powerhouse quartet Disappears. It was formed during the gloom of the Chicago winter at Electrical Audio by now regular foil John Congleton. Insular and dark, the album sees the band further refining their love of dub, minimalism and repetition into their most original and stark set yet. It harks back to the early 80's post punk period, when almost anything seemed possible with the classic two guitar, bass and drums lineup, and exploration and…
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…