Search Result for Genre EXPERIMENTAL
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CD
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CSR 330CD
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$15.50
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RELEASE DATE: 5/3/2024
Cold Spring Records present a unique collaboration between industrial breakbeat pioneers Meat Beat Manifesto (Jack Dangers) and the undisputed king of Japanese noise, Merzbow (Masami Akita). "We may not speak the same language, but in the vortex of sound, there's a raw, primal understanding that transcends words. Noise can be art, a visual representation could maybe be Jackson Pollock's No 5, a plexus of chaos redefining what music can and could be. Pushing boundaries with Masami wasn't just a musical adventure, it was a masterclass in sonic anarchy" --Jack Dangers, January 2024. Extinct sees the duo take listeners on a transcendental journey, focusing on the dismantling of beat and structure and recycling the result through layers of beautifully crafted noise and feedback loops, giving birth to new rhythms buried deep in the dirt. The 20-minute opener "!FLAKKA¡" takes constantly evolving breakbeats which are gradually broken down over time, driven through a filter of harsh noise, destroying the old to give birth to the new. Raw and unforgiving, the track is a behemoth that blends mutant forms of broken beats and hints of dub, creating rhythmic noise of the highest caliber in the process. "Burner" takes the record to its ultimate conclusion, the initial drum beat broken down so that it is barely recognizable. Pulsating distortion and high-end audio fragments bleed into each other as the track lumbers forth and destroys everything in its path before slowly unravelling, degrading and falling apart. A harrowing yet somewhat cathartic trip through walls of harsh industrial noise and audio degradation, Extinct is a masterful pairing of artists who have delivered something truly unique yet totally relevant. Composed, recorded, and produced November 2023-January 2024 by Jack Dangers and Masami Akita. Art by Abby Helasdottir (Gydja).
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LP
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CSR 330LP
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$31.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 5/3/2024
LP version. Cold Spring Records present a unique collaboration between industrial breakbeat pioneers Meat Best Manifesto (Jack Dangers) and the undisputed king of Japanese noise, Merzbow (Masami Akita). "We may not speak the same language, but in the vortex of sound, there's a raw, primal understanding that transcends words. Noise can be art, a visual representation could maybe be Jackson Pollock's No 5, a plexus of chaos redefining what music can and could be. Pushing boundaries with Masami wasn't just a musical adventure, it was a masterclass in sonic anarchy" --Jack Dangers, January 2024. Extinct sees the duo take listeners on a transcendental journey, focusing on the dismantling of beat and structure and recycling the result through layers of beautifully crafted noise and feedback loops, giving birth to new rhythms buried deep in the dirt. The 20-minute opener "!FLAKKA¡" takes constantly evolving breakbeats which are gradually broken down over time, driven through a filter of harsh noise, destroying the old to give birth to the new. Raw and unforgiving, the track is a behemoth that blends mutant forms of broken beats and hints of dub, creating rhythmic noise of the highest caliber in the process. "Burner" takes the record to its ultimate conclusion, the initial drum beat broken down so that it is barely recognizable. Pulsating distortion and high-end audio fragments bleed into each other as the track lumbers forth and destroys everything in its path before slowly unravelling, degrading and falling apart. A harrowing yet somewhat cathartic trip through walls of harsh industrial noise and audio degradation, Extinct is a masterful pairing of artists who have delivered something truly unique yet totally relevant. Composed, recorded, and produced November 2023-January 2024 by Jack Dangers and Masami Akita. Art by Abby Helasdottir (Gydja).
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LP
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UMA 182LP
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$29.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Atrax Morgue, the artistic moniker of the Italian musician Marco Corbelli, stands as an enigmatic figure within the realm of industrial and noise music. Revered for his gloomy sonic explorations, Corbelli forged a distinctive path through the auditory landscape, leaving an indelible mark on the Italian (and worldwide) underground music scene. Employing very minimal electronic instrumentation, Corbelli sculpted an auditory experience that transcends the conventional confines of music. Corbelli's compositions, characterized by their sick nature, evoke a sense of otherworldly melancholia, challenging the listener to confront the boundaries of their auditory comfort zone. Negative Frequencies is a profound musical testament that emerged from the visionary mind of the Italian artist Marco Corbelli, released in February 2006. The album encapsulates the diseased and bleak essence for which Corbelli's project, Atrax Morgue, is renowned. Corbelli, through his meticulous approach, manipulates synth and analog tape to craft a sonic landscape that challenges conventional notions of music, inviting introspection into the darker recesses of the human psyche. In a poignant turn of events, this seminal work is now set to be reissued for the first time on vinyl, marking a significant moment in Atrax Morgue's discography. This reissue not only amplifies the significance of Negative Frequencies within the avant-garde canon but also serves as a poignant reminder of Marco Corbelli's enduring artistic legacy. Tragically, shortly after the album's CD release in 2006, Corbelli took his own life, rendering this album one of the last tangible echoes of his creative brilliance. This vinyl reissue feature also a meticulously crafted four-page A3 folded booklet, containing the original notes and drawings by the talented Marco Corbelli from the CD edition. Additionally, this booklet is enriched with a collection of new annotations and previously unreleased photographs, graciously provided by Andrea Marutti. Edition of 199.
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2LP
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UMA 181LP
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$42.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Emerging from the vibrant tapestry of Japan's experimental music scene in the late '80s, Incapacitants had beginnings as Toshiji Mikawa's solo project in 1981. The original epicenter of their creative endeavors was Osaka, where Mikawa collaborated with luminaries such as Yamatsuka Eye, JOJO and others. However, the trajectory of Incapacitants evolved with a move to Tokyo, where Fumio Kosakai joined forces with Mikawa, solidifying the current duo that continues to shape the landscape of experimental music. The dynamic twain have spent decades challenging preconceived notions of sound, weaving a complex tapestry of auditory exploration. Their avant-garde approach and relentless commitment to pushing boundaries have solidified Incapacitants as a cornerstone in the global noise music phenomenon. Their ability to seamlessly blend raw energy with the sheer beauty of their noise is a testament to their unique artistry. Originally released in 1999 on CD by legendary Alchemy Records, Default Standard is a testament to Incapacitants' relentless pursuit of pure noise. Carefully remastered under the skillful guidance of the highly respected engineer, producer as well as sound artist Lasse Marhaug, this reissue invites listeners to rediscover the sonic intricacies that define Incapacitants' artistry. The five tracks on Default Standard immerse listeners in a sonic landscape marked by tumultuous chaos. The album showcases an extensive incorporation of feedback, distortions, and electronic manipulations, creating an avant-garde and experimental auditory experience is at the core of Incapacitants' artistic approach. Each piece is a testament to the band's commitment to pushing the limits of conventional musical structures. Incapacitants often employs dissonant tones, unconventional time signatures, and unpredictable arrangements, inviting listeners to engage with the music on a level that goes beyond traditional notions of melody and harmony. Available in only 199 copies. Beyond the auditory experience, delve into a big poster and inserts featuring unpublished photos by Yuichi Jibiki, offering a glimpse into the era of the original CD release. And then explore a four-page A3 folded insert with previously unpublished photos with extensive notes from both Lasse Marhaug and Toshiji Mikawa, alongside a 1999 interview translated into English, from Japanese music magazine EATER.
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LP
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ISA 001LP
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$24.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Having flown in from Tbilisi, Anushka Chkheidze found herself completely alone inside the empty and as yet unoccupied University of Basel's Biozentrum: just her, a piano, and the surrounding spaces. Over a two-week period the young Georgian musician and composer was able to explore the building, designed by Ilg Santer architects, with the piano, microphones, a mixing deck, a computer, and her voice. She also assembled a small choir from the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis music academy in Basel, who performed in an auditorium in the basement. Anushka used her field recordings and compositional ideas from her on-site sessions to create the music for this album in the studio in Tbilisi, Georgia. The eight tracks are an acoustic and associative journey through the Biozentrum with a nonvisual form of perception: she encountered eight very different places in the building, and the spatial acoustics and nonvisible interior spaces all play their part. Clean Clear White was mixed by Taylor Deupree (Pound Ridge, New York), mastered by Christoph Stickel (Vienna), cut by Sidney Claire Meyer at Emil Berliner Studios (Berlin), and pressed on 180-gram black vinyl by Optimal Media (Röbel/Müritz) with love and care to audiophile standards.
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LP
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DC 917LP
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$20.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
"Oren Ambarchi has been collaborating with the Fire! trio (Mats Gustafsson, Johan Berthling, and Andreas Werliin) for over a decade -- and both Johan and Andreas played on Oren's Live Hubris as well. Oren and Johan began music-making together back in the early aughts -- but it wasn't until 2021 that the three of them got together to record music. That became the first Ghosted album. When they were done, it was clear they had founded a new group. A music of sustained tension and deep atmosphere marked by subtle, shifting dynamics, Ghosted was released in May of 2022 to psyched response everywhere; the trio embarked upon an ongoing series of concert bookings around Europe, with loads of other people in the world still hoping to have the chance to be in the room at the next show. Two years on, Ghosted has gone through several represses; now, it's time for the 'dreaded follow up album.' What made the most sense was to go back to Daneil Bengtsson at Studio Rymden in Stockholm for a couple days, then have Oren and Joe Talia mix and Joe master it at Good Mixture in Melbourne again, then get Pål Dybwik to do some well-distinctive cover art, and once more, call it a record. Ghosted II has a definitively fresh quality radiating throughout it. The mutual feeling among the three players goes deep, allowing for lots more to say every time they get together -- a further recombination of elements, a new expedition through alternative angles. There's always more, and incredibly, it's all improvised, with next-to-nothing prepared going in and minimal overdubs after they've laid things down. As noted, these guys balance their music improbably between a relaxed feel and a nervy resolve, as each member holds down their corner in an open sound field. Making Ghosted II, the band found that there's a different kind of tension making something for an established project rather than the kind one feels making something for the first time -- and they used this new variety, as before, as a kind of fuel --driving their terse minimalism fruitfully through the process of succumbing to and then transcending guilty pleasures. Finding fresh territory in funk sketches, jazzy heads, ambient pastorals and droning soundtrack pieces, Ambarchi, Berthling and Werliin compellingly haunt a mad variety of spaces."
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LP
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ZORN 081LP
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$28.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Originally released on tape by SicSic in 2014, Aprilnacht commemorates a decade of music from Brannten Schnüre and marked the spring in a tetralogy of albums about the four seasons when it came out. Back then the Würsburg-based project consisted solely of Christian Schoppik, who later welcomed Katie Rich to take over the vocals. He used to perform as Agnes Beil, but dropped the name when, while making this album realized his music was becoming "much gentler and more fragile." Aprilnacht already captured the particular musical ideas that Schoppik would thoroughly keep exploring, delving deeper and deeper into the use and manipulation of samplers from sources so diverging as to wander between the five continents to post-war German family television and cult cinema. Heir of the ritualistic intensity of Coil, of the intricate sampler assemblies of Ghédalia Tazartès', and of the dusty, dismal old ballads from around the world, Brannten Schnüre manages to make these paths cross in a territory that is as inherent as it is uncanny; sieged by the past and intimate as a hearth. An organic approach to folk, ambient, and sound collage, where ethereal yet thoroughly textured pieces coalesce in enthralling, delicate, and innermost musical rituals. Aprilnacht was inspired by the stories of German philosopher and writer Friedrich Alfred Schmid Noerr, whose work exhaustively examines the conflict between paganism and Christianity, safeguarding myth in a way that Schoppik describes as boldly modern, humorous and unpredictable in its variations of the Germanic folklore motifs. Do not succumb to the insipid howl of death, for nothing may last but mutability. You see, the rock has moved a little during the night; the rest is just wind fleeing from the void.
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LP
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BT 117LP
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$29.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Black Truffle announces The Mountains Pass, a major new work from Olivia Block. A key player in Chicago's vibrant experimental music scene since the late 1990s, Block has developed an extensive body of work grounded in a personalized, at times emotive approach to the studio-based practices of the musique concrète tradition, while also encompassing improvisation, orchestral pieces, sound installations, and a sustained engagement with the piano. On The Mountains Pass, recorded by Greg Norman at Steve Albini's Electrical Audio and meticulously edited and constructed over the course of three years, Block pushes into new terrain, introducing her singing voice and drums played by Jon Mueller into flowing assemblages that move seamlessly from ruminative organ tones and fragmented piano airs to explosions of sizzling synths and thundering percussion. Like many of Block's past works, which include, for example, a sculptural installation using the sound of oyster beds, The Mountains Pass draws inspiration from nature and the animal world. Time spent in a particular mountain range in Northern New Mexico informs this suite of pieces, whose lyrics and titles refer particularly to animal life in the area. The music sometimes suggests the great outer-limits works of '70s Italian prog figures like Franco Battiato or Arturo Stalteri in the languorous drift of synthesizer, organ, and piano tones and the meticulous yet organic flow of its construction. Block's crystalline voice and rich piano chords at times call up the restrained chamber songs of Janet Sherbourne, but fragmented and threaded through passages of woozy pitch-bent keyboards, hypnotic distant thuds, tinkling bells, and searing distorted synth tones. On "f2754," the freedom of the roaming wolf surges through dense layers of rapid keyboard attacks and long organ tones over a propulsive drum performance straight out of Animal Magnetism-era Arnold Dreyblatt. This distinctive sound world is then reencountered in a darkened mirror image in the uneasy, metallic shimmer of the closing "Ungulates," named in reference to a heard of elk roaming through the mountains. Like Battiato's Clic or Gastr del Sol's Upgrade & Afterlife, The Mountains Pass inhabits the underexplored terrain where the beauty of song coexists with a radical formal openness, illuminating the deep musicality and warmth that have been present in Block's work all along.
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Cassette
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SAUNA 080CS
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$11.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/26/2024
Melbourne/Naarm-based musician and curator Rama Parwata, known for being the backbone drummer in bands such as Kilat, Whitehorse, and Rinuwat, releases his second major solo album titled Ceases on Cassauna/Important Records. Parwata's gripping new electro-acoustic work is a sonic exploration within the realms of post-free-jazz and experimental electronics. At its core, Ceases navigates the liminal spaces between rhythm and noise, structure and chaos. The album traverses a vast emotional and conceptual landscape, touching upon themes of impermanence, transformation, and the cyclical nature of existence. At the forefront of the album is Parwata's emotive compositional and performative approach, which serves as both anchor and catalyst for the album's journey. The percussion performance is cymbal heavy accompanied by deeply meditative drones and slow-moving melodies. The wash of sound touches on a spiritualism akin to Coltrane's "A Love Supreme Part 4: Psalm," albeit with a modern electronic vision á la Tim Hecker. With a keen sense of textural intricacy Parwata favors the emotional expression of electro-acoustic composition, weaving complex poly-textures that ebb and flow with hypnotic, prayer-like intensity. Each performative gesture creates a visceral immediacy that draws the listener deeper into the celestial, otherworldly sonic framework. The diverse array of electronic elements, meticulously crafted and seamlessly integrated into the fabric of the album are a testament of Parwata's capacity for acousmatic composition. From pulsating synthesizers to glitched-out samples, the electronic timbres in Ceases serve as both sonic embellishments and structural foundations, blurring the boundaries between organic and synthetic, acoustic and digital. Honing in on the electronics, a listener could be convinced they were hearing anything from spiritual-jazz, '90s rave, dungeon synth or doom. Through judicious composition, Parwata imbues each sound with a sense of transcendental allure and paints a soundworld that has a distinct "outerness." At times the narrative is pointedly bleak but over a few passages the sonic language often bends toward rejuvenation; finding respite in cadence. The title itself suggests a sense of cessation, of endings and beginnings intertwined -- a motif that reverberates throughout the album.
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LP
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KR 115LP
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$24.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/12/2024
LP version. A new piece by minimalist/experimental composer Phill Niblock (1933 - 2024), co-composed and performed by Anna Clementi and Thomas Stern. Intense, menacing layers of thick drones and alien sounds. In summer 2022, within just a few weeks and by pure coincidence, two proposals regarding Phill Niblock albums arrived at Karlrecords: one suggesting an overdue vinyl reissue of a CD release, while the other email was from Anna Clementi saying she and Thomas Stern were working on new pieces that Phill Niblock has written for her. When Zound Delta 2 was complete, Phill sent photographs for the two artworks, and Karlrecords met with him twice to discuss details, but unfortunately he died unexpectedly in January, 2024, so the album now is a posthumous release. An intense goodbye from one of 20th century's most iconic composers.
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CD
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KR 115CD
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$16.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/12/2024
A new piece by minimalist/experimental composer Phill Niblock (1933 - 2024), co-composed and performed by Anna Clementi and Thomas Stern. Intense, menacing layers of thick drones and alien sounds. In summer 2022, within just a few weeks and by pure coincidence, two proposals regarding Phill Niblock albums arrived at Karlrecords: one suggesting an overdue vinyl reissue of a CD release, while the other email was from Anna Clementi saying she and Thomas Stern were working on new pieces that Phill Niblock has written for her. When Zound Delta 2 was complete, Phill sent photographs for the two artworks, and Karlrecords met with him twice to discuss details, but unfortunately he died unexpectedly in January, 2024, so the album now is a posthumous release. An intense goodbye from one of 20th century's most iconic composers.
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LP
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MOM 050LP
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$32.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/12/2024
LP version. Earth, Our Planet?: A call for environmental awareness. This time, Pedro Vian -- the founder of Modern Obscure Music -- presents his fourth solo album. Earth, Our Planet? promises to immerse listeners in a moving odyssey, crossing the boundaries of musical genres to provoke an urgent meditation on the protection of the planet. On this occasion Vian has composed the album influenced by the myth of the eternal return, the compositions are long and repetitive, generating states of pure trance. Pedro Vian, singular for his fusion of genres and styles, ventures into even more complex territories in Earth, Our Planet?. From the first listen, it is evident that this work treads the line of convention and breaks the boundaries of electronic and experimental music with artistic dexterity. The album weaves together texture, hypnotic rhythms and melody. Each track reveals his distinctive ability to create immersive landscapes, guiding the listener into deep emotional introspection. The album features high-caliber collaborations that add layers of creativity and elegance. Trumpeter Pierre Bastien, whose early productions left an indelible mark on Aphex Twin's Reflex label, infuses "A Day in Rotterdam" with a unique emotional resonance. Violinist Asia, renowned for her avant-garde approach and ability to conjure unique landscapes, elevates the album's opening tracks "Urobóros" and "Les Tambours Subterraniens." Their skill and sensitivity intertwine perfectly with Vian's artistic vision. In addition, Italian producer Daniele Mana, with whom Pedro Vian collaborated closely on his previous album Cascades (MOM 036LP, 2022), also contributes to "Les Tambours Subterraniens." There is also a collaboration with Raül Refree, an artist with whom Vian worked with in 2023, presenting "Font De la Vera Pau," an album that The Guardian defined as "a wonderful piece of electro-acoustic music, a captivating mix of strings and analogue synth drones which sometimes flirts with Alice Coltrane-ish spiritual jazz." With Earth, Our Planet?, Pedro Vian not only offers up some of his best work to date, but it is also a call to reflect on humanity's relationship with the natural world.
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CD
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MOM 050CD
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$13.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/12/2024
Earth, Our Planet?: A call for environmental awareness. This time, Pedro Vian -- the founder of Modern Obscure Music -- presents his fourth solo album. Earth, Our Planet? promises to immerse listeners in a moving odyssey, crossing the boundaries of musical genres to provoke an urgent meditation on the protection of the planet. On this occasion Vian has composed the album influenced by the myth of the eternal return, the compositions are long and repetitive, generating states of pure trance. Pedro Vian, singular for his fusion of genres and styles, ventures into even more complex territories in Earth, Our Planet?. From the first listen, it is evident that this work treads the line of convention and breaks the boundaries of electronic and experimental music with artistic dexterity. The album weaves together texture, hypnotic rhythms and melody. Each track reveals his distinctive ability to create immersive landscapes, guiding the listener into deep emotional introspection. The album features high-caliber collaborations that add layers of creativity and elegance. Trumpeter Pierre Bastien, whose early productions left an indelible mark on Aphex Twin's Reflex label, infuses "A Day in Rotterdam" with a unique emotional resonance. Violinist Asia, renowned for her avant-garde approach and ability to conjure unique landscapes, elevates the album's opening tracks "Urobóros" and "Les Tambours Subterraniens." Their skill and sensitivity intertwine perfectly with Vian's artistic vision. In addition, Italian producer Daniele Mana, with whom Pedro Vian collaborated closely on his previous album Cascades (MOM 036LP, 2022), also contributes to "Les Tambours Subterraniens." There is also a collaboration with Raül Refree, an artist with whom Vian worked with in 2023, presenting "Font De la Vera Pau," an album that The Guardian defined as "a wonderful piece of electro-acoustic music, a captivating mix of strings and analogue synth drones which sometimes flirts with Alice Coltrane-ish spiritual jazz." With Earth, Our Planet?, Pedro Vian not only offers up some of his best work to date, but it is also a call to reflect on humanity's relationship with the natural world.
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LP
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HG 2402LP
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$28.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 4/5/2024
Sound of Matter is the debut album by Romanian sound artist and composer Simina Oprescu. The two pieces draw on research conducted with 15 historical church bells at the Märkisches Museum and the Stadtmuseum Berlin. After the artist had presented the results of her studies of the connection between matter and harmony in the form of a multi-channel installation, she has translated the underlying approach of this site-specific work into an album that unfolds slowly, consistently setting in motion subtle tonal changes that continuously change the mood of the two pieces. Sound of Matter is both minimalist and maximalist, creating an infinitely rich and multi-layered dronescape that modestly invites its audience to get lost in the sonic experience. Oprescu has been fascinated by church bells since her childhood spent in Transylvania since the instruments were shrouded in mystery, as she explains in an in-depth essay that accompanies the album. She started working with the archive of the Märkisches Museum, which included 15 historical church bells that were built between the 15th and the early 19th century. Since every bell sounds different according to its shape, material, and density, Oprescu abstracted these qualities in a mathematical formula. This enabled her to recreate the harmonic tone of the individual bells with Max/MSP. She then composed a piece with semi-overlayed tones, i.e. overlapping frequencies. Naturally, this resulted in a beating effect that provided the music with a sense of urgency, though the five-second-long natural reverb of the Märkisches Museum's Große Halle turned it into a "warm blanket of sound," as the artist herself puts it. This is perfectly recreated on Sound of Matter due to the music being presented in mono, bringing out the intrinsic movement of the beatings with more nuance than a stereo version would. Sound of Matter feels warm and welcoming even when different frequencies seem to create friction between each other or when the subtle beating effects turn into throbbing rhythms like at the end of the record. It manages to explore both Oprescu's personal fascination with church bells and psychological and psychoacoustic questions relating to them as well as philosophical issues connected with them. This music is profoundly physical, but also intellectually stimulating -- perfectly at home in the catalogue of the Swiss Hallow Ground label between records by Kali Malone, Lawrence English, or Siavash Amini.
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ET 938-02LP
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Christina Kubisch (b. 1948) belongs to the first generation of sound artists and is among the most prominent European artists working in sound installation and electroacoustic composition today. Many of her works involve ephemeral phenomena such as ultraviolet light, solar energy and electromagnetic induction. She transforms them to make them perceivable acoustically and visually, thereby reminding the spectator of their presence while also allowing their aesthetic qualities to crystallize. Among her most well-known works is a project called Electrical Walks which employs specially-built headphones that receive electromagnetic signals from the environment and convert them into sound. She uses these headphones for auditory dérives through any given territory, guided by the sounds that are inaudible to passersby, and stopping wherever they seem interesting. Things like light systems, wireless communication systems, ATMs, anti-theft security devices, surveillance cameras, neon advertising, etc., have proven to emit particularly strong signals worth of being explored, often even sounding quite musical. Finally, Kubisch compiles her findings into a map and allows the public to use the headphones themselves to set off for own journeys. One sound source that has shown to be particularly worthwhile, and surprisingly varied throughout different countries, is public transportation. Zenger Station thus focuses on the electromagnetic sound qualities of trams, buses and related infrastructure. Side A is taken by the "Zenger Station" suite of three single pieces, composed from recordings Kubisch made in Prague in 2021 and 2022 and titled after the transformer station of the same name. Side B has a piece from 2021 called "A bus meets a tram meets a trolley" including tram, electric bus and trolley bus recordings from Rome, Bangkok and Bratislava, respectively. Edition of 300 with full-color sleeve and four-sided insert with photos, liner notes and an extensive interview with Christina Kubisch by Christoph Cox.
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KEPLARREV 017LP
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2003 album by Tujiko Noriko on vinyl for the first time, featuring new artwork. Edition of 500 copies with black poly-lined inners, and download featuring eight tracks. Keplar presents the first-ever vinyl edition of the 2003 album From Tokyo to Naiagara by Tujiko Noriko. This reissue with new artwork by Joji Koyama is an abridged version of the album as Tomlab label owner Tom Steinle and producer Aki Onda had originally intended to publish it alongside the original CD version. Written by the France-based Tujiko while she still lived in Japan, From Tokyo to Naiagara followed up on her two seminal Mego albums and marked a turning point in both the artist's career and personal life. Tujiko worked primarily with a Yamaha synthesizer and an MPC sampler while also incorporating contributions by other musicians such as Onda, Riow Arai, and Sakana Hosomi into the pieces. Sometimes approaching an IDM and clicks'n'cuts-style production or working with trip-hop and hip-hop beats while using conventional song structures in the most unconventional of ways, the album showcases her multifaceted influences and skills as a singer and musician to full effect. Tujiko describes producing it in close collaboration with Onda, who would relocate to New York City shortly after, as "quite Tokyo and very local." This music is looking back while moving forward. It is probably no surprise that its reissue too evokes tender memories of Onda and Steinle in Tujiko, while also reminding her of what lies ahead. Influenced in equal parts by the experience of strolling through previously unknown Tokyoite back alleys and thinking about the paths not (yet) taken, From Tokyo to Naiagara is precisely that: the perfect travel companion for a journey that leads its listeners from past to future.
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CD
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NMN 175CD
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$17.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 3/29/2024
Boston/Tenor/Index presents for the first time some of the earliest works by the American composer Phil Niblock, including the three never before released "Index" (1969), "Tenor" and "Boston III" (both from 1972), thus making it possible to discover Niblock's starting point as a composer. Until now, it's been impossible to encounter Niblock's compositions from earlier than the '80s, a reality thankfully rectified by the long overdue publication of this Boston/Tenor/Index, now on CD from Alga Marghen. "Tenor" (1972) represents the first evolution of Niblock's musical thought towards the aesthetics of microtones, overtones, and drones which the composer would develop in following decades. The piece was recorded by the photographer Martin Bough on tenor saxophone and gradually dubbed back and forth by the composer in his New York studio. The audio materials activated in "Tenor" through technologically de- and re-composed sounding textures, became a vehicle for those sound anomalies that would determine Niblock's audio poetics. Performing gestures are deconstructed though disseminating and editing processes by the imperceptible gestures of the composer. With its smooth flowing structure, "Boston III" (1972) stands at the very beginning of this illusion. It was recorded at the Intermedia Sound studio in Boston with Rhys Chatham (flute, voice), Martin Bough (tenor saxophone), and Gregory Reeve (viola, voice); the composer himself also contributed with his voice. "Index" (1969) is an improvised sound performance by the composer himself. The listener is lucky to listen to the movements of the artist's fingers hitting a guitar string and the soundboard in breathtaking tempo. The piece itself represents early minimalism in its virgin state, untouched by distancing technology. Guitar (both its body and strings), fingers and fingering fuse in a vehement action around which barely listenable sounds and resonances vibrate. This CD also includes "Boston I" (1972), or the first chapter of the "Boston" series. This 25-minute bonus track is less massive than "Boston III," but this version is much richer in dynamics and presents a more recognizable voice of each instrument. The music changes according to the loudness of playback. The interaction of the upper harmonics changes especially, with much richer overtone patterns being produced at louder levels. Edition of 300 copies in digipak sleeve, including an eight-page booklet with photos and liner notes.
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UR 150LP
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Solo debut album by Camila de Laborde aka Opuntia, who is part of the project Camila Fuchs. Pink color vinyl, edition of 300 copies. Includes download code. Mercurio is the debut album by Opuntia, the solo project of Mexico City producer Camila de Laborde. After three albums with her duo/band, Camila Fuchs (ATP/Felte, etc.), Camila decides to embark on a new path of musical and interpersonal exploration with Opuntia as her new alias, and with the album Mercurio as a statement of metamorphosis and creative process. Broadly speaking, Mercurio is a direct impact of beautiful melodies, rhythms, and voices that traverse a leftfield electronic pop axis, sprinkled with elegant nods to experimental transitions. In Mercurio, you can sense the spaces, textures, and echoes, akin to a sort of retro sci-fi analogy. Bass hits or percussions carry a weight that bursts forth yet delicately dissolves instantly -- perhaps another analogy, akin to liquid metal. From softness to fury across the ten songs, Opuntia proposes an artistic reinvention in constant movement. Speeds and spaces change, but the narrative remains consistent from beginning to end -- finding a place, a resolved utopia. Mercurio is darkly joyful, with substantial doses of sophisticated pop.
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SR 462CD
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The anthology Spectra Ex Machina brings together rare documents pertaining to so-called occult phenomena, most of them taken from little-known archives. In the course of three volumes, this series traces an audio history of parapsychology through the exploration of spiritualism and haunted houses (Vol. 1); musician mediums (Vol. 2); experiences of extrasensory perceptions (clairvoyance, psychokinesis, etc.) and electronic voice phenomena (Vol. 3). The link between music, sound and the paranormal is manifested in many different ways. Gerard van der Leeuw, the Dutch historian and philosopher, wrote "Music represents the great struggle of reaching the wholly other, which it can never express." Furthermore, "The effect of music on the emotions is so mysterious as to seem magical. There is no logical explanation why a particular combination of musical notes, whether in the form of a tune or of a simple chord, can affect the heart. Nothing in nature has perhaps so persistently resisted explanation," as said Derek Parker, the British journalist. Since music is arguably the most intangible of the arts and since the paranormal, in all its manifestations, continues to intrigue people, the placing of these two subjects together seems obvious. This second volume of musical and audio anomalies continues and expands upon the works initially reproduced in the latter. Rosemary Brown makes a welcome re-appearance, especially with a performance of Grübelei via Liszt, as well as the Caruso-inspired tenor Leo May making a repeat performance. Few people realize that both Anton LaVey and Aleister Crowley were quite fine musicians and Alex Sanders was also interested in music. The background music of Wagner's Tannhäuser used by the latter combines both pagan and Christian elements. So close your eyes and let the magic of sound take over! Also featuring David Behr, Jack Webber, Robert, Rita Goold, Leslie Flint, Leo, Carmen Rogers, Uri Geller, Jean-Louis Victor, Joe Meek, Howard Menger, Barbara The Gray Witch, and Rev. Patrick J. Berkery, Ph. D.
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CELL 012LP
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New recordings by Mouchoir Étanche (Marc Richter) aka Black To Comm. Edition of 300 copies. Le jazz homme is the second album of Black To Comm related entity Mouchoir Ètanche. This time heavily influenced by French jazz as well as the usual suspects: Nurse With Wound, Luc Ferrari, JG Ballard, Surrealism. The human entity has finally been replaced. "Program music, instrumental music that carries some extramusical meaning, some 'program' of literary idea, legend, scenic description, or personal drama. It is contrasted with so-called absolute, or abstract, music, in which artistic interest is supposedly confined to abstract constructions in sound. It has been stated that the concept of program music does not represent a genre in itself but rather is present in varying degrees in different works of music." (Encyclopedia Britannica). Prompt 1: Pascal Comelade's toy piano falling down the stairs , Hector Zazou pushing from behind, laughing. Prompt 2: Cool jazz played on antique mellotron, low in fidelity, and sad, Glenn Miller's grandma crying silently. Prompt 3: A hippie commune version of jazz as played by a cheap computer fed by Chat GPT with medieval cuisine fanfare information and samples, trained on the entire Amon Düül II history, heavily looped yet unsynchronized. Prompt: 4: Same, but flutes and synths and trance and chants. Prompt 5: French female artist philosophizes about Shirley Temple, mysterious atmosphere, insensitive homme laughing nervously, heavily looped, hypnotic 18th century morgue de salon underneath. Prompt 6: Cool jazz, Echoplex, strange rhythm, Blue Note daydreaming. Prompt 7: Hammond jazz with fake Cyro Baptista loop, Madagascar indri indri lemurs chanting fake sax solos in Malagasy language, electronic bells. Prompt 8: German jazz and artificial prayers, and Shirley Temple returning, with defect Publison recorded at GRM, destroying the voice recording. Prompt 9: Andrei Tarkovsky's moustache meets Johann Sebastian Bach's wig, a well gently lapping in the background, fifths, car crashing into a poor violent onsen geisha. Marc Richter records as Black To Comm and under the Mouchoir Ètanche and Jemh Circs monikers (and solo) for his own Cellule 75 imprint. He collaborated with visual artists such as Ho Tzu Nyen, Jan van Hasselt, and Mike Kelley. He also produces soundtracks and acousmatic multichannel installations for institutions such as INA GRM Paris, ZKM Karlsruhe and Kunstverein Hamburg.
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SR 461CD
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The anthology Spectra Ex Machina brings together rare documents pertaining to so-called occult phenomena, most of them taken from little-known archives. In the course of three volumes, this series traces an audio history of parapsychology through the exploration of spiritualism and haunted houses (Vol. 1); musician mediums (Vol. 2); experiences of extrasensory perceptions (clairvoyance, psychokinesis, etc.) and electronic voice phenomena (Vol. 3). The documents gathered here are, by their extravagance and far-fetched aspects, more than the mere objects of belief one would be tempted to reduce them to. They are vestiges of aberrant phenomena, fossils of an unknown civilization buried in the depths of the unconscious that are revived, in a way, when audiences listen to them. They can be understood as "works," in the full artistic sense of the word, and constitute a kind of "cabinet of sound curiosities" that is worthy of aesthetic interest. Sometimes imbued with a disconcerting dramatic intensity, these documents bear the features of an authentic time machine, placing the listener in the position of a witness of the time immersed in the dim darkness of the experimental hall. And it is at that precise moment that the aesthetic power of these archives takes precedence over their probative value. Their somewhat old-fashioned charm, maintained by the surface noise of magnetic tapes and old wax disks, gets stronger with each listen. Comes with 32-page booklet.
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KOO 009LP
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Io is the result of a process that started in 2022 during the composition of the music for Bertolt Brecht's play Life of Galileo, directed by Carolina Frände, at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm. In Galileo's search for the unseen, he points his telescope to the sky, expanding human perception and our understanding of the world. Here, the electromagnetic fields of the theatre stage are recorded using a sort of anti-radio, an artisanal pocket electromagnetic detector, in line with the significance of the Neosurrationalist bridge between art and science inaugurated by Koo Editions. Sculpting and arranging these frequencies became a compositional practice that began with the track entitled "Io", named after the moon Io, which was one of Galileo's first discoveries. The album was made at the legendary Elektronmusikstudion in the spring of 2023 and finalized during a summer residency at Palazzo Stabile, Piemonte, Italy.
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KRXN 026LP
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Presenting the second thematic volume on the Aquapelagos series -- a collection of split LPs where selected artists offer their own take into water surrounded cultures and communities. After the initial release of the anthology compilation Aquapelago in 2022 and the split LP Atlantico by Lagoss & Banha da Cobra, Keroxen introduces a unique collaboration in the series in the shape of no other than two improvising giants, Mike Cooper and Pierre Bastien. This second volume blows the lid wide open with a sound journey inspired by the equally majestic and mysterious Indian Ocean, a wide space of open ocean bounded by Africa, to the west, Asia to the north and north-west and Australia, to the south west.
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INT 30041LP
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"2024 re-release. The renowned and widely acclaimed music label Intuition, well known since the 1980s, is proud to announce the release of its most important and successful back-catalogue titles on vinyl under the name 'Intuition Master Series'. The American trumpeter and multi-instrumentalist Jon Hassell (March 22, 1937-June 26, 2021) was an international legend despite never having managed a popular breakthrough. Hassell was a musical visionary and pioneer, one who was inspired by ambient sounds and new music. He appreciated the music of avant-gardists such as Stockhausen, in whose Cologne school he also studied. He came into contact with Terry Riley and his minimalistic music early on and played on his first albums. Hassell was also a musically driven person, someone who had to get to the bottom of styles. Thus, he was intensively involved with Far Eastern, but especially Indian music. Using the ingredients he learned, he created a completely new way of playing on and with the trumpet. He created language-like modulated air currents flowing through the instrument to produce seemingly alien, microtonal sounds. He combined this technique with ethnic polyrhythms, electronic alienation, soundscapes and jazz to create his own style, which he called 'Fourth World'. With this kind of music, he significantly influenced numerous emerging styles such as world music, nujazz or ambient. It is no mistake to say that without Hassell's ideas, these types of music would have taken a very different course. Hassell's influence on the music world cannot be overestimated, even if he himself was always unimpressed by the praise. 'It's the invisible things that buzz around us. You just have to bring them to light and make them visible.' In a tried and tested association with Brian Eno (as producer), his first completely live-recorded album was released at that time. The individual pieces, which were recorded in Paris, Vancouver, Hamburg and Brussels, reflect the special atmosphere that made every (rare) Jon Hassell concert something extraordinary. Intuition's 1987 The Surgeon of the Nightsky Restores Dead Things by the Power of Sound is undoubtedly one of his best works."
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ASH 15-0CD
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$14.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 2/16/2024
Written and performed by Ian Wellman. The Night the Stars Fell is a journey that begins in a fire-scarred forest. The fourth album by Ian Wellman, and his Ash International debut, The Night the Stars Fell is built from field recordings from the forests and deserts of Southern California, shortwave radio static, and cassette tape loops layered in distortion. The eleven tracks across the album are carried by the physicality of wind which drove the fires that burned the forests where the sounds were recorded. The Night the Stars Fell explores a time of rebuilding, of searching for a new path. Ian Wellman is a sound artist currently residing in Los Angeles, CA. His recordings have been published by Room40, Dragon's Eye Recordings, Luminous Drift, and Industrial Coast. Ian is an IATSE Y-1 journeyman, and a member of the LA-based sound collective VOLUME. Recorded, composed, and mixed in Los Angeles between 2021-2023. Field recordings recorded in the forests and deserts of Southern California.
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