Browse by Label: STUDENTS OF DECAY

Artist:	CANTU-LEDESMA, JEFRE
Title:	Shining Skull Breath
Label:	STUDENTS OF DECAY
Format:	LP
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	SOD 085LP

"With the release of 2010's Love is a Stream, the solo work of Bay Area stalwart Jefre Cantu-Ledesma (The Alps/Tarentel/Root Strata) leapt into public consciousness, garnishing accolades for its transfixing melding of shoegaze pop with drone, ambient and noise sensibilities. Originally released in 2007 as part of our limited run CDR series, Shining Skull Breath finds Cantu mining similarly rich sonic territory with enchanting results. Throughout the album he submerges delicate, drifting guitar passages in constantly shifting webs of sound, creating buried melodies which snake and hover through a haze of tape noise. If the emphasis in Love is a Stream was on the subtle subversion and appropriation of shoegaze tropes, on Shining Skull Breath Cantu's compositions seem a bit more opaque and mysterious, but no less moving. He invites the listener to accompany him through this beautiful fog and, in the process, offers a glimpse of rare and radiant beauty. This definitive edition has been remastered by James Plotkin and features two new tracks not included on the original release."

Artist:	CABOLADIES
Title:	Renewable Destination
Label:	STUDENTS OF DECAY
Format:	LP
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	SOD 086LP

"Recorded from 2009-2011, during which time Caboladies members Eric Lanham and Chris Bush relocated from Kentucky to Chicago, Renewable Destination constitutes the duo's most refined and focused work to date. Both as a collaborative unit and under solo monikers Carl Calm and Flower Man, Lanham and Bush have produced a wealth of limited-run releases in recent years on labels such as Arbor, Dekorder, Digitalis, and their own Smooth Tapes imprint which document their uniquely fractured sonic sensibilities. Perhaps what amazes most about the pair's work is the sheer diversity of their palettes. At any given time, we get the sense that any sound is possible, as they construct intricately-designed edifices rife with microcosmic detail. It is this keen attention to the hyper-detailed that distinguishes Renewable Destination, and the oeuvres of Lanham and Bush as a whole, from their 'synth revivalist' contemporaries.This is music that refuses to sit still, yet at the same proves remarkably coherent and, at times, strikingly beautiful. If pressed, one could perhaps locate the duo's aesthetic somewhere between the sounds of Mouse on Mars and Microstoria and composers such as Francois Bayle and Bernard Parmegiani, but the soundworlds which Lanham and Bush inhabit are truly and uniquely their own. Edition of 300 LPs w/ digital download coupons."

Artist:	AQUARELLE
Title:	Sung In Broken Symmetry
Label:	STUDENTS OF DECAY
Format:	LP
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	SOD 089LP

"Describing the music of Aquarelle's Ryan Potts is a difficult task indeed. It's related to the hazy, heavily treated output of musicians such as Fennesz and Tim Hecker, but one would be remiss to locate it solely within the realm of electronic ambient or drone, as there are often strong organic, rhythmic and composerly elements to Potts' work. In fact, the title of his last record, Slow Circles, might offer the best point of access into the Aquarelle aesthetic, in which compositional tropes such as cyclicality and accretion are woven together with surging, bright overtones, fragmented acoustic guitar melodies, and monumental distortion. Another point of distinction between Potts' guitar-based compositions and that of the laptop-wielding contemporaries and forebears amongst whom one would be tempted to locate his sound is the fact that he largely eschews digital, 'in-the-box' processing. A self proclaimed 'FX pedal fetishist,' his compositions carry with them a boldness, depth and grit that is all but impossible to cultivate through DSP alone and aligns some elements of his sound with that of Scott Cortez/Lovesliescrushing and late-period Yellow Swans. Using a palette of electric and acoustic guitars, vintage and boutique effects pedals and various percussion sources, Potts crafts highly detailed, slowly evolving soundscapes which beg for repeat listens so that one might get inside their myriad layers. 'With Verticals' opens the record, blooming suddenly into a startlingly propulsive edifice replete with crackling, distorted guitar sounds married to quasi-Reichian percussion. Later, 'Origin' sizzles and hisses its way into a staggeringly detailed drone opus before opening up into a veritable vista of acoustic guitar, cymbal and cello histrionics. A cohesive and fully immersive collection, Sung in Broken Symmetry is an assured statement from a young musician who is equally comfortable navigating frailty and violence. Mastered by James Plotkin. Edition of 300."

Artist:	GRODY, DANNY PAUL
Title:	In Search Of Light
Label:	STUDENTS OF DECAY
Format:	LP
Price:	$16.00
Catalog #:	SOD 090LP

"In Search of Light is the full-length follow-up to the well-received Fountain (RS 057CD), Danny Paul Grody's debut solo release. Many listeners no doubt recognize Grody from his work in San Francisco-based groups Tarentel and The Drift. As a solo artist, he produces wistful, poignant music culled principally from acoustic guitar and synthesizer. Grody's work recalls aspects of the post-Takoma school in that fingerpicked, cyclical melodies make up the crux of many of his recordings. However, he also masterfully avoids the pitfalls of the genre, invariably favoring concision, lyricism and ideas over dexterity and flare. In listening to In Search of Light, one can't help but imagine these recordings appearing on some lost private issue California folk LP from the late '70s- such is the timelessness of Grody's aesthetic. As an album, In Search of Light is an assured and beautiful statement, an aural tracking shot of the California coast that feels as old and familiar as the sun. Artwork by Billy Joe Miller. Mastered by James Plotkin. LP in edition of 500."

Artist:	EN
Title:	Already Gone
Label:	STUDENTS OF DECAY
Format:	CD
Price:	$11.00
Catalog #:	SOD 096CD

"Already Gone is the second full length album from West Coast dream-drone unit En, the duo of Maxwell August Croy and James Devane, following their well-received debut album The Absent Coast (released in 2010 on Root Strata, which Croy runs alongside Jefre Cantu-Ledesma). For their sophomore release, the pair has opened up their tonal palette considerably. While the comparisons that critics made of their first album to the work of Tim Hecker and Stars of the Lid still hold true, Already Gone finds Croy and Devane mining even richer sonic climes. Here, the duo pull back the curtain on some of their source material, a move that allows the diversity of their instrumentation to resonate. On The Sea Saw Swell, Croy's acoustic koto pings across the stereo spectrum as a looping guitar figure from Devane evaporates from the haze of a beautiful, slowly shifting drone. The side-long closer Elysia is likely the duo's defining recording to date, an epic slow-burner that reaches heights both angelic and cacophonous. Ultimately, it is the harmonious marriage of the organic and the obscured that recurs throughout the album that proves its defining trait, and it is precisely what makes En stand out in the ever-growing field of contemporary drone/ambient music."

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