Browse by Label: MIASMAH (UK)

Artist:	VA
Title:	Silva
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 001CD

Originally released in 2006. This compilation features appearances from Yasume, Julien Neto, Ryan Teague, Marsen Jules and Deaf Center. Silva is the debut release from Norwegian-based label Miasmah, yet it is by no means their first foray into the music scene. After working as a net-label releasing MP3 albums and EPs for years, featuring artists such as Helios, Paavoharju and Deaf Center. No surprise then, that holding the reigns at Miasmah is Erik Skodvin, one half of the aforementioned and always mysterious Deaf Center. While compiling this compilation, Skodvin asked artists he had worked with and who he admired to create a track with a theme in mind; theatrical and dark organic music. Hearing Deaf Center's Pale Ravine would give you a good idea of this sound, yet Skodvin wanted to take it further, and in doing so he has managed to collect some of the best artists working in the genre at the moment. Opening the compilation is newcomer Makunouchi Bento, who contributes a solemn piano piece, before Type mainstay Julien Neto launches into "Ninety Four." City Centre Offices double act Yasume also make an extremely rare appearance with "Wakare" (which for those interested means "Farewell" in Japanese...), a Lynchian fusion of strings and digitally-enhanced beats. Marsen Jules, also of City Centre Offices, offers up yet more of the droney orchestral goodness we have come to love with "Rainy Days In Milan," and Type's Ryan Teague takes the orchestral theme even further with a dark violin piece, guaranteed to send shivers down your spine. As the record comes to a close, with the blood curdling tryptich of Dead Center, Svarte Greiner (Erik Skodvin's solo project) and Lampse's Jasper TX one thing is on your mind, to press play once more and re-live the darkly mysterious dreamscape that is Silva. Other artists include Gultskra Artikler, Library Tapes, and Greg Haines.

Artist:	HAINES, GREG
Title:	Slumber Tides
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 003CD

Originally released on the Miasmah label in 2006. Hearing the expertly-constructed and deeply sensitive post-classical pieces featured on Slumber Tides, it is difficult to comprehend that this is a young musician. Harking from the boredom-filled lands of Greater Surrey in England, Haines quickly tired of school life and found himself immersed in music, and in a move indicative of the current trend of our disillusioned youth, became obsessed with the intrigue of experimental sound. Travelling through Europe whenever he could and sleeping on the floors of musicians he would contact by email, he quickly built up a network of friends, most importantly in Oslo, Norway where he spent time with Deaf Center's Erik Skodvin (who also runs the Miasmah imprint) and his collaborator Kristin Evensen Giaver who contributes her haunting vocals on a number of Haines' tracks. In Sweden, Haines met up with Lampse's Dag Rosenqvist (Jasper TX) who kindly provided his pump organ skills. His nomadic existence is represented beautifully on the album, which opens majestically with "Snow Airport," a slowly building work of looped cello sounds played by Haines himself. The structure is similar in sound to the phasing experiments of Steve Reich or the electronic/acoustic works of Ryan Teague, but Haines has injected enough of his own personality and experience to give the compositions a distinct sense of gravitas and a refreshing narrative. The second piece, "Submergence" builds over nine minutes with Kristin Evensen Giaver's shimmering vocals drifting over waves of cello and subtle electronic structures until it reaches an almost cacophonous peak and dips into breathless squeaks and groans. By the time we reach the album's centerpiece "Arups Gate," we have already been on a rich emotional journey, but Haines doesn't let off yet, instead, he takes us even further into epic territory with xylophone and glockenspiel tones serving as the backbone of the track as those signature cello sounds swoop overhead. This track feels as if it could be married with any number of films or stories -- yet Haines shows an incredible sense of restraint, never letting the music get too melodramatic or overdone. For a debut album, Slumber Tides is a simply remarkable accomplishment.

Artist:	IRISARRI, RAFAEL ANTON
Title:	Daydreaming
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 004CD

2009 repress; originally released on the Miasmah label in 2007. Seattle-based multi-instrumentalist Rafael Anton Irisarri is the latest in a growing number of electronic musicians returning to that hallowed of instruments -- the piano. It has become something of a cliché now for the electronic musician to turn to the humble keys in the hope of adding something organic into the mix, but it would be frivolous to pass Daydreaming off in such a manner. Rather than an electronic album with elements of piano, Daydreaming sounds like a record written for piano which somehow manages to utilize current technology in its production. As the drifting synthesizers lap around the feet of a majestic piano part in the album's opening track "Waking Expression," it is startlingly clear that there is more to Irisarri than mere stereotyping. Rather, this is a carefully-constructed soundtrack to your most intriguing dreams, the dreams you might remember for a split second before losing everything, only to have images creep up on you some time later. Those of you left spellbound by Deaf Center's haunting and beautiful Pale Ravine album will be pleased to know that Daydreaming continues in the tradition of murky, theatrical and deeply imaginative music quite wonderfully. Even Lynch is hinted at again with the album's clear highlight "Lumberton" (possibly a reference to Blue Velvet's troubled small-town) and as the emotive piano shimmers around radio static and lightly picked guitar, it is impossible not to get drawn into the shattered American dream. This is rich, visual music showing a dark, melancholic side to American life and captured perfectly by an artist unafraid to bear his soul to the world. Uncluttered and subtly realized, Daydreaming is maybe best summed up as it draws to a close with a gaseous ambience, drawing you in for the last time before the inevitable repeat play. Pure, uninterrupted bliss.

Artist:	IRISARRI, RAFAEL ANTON
Title:	Daydreaming
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	LP
Price:	$18.00
Catalog #:	MIA 004LP

Originally released on CD by the Miasmah label in 2007, now available on vinyl. Championed by the likes of David Sylvian and Thom Yorke, Daydreaming is the stunning debut album from Seattle's Rafael Anton Irisarri. Released to great critical acclaim, Daydreaming is a collection of piano-led instrumental compositions of astonishing beauty. This sounds like a record written for piano, but it also incorporates an array of modern sound sources in its production. As the drifting synthesizers lap around the feet of a majestic piano part in the album's opening track "Waking Expression," it is startlingly clear that there is more to Irisarri than mere stereotyping. Rather, this is a carefully-constructed soundtrack to your most intriguing dreams, the dreams you might remember for a split second before losing everything, only to have images creep up on you some time later. Those of you left spellbound by Deaf Center's haunting and beautiful Pale Ravine album will be pleased to know that Daydreaming continues in the tradition of murky, theatrical and deeply imaginative music. Lines of comparison can be drawn between Irisarri's compositional approach and the work of artists as varied as Machinefabriek, Peter Broderick and Mogwai. This is rich, visual music showing a dark, melancholic side to American life and captured perfectly by an artist unafraid to bear his soul to the world. Daydreaming offers another chance to discover a highlight release from the Miasmah label's earlier days. On purple-colored vinyl.

Artist:	ELEGI
Title:	Sistereis
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 005CD

2009 repress, originally released on Miasmah in 2007. Since Knive from Svarte Greiner (Miasmah boss Erik Skodvin), the world has been waiting eagerly for the next addition to the acoustic doom canon. Maybe fitting then, that it should also come from Oslo, as we all know that Norway is home to everything that is dark and all that is desolate. Sistereis is the debut solo release from Tommy Jansen aka Elegi, a man who besides crafting effortlessly mysterious Lynchian soundscapes, takes time out of his everyday life to go wreck-diving. For those of you unfamiliar with this sport, it involves diving into the deep sea to explore shipwrecks; empty maritime museums of lost life and forgotten history. This deep obsession is reflected in the album's title "Sistereis" which is a word used for a ship's doomed final voyage, a theme which is followed closely throughout the recording. It is hardly surprising then that Jansen, an experienced studio engineer and classically-trained musician, took his love of sound into the deep seas and while diving, made reel upon reel of waterlogged recordings. These passages of sound, which Jansen believes capture the ghosts of the shipwrecks, formed the basis of many of the album's tracks, and if you listen very closely, you hear the deep seas rumbling around you. Within the haunted piano melodies and scraping of damp wood, there are much deeper, much more frightening sounds to be heard -- and using his personal knowledge of all things watery, Jansen has truly created the next chapter in the black book of acoustic doom. Where better to find influence for such music than the frightening world of forgotten souls that is the sea, and while the choppy blue expanse may have lent itself to many an album, there is something devastatingly original about Jansen's approach. Maybe it is down to his deep historical knowledge, or maybe it is down to simple compositional skill, but it is almost impossible to listen to Sistereis without being thrust into a blackened world of stormy waters and drifting bodies. A truly epic record which is sure to appeal to fans of Earth, Wolfmangler, Angelo Badalamenti and of course, Svarte Greiner, this is something for the darker nights. Turn the lights down low, make sure the windows are locked tightly and drift away -- just watch out for that rolling fog -- there's no telling what the seas might bring.

Artist:	GULTSKRA ARTIKLER
Title:	Kasha Iz Topora
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 006CD

Last time we came across Russian pranksters Gultskra Artikler, they were a duo comprising of Alexey Devyanin and Dmitry Garin, but since the release of the haunting Pofigistka on the Lampse label in 2006, Garin has left the band leaving Devyanin to come up with the most definitive Gultskra Artikler statement to date; Kasha Iz Topora. The entire record, which plays continuously through its hour-long duration, is set to a fairytale written by a friend of Devayanin, detailing the adventures of a man with an axe that makes flying porridge (based on a traditional Russian tale). The macabre elements of the disc's storyline provides ample source material for Devayanin to weave his processed darkness in and out of folk-tinged guitar parts, knee-trembling vocals and all manner of other obscure instrumentation. Kasha Iz Topora is one of those records that truly sounds on its own in an overpopulated music scene, and Devyanin has truly developed his windswept sound stories over years of careful experimentation and fine-tuning. Hailing from Novosibirsk in Siberia, he has much to draw influence from -- wrapping up warm and constructing choppy experimental music on an archaic personal computer was only one way of keeping his mind off the intense world outside, drawing influence from such artists as Leafcutter John, Jackie-O Motherfucker and Tod Dockstader. This record is a new stage in the development of not only Gultskra Artikler, but in the ever-growing Miasmah label. If you give this album the time and let yourself fall into its cryptic story, you may find this the strangest and most involving record you'll hear this year.

Artist:	JACASZEK
Title:	Treny
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 007CD

Michal Jacaszek's Treny is the seventh release from Norway's Miasmah label -- a label that has already created a unique and distinctive identity for itself through a string of releases existing on the darker side of the musical spectrum -- each artist shares a similar aesthetic and a penchant for introspective, lamenting, classically-influenced music. With this in mind, no better home comes to mind for Poland's Jacaszek. The opening track, "Rytm To Nieśmiertelność I" sets the dimly-lit scene perfectly. A beautifully-arranged string quartet and a lonesome female voice are framed with waves of distant underwater rumbles and creaks, with fragments of harp occasionally surfacing to release mournful motifs onto the dense musical canvas. Jacaszek so perfectly blends acoustic and electronic sounds, that it is hard to tell where tape loops end and forlorn violin melodies begin. By the beginning of the second piece, the appropriately titled "Lament," Jacaszek has already firmly established a sound for himself. Clearly influenced by the liturgical compositions of Henryk Gorecki and John Tavener, with a healthy pinch of Angelo Badalamenti's mood-setting soundscapes, Jacaszek manages to find his own niche somewhere between Murcof and Francois Tetaz's indispensable score for Wolf Creek -- somewhere dark and mysterious, but ultimately beautifully rewarding and moving. There are traces of optimism in these songs, and as the album ends, the clouds turn from a heavy grey to an uplifting palette of autumnal shades, as a subtle rhythm emerges to gently guide the listener into lighter pastures. Despite the somewhat uplifting ending, as the last note strikes, you may find yourself wanting to turn back into the darkness and start the whole adventure again.

Artist:	JACASZEK
Title:	Treny
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	LP
Price:	$18.00
Catalog #:	MIA 007LP

Originally released on CD by Miasmah in 2008, now available in a limited LP version. Poland's Jacaszek has managed with Treny to assemble an album so heart-stoppingly beautiful and personal, that you'll been stunned into silence for its entire 45-minute duration. With string arrangements provided courtesy of Stefan Wesolowski, the foundations of the album are set with cello and violin painting fragile outlines colored by subtle electronic manipulations, harp, piano and reduced, haunting voices. Unlike so many of his contemporaries, Michal Jacaszek doesn't make use of any samples, with everything on the album assembled by the musicians on hand (notably Maja Sieminska, Anja Smiszek-Wesolowska and Wesolowski and Jacaszek themselves) -- and the subtle grandeur of the album is almost impossible to take in over one sitting, even if the impact is absolutely immediate. Marsen Jules, Arvo Pärt, Zbigniew Preisner's soundtrack work for Krzysztof Kieslowski, Deaf Center, Max Richter, Erik Satie, Alberto Iglesias -- if you are familiar with any or all of these names, then this album will no doubt end up on your essential listening pile for the foreseeable future. This just feels like a hugely important piece of work.

Artist:	JASPER TX
Title:	Black Sleep
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 008CD

This is the fifth full-length release by Swedish musician, Dag Rosenqvist aka Jasper TX. Black Sleep, in a way, feels like the album he has been building up to for some time now, as if all his previous experiences in creating haunting, oft-beautiful soundscapes have been harvested and fine-tuned. Originally conceived as one continuous track, Black Sleep is no random collection of songs -- it is one work, one statement. Ambitious as it may be, it's impossible to deny its resounding success. As is often the case with Jasper TX's music, the guitar plays a prominent role. This album sees every conceivable sound caressed and tortured from the instrument, from the romantic and direct chimes of "Pt. III" to the distant whisper of "Pt. IV." Rosenqvist states Oren Ambarchi, Johann Johannsson, Arvo Pärt and Tim Hecker amongst his influences -- something that gives some insight into the sound and scale of this release. Impossible to explain in simple terms, comparisons could also be made to Deathprod, with sounds slowly emerging and disappearing into thick clouds of murky warmth. Black Sleep is also akin to a symphony -- its orchestra made from guitars, pianos and synthesizers instead of the usual strings and brass. This release is possibly one of Rosenqvist's darkest moments, its bleakness somewhat in tribute to the soundtracks and visual artistry of David Lynch's Mulholland Drive. This is music for rainy days spent indoors, looking out towards a vacant street while tracing the build up and release of condensation droplets. This release is a stand-out for the Miasmah label and will undoubtedly be remembered as Jasper TX's most concise and accomplished album to date.

Artist:	ELEGI
Title:	Varde
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 009CD

Norwegian composer Elegi (Tommy Jansen) returns with Varde, the second installment of a trilogy on Miasmah Recordings. '"Varde" (trans. cairn: a pile of stones, used as a monument or marker), tells the story of the pioneer Polar explorers who risked their lives to go to some of the most hostile places on earth, to conquer land and to "triumph" over the elements. Inspired by this, Elegi's music explores the feelings those brave men must have felt, as they went into the unknown, well aware that they might never see their families again. Ice cold winds and blizzards, creaking ice, stormy waters, constant hunger, isolation, disease and death, provide the basis for the music, depicting the immensity and scale of these great white landscapes. Varde is an incredibly accomplished body of work, its natural progression of movements transporting the listener through cinematic soundscapes and evocative passages of intense, doom-laden, droning acoustic instruments. The eerie, underlying sounds taken from seemingly unrecognizable sources, add to the feelings of unresolved tension, and with them bring into focus the ambition of the compositions -- the likes of which can be found in the later work of Scott Walker. The album's opening tracks, it could be suggested, recall aspects of the slow-build of Gorecki's 3rd Symphony, with the murk of Gavin Bryars' The Sinking Of The Titanic; a hollow-sounding and desolate part-composed/part-improvised harmony. A sorrowful solo violin emerging from the abstract ambience sets the tone for this journey, musically a reflection of the lonely voyager's terrain; something at once so utterly desolate yet so equally staggering in its awe-inspiring beauty. As the journey progresses, the compositions shift through the barren lands, instilling an array of emotions; despair and confusion, loss, hope and determination, always with a constant and unrelenting sense of movement forward. This time around, the artists garnered help from musicians he admired, to give the record an extra dimension, with violin, percussion, double bass and musical saw. Elegi operates in the area between composed and improvised music, building bridges between classical music and dark ambient drones and textures. His love for Victorian storytelling also shines through -- imagine Edgar Allan Poe as a music composer and you might get an idea of what this sounds like.

Artist:	KRENG
Title:	L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 010CD

L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu is the incredible debut album from Belgian artist, Kreng. Upon initial listening, this recording immediately presents itself as a fully-realized body of work, with focus, flow and continuity. It may therefore come as a surprise to discover that the album mainly comprises recordings created for a variety of separate theater productions, and even more of a surprise to learn that the compositions found here are sample-based constructions. The pieces incorporate sounds and material from a variety of sources: free-jazz, new electronic-generated sounds, classical modernism and vintage geographical recordings. The subtleties of the techniques Kreng has employed in the creation of these pieces is simply stunning. Discordant segments of wailing, top-end violins give way to clunking rhythmic passages of metal marimbas and tuned percussion; free-roaming passages of rasping, low-end brass and the shuffle of free-jazz recall the work of Prestige-era Moondog, as well as aspects of Harry Partch's instrumentation via mid- to latter-day period Tom Waits -- all are at work here. Atonal ambiance and slow builds, eerie segues into low murk, and a haunting solo soprano voice are all pulled together to make perfect sense, often in terrifying ways. The creative process in Kreng's twisted soundscapes works perhaps in parallel with the abstract and often disturbing work of Belgium's Abattoir Fermé theater company, which has used many of the scores found here in a variety of their productions. In this context, the dark and threatening moods the album creates suggest it may house more subversive, ritualistic, even occult undertones; and in fact, Kreng's music is based upon the possibility of silence as a confrontational weapon. L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu also features suitably twisted artwork coordinated by Erik Skodvin aka Svarte Greiner aka Deaf Center. Includes 7 additional tracks not available on the previously-released vinyl version.

Artist:	KRENG
Title:	L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	LP
Price:	$18.00
Catalog #:	MIA 010LP

LP version, pressed on limited edition green vinyl. L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu is the incredible debut album from Belgian artist, Kreng. Upon initial listening, L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu immediately presents itself as a fully-realized body of work, with focus, flow and continuity. It may therefore come as a surprise to discover that the album mainly comprises recordings created for a variety of separate theatre productions, and even more of a surprise to learn that the compositions found here are sample-based constructions. The pieces incorporate sounds and material from a variety of sources: free-jazz, new electronic-generated sounds, classical modernism and vintage geographical recordings. The subtleties of the techniques Kreng has employed in the creation of these pieces is simply stunning. Discordant segments of wailing, top-end violins give way to clunking rhythmic passages of metal marimbas and tuned percussion; free-roaming passages of rasping, low-end brass and the shuffle of free-jazz recall the work of Prestige-era Moondog, as well as aspects of Harry Partch's instrumentation via mid- to latter-day period Tom Waits -- all are at work here. Atonal ambiance and slow builds, eerie segues into low murk, and a haunting solo soprano voice are all pulled together to make perfect sense, often in terrifying ways. The creative process in Kreng's twisted soundscapes works perhaps in parallel with the abstract and often disturbing work of Belgium's Abattoir Fermé theater company, which has used many of the scores found here in a variety of their productions. In this context, the dark and threatening moods the album creates suggest it may house more subversive, ritualistic, even occult undertones; and in fact, Kreng's music is based upon the possibility of silence as a confrontational weapon. L'Autopsie Phénoménale De Dieu also features suitably twisted artwork coordinated by Erik Skodvin aka Svarte Greiner aka Deaf Center.

Artist:	SCOTT, SIMON
Title:	Navigare
Label:	MIASMAH (UK)
Format:	CD
Price:	$14.50
Catalog #:	MIA 011CD

This is the debut full-length release by the UK's Simon Scott. Scott has had a notable musical past: in the early '90s he was the drummer for the renowned shoegaze band Slowdive. Upon leaving Slowdive, he formed the more electronic-based group Televise. He also set up his own label, Kesh Recordings, and has so far released titles by the likes of Hannu, Sebastian Roux, Aus and Mark Templeton. More recently, Scott has been involved in several diverse projects, including his work as a member of Seavault (with Antony Ryan from Isan), and collaborations with Machinefabriek, Jasper TX and Emmanuele Errante. With Navigare, there are shades of Scott's previous output and musical interests, but as a whole, the album marks a bold new direction. Navigare opens with "Introduction Of Cambridge," a shimmering wall of sound, its ethereal tones and slow-burning drones gradually drawing closer and closer, creating gorgeous uplifting melodies and textures. The processed guitar combined with gentle swathes of interference and underlying rhythms echoes the processes of Chain Reaction's productions as much as it does the screeching, arcing feedback lines of Kevin Shield's guitar work. Navigare shares an affinity with the melodic content of Fennesz's work, the dark beauty of Tim Hecker's sound, and houses elements of the restraint found in Andrew Chalk's drone compositions. What really devastates here is Scott's ability to merge ambient passages with such memorable melodic cycles, taking the simplest of ideas and building on them, generating murky hooks and submerged "riffs." Scott explores textures using a variety of instruments including sitar, violin, cello, and flute, merging them with excerpts from field recordings; it all sounds so effortless. The looping rhythms and slow guitars rise and grow, at times approaching something oppressive; select pieces such as "Flood Inn" house an underlying weight, comparable to Justin K. Broderick's Jesu and Final projects. Perhaps the hazy drums, bass and guitar drift of "The ACC" presents the most recognizable of stylistic qualities from Scott's back catalog; a groove that recalls the Souvlaki-era sound in all its glory, re-imagined in a new, darker and more expansive form. Additionally, a guest appearance from label mate Jasper TX, a vocal contribution from Moskitoo, and a track co-written with Rafael Anton Irisarri, adds even more depth to Scott's already ambitious vision.

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