Browse by Label: PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)

Artist:	VA
Title:	Pingipung plays: the piano
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	PING 006CD

"It was around two years ago that the four Pingipung label founders were sitting in a car, listening to the piano-play of their favourite Icelandic band, when one of them remarked a piano should sound just like that. With their decision to start a song collection in honour of this instrument, the four initiated comprehensive measures to prove to themselves the very contrary. Listen closely and realise: The piano doesn't need to do anything at all. It wants to be touched. On this record, 17 artists lay their hands upon this big, wooden box. Whether introverted or straightforward, the results deliver an impressive, electronica-saturated piano overview, in its most diverse facets." Artists: Lawrence, Nils Frahm, Mister Tingle, Barbara Morgenstern & Robert Lippok, Hauschka, Grabuk, Peter Presto, Petit Nuage, DJ Nalesniki, Coloma, Guido Mobius, Egobird, Spinning Tap, Florian Grote, Springintgut, Adam Butler, Thaddi.

Artist:	VANISHING BREED
Title:	Between Arrival and Departure
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	PING 008CD

"Alexander Holmes is a British singer-songwriter who is currently based in Berlin. He's also the mastermind of the anarchistic London crew 'They Came From The Stars, I Saw Them.' His solo project is called Vanishing Breed and it would be rather a shame if someone like him were actually among the species to become extinct. Songwriter, guitarist and poet Alexander Holmes has developed a wonderful and unique style all of his own. Vanishing Breed uses surreal imagery for his lyrics, while his music often tends to have an element of misplacement. A moment of irritation -- like a stain on a shirt or a picture that hangs crooked in its frame. What makes the music of Vanishing Breed so particular is the surprise factor, the deliberate out-of-placeness and unexpectedly drastic. Naïve, merry songs tripping over their feet from the abrupt hefty dancehall beat. Rhythmic changes and sudden chaos in the arrangement prevents the listener from getting too comfortable while enjoying the warm-sounding voice and the Africanesque high-life guitar picking. Holmes' humour and the often slightly surreal settings of his stories unite in fantastic, dreamy alliances. Vanishing Breed is interested in the poetry that can be found in strange everyday situations. He not only takes us into the parallel worlds of airports and train stations, to the waiting lounges of long-distance relationships. No -- this album is a parallel world in itself, full of people waltzing and waving from balconies."

Artist:	PRESTO, PETER
Title:	Schon, Das Du Mal Wieder Reinhorst
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	PING 009CD

"Now, some four years later, during which Peter Presto contributed to two compilations, and, to 'der Spiegel's attention, remixed Edmund Stoiber, he returns with some old and some more new songs, collected in album format. What's in it for you? Probably the most laid-back contribution to your personal summer soundtrack-of-your-life, full of engaging synth hooks and melodies with haunting potential. A cornucopia of solar heat, constantly jumping from swaying moods to silliness and back again. Whether roots in ska, reggae, dub or even schlager ultimately predominate, or whether his music stands beyond such categorisations, is entirely up to the listener. One thing is clear though: the humour dies last. The lament is over. Peter Presto shows us that life is easier with a good mood."

Artist:	KACIREK, SVEN
Title:	The Palmin Sessions
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	PING 011CD

"Through Sven Kacirek's solo debut runs a special, peculiar tension between rhythmic speed, a deep calm full of harmonics, and discreet electronics. Tubular bells are omnipresent, the marimba sounds warm, the jazz brush beats (on glass, wood or paper) are virtuoso, the arrangements surprising. The dry concreteness of natural percussive instruments is brought out by Sven Kacirek in a repetitive, subtle harmony, without obtruding. The Palmin Sessions unites two extremes: urban fever and contemplative calm. By forgoing the use of synthesizers, and playing exclusively acoustic instruments live, Sven creates an utterly individual, intimate and captivating sound pattern that spellbinds right from the first few tones."

Artist:	HOLMES, A.J.
Title:	The King of the New Electric Hi-Life
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	PING 012CD

"After two records, he takes the step towards making music only under his own name. Now Vanishing Breed is called A.J. Holmes. Furthermore, the bold album title The King of the New Electric Hi-Life tells the listener: here's someone who takes royal pride in presenting his music, and that music is West-African Hi-Life folk tradition imbued in finest electronica. The King of the New Electric Hi-Life is West-African tradition turned into a contemporary example of British/European modern pop: this is the formula from which A.J. Holmes develops irresistible dance tracks like 'Lumumba Berlin Sex City,' instrumentals with a fragile swing like 'Schloss Lanke,' pop tunes with earworm qualities like 'For Export Only,' or heart-warming love songs like 'Nino.' However, A.J. Holmes isn't only one, but many, because the album has just as many different faces, atmospheres and ethnic influences as the currently Berlin-based Brit himself. Anne Laplantine as well as João Orecchia, Robert Truscott and Shintaro Taketani support him musically, and his tracks are crowned by his own emotional and sometimes self-ironic lyrics."

Artist:	GOTO80
Title:	Made On Internet
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	PING 013CD

"Considering the global distribution of computer technology for already over 30 years, the Demoscene and the related Chiptunes music have never really had a high profile. Maybe that's because of their non-commercial background, or because making obsolete digital technology the center of cultural production is mostly an insider's passion. Call it 'Geek-Art for Geeks.' In today's electronic music, the sounds of Gameboy, C64, and other discarded game hardware have gained cult status, propelled by an enthusiastic community. A key character in this permanent dedication to chiptunes is Anders Carlsson from Sweden. He has been an active member of the demoscene for almost 15 years and known under the name of GOTO80 for almost a decade. Always driven by the everlasting challenge to compose music for the best C64 demo. His knowledge of the sonic core of the C64, the legendary SID-Chip, is awesome. Just as exceptional are his musical intuition and his stylistic variety, combined with his technical skills. Made On Internet brings together 11 of his recent works showing the full scope of his production work."

Artist:	DIN A4, JAMES
Title:	Fistel Rose Power
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$20.00
Catalog #:	PING 014CD

"Fistel Rose Power marks the third collaboration of Pingipung and James Din A4, after his two terrific compilation contributions ('Reggae- Olympiade' on Kami Eins, 2002 and 'Graumelierte Pötstellen' on Pingipung Blows: The Brass, 2007). Together we handpicked the pearls featured on the album from more than 20 vinyl records, all of which the musician and artist from Ottersberg released himself. They appear on CD for the first time, as a 'Best Of,' and come with elaborate artwork. The 24-page booklet and the digipak were designed for this purpose by the artist himself, and offer an impression of his illustration, which he brings to the world under the label Made with Hate."

Artist:	ISO68
Title:	Space Frames
Label:	PINGIPUNG (GERMANY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$19.00
Catalog #:	PING 015CD

"Jazz, dear followers of independent pop music, is not a competitive sport. It's a feeling -- like in Mr. Fingers' acidiferous classic, 'House Is A Feeling.' And somewhere between the melting polar caps of jazz and house, between the principles of division of labor and of sound studies driven by machine-made rhythm, the iso68 duo too arrive at an archaic modernism that is all their own -- made up of electrically-charged Hohner clavinets, radiophonic workshops with David Tudor, and a bag of fermented grass, to be smoked preferably with Augustus Pablo's excursions on the melodica. What time is it? It's pretty late, but iso68 are not about vague indietronic swirling, they're about positioning their wibbly-wobbly sound paintings quite deliberately near the places of longing of musical culture. Near Sun Ra's grand keyboard improvisations, like in the holiday song 'the great punster,' near the strange duos on the British electronic label Warp and their bunker-line studios in the sand, in the same song. iso68 create melodies that you can pick out from hundreds of music pieces, that are carried our way through the ether, that waft across the splashing waves of a lake, or that say 'hello' to us straight from a manhole cover next to the autobahn, like a ghoul. Is that a combo jamming, or is the ensemble being bolted together by a top engineer at a mixing board? I can't tell, but the incredibly long drawn-out notes send shivers down my spine, and I mistake the iso68 track 'Plano Piloto' for the main theme of an old French soundtrack by -- what's his name again? -- and that's a good sign. With iso68, the beats are always in the front, but not for a single moment you become aware of it. Or else, such as in the cooled-down ice machine crusher 'Forestrain,' they evolve into a smoldering atmosphere-roller: no escape, I assure you. Everything here is dense, at the same time diaphanous, friendly, focused and yet incomparably relaxed. Jazz! It's amazing how there are only two permanent members to iso68, but on their new and fourth album 'Space Frames,' Thomas Leboeg and Florian Zimmer put so much feeling (there it is again!) into the details of sounds that you could just as well call them a collective. A sound collective, traversing electronic space, jamming." --Julian Weber

Previous Page Index of Labels Next Page