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Browse by Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)


Artist: POUSSEUR, HENRI
Title: Hommage Au Sauvage - A Portrait Of Henri Pousseur
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: DVD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: OME 006DVD
Sub Rosa re-releases the 2005 documentary of Belgian theoretician and experimental/avant-garde composer, Henri Pousseur. Over 15 years ago, the Basel-based Fondation Paul Sacher, which preserves archives related to 20th century music, sent its best expert, musicologist Dr. Albi Rosenthal, to Henri Pousseur's home. Upon finding out the scope of documents Pousseur had kept, the musical antiquarian's eyes widened. Now, Pousseur's past, present and future archives can be found at the Foundation: magnetic tapes, scores, correspondence, etc., along with his most complex research work, his most obscure sound materials, and his most random memos. This documentary film is part of that archival body, in the form of a "road movie," if you will. Henri leads a convoy en route to Basel. For hours on end, the footage conjures up far-away and ancient places, but we know nothing of the moment, the location, or the context of their emergence. The enclosed and moving space of the car is the only thing you can hold on to or believe in. On the way back, after sitting in the car for hours, the setting sun illuminates Pousseur's face. He remembers his first glimpse of Mount Fuji and carefully shows the viewer where he was sitting on the Tokyo-Kyoto train, years ago: "Right there, like that. My wife was there and I was there." Through the window, he shows us where Mount Fuji stood. And suddenly, we can see it too, silhouetted on the horizon. Thanks to what happens off-camera, the filmed reminiscence turns into Presence. As we capture the tale of this vision, we can see what Pousseur sees. And yet, beyond that, and that light: nothing. This is a powerful documentary, which manages to change sensations simply by recording a living, direct, and unpredictable narration. It is also Henri's last voyage. Directed by Dominique Lohlé and Guy Marc Hinant. 52 minutes; double-sided DVD in both NTSC & PAL formats, region-free; in French with English subtitles.


Artist: TOOP, DAVID
Title: I Never Promised You A Rose Garden
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: DVD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: OME 010DVD
...A Portrait Of David Toop Through His Records Collection. In his home in the northern part of London, David Toop plays us records for several days and asks: does music have any limits? Is the collective vomiting of Amazonian shamans on a vision quest music, or not? What about the funeral dirges of the Potu people? How did New Orleans jazz-bassist John Levy's recordings radically change our perceptions? How did improvised music and electronica redefine some secular frontiers? What influence did solitary rockabilly singer Hasil Adkins have on Finnish electronic group Panasonic? Sub Rosa presents a 90-minute film of these questions and more in a 96-minute film, directed by Guy-Marc Hinant and Dominique Lohlé. However, this film is not only about music, it is about speech patterns, and the moments where speech progresses towards exhaustion, where at any moment, words are lost, the body's limits take hold, and the film is over. Toop's record collection is endless, but after a while, the man gets tired, as if envisioning himself commenting on tens of thousands of records, one by one. Could that be done? At one point, the tone switches from the desire to continue to the desire to see it all stop. A type of despondency and hidden sadness is revealed. 96 minutes; double-sided DVD in both NTSC & PAL formats; region-free; in English with French subtitles.


Artist: HINANT AND DOMINIQUE LOHLE, GUY-MARC
Title: Fuck You: Fucking Noise In China Now
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: DVD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: OME 013DVD
Fuck You: Fucking Noise In China Now is a film made by Dominique Lohlé and Guy-Marc Hinant from Sub Rosa -- 100 minutes of electronic noise music and harsh speeches -- a road movie between Beijing and Shanghai. Featuring artists Torturing Nurse, Wang Changcun, Wang Fan, Li Jian Hung/Dickson Dee, the poet Sun Meng Jin and Zbigniew Karkowski. 100 minutes. In English with French subtitles. Double-sided DVD in both NTSC & PAL formats, region free.
"We went on a trip, with a vision that may have confused feelings of revolt with revolt itself, expecting to shoot a monument to the glory of Noise "as a subversive action" in the People's Republic of China. After spending a few hours on site, we had to admit that nothing political was being expressed in this place and at this time. In two weeks, we still shot about a hundred hours of rushes, in a totally chaotic fashion, as if in the throes of panic."


Artist: HINANT AND DOMINIQUE LOHLE, GUY-MARC
Title: Ecce Homo: A Portrait Of Célestin Deliège
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: DVD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: OME 015DVD
Ecce Homo: A Portrait Of Célestin Deliège is a deep, strong and raw portrait of one of the greatest musical thinkers in Europe, who passed away in 2010. Célestin Deliège was the last representative (with Pierre Boulez) of post-War modernism. Prestigious musicologist (passing his encyclopedic knowledge through violent polemic), teacher at the Conservatory of Liege, Brussels and La Sorbonne, he impressed many students -- students who have since become important composers today, not the least Hugues Dufourt, a founder of spectral music. This film is made from ten interviews with Deliège, either introspective face-to-face meetings, or with artists such as Pascal Decroupet, François Nicolas, Fred Lerdahl, Hugues Dufourt, Antoine Bonnet and Ensemble Ictus. Ecco Homo shows a man in his illness, certainly, but who fights until his last breath, looking for a lost transcendence, a re-enchantment, calling for Artaud's madness. Rooted in the supreme art of music, this film addresses both the pain of departure and the beauty of existence. 90 minutes. In French with English subtitles. Double-sided DVD in both NTSC & PAL formats, region free.


Artist: BUDD/GAVIN BRYARS/JON HASSELL, HAROLD
Title: Myths 3: La Nouvelle Serenite
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 005CD
This is a reissue of the third volume in this early Sub Rosa compilation series, originally released in 1987. Features long tracks from Jon Hassell (duo with J.A. Deane, from 1985), never released since; Harold Budd (duo with Eugen Bowen, from 1983) in the mood of "The Serpent in Quicksilver" (with a splendid steel guitar); Gavin Bryars (duo with Andrew Thomson, from 1987); an unpublished sketch for two pianos called "Sketch For Sub Rosa" (later published on ECM with a chamber ensemble); and an excerpt from Les Archives Sonores Sub Rosa, a short film without image.
       
       
       
       Spanning from 1972-1975, Harold Budd created four individual works under the collective title The Pavilion of Dreams, produced by ambient pioneer Brian Eno. His two subsequent collaborations with Eno, The Plateaux of Mirror and The Pearl, established his trademark atmospheric piano style. Jon Hassell's first recordings were made with minimalist masters La Monte Young and Terry Riley, through whom he met the Hindustani raga master, Pandit Pran Nath. From his studies of the classical Indian music of the Kirana tradition he adapted these techniques to the trumpet and developed a new style of playing which forms the basis of his own unique sound world. Gavin Bryars has written a large number of works, including three operas, and a number of instrumental pieces. His first major work as composer was The Sinking of the Titanic on Brian Eno's Obscure label in 1975.
       
       
       
       This collection gathers together the most stunning of ambient, atmospheric sound worlds from three very important composers.


Artist: VA
Title: Myths 4: Sinople Twilight in Çatal Hüyük
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 007CD
Reissue of the fourth volume in this early Sub Rosa compilation series. Features long tracks from: Cheb Mami, Coil, Current 93 and some Turkish dervish ceremonial music from 1973 -- from the Sub Rosa archives of Revan Sanchez-Cotan. The Coil track is a liver version of "Another Brown World", recorded in 1989. The Current 93 track is "Some Morning When The Moon Was Blood", recorded in London, 1989; mixed by Steven Stapleton.


Artist: BURROUGHS, WILLIAM S.
Title: Break Through In Grey Room
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 008CD
Along with the first ever vinyl release, now repressed and fully available on CD as well. "Officially re-released -- one of our absolute classics, back in print at last. Extraordinary cut-up voices recorded during the mid-60's in hotel rooms in New York, Paris, London...It's impossible not to recognize the writer's voice -- the sonority of this voice -- a sonority also present in the silence of every text he wrote. An explosion of styles -- a blasting of borders -- the silence after a gunshot -- the overtaking of the fetishized word -- from the exploded painting to the cut tape. This record starts with a piece of more than 13 minutes, recorded around 1965 with Ian Sommerville somewhere in New York and London -- K-9 was in combat with the alien mind-screens, including various monologues, radio short waves and music...Tapes, cut and cut and cut up to the limit of sense -- emerged new structures of communication... and senses. Words gain power when loosing the boundaries of semantics. Including too Joujouka music recorded by WS Borroughs in the hills of Morocco with Ornette Coleman, circa 1973."


Artist: BURROUGHS, WILLIAM S.
Title: Break Through In Grey Room
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 008LP
2013 repress forthcoming.... One of the most classic and in-demand titles in the Sub Rosa catalog -- mid-'60s cut-up tape machine recordings made by William S. Burroughs in hotels -- originally released on CD in 1987, reissued in 2001, now released on vinyl. Great gatefold packaging! During the 1960s, Burroughs was in Europe and England. The Vietnam War, the cultural revolution, hippies and the acid gospel, the U.S. in tumult -- all these were dispatches to him. Living between Paris and London, his only excursions to America were in 1965, when he lived a year in New York at the Chelsea Hotel and 210 Centre Street, and revisited St. Louis and Palm Beach; and in 1968, when he covered the Democratic Convention in Chicago for Esquire in the company of Genet, Southern and Seaver. Burroughs had quit the States in 1953 exactly because he foresaw these police-state conditions. But now the wild boys were in the streets, in London and Paris too, and Burroughs was inspired to hope that the world could really change. In the creative world/switchboard of Paris' Beat Hotel, in London, in a house in the Arab Quarter of Tangier, he experimented with tape recordings -- under the tutelage of Brion Gysin -- hoping to cut the pre-recorded time line of present time, and, as he put it, "let the future leak out." It's impossible not to recognize the writer's sonorous voice -- a sonority also present within the silence of every text he wrote. An explosion of styles -- a blasting of borders -- the silence after a gunshot -- the overtaking of the fetishized word -- from the exploded painting, to the cut tape. Break Through In Grey Room includes various monologues, radio shortwaves, music, and countless cut-up tape from which emerges new structures of communication. Words gain power when losing the boundaries of semantics. Also included is some Joujouka music recorded by Burroughs while he was with Ornette Coleman in the hills of Morocco, circa 1973. Many of these tapes are as much Ian Sommerville's work as Burroughs, or even more so. Ian's technical background is a tribute to the early development of sound-and-light shows in London. Ian was a sorcerer's apprentice in creating recordings. This is an important sound document in the history of Burroughs as an innovator, as well as an archive of the genesis of literature in opposition during a time-period whose urgency is more relevant than ever.


Artist: TZOTZILES
Title: Psalms, Stories and Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 017CD
2008 reissue of these field recordings made by Thierry Zéno in the Tzotzile community in Chiapas, Mexico, originally released by Sub Rosa in 1999. This is a unique document that includes rare ritual music, psalms, dialogue and stories of revolt from the last descendents of the Mayan culture. For the past 20 years, Belgian author and filmmaker Thierry Zéno has regularly visited the Tzotzile community that can be heard on this record, archiving and filming. Because he is accepted as "the man who makes pictures," and has made a point of showing the preceding year's film on each of his visits, he has compiled a survey of prime importance. A few of the most important rituals in the life of this community are offered here -- including the music for the Day of the Dead, the music heralding All Saints' Day, The Transfer of Power (chant of authority changing hands), sanctifying rituals, some dialogue in the language of the Maya, field recordings of Christmas night and Carnival and a fragment of speech of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. Who are the Tzotziles? Some 150,000 Tzotziles live in the high plateaus in the state of Chiapas. They form, with the Tzeltales, a closely-related tribe, one of the most prominent Indian communities in Mexico. Of Mayan extraction, they retain a traditional life comparatively devoid of Hispanic influence. The Tzotzile religion is a syncretic fusion of Christianity that was imposed on them and their surviving ancestral beliefs. They venerate not only heaven and earth, but also the statues of the saints that are believed to be more than idols with non-Indian faces. They dress them up in clothes and jewels, wreathe them in flowers, burn incense to them, cover them in oil and make offerings of alcohol, and, more recently, of Coca-Cola and Pepsi -- the most expensive of drinks. The traditional Tzotzile orchestra is made up of instruments of their own fabrication -- harps, guitars, drums, little fiddles, and water pipes that mimic bird song. An incredibly important and poignant release, documenting the patchwork remnants of a completely unique culture that still exists beyond time and recollection.


Artist: HAYWARD, CHARLES
Title: Switch On War
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 040CD
Hayward was a founding member of the seminal UK group This Heat, then later formed Camberwell Now. Switch On War was originally issued in 1991 and is now reissued on its original label, after a long vacuum of unavailability. "Switch on War a dream state synthesis of nights watching live TV coverage of the 1st Gulf War, the reduction of colours to an electron midnight blue, the long periods of nothing really happening, the contrasting landscapes, (the desert, the city at night, the newsroom), the sudden hurtling through space, through a doorway, a camera on the nose of a missile, the bearing of silent witness slowly turning into complicity and mute acquiescence. At the back of the mind the thought that all this would soon be reduced to snapshot memories, archive, newsreel, history. Originally devised as a performance for the Club Integral, in South London, at the height of the military activity, Switch on War was a harsh and brutal response to the media coverage of the conflict informed by a grotesque and disconcerting anti-music aesthetic heavily influenced by the disorienting, overloaded sound world of Space Invaders arcades. The CD version was recorded binaurally some weeks later, live in a disused morgue, as the war came to its stalemate close. By this time the anger had a bleak streak of sadness, a distorted expressionist requiem. This CD had the life expectancy of a magazine article or some such, no more than a year and it would be archive, a mere souvenir." -- Charles Hayward


Artist: DUCHAMP, MARCEL
Title: The Creative Act
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 057CD
2012 repress of this mid-90s release. "The first CD devoted exclusively to Marcel Duchamp brings some 50 minutes of very rare documents, all of which are crucial not only to understand Duchamp's work but also to grasp the rebellious, unconventional, anticonformist spirit that has always been there, but in the Zürich of 1919 took the absurd name of Dada." Content: "The Creative Act" (a lecture in Houston, TX -- April 1957); "Some texts from a L'Infinitif" (1912-20; lecture read in 1967, shortly before his death); "Erratum Musical" (score drawn at random and played on pedal harmonium by Jean-Luc Fafchamps; the first aleotry composition, long before John Cage); "An Interview" (by Richard Hamilton, recorded in NY, 1959); "A Score For Three Voices" (a score for 3 voices, only score written by Duchamp for his 2 sisters).


Artist: VA
Title: Konstantin Raudive - The Voices Of The Dead
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 066CD
"Sub Rosa presents a CD which contains fragments and reworkings of the legendary Raudive tapes. Who was Doctor Konstantin Raudive? Dr. Raudive, a student of Carl Jung, was a Latvian psychologist who taught at the University of Uppsala, Sweden, before devoting the last ten years of his life to electronic voice phenomenon (EVP). He published in his book Breakthrough in 1971. His early collaborator F.Jurgenson, whom he met by the very beginning of 1965, awakened Dr. K. Raudive's interest in EVP research. Raudive spent endless hours for the thorough study of Jurgenson's books (Voices from Space, 1964 and Radio-Link with the Dead, 1967). From an overwhelming database (ranging about 72000 samples!), Raudive's mother seems to be statistically the most frequently reported contact personality. The reality of the tapes: For many, the first traces of the Raudive Tapes were in William Burroughs' fictions and articles. The fact is, these mysterious magnetic tapes, which capture the voices of the dead, and were recorded by the Baltic scientist Konstantin Raudive, are not a fiction but a reality (we are not here to judge their scientific objectivity ). These tapes, as rare as Lovecraft's Necronomicon are now in the Sub Rosa archives. This Raudive celebration CD includes unpublished material by Scanner, Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky, Calla, Lee Ranaldo, Ensemble, Random Inc., David Toop, Carl Michael Von Hausswolff and Brett Dean."


Artist: MASTER MUSICIANS OF JOUJOUKA, THE
Title: Joujouka Black Eyes
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 087CD
"The master Musician of Joujouka come from the Rif mountains of Morocco. They are one of the best sufi music players of the world. The result is a unique records with the real thing, something to do with the day-by-day life -- a very intimist mood. One of the few legitimate recordings of the legendary Moroccan ensemble, recorded in Joujouka, 1994. Once a strange boy from the Greatest Rock'n'Roll Band In The World visited Joujouka. He proved to be a the catalyst for the ongoing interest in the music of the village. Hamri brought him there because he hoped something positive and serious would come of it for The Master Musicians and for the village. Those adventures lead to the album Brian Jones Presents The Pipes of Pan at Joujouka. The album is lasting testimony to a mass collaboration between a motley crew of delinquent artists: Bowles, Burroughs, Hamri, Gysin, Jones and the individual musicians of Joujouka. Jones was honorable in his dealings with Joujouka but, in the years since his death, much that is dishonorable has been said, written and done. There has been the remorseless tokenism of 'World Music'. There have been myriad attempts at cultural hegemony on the broad-spectrum 'Beat Generation' scene. Many pseudo-hip figures with pristine international reputations have been shameful in their uncharacteristically discreet negotiations with Musicians on the mountain. The rock remains. The music of Joujouka is still one of the most liberating of musics, a secret message to the soul at a time when the soul has been effectively discredited by conservative forces. Hamri, the Painter of Morocco, believes that the world now needs the healing powers of The Master Musicians. The people of Joujouka share this belief. Their village, sublime in it's silence and tranquility, is by the way of sharp contrast with the post-modern cosmopolis. For sure, the world outside the village is a battered and tragic place where there is no respite from moribund philosophy or from an increasingly malevolent media/State interface. The time for the music of Joujouka has assuredly arrived."


Artist: MASTER MUSICIANS OF JOUJOUKA/GNOUA BROTHERHOOD OF MARRAKESH
Title: Moroccan Trance Music Vol. 2/Sufi Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 097CD
From the Rif mountains of Morocco, comes the second volume of Moroccan trance music from the Coeur du Monde/Ritual Music and Field Recordings project by Sub Rosa, featuring Sufi music. Recorded on location
       
       in Morocco in 1995, the purpose of this series is to record rare and secret ritual music as it happens. The logical continuation is with the more reflective music of the Sufis. Along with the droning sound of the double reed and tebel drum, the recording begins with the very raw Gnaoua of Marrakesh featuring the true and pure voice of young Tayib Taiybe (the most extraordinary soul voice since Jimmy Cliff). This release showcases the solo flute of some of the oldest musicians of Joujouka. For your ears and heart, this second volume reveals heretofore unknown sacred chamber music by the Morocco's most acclaimed musicians. The music of Joujouka is still one of the most liberating of musics, a secret message to the soul at a time when the soul has been effectively discredited by conservative forces.


Artist: VA
Title: Folds & Rhizomes: A Tribute to Gillez Deleuze
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 099CD


Artist: VA
Title: The Unfinished
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 103CD
"Locust is one of the many shades of Mark Van Hoen. Locust are difficult to describe in that no one description can adequately cover the intensity and complexity of their craft. Theirs is a deep, moving and mysterious work which ranges from abstract electronica, intelligent yet sensual techno grooves, and sparse minimalistic experimentations: all of which can be admired on several critically acclaimed (and classic) releases as Locust on R&S, as well as his other collaborations as Scala (Touch) and Aurobindo (Ash). While artists such as Oval, Seefeel, and Mouse on Mars continue to gain popularity, it should be very evident that Mark Van Hoen is at the forefront of this new school of innovative sound pioneers. Lilith, the captivating magic and alluring beauty of Scott Gibbons' very unique blend of musique concrete, supernatural ritualistic recordings and meditative cadences were prepared live on this very special occasion for a broadcast over the airwaves. Mick Harris dark ambient soundscapes of the inner psyche are further explored from the depths of dense dub dementia with biting noise terrorism. On this sinister, hypnotic rhythmic excursion, Mick Harris (Napalm Death, Scorn, Lull, Painkiller) shows us a reflection of himself, complete with shattered illusions. David Toop is familiar from his earliest outings with General Strike to his contributions to Prince Far I (and other On-U Sound outings) and more recently his collaborations with artists such as Scanner. David has been a innovative pioneer on the revolutionary fringes of sounds; both cutting edge and timeless cultures. As extraordinary as his diverse and prolific background may be as musician, performer and composer, his talents as a writer, historian and music critic (e.g. his recent Ocean of Sound book) are of equal significance. A truly profound and rare artist who has created very accomplished and provocative work in seemingly opposing fields."


Artist: RIMBAUD, ROBIN
Title: The Garden Is Full Of Metal
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 104CD
"Sub Rosa presents the re-release of a classic: Robin Rimbaud's aka Scanner tribute to Derek Jarman. Derek Jarman was one of England's greatest cinematique visionairies. Spanning painting, theatre, film, he comfortably moved between genres, seemingly shape shifting at will. From designing ballet and theatre in the sixties for Frederick Ashton and Ken Russell, through to his own films in super-8 and seminal features such as Sebastiane (1976), Jubilee (1978), The Last of England (1987) and Blue (1993), Jarman explored a unique and compelling vision until his death from AIDS in 1994. Robin Rimbaud aka Scanner was both a friend and collaborator over the years and this CD is his tribute to an important figure in both his life and others. Using recordings of Jarman's voice as well as location recordings around his home, he creates a graceful and delicate sculpture in sound. This is a close friend's tribute, backed by a profound understanding of the filmmaker's sense of intimacy, atmosphere and drama."


Artist: VA
Title: Double Articulation: Folds & Rhizomes Remix Project
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 110CD
Repromtion of this classic mid-90s Sub Rosa CD. "After having conceived Folds and Rhizomes, the very first time we listened to it, we had the idea of re-creating another plateau -- another little quantum sculpture called a CD -- sending out lines of departure in order to remodel the material as it appeared to us then elsewhere and in different fashion. We asked the participants to remix among themselves and what emerged was more engaging than anything we had imagined -- Oval remixing himself, David Shea remixes Scanner, Scanner remixes Mouse On Mars, Tobias Hazan remixes Main, Main remixes Oval and Mouse On Mars remixing the whole. The notion of remix is fascinating in itself in that it offers a new vision -- never definitive -- of what is, a new space where two styles interpenetrate, two ways of doing things which, instead of cancelling each other out, reinforce each other, resulting at best in -- something else."


Artist: RAWFRÜCHT
Title:
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 113CD
Repress of this debut album from 1997. "Two guitars & drums. Swell Maps meet Parliament, shades of Hendrix . Can-erisms catching up with the ramblings of Gastr Del Sol. Secret & reserved side in the best tradition of the Chicago School: Tortoise, Rome etc."


Artist: LASWELL, BILL
Title: City of Light
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 114CD
Originally released in 1997 on Sub Rosa, now reissued. American bassist Bill Laswell (Praxis, Massacre, etc.) is the founder of "collision music" -- a collaborative concept that brings together musicians from divergent instrumentations and backgrounds. City of Light is about Banaras, a city older than history, tradition, way beyond legends. It is Shiva's land, founded at the dawn of creation. It is India's oldest and most fabled city. The Hindus call it Kashi, the luminous... The City of Light. This release features a truly stunning and contemplative merging of Eastern and Western sounds: from tabla to ambient drone and field recordings, in collaboration with some of the best experimental minds. Featuring Lori Carson, Coil, Trilok Gurtu, Tetsu Inoue, Hakim Bey. Recorded in Banaras, India, and mixed at Greenpoint Studio in Brooklyn. India meets New York in the industrial darkness.


Artist: INUIT
Title: 55 Historical Recordings/Traditional Music From Greenland
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 115CD
"This record is surely unique. It was published a few years ago only in Greenland by Ulo. We took the decision to enlarge the distribution of this tribute to traditions and roots of the Inuit culture.This is more than an hour of ultra-rare documents, the testimony of a century of Inuit recordings! As a guide through this abundant material, we included the complete notes from the original booklet... Notes, comments and photos. A helpful 24 pages complement not only for purists. Voices recorded in Greenland almost hundred years ago on wax glader cylinders for today, hearing a lost shamanic story, a duel-song, a mournful melody, this record presents an unique collection of drumdance and songs. 55 historical recordings of traditional Greenlandic music recorded between1905 (by the British ethnologist William Thalbitzer) to 1987 and collected by the Danish ethnomusicologist Michael Hauser. This is -- beyond the document in itself -- a way to be lost in time and space. Hope, happiness, mourning, humanity is right there."


Artist: SILK SAW
Title: Dystopia
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 116CD
"Repress of the 2nd Silk Saw release on Sub Rosa. Could be ambient? Could be dark trip hop? Could be psycho drum'n'bass? The emphasis here is on sinister atmosphere and lowish drum patterns. Silk Saw masterfully employ samples from films such as the original Dracula to achieve a filmic quality to their dub soundtracks. And producing a gem of subtle, measured rhythmic darkness."


Artist: SCANNER
Title: Sound For Spaces
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 119CD
"The collection Sounds For Spaces is the second Scanner rerelease on the Sub Rosa label. Outside of Scanner's controversial mobile phone scans of the time, he was also creating works for installation and radio art projects, some of which are documented on this CD. Sound for Spaces is a collection of his best unreleased works, running in reverse chronological order from 1997 back to 1984. 'Documenta X' is the sort of ambient music to give your bass bins serious trouble, 'Invisible Choirs' sounds like a walk through the inner workings of an immense cathedral organ, and 'A Piece of Monologue' makes logical connections between the emotive pull of Samuel Beckett's found phrases and the subconscious of Rimbaud's found sounds."


Artist: VA
Title: Water & Architecture
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 120CD
Originally released in 1998 by Sub Rosa, now re-issued. Water & Architecture features previously unreleased material by Atom Heart, Seefeel, Directions, Bisk and AER. Nature, cities, water, concrete... water eating rocks, shores. Cities eating landscapes, life. Those two elements are interconnected, though constantly embattled. In between there are humans, needing both elements to survive, and a shelter to protect the body -- also mostly comprised of water. What is the connection, the dialogue, the potential of construction/destruction? What is the impact of architecture on water, what is its influence on modern cities? These artists attempt to answer these questions through carefully-constructed mediations. Directions: post-rock with electronic flavors, featuring Bundy K. Brown (Tortoise, Bastro, Gastr del Sol) and Doug Sharin (June of 44, Him, Rex). Recorded in the Tortoise Studio, Chicago. Seefeel: releases on Too Pure, Warp -- a unique act in the pop-electronica scene, somewhere in between folk-dub-intelligent electro. Their two tracks mix natural rhythms and minimal electronica. Atom Heart: his track starts as a German techno groove that ends in electro-limbo. Bisk: the Osaka post drum'n' bass wizard Naohiro Fujikawa, in a three-piece suit of strange sounds. AER (Alpha Echo Romeo), aka Jon Wozencroft, British designer, co-founder of the Touch label, composes these tracks with sounds collected worldwide. Pure architectural experimentation.


Artist: DE PUTTER, RENAUD
Title: Chorée
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 131CD
"We intensively continue our unclassical program. We were the first in the early 90s to publish Morton Feldman, Giacinto Scelsi, Marcel Duchamp and young European composers as Jean-Luc Fachamps and Thierry Demy. Choree is the first record of the young Belgian composer Renaud De Putter -- what we present here is 3 pieces for piano (performed by Stephane Ginsburge). We are here far away either from the neo-classical trends and from the new post-serial academism -- it is really a quite free method of composition -- very rhizomatic, and strong in its realization. Included in this production: a multi-media aspect (CD ROM) -- 5 films from 1904 by the Belgian neurolog (and pioneer of the scientific film!) Arthur van Gehuchten. In the very early part of this century he decided to film his patients (who had strong neurotic problems) after seeing the first projection of the Lumiére brother in Brussels. The result is more than 200 short scientific films. Renaud de Putter was very impressed by them and decided to compose short piano piece on them. Strong!"


Artist: VA
Title: Unclassical
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 138CD
"This disc presents the Unclassical aspect of our catalogue -- that is, music of today, performed for the most part with traditional acoustic instruments (piano, violin, cello...). Musicians, composers, and pieces, liberated of all dogma and far from the coteries or more practical application of theories. What we present here is a collection of the highspots in contemporary music -- many unpublished pieces for piano, violin, voices or ensemble by Morton Feldman, Luciano Berio, Luigi Dallapiccola, Giacinto Scelsi, Hanns Eisler, Stefan Wolpe. There's even a rare piece by the merican writer Paul Bowles, it ends the record in a way of hommage. Also featured are young composers who took their first breaths with Feldman. David Shea, with commissioned works for Ictus and the ensemble Musique Nouvelle, was a student of Feldman's in New York before becoming John Zorn's protégé in the alternative scene downtown. Brett Dean, viola player at the Berliner, and an Australian member of Frame-Cut-Frame, was, with David Shea, among the first to release successful works based on sampling. There are other young composers with vision too, like Jean-Luc Fafchamps and Renaud De Putter. Plus, included is an unreleased version of musical erratum by Marcel Duchamp, two pieces recorded in Italy by the Russolo Brothers (a murmur recorded in the beginning of the 20's -- a first step towards a musique bruitiste, électronique or concrète). There's also a 1911 recording performed by Claude Debussy himself, an extract from a piece composed by Henri Pousseur for the foundation of Paris' contemporary art center Beaubourg in 1977. Here you'll find the profound investigations pursued by the founders of the electronic music of the 50's and 60's throughout the world."


Artist: VA
Title: Floating Foundations Vol. 1
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 146CD
"The idea which preoccupies us in this series, is to create sound objects, abstract in their appearance, with musicians who are, in most cases, plastic artists too. The border between music and plastic arts is thinner than ever before. This is what we will try to explore for the time being. On this first volume you will find tracks from Janek Schaeffer, Main:Robert Hampson, Christophe Charles, Stephen Vitiello and Kurt Ralske. Janek Schaeffer is based in London as architect and musician. After his Above Buildings, he worked with Robert Hampson on a project called Comae. Completing actually for a complete album for Sub Rosa (early 2002). Moreover he invented the Tri-Phonic Turntable! Robert Hampson is the founder of Loop and Main. He produced about 12 records from early 90 and participated to the 'Gilles Deleuze Unit' with scanner in the mid-'90s. Christophe Charles is a French sound plastician and lives in Tokyo. Close in mind with Markus Popp/Oval -- he released Undirected 1986-1996 on Mille Plateaux and Dok -- a soundfile exchange between Oval and him. Stephen Vitiello was born in New York City in 1964, his work has been featured in group exhibitions at Whitney museum and Postmasters gallery, in New York. As a musician and media-artist, he is involved in the New York avant garde, he is too a close collaborator of Nam June Paik and make a record on sulphur with Scanner. Kurt Ralske is a Manhattan-based composer, electronic musician, and computer audio-video artist. Described by Alternative Press as 'proving than machines do indeed have souls'. Furthermore he is the founder of the mythic Ultra Vivid Scene 10 years ago."


Artist: VA
Title: Sub Rosa Vs Shi-Ra-Nui
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 148CD
"Shi-Ra-Nui is a Japanese breaks`n`beats label. Breaks`n`beats is a foundation, a source, a current, a move, a body, a flow and mainly a source of inspiration for many different innovative musicians and DJ's covering different genres in the process of creating their own distinctive hybrids. It relates from all grooves from techno to downtempo to d`n`b to hip hop. Sub Rosa crew: DJ Wally, Bisk, Tone Rec, Sasha Frere-Jones, and Multiphonic Ensemble attack the Japanese underground: DJ Hati Monji, Jigen, Cappablack, Ruf Neck Piano and Broken Bells. A new kind of virtual battleground...the versus project proposes some friendly clashes between Sub Rosa and labels ready to fight! Next opponents: Kompakt, Fat Cat...."


Artist: VA
Title: Sub Rosa Vs Shi-Ra-Nui
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $12.50
Catalog #: SR 148LP
LP version.


Artist: FREEFORM
Title: Green Park
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $12.00
Catalog #: SR 149LP
LP version. "Freeform is the extremely free and open minded doppelganger from Simon Pyke, the prolific English musician sampled by Howie B. and getting credits for it. Appearing everywhere action is: Skam, Warp, Worm Interface, Language (on Electric Kingdom as Nudge), Law and Auder, Chocolate Industries. Freeform is a 'non-linear' electronician, experimentaing and investigating every aspect of what electronic music is and should be. For his new album under the Sub Rosa banner, Freeform is playing with the world of acoustic sources: creating a toy box ready to be opened for fun and pleasure, and forget all about Pandora. You get: action, exoticism, and weird things from outer space. Freeform is guiding whoever listens to this strange and amazingly beautiful album to unknown countries. Green Park is filled with the sound of a gamelan ensemble facing the gateway to King Kong's lair, with the astonishing sound from futuristic samba anthems, and sometimes with childlike neo-expressionist lullabies close to The Residents. An incredible soundtrack for a movie to create while listening -- eyes shut -- to this album, the source of inspiration for Roger Corman's James Bond feature, including exotic dancers abducted by pink and purple aliens while the hero has psychedelic dreams under a snowstorm in Bali. This time there will be a rumble in the quiet electronic village, and nobody to save This Island Earth, at last. Looking back to Freeform's already thick catalog, one might say that Green Park is once again a musical neologism, a habit that Simon Pike will surely not abandon too soon. If you thought you knew Freeform, have a walk in this Green Park and you can be sure things will change a little bit."


Artist: SCANNER/DAVID SHEA
Title: Free Chocolate Love
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.00
Catalog #: SR 151CD
"Sit back, relax and plunge into the lush enticing world of Free Chocolate Love. The split album is a tribute from David Shea and Scanner to lounge or cocktail music, the first opus of a new series called Themes. Themes is a high-tech travel invitation to the land of 'cult' music, from Les Baxter to Prince Charles, Jean-Jacques Perrey to Latino soul, soundtracks to whatever. What is the essence of all these strange cult anthems, what is the common factor between kitschy disco and Attilio Mineo's futuristic extravagance? An answer to discover in the next Themes volumes through the work of musicians like Atom Heart, Stock, Hausen & Walkman, and Rip-Off Artist. There's a wide range of influences: lounge, electrofunk, disco, samba, electro-pop, so if there is a general thematic guideline behind Themes, there are no genre restrictions. The main idea is the confrontation of these pearls from the 'past' and the present technology or techniques. In David Shea's universe nothing seems to be impossible. Imagine Spike Jones remixed by John Cage or Lil' Louis working with Stockhausen, the meeting of Tex Avery and Jean-Luc Godard with a musical illustration from Les Baxter. As a human sampler, David Shea tends to redefine the common space-continuum, geographical, sociological and musical frontiers, reaching a point of restructuration where anachronism is senseless."


Artist: VEDIC SOUND
Title: Song Of Light
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 152CD
"Vedic aka Prakasa was resident DJ with Talvin Singh and State of Bengal at the Blue Note night Anokha. He has been incorporating the Sacred Arts into his music and has been using elements from the Angelic and Sanskrit traditions, East and West, in spiritual free style, both recording and performing alongside Coldcut, Asian Dub Foundation, Universe, Tribal Posse, Pressure Drop, Earthtribe, Nitin Sawhney and Bill Laswell. His fusion led to his first work on Sub Rosa Rhythmic Intelligence; Vedic´s new LP is a timeless piece that reflects the true nature of the universes in word and mantra, with its mix of truth and celestial vibrations that was recorded with this millenniums first Scalar Energy device, which coats particles with electro magnetic waves to form a unique energy signature."


Artist: LASWELL, BILL
Title: Hashshisheen -- The End of Law
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 154CD
Originally released in 1999 by Sub Rosa, now reissued. Hashishisheen -- The End of Law is one of Bill Laswell's best-known masterpieces of ambient spoken-word. The works of William S. Burroughs and collaborator Brion Gysin are the main inspiration and key to the initiation of The Hashisheen project. Through immense exposure to their innovative experimentation, Bill Laswell developed a strong interest in North Africa, Arab culture, Islam, the Tangier scene, the Master Musicians of Jajouka, Paul Bowles, ritual magick, drugs and travel; and discovered their obsession with the wild heretical actions of the Persian-Hassan-i-Sabbah, who claimed to be the incarnation of God on earth -- Hassan, son of Sabbah. Featuring the music of Bill Laswell, W.S. Burroughs, Iggy Pop, Techno Animal, Patti Smith, Lizzy Mercier-Descloux, Genesis P-Orridge, Jah Wobble, Paul Schutze, Anne Clark, Hakim Bey, Nicky Scopelitis, Peter Wilson, Nicole Blackman, Ira Cohen, Helios Creed, Anton Fier, Sussan Deyhim and Percy Howard III.


Artist: VA
Title: Sub Rosa Vs Kompakt
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 157CD
Repress of this long unavailable 1999 release. "A New Kind Of Virtual Battleground: The versus series project proposes some friendly clashes between Sub Rosa and labels ready to fight! Next opponent: Fat Cat . This second opus in the series is a virtual journey through a gallery of electronic pieces. Side by side original tracks and remixes offer in their combination a new approach to the Köln-based label Kompakt. Tobias Thomas/Michael Mayer, Jürgen Paape, Dettinger, Freiland, and Michael Mayer have been reshaped by To Rococo Rot, Autechre, DJ Olive, Freeform, Lelonek, Nail Harvey, Scanner, etc. A wide range of new approaches to Kompakt's electronic hymns, mixing together the pleasure of solid dancefloor oriented songs to abstract electro, Indian vibes, dub. Kompakt is the new electro scene from Germany, the missing link in between the spirit of the early Detroit's techno sound and the melodic abstraction from Mouse On Mars and so many more. Minimal, massive, subtle. Kompakt is now considered a not-to-be-missed label, don't ask why, just listen!"


Artist: TONE REC
Title: Coucy Pack
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 159CD
"Sound boundaries for their third album - still on Sub Rosa - French foursome Tone Rec, whose slow-burning tracks often rely on CD skips, crystalline drones and computer/DAT manipulation, form part of a strange, lo-fi dissonant movement that seems to seep its way out of the walls and across national boundaries in osmotic fashion. They seem to have a mission: to strip down the essence of electronic sound into dry husks and weave those husks into some primordial sonic basket to be later used to carry small cargos of fragmented rock. Deconstructing their own live-recorded breaks and then manipulating them via computer is the nature of the weave taking place. Rock broken CD. 'We haven't got any predetermined structural model, and we never had a theoretical approach to our music,' they explain. 'We like moments when the loops are running in desynchronised ways to create unexpected rhythms. We really enjoy the idea of digital mistake,' they note before explaining that one of their instruments is 'a broken CD of spectacular sound effects' [like Oval, they clearly believe in extending the possibilities of spray-painting, scratching and otherwise ruining the playable sides of perfectly healthy CDs]. Last deconstruction form, despite this unconventional nature, much of the band's music is basically a form of heavily reconstructed techno [in much the same way as Tortoise could be construed as deconstructed rock], hardly inaccessible in its basic format but highly innovative all the same."


Artist: TONE REC
Title: Coucy Pack
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $12.50
Catalog #: SR 159LP


Artist: MATI:K
Title:
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 162CD
"After the concrete experimentalism from Bisk, the unique and introspective hip hop from The Multiphonic Ensemble, be sure to taste without any restrictions (no side effects detected) the electronic melodies from Mati:k (a.k.a. Masanobu Yanagida). You won't believe this guy is a 'newcomer'. Following the albums from Bisk and The Multiphonic Ensemble, Sub Rosa presents another Japanese sensation: Mati:k. For his first album Masanobu Yanagida chose to explore the world of electro oriented music with a very personal approach: crushed and distorted beats mixed with an accurate sense of melodies placed in an open field. Far from the usual Japanese hectic archetype, Mati:k is the perfect remedy to avoid the claustrophobic aspects of electro. Be ready to face a world full of contradictory sensations, constantly mutating -- yet constant in intensity and straight electronic orientation, as opposed to the usual 'human-machines don't think or feel' attitude. As a wishmaster, Mati:k will provide the necessary energy when you are down and the quietness you need to face stress. But don't expect him to show you the 'way' to follow. Listen and you will find the answers."


Artist: MATI:K
Title:
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $12.50
Catalog #: SR 162LP
LP version.


Artist: TOOP, DAVID
Title: 37th Floor at Sunset
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 163CD
"David Toop is a musician, composer, writer and sound curator. He published three books: Rap Attack, Ocean of Sound and Exotica. He has also released five solo albums since 1995: (Screen Ceremonies, Pink Noir, Spirit World, Museum of Fruit and Hot Pants Idol). He worked with musicians such as Brian Eno, John Zorn, Prince Far I, Jon Hassell, Derrek Bailey, Talvin Singh, Evan Parker, Max Eastley, Scanner, Ivor Cutler and Witchman. 'I wanted to create atmospheres suggestive of buildings as living organisms, creatures with nervous systems, without reducing the soundtrack to a catalogue of sound effects. In his novel, High Rise, J.G. Ballard described the subtle relationship of an apartment block's nervous system to the disintegrating ecology of the mini-society of its inhabitants. Apartment blocks look much the same, whether in China or the suburbs of Paris, yet the lives within them are very different. The sounds of lift shafts, ventilation and heating systems, the murmurs of human activity, radio and television, have a universality that becomes specific only in the finest details, a moment in time at the right place, maybe through the walls of the 37th floor at sunset.' -- David Toop"


Artist: VA
Title: Institute of Sonology 1959-1969
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 164CD
Re-release of this classic Sub Rosa historical electronic music release, originally released in 2001. This is a collection of electronic works composed between 1959 and 1969 at the Institute for Sonology in Utrecht, Holland. Once again, Sub Rosa offers a chance to reflect upon a rare lineage of electronic music's origins, a revolution of the fifties and sixties when an art form was emerging without a base -- ex nihilo -- a new music produced by machines designed to construct the new. Utrecht University's large complex of studios that comprised the Philips laboratories housed an extensive collection of early electronic instruments and tapes. The Institute for Sonology was officially established in 1960, its founding instigated by academic and cultural initiatives in the field of electroacoustic music that had already begun years before -- among them, Edgar Varèse's construction of his famous "Poeme Electronique," presented at the Philips Pavillon at the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels. Comprised of the most basic components -- oscillators, filters, and tapes -- listening to these songs today offers rare insight into an important period in early electronic music, a cross section of primitivism and futurism. This collection features work by early Dutch electronic music pioneers Dick Raaymakers, Frits Weiland, Ton Bruynel, Konrad Boehmer, Gottfried Michael Koenig and Rainer Riehn.


Artist: ASHER & GUY HARRIES, MEIRA
Title: Infantry
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 165CD
"The album Infantry by composers/performers Meira Asher & Guy Harries dives headlong into the harsh reality of a child in an adult's world. It is an intimate document exploring manipulation, militarist education and war. The mood shifts rapidly from the violent and tragic to the comic and grotesque, reflecting the ambiguous nature of the subject. The sound material draws from a wide scope of sources: Extensive use of text and voice, recorded sounds of children in their natural or unnatural surroundings, acoustic instruments and a variety of the latest electronic techniques in the field of synthesis and sound processing. The album combines different genres; heavy beats, soundscape narratives, noise and theatrical elements merge into one. Both text and sound refer to different places, ranging from the Middle East (where Meira Asher & Guy Harries grew up) and Africa to Europe. Infantry being a painful and intense listening experience as it is, cannot amount to the harshness of the reality it reflects. It will not leave you indifferent."


Artist: BENGE
Title: The Very Best Of Benge
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 167CD
"After 7 albums of unique electronica released on his own label and recorded in his studio based in London, Benge shares his musical visions with Sub Rosa by way of his favorite tracks from his five first releases on an album outrageously called The Very Best Of and packaged in the grand tradition of seminal listening music albums. In an attempt to reconcile the sound of machines dreaming of electric shapes and floating on magnetic clouds with an updated musical expression of warmth, the British sandman invites you to the land of electronic meditation. Regarding his direct and reduced style, Benge is the missing link between the 70´s melodic electronica and the present advanced electro wizards, a truly relevant ambient revivalist."


Artist: MULTIPHONIC ENSEMBLE
Title: Cirque
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 168CD
"Based in Osaka, Multiphonic Ensemble, a.k.a. Yoshihiro Hanno has been exploring, since 1988, the many faces of music (drum 'n' bass, hip hop, soundtracks, post-free jazz) with an obvious taste for fusion. After the fascinating and acclaimed King of May, here is Cirque. But don't expect a simple illustration of the circus arena from Yoshihiro Hanno. Imagine something closer to a parade of junglists meeting contemporary music composers who are experimenting with hip hop illumination, or jugglers presenting their skills with sounds, voices and noises. Cirque is an eclectic wild performance based on furious diversity, reaching a high level of magic and emotion on the more atmospheric tracks (like the finale for 'Sonata for Impudent Moon'). A bridge between King of May and the soundtrack Yoshihiro did for Hou Hsiao Hsien's Flowers For Shanghai movie. This new opus is a perfect example of what the multiphonic project is based on: a taste for an infinite universe of fusion, and an attempt to tame one's own world of ideas, thoughts, emotions. The Multiphonic Ensemble paints an invigorating yet chillingly surreal picture of Tokyo, providing proper audio accompaniment to the hi-tech, ambiguously subjective realities proposed in sophisticated anime, like a ghost in the machine. Japanese-junglist fusion is natural, since both have a concept of musical space, breath, and phrase construction unlike much in the West. Powerful and innovative, yet urban like Squarepusher, Hanno seeks to de- and re-construct jazz using drum 'n' bass techniques. In addition, like Photek, he does so in a way that remains listenable and stimulating. Nicely placed atmospherics from chimes, tuned percussion, funky bass lines, and electronics make this a real listening pleasure."


Artist: MALANGA, GERARD
Title: Up From the Archives
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 170CD
Reissue of this 1999 release, which has been unavailable for a few years. Writer, photographer, filmmaker, performer (with the Velvet Underground) and Andy Warhol's main assistant, superstar and closest friend at the Factory from 1963 to 1970. This is a complete New York pop archive from the beatnik era. Also known as a seminal photo archivist of pop culture, Gerard Malanga edited for Sub Rosa a selection of his audio documents from the early '60s to the '90s and invited some friends like Iggy Pop, Thurston Moore and DJ Olive to be part of this vivid archive; mixing the past with the present and the future. Next to the exclusive tracks by the above-mentioned artists you'll find some more from William S. Burroughs, Charles Henri Ford, Peter Hartman, Andy Warhol, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Gerard himself. The CD comes with a special booklet of photo portraits and poems by the artists.


Artist: SILK SAW VS. JARDIN D'USURE
Title: Electric Musical Chairs
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 172CD
"Back in 1989 came the first efforts from Jardin D'Usure, a post-dada duo from Brussels which soon became purveyors of Sub Rosa classics. Slowly mutating under massive exposition to radioactive particles into the Silk Saw chaos factory, producing an highly innovative illbient material, full of sub-bass and groovy abstraction. 1999, ten years after their first appearance, they decided to create the best of both worlds, the ultimate confrontation between their schizophrenic projects. Hybridation is now successfully completed. Through the project Jardin D'Usure, the Belgian duo Marc Medea and Gabriel Severin, tried to cut the edges of music, with an obvious taste for abstraction and 'dadaïsme'. They recorded under this name the memorable album Musique du Garrot et de la Ferraille and several pieces for compilations such as Continuum Absorbus 2, a Sub Rosa lexicon. They added a new approach to their universe, and started a new project, more oriented toward massive bass and slow-motion crushing. Silk Saw was born. Their first album Come Freely, Go Safely was acclaimed as a masterpiece in the new-born illbient scene, even without a connection to New York. The Multi-Projects duo (a.k.a. Ultraphonist) dared the ultimate experiment: blending the particles from Jardin D'Usure and Silk Saw, trying to create the perfect hybridation through a process of recreation, some kind of strange and fascinating osmotic process. As always, their fascination for organic sounds is creating a two-sided, (or, one might say, three-sided) musical field, pulsating in unison with your mind, heart, bones, and chest. Infiltrating every cell and organ. As the band said 'the ultimate billow which makes us overturn, it gets you tipsy and is about to revoke.' Let's keep some secret about it. Hybridation is the future for sure."


Artist: BERTHET, PIERRE
Title: Two Continuum Pieces
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 176CD
"Pierre Berthet lives and works in Liège, Belgium. Musician, composer, inventor, craftsman he is working with Frédéric Le Junter, Pierre Bastien, DJ Low, Rudi Trouvé and Arnold Dreyblatt. He has created here two minimal explorations of his own musical instruments -- springs, tank, tubular drums, jerry can, wires sound installations, home-made instruments, found objects -- the two continuum process pieces -- purely acoustic, full of drones and natural percussions (1. Tubular Drums, Drops And Springs, 2. Cuve, Bidon Et Fils ) were composed and recorded during the 90' s by Pierre Berthet and Brigida Romano. Recorded at location with a mobile studio and an armada of mikes."


Artist: SURVIVAL RESEARCH LABORATORIES
Title: Survival Research Laboratories
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 177CD
2011 repress, originally released in 2001. Mark Pauline, founder of Survival Research Laboratories, is a Californian artist, sculptor and robot-machine builder. Since the late '70s he has created some of the most destructive events ever imagined. He and his crew organize battles of intelligent machines until their final auto-destruction in the desert. This album presents the destructive mood of these shows. GX Jupitter-Larsen is a musician and a sound designer involved for more than 10 years in the American radical noise band The Haters. He composed for Mark Pauline some introduction music to push people who will watch with a certain degree of anxiety the coming of these self-destructive machines. On other parts of this album is a mix-up of machines, screams, motors, bombs, music and noises. Survival Research Laboratories was founded in November 1978. Since its inception, SRL has operated as an organization of creative technicians dedicated to redirecting the techniques, tools, and tenets of industry, science, and the military away from their typical manifestations. Since 1979, SRL has staged over 50 mechanized presentations in the United States, Europe and Japan. Each performance consists of a unique set of ritualized interactions between robots and other machines. SRL shows provide both a catharsis and a philosophic lesson in man's mortality and his relationship with machines, including texts, explanations and unpublished photos.


Artist: PAIK, NAM JUNE
Title: Works 1958-1979
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 178CD
"This is a wide panorama of Nam June Paik work as musician -- 'Hommage à John Cage' (1958-1959), 'Étude for Pianoforte' (1959-1960) and 'Simple' (1961) are good exemple of neodada music and de-structuration in the late 50's, this is basically irreverent audio-collages. 'Prepared Piano for Merce Cunningham' (1977) captures an improvised performance by Paik on a de-tuned piano. While 'Prepared for Merce Cunningham' was later mixed and edited for use by Cunningham, this raw, straight-to-tape version is favored by Paik. 'Duett: Paik/Takis' (1979) this is the only piece already released (by 20 years ago on a limited vinyl edition). Paik improvises on piano and voice, while Takis performs on his metal sculptures. Nam June Paik, was born in Seoul, Korea in 1932. After a move to Japan, where he studied the work of composer Arnold Schönberg, Paik came to Germany in 1956 to continue his studies in the history of music. His interests soon turned away from the university setting, to less traditional forms of music leading him to the Westdeutsche Rundfunk's Studio for Electronic Music, where Karlheinz Stockhausen was working. To date, there have been only a handful of limited edition LP and cassette releases of Paik's music, primarily documenting collaborative performances with colleagues and friends such as Joseph Beuys and Charlotte Moorman. This is the first CD release of Paik's music and the first ever release of the early tape collage pieces that were to inform the video and performance works that he has continued to produce over the last forty years."


Artist: VA
Title: Substancia 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $7.50
Catalog #: SR 180CD
"For this Substancia 2, the guideline is clear: unreleased and forthcoming tracks as leitmotiv. Here you will find exclusive material from Richard Thomas, atom tm a.k.a. Atom Heart, Scanner, Freeform, Calla and our Japanese pride Bsik. New artists like Tal (hip hop-like beats and collages), Rip-Off Artist (wicked late 70's electro fusion), Ensemble (melodic skips and scratches) share the track listing with some Sub Rosa names: Tone Rec revisited by To Rococo Rot, Benge with an extract from his upcoming album Silicon Valleys, Bump and Grind presenting a track from the new album Abstract Theme Variations'. And as a reminder of the superb Multiphonic Ensemble's Cirque, we've enclosed the track 'A Tasty Choreographer'. Unreleased material & forthcoming tracks for a low low price."


Artist: VA
Title: Electric Flat Land
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 181CD
"Here is a selection of Belgian musicians that have in common a passion for creating electronic music in a truly and purely personal way. This doesn't mean that we are purely in some abstract landscape, the usual language and codes of music can be disobey without becoming an experimental mess. These musicians are building some new forms of communication. It seems like there are artists and musicians today who do not think like before. For many of them, it has to do with -- although none of it is calculated -- living a more enjoyable life, to be able to move freely, not asking for anything and not caring about what others think, leaving aside the knowledge of the past, expressing more than that through music, by giving birth to knowledge that they carry within them, naturally. That is the knowledge of folly. However, to remember the 'optimists' club' in order to practice and seek out that which does not come through words, confuse ethics and aesthetics with often bare, generous, and precise gestures. Not out of self-arrogance that is lost and that can never be found (the artist and not his parody, is singular, but still linked), not wait for orders that come from somewhere else, from something that does not exist anymore, and therefore meaningless to them. Here is, without a doubt, some of these people, here, close by." Artists include: Object, Géographique, J-Drik, Mash'ta, Köhn, Jardin D'usure, P'chu, Seal Phüric, Ultraphonist, Urawa, Todor Todoroff, Martiens Go Home, Kern, RM, The Joint Between, Frédéric Marbaix.


Artist: MACLISE, ANGUS
Title: The Cloud Doctrine
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 182CD
2010 repress, originally released in 2003. Sub Rosa presents a real sensation: 159 minutes of minimal electronic music, readings, and soundtracks from the archives of composer, poet, occultist, calligrapher, and original Velvet Underground drummer Angus Maclise from 1963-1976, featuring Tony Conrad, John Cale, Piero Heliczer, Beverly Grant Conrad and Hetty Maclise. This deluxe 2CD set features rare music, performances, soundtracks, and spoken word by this seminal poet and musician who was active in the New York avant-garde of the '60s. Included is a historical text by poet/photographer Gerard Malanga and many unpublished photographs.


Artist: DUCHAMP, MARCEL
Title: Erratum Musical
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 183CD
Subtitled: "7 Variations on a Draw of 88 Notes." Performed 2/8/2000. "The principle of musical erratum is simple: you choose a keyboard -- any keyboard -- you draw each note at random -- no note can be struck twice, but all are struck -- the resulting whole is played without any particular modulation, 'a uniformity de rhythm, an accentuation' says Duchamp. The premises of minimal and aleatory art are thus expressed in 'the green box', published in 1934 (although the writings date back to 1912-15). To do this, we chose to use a piano (a Bösendorfer). Stephane Ginsburgh still young (born in 69), he is already known as a great pianist by the critics -- he loves to build his concerts as a mix-up of styles -- perfect in his performance of Robert Schumann, Morton Feldman and Stockhausen, he was the man between the pieces for piano by Renaud de Putter. The pieces heard here were recorded on one single day -- the beginning is lively, full of exploration (#1) - then it becomes gentler (#2) -- almost Feldmanian (#3) -- we reach the hard core in the center: 36 minutes that swallow up the everyday world (it's 4 pm, children are getting out of school, people are coming and going, cars rev up...) (#4) -- then there is the magic inverse version (#5) -- a strong reverse, tense, strung out (#6) -- then, tenuous, ending as evening falls (#7) -- the last note -- no. 63 -- is struck for the last time -- it was also the first note, played six hours earlier. To conclude on Erratum (from The Latin, fault, error, erratus, to lose one's way), neither order, nor chaos, we have obeyed the laws of chance -- an innocent hand, taking numbers from a vase -- a chance signed by Duchamp's idea, the sounds that come out here are his or the piano's or any human being's, living or dead."


Artist: OLIVEROS, PAULINE
Title: Four Electronic Pieces 1959-1966
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 185CD
Sub Rosa presents Pauline Oliveros' early and definitive tape and electronic music of the late fifties and sixties -- all released for the first time ever! Born in Texas in 1932, Pauline Oliveros is more than ever an important American composer. Her accomplishments speak to an array of disciplines: her pieces for accordion; the creation of the Deep Listening Institute, a center dedicated to fostering artistic creativity through workshops, performances, and new technologies; her approach to improvisation in relation to meditation; and her numerous and varied collaborations with, among others, John Cage, Morton Subotnick, Terry Riley, Sonic Youth, Erold and Andrew Deutsch. Each piece on this release exemplifies her systematic exploration of electronic sounds, which was fundamental to this period. "Mnemonics" prefigures her meditative and breathing pieces. "V of IV" structures sound as noise. "Time Perspectives" is among her first variations on silence. Finally, "Once Again" develops a wild energy that out-strips itself, a frenzy the likes of which is hard to find even to this day. As Oliveros explains, the detailed methodology behind her work offers a unique inquiry into the process of artistic invention itself. "My work with electronic music began in 1959. My first tape piece was an ambitious four channel work called 'Time Perspectives.' The piece was made by recording small sounds from objects resonated on a wooden wall and changing the tape speed. I used cardboard tubes as filters by inserting the mic into the tube and recording sources through the tubes. I used my bath tub as a reverberation chamber. Sections of the piece were improvised and then subjected to speed changes. When the San Francisco Tape Music Center was established together with Ramon Sender and Morton Subotnik there was a pool of equipment to use and I began to work with electronic sound. Rather than cut and splice small pieces of tape together to make a composition I chose to work in real time. I used two tape machines with the tape running across both machines to make a delay system. I used two or more oscillators at high frequencies to produce different tones. These tones would also interact with the bias frequencies of the tape recorders. I would play the oscillators into the tape recorders improvising my way through the piece. My system of composing in this manner was my own invention." --Pauline Oliveros


Artist: RAWFRÜCHT
Title: 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 186CD
"As a trio [guitars plus percussions], Rawfrücht tends to redefine the rules of the secular guitarist's world. Described as a weird avant garde noisy soundscape jazz rock trio... with a groovy approach, one might say that eclecticism is a much better and convenient description for this unique Belgian band. A not to-be-classified universe now completed with some timid voice appearances, floating over the unusual rock-but-not-postrock field of guitars. After the release of their first untitled album names like Marc Ribot, Sonic Youth, Tortoise, and King Crimson were tossed around frequently. Seemingly aware of these echoes, the trio seems to have achieved a new level of guitaristic blend and 'unclassical' elements. Their new opus 2, is unabashedly presumptuous and presented as a 'conceptual' object, evolving like a landscape observed through a windscreen while driving in an unknown country under permanent misty weather. Music for an introspective journey toward the far limits of one's subconscious, with as a guide the 13 minute long opening track 'Suite 2', and the subtle murmured vocals on 'Forythia Pt. 1 & 2'."


Artist: TONE REC
Title: Demo Pack Demoli
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $8.50
Catalog #: SR 188CD
"Here´s some more of funky Tone Rec. A mini album featuring 4 new tracks and remixes from Christian Fennesz, To Rococo Rot and Tone Rec's new avatar DAT Politics. On this Coucy Pack follower, Tone Rec illustrate their ability to create a radical melodic destructuration. As they once said: 'we haven't got a predetermined structural model.' That is what it's all about, going a step further into abstract minimalist patterns, establishing deconstruction as a skill. 4 new tracks working at the same time as a complement to their previous material, and a preview for the future. But Demo Pack Démoli is more than that. This mini-album features 4 remixes, visions filtered through a broken mirror of the French quartet's universe of the gentle chaos, re-orchestrations made by Christian Fennesz (Mego crew, some more minimalism), To Rococo Rot (a groovy kind of...), and Tone Rec's side project Dat Politics."


Artist: FELDMAN, MORTON
Title: Last Pieces (Performed By Stephane Ginsburgh)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 189CD
"This new release on Sub Rosa is the third in a series of three concentrating on avant-garde piano compositions (prev. volumes: Triadic Memoris, Piano Pieces For More Than 2 Hands). American composer Morton Feldman, born 1926, is now recognized as an one of the most important composers of the 20/21st century. After he met John Cage in the late forties he developed a method of intuitive composing which allowed Feldman to work on the outside of the strict classical system. On this recording pianist Stephane Ginsburgh plays three piano compositions which capture the essence of Morton Feldman's artistry, pure moments of sound and infinity. Or as Ginsburgh quoted: 'Ask the music first and use your concentration.'"


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 1
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 190CD
2012 repress. "Sub Rosa presents part 1 of a vast anthology of noise and electronic music to be released during the next years in seven volumes. An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Vol. 1 begins in the 1920s, with the Russolo Brothers, and looks at each decade in turn -- Varése, Cage, Schaeffer, Xenakis, the great pioneers -- and shows the first traces of a music that was necessarily revolutionary: electronic music, created from nothing (and hence to be entirely invented). Some pieces on these CDs are certainly classics, but there are others, which, though old, were distributed informally or never even released. The more contemporary pieces are, wherever possible, previously unreleased. In fact, more than the half of what we listen here is unreleased and unpublished. This 2xCD comes as a Digipak with 24 page booklet." Artists include: Luigi & Antonio Russolo, Walter Ruttman, Pierre Schaeffer, Henri Pousseur, Gordon Mumma, Angus Maclise, Tony Conrad & John Cale, Philip Jeck, Otomo Yoshihide & Martin Tétreault, Survival Research Laboratories, Einsturzende Neubauten, Konrad Boehmer, Nam June Paik, John Cage, Sonic Youth, Edgard Varése, Iannis Xenakis, Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid, Pauline Oliveros, Ryoji Ikeda.


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 1
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 3LP
Price: $34.00
Catalog #: SR 190LP
Subtitled: First A-Chronology 1921-2001. At last, the Sub Rosa label issues the highly-acclaimed Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music collection on vinyl -- 3LPs housed in a luxurious triple gatefold sleeve. Containing early and contemporary classics as well as pieces that had never been heard before. Volume 1 begins in the 1920s with the Russolo brothers, and examines each decade in turn -- Varèse, Cage, Schaeffer, Xenakis, the great pioneers crafting the first traces of a music that was markedly revolutionary: electronic music, created from nothing and an artifice without boundary that was to be entirely invented. Whereas composers such as Stockhausen, Berio and Pousseur had come from Serialism and began making electronic music as a continuation of their work with traditional instruments, others such as Boehmer and Oliveros immediately began composing using electronic bases. There were those who invented new methods, like Schaeffer and musique concrète, others were outsiders, revolutionaries and visionaries like Xenakis and Cage, and still others who derived their sound from Dadaism, the complex forms of free-jazz, John Coltrane, the acoustic and electronic improvisation scene, alternative rock, psychedelic and industrial music, the German Krautrock wave of the 1970s, and so on. The contemporary generation of electronic musicians on volume 1 are DJs, reinventors of drones, painters and sculptors using sound as a process, and maverick software creators. An absolute must for anyone interested in the roots and history of electronic music, now in a beautiful deluxe triple vinyl package including liner notes. Other artists include: Walter Ruttmann, Gordon Mumma, Angus Maclise, Tony Conrad, Philip Jeck, Otomo Yoshihide and Martin Tétreault, Survival Research Laboratories, Einstürzende Neubauten, Nam June Paik, Sonic Youth, DJ Spooky, and Ryoji Ikeda. Includes 100% of the music originally released on the 2CD version.


Artist: VA
Title: Floating Foundations Vol. 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 191CD
"This second volume marks a continuity and a change -- a continuity because, like the first Volume, five musicians wrote a 10 minutes electronic piece exclusively for the project. And a change, because this second attempt is more varied and explores other domains. The approach of Mark Clifford (ex-Seefeel), for example, amends the deal -- it's more immediate, less meditative. David Toop presents a brand new piece too, including electronics and guitars (a good choice after his complete CD 37th Floor At Sunset). The other contributors are Robin Rimbaud aka Scanner, who's piece is on his usual high quality level, Hard Sleeper aka the designer Peter Maybury and CM Von Hausswolff. Combined on one CD these five works emanate from the beginning a strong energy which develops step by step into a deep and intelligent drone."


Artist: ART ZOYD
Title: Experiences De Vol
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 3CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 192CD
2006 repress of this 2002 release, not previously distributed in the US. Legendary French avant-garde weird symphonic rock/prog group Art Zoyd asked thirteen composers around the world to create a piece for Ensemble Musiques Nouvelles -- directed by Jean-Paul Dessy (but founded by Henri Pousseur in 1962). For the realization of this project, many forces were necessary: two regions between two countries -- Belgium and France -- two ensembles -- Musiques Nouvelles (20 musicians) and Art Zoyd (6 musicians) and their high-tech studios -- and two years of work. Each piece on this compilation explores the essential framework of today's creators, pushing boundaries and revealing the unexpected results from some of the greatest names in today's electronic world as expressed by classical musicians. "Opus #1" by Ryoji Ikeda is the first piece that he wrote for non-electronic instruments -- and paradoxically one of his most accomplished works. Atau Tanaka's composition is for chamber orchestra, Theremin and infrared. Horatio Radulescu, the founder of the Spectral technique of composition is, for sure, one of the greatest composers alive, this is his last Opus (#64). David Shea is well-known by his many collaborations with Sub Rosa and Tzadik, and Jean Luc Fafchamps is also a Sub Rosa favorite. Jean-Paul Dessy questions mermaid's voices, Kasper T. Toeplitz organizes a Glenn Branca revival, and Jerome Combier tries to impart black light to music, while Giovammi Sollima mixes baroque chamber orchestra and techno rhythm. Gerard Hourbette continues Art Zoyd's expressionist legend, Jean-Christophe Feldhandler organizes a space in constant change, Fausto Romitelli matches a string quartet with a single mixer, and finally, Gualtiero Dazzi creates a tragic cinematographic space. 13 compositions. 13 unpublished works. 13 ways to combine electronic music and classical instruments.


Artist: HANNO, YOSHIHIRO
Title: April Remixes
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 196CD
"Yoshihiro Hanno a.k.a Multiphonic Ensemble begun to perform late '80s, took poetry reading and other role with his avant-garde Jazz unit. Its sound had a flavor of hip-hop elements and method. His 1st album Portrait of a Poet under his real name Yoshihiro Hanno has universalistic beauty and received the many compliments from artist like Ryuichi Sakamoto and Jim O'Rourke. He composed the music for the movie Flowers of Shanghai, directed by Hou Hsiao-Hsien, which was nominated to Cannes Film competition, this was Hanno's first movie soundtrack. 1999, he released a 2nd album for Sub Rosa Cirque as 'Multiphonic Ensemble'. Hanno wrote the theme music for the movie called Platform directed by Chinese director Jia Jia Zhangke who is most respected Chinese director in the new generation. Hanno's album April Music on Canvas#1 & Canvas#2 (remixes) are now available as one release on Sub Rosa, including 'Canvas#1' in its entirety and a selections of the remixes [Oval, Christophe Charles, Hidenobu Ito] appearing on the 'Canvas #2'. These tracks were only available in Japan (on Hanno's label Cirque) so far from 'classical' music to intense destructuration, a new form of avant-garde."


Artist: LASWELL'S MATERIAL, BILL
Title: Oz Fritz: All Around the World
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 197CD
Architecturally based location recordings made by engineer Oz Fritz, produced and presented by Bill Laswell. "All Around The World is an audio document of sacred spaces with their acoustic and consciousness altering properties. It is also the creation of new ambient spaces, new realities, through audio collage, juxtaposition and cut-up techniques. It is a child of John Cage's vision of being able to tune in and hear the music that is going on all around you by placing musical value on common sounds and elements of noise. Music that exists outside the structure of chords, scales and orthodox harmonic patterns. A new way of hearing music may occur for the attentive listener in much the same way that Edgard Varese broadened the way people heard music by introducing sirens and other found objects of noise into symphonic composition. All recordings were done on location in various sites that include ambience from The King's Chamber in the Great Pyramid of Giza, Notre Dame Cathedral, Mount St. Thomas and the Theosophical Society World Headquarters in Madras, India, the Australian Outback, the subways of Paris...Every space has a subtle yet profound effect on the consciousness of anyone who enters into it. Architecture has a profound effect upon mood most noticeably in a building's acoustics. Thus temples, mosques, cathedrals and other sacred buildings were designed to elevate a person's mood and raise their consciousness. 'Wake them up,' to use a Sufi metaphor, and lift them out of their everyday mundane reality (sleep). --Oz Fritz.


Artist: SAULE
Title: Saule
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 198CD
"This is the first full-length album of Saule aka Xavier Garcia Bardon. It contains three tracks/soundscapes of sentimental, lyrical, yet experimental turntablism: romantic loops, introspective rhythms, feedback and vinyl cracks. It's violence and love! All tracks were made using three record players and a few prepared records. Saule has played with Kim Cascone, Janek Schaefer, Leo Kupper and Tony Conrad in 2002."


Artist: POUSSEUR/MAIN/JECK/OVAL
Title: 4 Parabolic Mixes
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $14.00
Catalog #: SR 199CD
"In November 2001, Sub Rosa published Henri Pousseur's 8 Parabolic Studies in a box of 4 CDs -- these electronic pieces have been created in 1972 at the WDR studios in Cologne. The idea was to ask other musicians, of different generations, to attempt a new mix on the basis of these eight studies. The first mix (and not re-mix) was a re-interpretation by Henri Pousseur himself -- this laid the foundation stone of the edifice. Contrary to the mixes carried out thirty years ago, these were made digitally. The second mix was Robert Hampson's (aka Main) -- quite nervous of the master's reaction, who was present during the set. Robert, who holds an exhaustive knowledge of electronic music from its origins and of all its aspects -- even of the more obscure ones -- gave a personal but faithful interpretation of Pousseur's studies. Another degree of alteration was highlighted by Philip Jeck, who created a massive and powerful set, adding sounds from other sources (which is totally allowed according to Pousseur's original concept). And finally, Oval -- according to the process that is quintessential to his work, Markus Popp could only produce a piece far removed from its sources; since it is within sound itself that all sonorous source passes through the Oval-process, thus becoming Oval-music -- that is, music having its very own properties."


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 200CD
2010 repress, originally released 2003. "Sub Rosa presents the second part of the highly acclaimed and successful series Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music. This 2nd volume explores the early days of pre-electronic music (Percy Grainger, Johanna M. Beyer) and features some rare or unpublished pieces by main composers of electronic music (Vladimir Ussachevsky, Otto Luening, Tod Dockstader, Morton Subotnick, Hugh Davies, Luc Ferrari) as well as unreleased tracks by musicians who are cornerstones of the 90's electronic scene: (Autechre, Aphex Twin, Scanner, Kim Cascone, Yoshihiro Hanno), as well as tracks from the acid movement (Woody Mcbride, Choose) and the industrial scene (Laibach, Spk). Without forgetting some free-jazz (Sun Ra) or rare stuff from Captain Beefheart, Daphne Oram, Alan R. Splet (David Lynch's sound designer on Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet and Dune). Like Volume 1, this second part is an absolute must for anyone interested in the roots and history of electronic music. The 2xCD comes in a deluxe digipak with a 24 paged informative booklet."


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 3LP
Price: $34.00
Catalog #: SR 200LP
2012 repress. Sub Rosa issues the highly-acclaimed Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music collection on vinyl, containing all of the music on the 2CD version -- 3LPs housed in a luxurious triple gatefold sleeve. The story continues with volume 2, featuring slow explorations of the past and the present. Given the present system of production, there are reasons, some of them identifiable, why only a few names emerge in each period. There may also be a preference for concentrating information rather than letting it pile up in disordered fashion. Over the past 40 years, the same ten electronic music composers get mentioned again and again (including in music dictionaries and histories). Yet behind them are many other names. Who are they? Second-raters? Not necessarily. For we then need to define the concept of top-rate (rated by who, and on what criteria?) and second-rate or minor artist. Great pleasure can be derived from the works of minor artists. The case of Tod Dockstader is instructive: when "for lack of academic qualifications" he was denied access to the electronic music facilities he needed, was there not great beauty in the pieces he nevertheless created and in his determination to make music without those facilities? His name was never seen on the labels of top record companies. But he influenced quite a few people -- Richard James quoted him, and others then referred to his work. Some of his records were reissued, and what one could call the rehabilitation process continues. The same applies to many other composers. All such stories spell a passion for music, and weave myth. At the turn of the century, there were efforts to find new sources of sound -- a number of machines were exhibited, including Thaddeus Cahiel's Telharmonium in 1887 and the Dynamophone presented to the New York public in 1906; they generally played well-known romantic or post-romantic pieces. After a few flamboyant skirmishes described in the previous volume, the postwar period saw the arrival in 1951, of Wladimir Ussachevsky and Otto Luening in New York's Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. When audiences of the '50s and '60s first heard Varèse, Pousseur, Stockhausen, Berio, Ussachevsky, Yuasa, Dockstader and Mumma, what did they feel? Perhaps a sort of break -- an epistemological break, like it must have been for the first audience of Monteverdi's Orfeo. They left the auditorium completely stunned, because they had never heard anything like it. Artists on volume 2 include: Wladimir Ussachevsky + Otto Luening, Autechre, Luc Ferrari, Laibach, Alan R. Splet, SPK, Tod Dockstader, Johanna M. Beyer, Morton Subotnick, Captain Beefheart, Robin Rimbaud/Scanner, Hugh Davies, Daphne Oram, Sun Ra, Kim Cascone, Yoshihiro Hanno, Meira Asher, Woody McBride, Lasse Steen/Choose, Arcane Devices, and Percy Grainger.


Artist: DJ SPOOKY
Title: Rhythm Science: Excerpts and Allegories from...
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 201CD
...the Sub Rosa Audio Archive. "This time DJ Spooky remixes the complete catalogue of Sub Rosa. The result is a complete re-building of the label in an unique piece of 80 minutes constructed with more than 50 parts. Full of 'Spooky' sounds & grooves. There is the base of this complex architecture ----> Yoshio Machida "Afterimage" mixed w/ Sussan Deyhim "The First Reading" / Tibetan Evening Music / Nuuk Posse "Poesi" mixed w/ Antonin Artaud "alienation et magie noire" / DJ Grazhoppa "Milky Remix" of Bill Laswell / Directions "Encode" mixed w/ e.e. cummings "Let's From Some Loud Unworld's Most Rightful Wrong " / DJ Wally "Zeta Reticulli" mixed w/ Gertrude Stein "If I told him, a completed portrait of Picasso" / Charles Hayward "Accidents and Emergencies (instrumental)" / Bill Laswell "Oscillations (Vedic's live pop remix)" / Vedic "Kali Rising" mixed w/ Tristan Tzara "pour compte (phases, 1949)" / Oval "April Remix" mixed w/ James Joyce "anna livia plurabelle (finnegans wake)" (needs to be louder....) / Oval vs Yoshiro Hanno "April Remix" & Oval vs Main "SDII Audio Template" / David Shea "Satiricon" mixed w/ Marcel Duchamp "some texts from a l'infinitif" / Scola Hungarica "Sanctus" / Jean Luc Fafchamps "Chrysanthemum haradjanii" mixed w/ Meira Asher & Guy Harries "Girl" / Darba Del Hameni "Jilala de Tangier" / Jean Luc Fafchamps "Ground" / Seefeel "Is It Now?" / DJ Wally "Bitchley's Kow Korn" mixed w/ "In Principio - extract from Easter Nocturnal Liturgy" / Scanner "Fuse" / William S. Burroughs and Martin Olson "The Five Steps" / Kim Cascone/Scanner "Atavistic Endeavor" / Scanner "Control Phantom" / Merzbow "Lux Automobile/Krokodil Rock Mix" / Yoshio Machida "Afterimage" mixed w/ Vladimir Maiakovski "Aventure Extraordinaire Arrivée a Vladimir Maiakovski, en été a la Datc" / Claude Debussy "d'un cahier d'esquisses" / David Shea +Tobias Hazan "memoires d'un surfeur au bord du désert" / Disjecta "Bad Day for Wasps" / Matik "Indigo" / Giancinto Scelsi "Suite number 11" / Bill Laswell with Trilok Gurtu "Nothing" / Luciano Berio""Brin" mixed w/ Laswell's "Dislocation" / Brion Gysin "One Night @ the 1001" / Tibetan Evening music / Jon Hassel "Map of Dusk" / C.M. von Hausswolff "With the Flow Against The Current" / Jellaba Titara "Gnaoua De Abenb Binizi" mixed w/ Guillaume Apollinaire "Pont Mirabeau" / Nicholas James Bullen "Again and Again""mixed w/ violin from Brion Gysin recording "at 1001" / Gilles Deleuze "Mille Plateaux" / Nûs "lament" drum break mixed w/ Morton Feldman "Triadic Memories" / Nûs "lament" drum break mixed w/ David Toop "Tricyrtis Latifalia" / Mouse on Mars "Subnubus " / Current 93 "some morning when the moon was blood" mixed w/ Lee Renaldo's remix of "Konstantin Raudive" / Patti Smith "Morning High" / Sussan Deyhim "The Last Reading".


Artist: VA
Title: Japanese Avant-Garde
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 202CD
Features: Merbow, Otomo Yoshohide, Viewmasters, Joji Asano, Aki Onda, Yoshio Machida, Bisk, Sachiko M, Multiphonic Ensemble, Haco, Ground Zero, So Takahashi. About half the tracks appear to be exclusive to this compilation. "As an introduction to Japanese Avant-Garde here are some extracts from David Toop's liner notes: 'Most music in Japan has little to recommend it; it is a sonic equivalent of those brutal concrete towers or the transitory chaos of multi-storey teen-fashion emporia in Aoyama. But a sonic underground thrives, creatively if not financially, and perhaps it should be compared with the shabby Golden-gai drinking dens of Shinjuku, faint reminders of a lost time when desire and transgression shared endless cups of sake with political and artistic radicalism. How is it possible to live within and react against an extremely regulated society, politically moribund, engulfed by consumerism, technological innovation, mediated images, a confusion of influences and traditions? Agitation and stillness may seem to be opposing strategies, yet they converge at a certain point. Surging deep beneath the noir turbulence of Merzbow and So Takahashi, the car crash ruins of Otomo Yoshihide and Ground Zero, the curated urban fragments of Viewmaster, the technocratic complexity of Bisk and Yoshihiro Hanno's Multiphonic Ensemble, the piercing intensity of Sachiko M, the childlike placidity of Aki Onda, Yoshio Machida and Haco, is a conflicting sense of clarity attained through struggle. Out of turmoil, a stained purity is revealed. Listening to this alchemical transmutation, I think of Fujieda Baian, the central character of Shotaro Ikenami's historical novels. Professional assassin and acupuncturist, Baian kills to live, lives to heal. At the beginning of Yasunari Kawabata's novel, 'The Sound of the Mountain', Ogata Shingo hears an elusive sound, the faint rumble of the mountain at the rear of his house. 'It was as if a demon had passed, making the mountain sound out.' Shingo shakes his head, thinking the disturbance might be a ringing in his ears. Feeling fear, perhaps he hears the collapsing certainties of the future, our present, where everything is in flux.'"


Artist: CASCONE & SCANNER, KIM
Title: The Crystalline Address
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 203CD
"This record, build in two parts, combines the work of Kim Cascone and Robin Rimbaud aka Scanner. This is not any randomatic improvisation, it is more the result of a an intention, the envy to create a circular collaboration based on exchanges -- Scanner > Cascone > Scanner > Cascone > Scanner progressing in order to achieve the perfect structure. The result is in the vein of the best Oval and Fennesz pieces."


Artist: TOOP, DAVID
Title: Black Chamber
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 205CD
"'The Black Chamber (Kurodo) is a room where the emperor from Komatsu after his accession to the throne always cooked for himself, still remembering how in the past, when he was a private person, he had dabbled in cookery. They say it is called the Black Chamber because it has become sooty from kindling smoke.' Essays In Idleness: The Tsurezuregusa of Kenko (c. 1330-1332). Recorded, played and produced by David Toop at the mythic The Bathosphere in autumn 2002, this record is an important landmark in his work because it's an accomplishment and a synthesis of many preoccupations from his whole artistic live. Presents in these sessions: Tom Recchion, Terry Day (Alterartion), Paul Burwell, Watanabe, Lol Coxhill...many of these musicians were the main protagonists of the London improvisation scene in the seventies. It included too some surprising field recordings in China and in his own garden in London. The tonality, the general key, is very diverse with something Japanese in the air, an important part of 'real instruments' on a complex electronic organization Soft Cavities, Raw Mouth Shape, The Slapping Gun and Plume (inspired by the Belgian Henri Michaux) are successful mix up of electronic devices and Coxhill's sax improvisations. 'Waxed Skin' and 'Poison Incense' are very delicate micro-sound exercises (including time to time some acoustic instruments). 'Apartment Thunder' and 'Ill-Faced Doll' are a short erotic Japanese movies. 'Silver Birds' and 'Life In the Folds' are field recordings in China and to be true it's hard to admit that 'Gored Fig Sacs' was recorded in his own garden (but it was). The very soft 'Blind Eel Priestess' involved electronics and beautiful electric guitars. At least, 'Black Chamber' is an amazing Lynchian piece with his compelling part of guitar arpeggio. a splendor. Black Chamber is his maturity masterpiece."


Artist: CHARLES, CHRISTOPHE
Title: Undirected 1992-2002
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 206CD
1: 'Next Point - Tribute to Henning Christiansen', is a performance given at the MANCA festival in 1992, it is an extension of 'Media Opera' organized by Yamaguchi Katsuhiro in October 1992 on Awaji Island to celebrate the foundation of his 'Village of the Arts'. One can hear the rain falling in the south from Majorca, the voices of salesmen of coffee and boiled eggs of the station of Howrah, beside Calcutta, the chants of the monks of Todaiji in Nara, and the calls of the merchants of ice cream of Hangzhou (recorded by Martina Diestel). Other sounds were sampled among the works of Henning Christiansen: sporadic chords of the piano of the cave of Penthesilea, the very particular sound of the long pipe which Christiansen hits more or less regularly on one end, 'in order to give a certain feeling of time', or the bells and the tuba of the 'garden of the yellow mountain' where low frequencies make almost inevitably vibrate the ceilings of the rooms where it is played.
       
       
       
       2: 'Deposition' contains ten episodes of various lengths which are connected according to a dynamics of tension and relaxation. There is no particular narrative dimension, but 'scenes', featuring soundscapes from various cities and countrysides, as well as musical (instruments) sounds: voice, flutes, or percussions, which reflect an interest for the fundamental actions of breathing, or hitting objects with the body -- rather than praising the mastery of a particular technique. The sounds generally come from an action which does not have any musical claim, for example, the Senegalese women who crush the millet. The voices are those of the salesmen from the Fischmarkt of Hamburg, the children of Calcutta, Italian dogs howling in the night, or insects of Japanese mountains. Other sounds come from a collaboration with Ryoji Ikeda, from 'In Memoriam Gilles Deleuze' and from the music of the two permanent sound installations of Osaka and Tokyo-Narita international Airport.
       
       
       
       Photographs & Cover : "Mobiles Floating in the Space".


Artist: FERRARI, LUC
Title: Les Anecdotiques
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 207CD
"Even if his art is historically linked to the musique concrète school, Luc Ferrari (born in Paris in 1929) is above all a man with a freedom of spirit rarely equalled in the history of music, who has repeatedly left what he excelled at for new territory still unexplored; thus he is par excellence the composer of new fields of investigation. Ferrari joined the Groupe de Musique Concrète in 1958 and remained a member until 1966; he collaborated with Pierre Schaeffer in setting up the Groupe de Recherches Musicales (1958). By 1963-4 he had begun Hétérozygote, an extended tape piece in which ambient sounds unfold in narrative form, suggesting a dazzling variety of incidents, all unexplained. He was Professor of Composition at Cologne's Rheinische Musikschule from 1964 to 65. In 1965 and 1966 he produced Les Grandes Répétitions, a series of television documentaries with Gérard Patris on the subject of contemporary music, specifically Olivier Messiaen, Edgard Varèse, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Hermann Scherchen and Cecil Taylor. Luc Ferrari's diverse work and aesthetics continue to have a singular impact on the young generations of electronic musicians and artists. The corpus of his work is immense and includes hundreds of compositions of all kinds. Les Anecdotiques -- his last composition -- is a vast sound-film of more than an hour who explores in 15 steps the intensity of re-composed sounds from his continual travel around the world -- with electronic additional structures."


Artist: DEUPREE & KENNETH KIRSCHNER, TAYLOR
Title: Post_Piano
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 208CD
"Post_Piano is a CD of experimental electronic music derived entirely from the sound of one key being struck on a piano. Using only a single, low-resolution piano sample, Kenneth Kirschner first composed a series of spare, improvised piano sketches. These pieces were then passed on to Taylor Deupree, who used them as raw material for digital manipulation and as building blocks for the construction of new, collaborative compositions. Each of Deupree's pieces, which Kirschner later collaborated in editing, was created entirely from sounds derived from one of the piano sketches. The final recordings transform the elements extracted from the piano sketches into experimental new works which accentuate the artifacts of the digital manipulation process while at the same time evoking the timbre and harmonies of the source material. Because each of these recordings was derived from one of the piano sketches, and each of the sketches began with a single piano sample, every sound on the CD can ultimately be traced back to the sound of one key being struck on a piano. Conceived as an 'open source' project, Post_Piano is being released on a split data/audio CD containing not only the final Deupree/Kirschner recordings, but also the components used to create them, including mp3 files of Kirschner's piano sketches and a copy of the original piano sample with which the project began. By accessing the CD in a computer, listeners can trace the development of the project from the single starting note, through the piano sketches, and on to the final recordings. Further, the composers encourage other musicians to utilize these source materials in their own work, freely sampling, modifying or appropriating the sounds and ideas presented on Post_Piano."


Artist: AKIYAMA, MITCHELL
Title: If Night Is A Weed And Day Grows Less
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 209CD
"Recorded in Montréal, Canada, If Night Is A Weed And Day Grows Less, the 4th solo CD by Mitchell Akiyama, marks a more concerted return to Akiyama's classical roots. All eight pieces grew out of four piano compositions that were torn apart and reassembled -- fragments of one piece contaminating another -- reordered melodies, hidden references, obscured refrains. It is weeds fighting the hegemony of the lawn, it is the possibility of anarchy resulting in fleeting orders of beauty, it is the progeny of Steve Reich, Michel Foucault and Marcel Duchamp. The clear melodic beauty of Christian Fennesz but with a piano..."


Artist: HARD SLEEPER
Title: Rain/A Leaf Spiral
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 211CD
"Following on from his contribution to Floating Foundation vol. 2 (SR191), "Rain"/A Leaf Spiral is the first album-length release for Sub Rosa from Dublin based artist Hard Sleeper (Peter Maybury). Maybury would qualify his music as 'the detritus of pop,' tentative shapes and melodies are pieced together through fragments of dislocated sounds. Drums, piano, analog synthesizers and guitars allowing music and images to travel a parallel journey through dreamy landscapes drifting in and out of focus -- as if memories or thoughts that come to you while travelling, passing from waking to sleeping and other states of semi-consciousness. Hard Sleeper has released material on Emigré Music, Tu m', Static Caravan and Fällt."


Artist: HANNO, YOSHIHIRO
Title: ES:
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 212CD
"Yoshihiro Hanno explores for years now a wide range of musics: soundtracks, contemporary music, free jazz , drum 'n' bass, fragmented electronica, hip hop... with a definite taste for fusion and destructuration in order to create a new form of avant-garde."


Artist: MERZBOW + KIM CASCONE
Title: Rondo/7Phases/Blowback
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 213CD
"In the 80's, Masami Akita, Asmus Tietchens and Kim Cascone collaborated on a CD called Grav which was eventually released on Silent Records in the early 90's. Having gone their separate ways, Masami and Kim reestablished contact in the late 90's. After email address were exchanged, Kim received a copy of the Amlux CD from Masami, and later heard about a remix project on Important Records paying tribute to the Japanese industrial/ noise-maker. Cascone started his own remix based on extracts from from Amlux CD. The new track was based on new editing techniques Cascone developed which were experiments in time compression by combining tape editing techniques commonly used in Musique Concrete with simple algorithms developed in Max/MSP. The track 'Blowback' -- the prototype track using this editing style -- was completely constructed by hand using a software sound editor. '7Phase' puts these editing techniques under algorithmic control in Max/MSP. By using each others published work as raw material for their collaboration. They then sent each other tracks via CDR to be used as either new source material or finished work. After choosing the best of the collection of tracks they had developed, Kim and Masami titled the pieces, sequenced the tracks and then designed a cover graphic for it using Jitter (graphic library for Max/MSP)."


Artist: KARKOWSKI, ZBIGNIEW
Title: One and Many
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 214CD
"Zbigniew Karkowski studied composition at the State College of Music in Gothenburg, Sweden, aesthetics of modern music at the University of Gothenburg's Department of Musicology, and computer music at the Chalmers University of Technology. After completing his studies in Sweden, he studied sonology for a year at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Den Haag, The Netherlands. During his education, he also attended many summer composition master courses arranged by Centre Acanthes in Avignon and Aix-en-Provence, France, studying with Iannis Xenakis, Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Boulez, and Georges Aperghis, among others. He works actively as a composer of both acoustic and electroacoustic music. He has written pieces for large orchestra (commissioned and performed by the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra), plus an opera and several chamber music pieces that were performed by professional ensembles in Sweden, Poland and Germany. He is a founding member of the electroacoustic music performance trio 'Sensorband.' Karkowski has lived and worked in Tokyo, Japan for the past eight years, and is active in the underground noise scene there. Professionally active in contemporary, industrial, rock and experimental music for the last 15 years. One and Many: an ode to loudspeakers -- These life conditions lead to a radical conclusion: the traditional definitions of music are irrelevant and music theories and music as a cultural concept must be destroyed. That is what we find in his latest works, in which his main concern is to produce pieces out of electronic sounds and acoustic walls on scores developed from the architecture of ruins. His last opus called 'who am I' is the exact development of years of theories and practices. As many of Karkowski's pieces, this is a highly delicate yet physical work, which can be seen as an ode to loudspeakers."


Artist: MEISSNER/SLAVIN/SACHS, SEBASTIAN
Title: Into the Void
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 215CD
Into the Void is a reflection upon the history and the recent changes in the Krakovian neighborhood of Kazimierz. The center of this meditation is the seemingly contradictory development of the last few years, which shows the attempts to re-animate Jewish culture. This piece is an attempt to reverse the seasons from summer to winter in the 700-year-old Jewish district of Krakow. What struck Meissner at first sight, was the glaring contrast between the rich, the rise of the material culture and the seeming absence of real community exterminated during the Nazi era. Four months later, on June 26th 2003, at Krowoderska52 club in Krakow, Sebastian Meissner, Ran Slavin and Eran Sachs offered the final effects of their research in the form of a series of pieces. They carefully crafted crunchy steps, freezing wind, cracking ice and conversations into a mesmerizing film for the ears. The imaginative power of the music was reinforced by Slavin's video impressions -- equally apt in conjuring up desolate though meaningful digital environments referring to Nowa Huta -- the empty, large, defunct metal industry zone.


Artist: LASWELL, BILL
Title: AFTERMATHematics
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 216CD
"(Instrumental); featuring Grandmaster Dxt, Skiz (Aka Spectre), Sly Dunbar. This new opus from Bill Laswell for Sub Rosa is exploring the veins of hip-hop and dub in some peculiar manner. Going urban with some old-school hip-hop ingredients, then dubbing and scratching, Laswell is paying tribute to the past of those musical styles and adapting the vibes to the present and future. Bass and kicks, straight and efficient, are the skeleton; turntablism, floating keyboards chords, abstract sounds are giving flesh'n'blood to this organic machine. Aftermathematics is at the same times urban and tribal, like being in an hidden cavern in the heart of N-Y, doing some shamanic rituals in a crowded big avenue in order to transform it in a gigantic dancefloor. 10 tracks to fly high, or get the echo, the resonance of a big city's pulse, and yet facing some ghosts from the past, like travelling in a time machine. Anything is possible going back to the prehistoric age or seeing the future. Enter the ritual."


Artist: VON HAUSSWOLFF, C.M.
Title: Three Overpopulated Cities Built By Shortsighted Planners...
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 217CD
...An Unbalanced And Quite Dangerous Airport And An Abandoned Church. "This second complete CD followed his Rays of Beauty and will build a subtle trilogy work for Sub Rosa. By visiting Lagos in 1983, Tokyo in 1999, 2000 and 2001, Bangkok several times between 1986 and 2002 and Mexico City in 2002 and 2003, CM von Hausswolff came, as thousands of other people, to the conclusion that something is running amok. An uncontrollable avalanche consisting of the construction of houses, streets and in-between spaces develops in large cities as independent do-it-yourselves-organisms. They're places we like because of their 'anything can happen'- status. They're places we hate, because they remind us of what lousy creatures we actually are. How long will they last? Maybe as long as the feedback sustains? A conclusive statement rolled over the above-mentioned composer when he stumbled over an abandoned church in Chicago. This sad place, once illuminated by Marin Luther King, is now in the hands of soaptalkshowcommander Oprah Winfrey's chef Art Smith ... Maybe it's a sign of something good. At least we know the quality of his desserts ... This new release, following his A Lecture On Disturbances In Architecture (Firework Edition Records, Stockholm, 2002), deals with these matters in a formal way. The rest is up to you ...."


Artist: KRIEGER, ULRICH
Title: Early American Minimalism: Walls of Sound II
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 218CD
...Early American Minimalism. Featuring classic 1960s works by: Steve Reich, Terry Riley & Philip Glass. "Walls of Sound is about what I call: 'static music' -- music that isn't semantic, gestured, or narrative, that doesn't move or change atmospherically, and isn't dramatic or has a development in the traditional European sense. If it changes it does it very slowly. The emphasis lies on the 'aural sculpture' in which one enters not just with the ears, but also physically with the whole body, and eventually with your mind, altering your perception. Inside the sculpture, inside the static, there are endless changing details, variations and microcosms. In a certain way it is a modern form of trance or ritualistic music without a pre-fixed ritual. This work is about 'pattern music', general mostly referred to as 'Minimal Music'. A music that uses as its main technique repeated (modal) patterns, which get varied or shifted against each other, generating 'audio walls', taking the emphasis and attention away from the original melodic pattern material towards the aural sculpture, the acoustic phenomenon. This is true for the early American Minimalism before 1970, which still was very conceptual, and did hold a strong influence from Fluxus ('1+1', 'Pendulumn Music'). Riley and La Monte Young had been active in the Fluxus scene. Also Conceptual Art, Minimal Art and Op Art were somehow related to and an influence for Minimal Music. Often the early Minimal Music pieces were just pure concepts (Pendulumn Music). This new music, which saw it's light in the 60s in America, was anti- or at least non-European. Young American composers were trying to find alternatives away from extremely intellectual European 'New Music' aesthetics, techniques of Serialism, Ultra-Expressionism and Accademia. The main influences were non-European and non-American: mainly Indian classical music (Riley, Glass) and African music (Reich)." -- Ulrich Krieger. Pieces performed are: Philip Glass: "Music in Fifths" (1969): Steve Reich: "Pendulumn Music" (1968): Terry Riley: "Dorian Reeds" (1964); Philip Glass: "1+1"(1968); Steve Reich: "Phase" (1967).


Artist: VA
Title: The Hidden City: Sound Portraits from Göteborg
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 219CD
Featuring: Christopher Brus, Alva Noto, Mapstation, Johannes Helden, Lars Carlsson, Sherif, Peter Hansen, Christina Kubisch, Daniel Skoglund/ 8tunnel2, Dan Fröberg, Paul Bauthén, Ànders Ilar, Leif Elggren, Henrik Rylander, Anna Eriksson. Features all exclusive tracks, commissioned for this release. This is a soundtrack to the book The HIdden City, People and Places in Gothenburg -- an exploration of the open and hidden perspectives of this north European harbour town by writer Magnus Haglund and photographer Stefan Schneider (published separately by Glanta Produktion). "Why is Gothenburg an interesting place? This is a city with a specific cosmopolitical history, where for example the East Indian Company, started in 1731, had its base and through its trading a lot of the wealth and property of the country had its upswing in the 18th and 19th centuries. The culture of trading meant an atmosphere of independence and a sense of both belonging and not belonging to the Swedish state. This is to be reflected in the Gothenburg version of the liberal tradition, something which is investigated and makes up one part of the book: what does this social liberalism mean today, when it is confronted with the multicultural situation and political tensions like the riots during the EU-summitt-meeting in June 2001... To transform, to question, to dream in new patterns: this is one of the themes of the book. Through conversations with writers and politicians, DJs and historians, and through situationist-inspired walkings-dérives through the city, the complexity of the town -- which had quite a solid identity but now is interestingly insecure -- is outlined and elicited. From the old city to the young one, through industrial areas and electronic soundscapes, the miscellaneous character comes through, the productive oppositions. The city disturbs us. The CD The Hidden City consists of some 15 sound portraits from the city, by artists that are featured in the book or have an interesting relationship with certain places or addresses in Gothenburg. The record is a collage of the city, just like the book."


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 3
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 220CD
2010 repress, originally released 2004. "This 3th volume continue to show all the aspects of electronic music from the early beginning until now -- including 2 pieces of historical concrete music (of the 70's), several piece of American tape music (Columbia university) with a special focus on all the electronic music from Germany -- WDR early works -- Krautrock -- electronic from 90's...featuring too some recent work of the greatest noise artists & several unsung electronic pioneers ....more than 2 h 30' of music -- many rare tracks and unpublished (at least 75%) + 40 page booklet of notes and biographical notices." FEATURING: Bernard Parmegiani, Hugh Le Caine, Faust, To Rococo Rot, Keith Fullerton Whitman aka Hrvatski, Ilhan Mimaroglu, Michael J. Schumacher, Justin Bennett, Scott Gibbons aka Lilith, Fred Szymanski aka Modular, Francisco Lopez, Zbigniew karkowski, Masami Akita aka Merzbow, Michel Chion, Erkki Kurenniemi, Carlsten Nicolai aka Alva Noto, Peter Rehberg aka Pita, Herbert Eimert + Robert Beyer, Günther Rabl, Asmus Tietchens, Michael Rother, CM von hausswolff + Erik Pauser > Phauss, Rune Lindgrad.


Artist: SHUKAR
Title: Bear Tamers Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 221CD
"Ursari music or Bear tamers music: Shukar's sound is coming from the old times, when Tatars and Mongolians came to Dacia (the old name of Romania). The members of Shukar (that's mean 'fine' in rom language) play very original sounds called ursari music (which descends from the brotherhood of the bear-tamers), a very old and primitive kind of gipsy nomad music. They use primitive and old 'instruments' like spoons, wooden barrel or darabuka. Shukar's music is very powerful and 'aggressive' but highly and deeply emotional. Basically it's exclusively a music made of percussions and voices. The core of the group is made of 3 exceptional people: Napoleon, Tamamgo and Classic. A unique, powerful and deeply emotional sound, exclusively from percussions (spoons, wooden barrel, darabuka...) and voices; dating back to the arrival of the Tatars and Mongolians in Dacia (now known as Romania)."


Artist: VA
Title: Tibetan Buddhist Rites from the Monasteries of Bhutan
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $16.00
Catalog #: SR 222CD
"Recorded by John Levy, a London ethnomusicologist, in 1971, more than 140 minutes of some of the most powerful music ever recorded on earth. John Levy, an Englishman in Bhutan early seventies: Released by Lyrichord in mid-70', all the people who have listen to these vinyls know that it doesn't exist something more powerful, more prodigious and pure than them. John Levy was a London ethnomusicologist who took refuge in Tibetan Buddhism. So he had all the possibilities to record -- with his nagra-stéreo -- all the rituals (even the most sacred). We can say that what is discovered here is unique and far beyond all what was done after that. All the material is fully remastered and we propose the Levy's collection divided into two discs of ritual and chanting (this CD) and one of instrumentals and folk music (forthcoming as SR230).
       
       The great power of the rituals of the Drupka and Nyingmapa Order: On the first volume, a double CD with extended notes, Rituals of the Drupka Order, the primary instrument is the long golden trumpet, along with various drums and percussion and a deep droning bass. Rather than soothingly meditative, the music can be a bit dissonant to Western ears. Chanted and played by 76 Lamas and Monks with long trumpets, shawms, cymbals, drums and other Tibetan instruments in sacred temples. Invited by the king of Bhutan, Levy was afforded every facility for recording monastic music in the principal dzongs (great fort-like monasteries) of the Nyingmapa Order. The ethereal Polytonal throat chanting, the long trumpets, shawms and percussion instruments, the processional music and spectacular mask dances, Tibetan and Bhutanese secular songs and poems, All reproduced with incredibly sonic fidelity! A truly remarkable collection, with extensive liner notes, photographs, and musical illustrations by John Levy."


Artist: DOCKSTADER, TOD
Title: Aerial (1)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 223CD
Tod Dockstader is one of the all-time great figures in the world of musique concréte composition, with his "organized sound" works from the 1960s being amongst the most radical ever conceived -- in league with Schaeffer, Henry, Stockhausen, and Varese. Aerial is a rare new work in the realm of shortwave radio, from one of America's most experimental composers. This release is the first (Volume 1) in a three-part series. "I've written before of my interest in shortwave radio. When I was very young, people got most of their entertainment from radio. They called it 'playing the radio,' as if it were a musical instrument. That's what I've tried to do in this piece. About this time, a few people encouraged me to look into using a computer for this work. I'd never used one, but I saw it would allow me to keep my mixes digital -- no more transfer losses. So, at the end of 2001, I got a computer and an editing program for it, and spent what seemed a long time learning it. I began selecting mixes and loading them into the computer in late March 2002. Out of the 580, I selected 90 'best' mixes -- eventually reduced to 59, the ones included on the CDs. Finally, in assembling the CDs, I followed David Myers' suggestion to allow each piece to flow into the next -- making a continuous journey to the end." --Tod Dockstader, 14 September 2003. [initial pressing of this came w/ a slipcase for all 3 volumes to be filed together, but is no longer available in that packaging, just as a regular jewel cased CD]


Artist: SHEA, DAVID
Title: The Book of Scenes
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 224CD
New York to Australia expat/turntablist/sampler wizard/composer David Shea returns to Sub Rosa with his seventh release for the label, Book of Scenes. Throughout his career, David Shea has collaborated on projects with the likes of such experimental/new music luminaries as John Zorn, Marc Ribot, Zeena Parkins, Jim Pugliese, Ikue Mori and Anthony Coleman. Through his work one might find equally steady fascinations for audio-collage, contemporary music, easy-listening, jazz, soundtrack, traditional music, and classical music, used in complex amalgamations of genres and cultural references. He employs compositional methods from contemporary classical composers and early electronic experimentalists such as Iannis Xenakis, Giacinto Scelsi, Gyorgi Ligeti, Morton Feldman, as well as many film composers such as Bernard Herrmann and Henry Mancini. This new release consists of specific atmospheric tracks; a kind of open book, an open music film... a true composed work of high-level classical sampler music! The Book of Scenes is a collection of pieces for viola and piano. Each piece is a single scene, scored on a single page, placing the players and the instruments in different situations and relationships to each other. Incorporated within this framework, the players experiment with sampled recordings of themselves as well as the electronic environment they perform in. The work can be played in any order and the sequence is chosen beforehand by the players. The scenes explore solo and duo playing, with musical roles placed inside of shifting contexts, many related to visual references, films and iconic memories. This record presents Book I -- the first 29 pieces performed live with some scenes constructed electronically from samples and memories of other scenes. Many of the sections are visual in nature, for example -- the alto player bows his instrument while the pianist places his hands on the viola neck and chooses the notes to be played, followed by the alto player placing his hands inside the piano to mute the pianist's notes as well as a scene where the players are blindfolded. These scenes have been replaced by electronic manipulations of the live performance. The result is a flow of relationships and scored or scripted scenes living between the orchestration of the acoustic instruments and the electronic characters they engage with.


Artist: VA
Title: Dada, Pansaers et Correspondance Volume 1 (1917-1926)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 225CD
This is the first volume in an archival collection of Belgian avant-garde big-wigs from Magritte to Broodthaers, and James Ensor to Christian Dotremont. The first volume in a three part series (that will ultimately showcase 220 minutes of rare Surrealist documents), this release covers the years 1917-1926. Includes the crazy lecture by James Ensor in 1929, as well as many testimonies concerning the Dadaist Clément Pansaers by his own son, Louis Aragon, Philippe Soupault, Pierre Bourgeois, Pascal Pia, and so on. This release also features Paul Neuhuys addressing the foundation of "ça ira" (Henri Michaux' publishers among others), poetry by Franz Hellens, early memories of Henri Michaux and Camille Goemans by Robert Guiette, and Jean-Pierre Verheggen reading Henri Michaux. Also contains material concerning the 1924-1926 Correspondance Groupe (a parallel movement to French Surrealism) with direct testimonies from Paul Nougé, Camille Goemans, Marcel Lecomte, André Souris, Paul Hooreman as well as the opinion of Salvador Dali concerning Camille Goemans and Paul Nougé. This is a hardcore historical spoken word document, in the native language known as French. It's the original voices, recorded many years ago (this volume features material recorded 1917-1926, published in audio form for the first time).


Artist: SCANNER + DESSY
Title: Play Along
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 227CD
"The adventure began in June of 2002 with two wonderful evenings at the Botanique (Brussels) devoted to crisscrossings and genre-stripping between electronic nomads and musicians, classically-trained composers eager to mingle with other forms. The 'Electronic Stroller' Robin Rimbaud, explorer of urban interstices, was the first to answer our call and met with Jean-Paul Dessy in London to elaborate an approach to deterritorialized co-composition: cello sounds sampled during short improvisations and later reworked by Scanner; electronic sequences and textures chosen by the Belgian composer and for which he wrote strings parts. These are the terms of a dynamic exchange resulting in a work open to both digital gesture and acoustic composition. In addition to this piece, which is the center panel of this album's triptych, Scanner and Jean-Paul Dessy each offered a solo electronics piece: the first integrating string sounds produced by the second, the latter choosing to strip down a previous composition of all its acoustic instruments, keeping only its animalistic essence (wolves and whales' cries) and treatments. Free exchanges between complementary sound worlds that keep feeding off each other through other residencies and performances, mirror effects distorting our preconceptions and generating fresh musical projections."


Artist: DOCKSTADER, TOD
Title: Aerial #2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 228CD
This release is the second (Volume 2) in the three-part Aerial series. Tod Dockstader is one of the all-time great figures in the world of musique concréte composition, with his "organized sound" works from the 1960s being amongst the most radical ever conceived -- in league with Schaeffer, Henry, Stockhausen, and Varese. Aerial is a rare new work in the realm of shortwave radio, from one of America's most experimental composers. Volume 1 was released in March 2005 inside a slipcase. Volume 2 and 3 will be released separately and packaged in individual standard jewel cases that will conveniently fit into the slipcase provided with Volume 1. Working from his interest in shortwave radio, Dockstader attempts to "play the radio," thus redefining this cultural medium as a musical instrument with the help of a computer and a good editing system. Out of the 580 mixes, he selected 90 "best" mixes -- eventually reduced to 59, which became representational of the distilled magic of the radio, as it elucidates the sounds between stations. Finally, in assembling the CDs, Dockstader allows each piece to flow into the next -- making a continuous journey to the end. Ghostly, ethereal, and irresistibly interesting-- like hearing secrets passed over airwaves. Volume 3 to be released early 2006.


Artist: Z'EV
Title: as/if/when
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 229LP
Sub Rosa presents works by industrial music pioneer, Z'EV. The physical vibrations of the objects in his works with both text and sound has been influenced by the Middle Eastern mystical system best known as Kabbalah, as well as -- but not limited to -- African, Afro-Caribbean and Indonesian rhythms, musics and cultures. He has studied Ewe music, Balinese gamelan, and Indian tala. From 1959-1965 he studied drumming with Arnie Frank, then Chuck Flores and then Art Anton at Drum City in Van Nuys, CA. In 1963, he abandoned Judaism and began his life-long relationship with World religions and esoteric systems. 1964 saw the beginning of his initial attempts at writing poetry and explorations of both two and three-dimensional artforms. After studying at CalArts from 1969-1970 with poets Emmett Williams and Michael S. Bell and writer/critic Sue-Ellen Case, he began producing works using the name S. Weisser, primarily concentrating on visual and sound poetries. In 1975, he was included in the "Second Generation" show at the Museum of Conceptual Art in San Francisco. In 1976 he moved from Los Angeles to the Bay Area, ending up with a storefront studio on MacArthur Boulevard in Oakland, pretty much midway between the headquarters of the Black Panther Party, (who dissolved that year), and the Hells Angels (still extant). A primary reason for this move was his association with the San Francisco Alternative exhibition space La Mamelle (run by Carl Loeffler and Nancy Evans). In 1977 he presented his first solo percussion performance under the project title "Sound of Wind and Limb." In 1978 he began developing an idiosyncratic performance technique utilizing self-developed instruments formed from industrial materials such as stainless steel, titanium, and PVC plastics. Critic John Buckley described his performances in this era: "the instruments are collections of objects ... strung together with ropes and swung at varying speeds and directions to produce a fairly astonishing range of pitches and timbres. And the moves the guy goes through to manipulate these instruments are, for grace and athleticism, strong stuff. Z'EV is also interesting for the close correlation of visual and musical aspects, since the physical vibrations of the objects you see are the same as those picked up by the ears as sound. Also, since the rhythms of the work are dictated by the performer's every and any movement, an inevitable integrity unifies the act." Here are two pieces from the artist's early sound experiments: "As," recorded in 1978 at the KPFK radio station in Los Angeles, and "If," recorded at Savoy Tivoli in San Francisco. On clear vinyl.


Artist: VA
Title: Tibetan and Bhutanese Instrumental and Folk Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 230CD
Recorded by John Levy in 1971 and released by Lyrichord in the mid-'70s, this comprises the second part of Levy's whole enterprise: to capture not only the sacred music of the Tibetan ritual in Bhutan, but all aspects of the native folk music as well. John Levy was a London ethnomusicologist who took refuge in Tibetan Buddhism, and recorded -- with his nagra-stéreo -- both sacred and secular music. This completely remastered folk and instrumental release follows the Tibetan Buddhist Rites from the Monasteries of Bhutan album of ritual and chanting, and features performances on both Tibetan and Bhutanese lutes and fiddles, beautiful folk songs, and a part of a drama of Tibetan origin performed by a troupe of yak and cow herdsmen of eastern Bhutan. The latter is particularly compelling, the standout performer being Go-Te Do-Pe, who sings and accompanies himself on the dramnyen, a Bhutanese lute. His two songs bear an eerie resemblance to the blues of Junior Kimbrough and other Mississippi hill country musicians. This is real blues from the top of the world.


Artist: POUSSEUR, HENRI
Title: Musique Mixte 1966-1970
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 231CD
This is the fourth Henri Pousseur CD in Sub Rosa's Early Electronics series, exploring the work of this Belgian theoretician and experimental/avant garde composer. Along with previous releases in this series, Musique Mixte will cover all his electronic music and his most radical works between 1953 and 1988 -- 35 years of research and experiments. These recordings are a continuation of Sub Rosa's earlier releases, namely: Liège à Paris (a piece composed thanks to Luciano Berio and premiered at the grand opening of the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, in 1977), the 8 Études Paraboliques box set (over 220 minutes of music realised in Cologne, 1972, at the WDR's studios -- the last étude featuring Stockhausen's participation) and 4 Parabolic Mixes, (four takes on the work by Henri Pousseur himself, Robert Hampson, Philip Jeck and Markus Popp). The two pieces featured on Musique Mixte (voice, pianos, various electroacoustic devices) are magnum opuses in Pousseur's body of work, though they are seldom heard -- "Jeu de Miroirs de Votre Faust" has been unavailable for a long time, while "Crosses of Crossed Colors" is released here for the first time ever. "Already for 'Couleurs croisées,' my initial idea was to add an amplified voice to the orchestra, a voice that could stand up to it and would clarify and explain the meaning of the piece, in the form of a black Baptist minister-style preach. So, besides the voice ('black,' if possible), we have: five pianos, whose assembled parts re-use almost all the harmonic-rhythmic contents of the orchestral piece." --Henri Pousseur


Artist: CHANCUN, WANG
Title: The Mountain Swallowing Sadness
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 232CD
Shanghai-based Changcun is a complex noise-maker in the style of the great Karkowski. This CD is his first release for Sub Rosa. Contextualizing his 40-minute long exploration entitled, "Grand Hotel," Chancun states: "I want to build an architecture in the ear." The other track is a field recording of a burial in the area of Harbin, northeast of China. An active member of the China Sound Unit, an acoustic phenomena research group composed of sound artists from various parts of China, Wang Changcun has performed solo or with ensembles at multiple sound art and installation events throughout China, Brussels and France. A year earlier, the composer, producer and founder of the Chinese-American record label Post-Concrete Yao Dajuin had released a bomb: China - The Sonic Avant-Garde, a 2CD compilation (which contains seven of Wang's short compositions) revealing the talents of Zhang Jüngang, Wang Changcun, Fu Yü, Jia Haiqing, Lisa Ruyi, Hu Mage, Xü Cheng, Zhou Pei, Zhong Minjie, Jiang Yühui, Intelligent Shanghai Mono University and the China Sound Unit -- over two hours of experimental music, plunderphonics, concrete (or post-concrete) music and noise. A great level of activity is currently developing in China's large cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Guilin, Guangzhou), and Wang Changcun is a shining example of how the bustling and ever-changing political and architectural landscape of China is expressed through everyday sound.


Artist: DOCKSTADER, TOD
Title: Aerial #3
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 233CD
This release is the third and last in the three-part Aerial series. Tod Dockstader is one of the all-time great figures in the world of musique concréte composition, with his "organized sound" works from the 1960s being amongst the most radical ever conceived -- in league with Schaeffer, Henry, Stockhausen, and Varese. Aerial is a rare new work in the realm of shortwave radio, from one of America's most experimental composers. Volume 1 was released in March 2005 inside a slipcase. Volume 2 and 3 have been released separately and packaged in individual standard jewel cases that conveniently fit into the slipcase provided with Volume 1. Working from his interest in shortwave radio, Dockstader attempts to "play the radio," thus redefining this cultural medium as a musical instrument with the help of a computer and a good editing system. Out of the 580 mixes, he selected 90 "best" mixes -- eventually reduced to 59, which became representational of the distilled magic of the radio, as it elucidates the sounds between stations. Finally, in assembling the CDs, Dockstader allows each piece to flow into the next -- making a continuous journey to the end. Ghostly, ethereal, and irresistibly interesting-- like hearing secrets passed over airwaves.


Artist: KEEP, SIMON
Title: Interview with the Eggs
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 234CD
"The original sound installation consisted of three headphones playing back three different sounds. Though the first set of headphones the sound of snow was heard, close up and sounding like dust or sugar. The second was the sound of a Buddhist monk meditating in an empty room. The last was the sound of volcanic steam seeping out of the sides of a mountain. Alongside the headphones were one thousand origami cranes. The paper was made from photo snapshots of Japan and when made the cranes were hung in ten rows of one hundred. To make one thousand origami cranes is a Japanese symbol of health and longevity. Sound pieces produced from Mini Disc recordings I made in Japan 2002. The audio has been extracted from Hokkaido's volcanic snow-covered landscape. The composition and patterns of the sound are based on the way I heard these sounds; they are inspired by my experience of listening. One of the recordings was made inside a temple. During 'Zazen' meditation the sound of an empty room was opening out to me and I was hearing sounds deep into the room. One evening I recorded the sound of an empty midnight landscape, again I was listening into the silence and into the distance. Sounds would ring out from the distance, then a split second later I would hear silent space again." -- Simon Keep. Simon Keep is a young Londoner, composer, involved in a series of sound installations. More recently, out of a desire for people to hear/think about sound in a more conscious way, he has been working on a public arts project with Vital Arts at the Royal London Hospital. He has also been working with sound outside of the human audibility, mainly radio waves. Over the summer of 2002 he created a sound triptych for an exhibition in Memphis called 'life/afterlife', (based on this inaudible sound.)


Artist: DJ OLIVE VS. JP DESSY
Title: Scories
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 235CD
Collaborative project by Gregor Asch, aka DJ Olive ("illbient" plastician and musicophiliac translistener turned sound fragment mixer, sculptor of vinyl matter, choreographer of audible bodies and movements) and Jean-Paul Dessy (masterful horizon-widener, new music surveyor, and cellist). Playing with them are the musicians of the Ensemble Musiques Nouvelles: violinists, cellists, a flutist, a trombonist... who, invited by the two accomplices, generously contribute their instrumental inventions in order to develop mixed pieces that play with sparks, scratches and caresses. Scories was recorded in the summer of 2004 at Igloo Studio under the supervision of soundmaster Daniel Léon, who contributed his expert touch to the mixing stage and found the best way to highlight the spontaneity and the energy that produced these inspired musical gestures. Scories is the result of various confrontations and convergences. These scoriae, solid residue from the smelting and refining processes of musical metals, build another edifice in electro-contempo history, the driving force of new sonic continental drifts.


Artist: FANFARE SAVALE
Title: Speed Brass of the Gypsies
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 236CD
"A tiny Eastern Romanian village, called 'Zece Prãjini', having less than two hundred Gypsy inhabitants, where any male can play at least one brass instrument and having probably the largest number of bands in Europe -- this is the place where the Fanfare Savale gypsy brass band comes from. It would be difficult to follow back in time their vast musical heritage as they have been playing music ever since they can remember and the gift of music and the instruments are passed from one generation to the other. From three years old kids to seventy years old grandpas, each person is a skilled and fully trained musician here. These Romanian Gypsies earn their living by working their lands and playing music at various feast, weddings and funeral services. Usually they gather and play music only to cheer themselves up. On the other opportunities, e.g. on the so called 'Green Gypsy Thursday' hundred of brass players come together from different villages, to demonstrate their skills, compete and party 'in private', without entertaining any audience.
       
       These traditions have been preserved for centuries and the Fanfare Savale are playing something peculiar in this Romanian region: Gypsy music that combines the traditions of ancient Gypsy music at a breathtaking speed -- up to 200 beats per minute -- with those of the Balkan area, producing wonderfully rhythmic tunes played. These ten musicians know extremely well the various music styles and although, most of them are barely able to play music by notes, can play any tune after hearing it only once."


Artist: SEVERIN, GABRIEL
Title: Soliloques
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 237CD
Spoken word release, in French. This is the first full-length solo release from Brussels-based sound-poet Gabriel Séverin on Sub Rosa. Séverin has been active in the field of electronic music for almost two decades (Silk Saw, Jardin d'Usure, Ultraphonist, Rob(u)rang, Dead Hollywood Stars), delving into diverse disciplines, exploring forgotten or obscure areas of the avant-garde. The artist himself contextualizes his literary and vocal-based work on Solliloques thusly: "The enemy's tongue/a friendly voice: there is a voice, the one we know, or so we think. Then, there is another one, the inner voice, timbre-less yet holding all timbres, the one talking when the first one does not. It does not always express itself, and with some people it might never do so, because it comes unrestrainedly and freely. How were the texts for this recording selected? Besides representatives from the écrit brut current (art brut's 'literary' equivalent), such as Aimable Jayet, Sylvain Lecoq, and Jeanne Tripier, celebrities from the literary pantheon have found a place within this collection. To us, there is no doubt that some of the writings of Henri Michaux, Antonin Artaud, Samuel Beckett, Raymond Roussel, Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Claudel (his 'art poétique'), Pierre Guyotat, Alfred Jarry, and many others, are level with a large number of écrits bruts. They convey the same desire to transgress codes, a similar explosion of semantics, an identical questioning of social standards, the same trance, an inner voice expressing a similar gift in clairvoyance or even shamanism, and finally very close kinds of fancy, humor and freshness. A few more words about this recording: each text was performed several times in the studio. Microphones (between three and six) were placed in various locations: usually one just above the mouth and another very close to the throat, with other microphones placed at an increasing distance from me (in one recording, there is even a microphone in the yard -- you can hear church bells). Sometimes, there was a mike pointed at the ceiling (but what could have been coming from that direction, except the voices of the household). In occasionally favoring the further microphones, we get breath, but also a certain sound modification (or even a delay) and a quavering in the air."


Artist: AKIYAMA, MITCHELL
Title: Small Explosions That Are Yours To Keep
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 238CD
Best known for his electronic deconstructions of traditional instrumental music, Montreal-based Mitchell Akiyama's fourth and most ambitious solo recording is a sprawling work that bristles, burns and slouches with emotion. Small Explosions That Are Yours To Kee came into being at the twilight edges of composition and digital manipulation and sets billowing strings drifting around household gamelans while shimmering guitars drown in saxophone waves. Since his debut release on Alien8 Recordings, Hope That Lines Don't Cross (SR 209CD), Akiyama's music has been a study in fiction and texture. He records compositions and improvisations for piano, strings, and other instruments, and restructures them in his studio in a post-facto montage. Playing on the distortions in causality that recording technology can effect, Akiyama creates music that lays claim to a moment of creation that never happened. Located somewhere in the interstices of classical, electronic composition and post-rock, his works vacillate between delicate melodies and confrontational bursts of noise.


Artist: MACÉ
Title: Circulations
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 240CD
This is the second release from the French musician Pierre-Yves Macé (following Faux-Jumeaux released on Tzadik). Circulations pushes the limits of contemporary and electronic music with the development of the auto-sampling process around the concept of the double or replica. Macé composed in four separate stages: writing four movements for solo instruments, having only a vague idea of their possible correspondances. Then the work consisted of using the recordings of the solo performances as a basis for an electroacoustic accompaniment for each solo, creating a stretchable feedback interplay between abstract and concrete. The performance falls halfway between mixed concert music (referenced by the instrument and tape device) and live electronics. This process invites the listener to crossread the work, matching each instrumental part to its electronic evolution: a sequence of vibraphone arpeggios elsewhere becomes a click n' cut gimmick, a guitar melody transforms into an ambient loop, and a sustained note on the bass clarinet gives birth to a rumbling in the subfrequency range. Truly an album that celebrates the mutation generated by interplay and movement.


Artist: NODERN
Title:
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 241CD
With his debut full-length album, Nodern blasts us into an introspective and apocalyptic world. Nodern has an uncanny ability to create dark, brooding, and carefully constructed electronic music, which shuttles with great ease from fractured poly-rhythms to menacing noise, interspersed with desolate ambient soundscapes. Produced over two years and in three cities (Venice, London and Johannesburg 2002 - 2004), Nodern's signature sound has a firm grip on the pulse of the sprawling urban settlements across the world. The album guides us through the relentless procession of industrial rhythmic structures to the suburban wastelands drenched in melancholy. Nodern's music seems to inhabit a perpetual twilight world where familiar spaces are swallowed in shadows, creating an ominous and sublime landscape. Nodern's confident album firmly establishes a unique sound in the ever-growing field of electronica.


Artist: VA
Title: Magritte, le groupe Surréaliste de Bruxelles, Rupture
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 242CD
...Volume 2 (1926-1938). This second volume aural document is devoted to the Brussels Surrealist Group, 1926, following in the surrealist footsteps that Dada, Pansaers et Correspondance Volume 1 (1917-1926) established. On this compilation you can hear rare documents, including the voice of Magritte explaining why it's impossible to answer the questions of journalists. As a nucleus started forming in 1924 around Magritte, Nougé, Lecomte, etc., dissension arose, spawning Correspondance (1924-26). This release documents the editorial activities of Magritte and Mesens, the only issue of Sophage (1925), and the obvious influence of Dada (Schwitters was a contributor). The avant-garde is stateless, but this release, along with the other two releases in the series, limit themselves to the geographical space comprised between France, Germany and The Netherlands, where the main language is French. This region's experiments and discoveries are missing in French and international anthologies. This compilation, and the project as a whole, is an urgent attempt to document an important aspect of surrealism that most surely would have disappeared into dusty archives, if not released to the world. Other artists include: Louis Scutenaire, Marcel Mariën, Paul Colinet, André Souris, Paul Delvaux, Constant Malva, Achille Chavée and Fernand Dumont.


Artist: MASTER MUSICIANS OF JOUJOUKA, THE
Title: Boujeloud
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 243CD
The Master Musicians of Joujouka are often credited with being the first "world music" group. The Joujouka music for Boujeloud, or the Father of Skins, is frantic and has several movements which would equate to a symphony or the score of an opera if it were European classical music. The festival and ritual originate in the worship of the God Pan. In 1994, Frank Rynne began a two year long project recording the Master Musicians of Joujouka in their village. Sub Rosa released two CDs from these recordings, Joujouka Black Eyes and Sufi to critical acclaim in 1995 and 1996, respectively. This is the third and final CD from these intimate recordings to be released by Sub Rosa. Boujeloud contains several different renditions of the ritual music Boujeloud. Each version has a widely different character which is determined by the combination of musicians and the spontaneous improvisation of the lead players. Tracks 1, 2, 6, and 8 are flute versions from various combinations of the Masters, while track 3 features the intense sound of the massed rhaitas playing the ritual. There are also songs which are used in lead up to the ritual, and songs that the musicians use to drive Boujeloud/Pan out of the village. The musicians recorded on this CD span four generation of Joujouka masters. Master musician Mujehid Mujdoubi was 83 years old when he recorded his music for this CD: though he had lost the ability to play the double-reed rhaita, Mujehid's lira playing fully demonstrates the musical dexterity which seventy years of playing honed to perfection. The core group who still live and play in the village are widely represented on this CD. The different versions of "Boujeloud" and the related songs allow the listener to experience the melodies and the improvisational nature of Joujouka music played live in its natural setting. These recordings are an intimate and unique experience.


Artist: QUELLET, ISRAEL
Title: Oppressum
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 244CD
Israël Quellet was born in Neuchâtel, Switzerland in 1972, and this is his first recorded release. At 16, he discovered on his own some different sound-worlds, such as Miles Davis' electric era, Sun Ra, dub, German cosmic music, Magma, Zappa and many more. In 1997, he stepped into the musical fray and, following the advice of a sound engineer friend, bought microphones, a digital mixing board, and studio monitors, turning part of his basement into a soundsmithing studio. That is when he started to create, out of his immediate surroundings, soundworks that have little to do with what is "normally" being done. Appreciated by Ecuadoran electro-acoustic composer Jorge E. Campos, Quellet is supported by the Centre Pierre Schaeffer in Paris. In 2003, he contacted Sub Rosa. Now, three years later, he is releasing his first public recording. Quellet's music is not really outsider sound art, but it shares strong similarities with it. It explores a debarred universe almost impossible to escape. Oppressum is a minute -- albeit extreme -- exploration of sound (particularly through saturation), mystical discourse and excesses. However, the composer is also pictured as a regular guy living in a Swiss town, a guy who likes to toy with the local church's organ, accompanied by his wife. Sound materials come from a number of sources: the local church's organ, rented or borrowed percussion instruments (bass-drum, timbales, gong, djembe), various objects being struck (his oil tank at home struck with hammers and iron rods), pipes, faucets, telephone touch pads, power tools, sound-producing toys, voice, mouth sounds, throat sounds, and wheelbarrows. You get the picture. Of his work Quellet says: "The diverse sounds and the diverse means used to capture them give each piece a different overall sound and stereo image. Therefore, the pieces are not standardized or calibrated systematically; they do not all sound the same."


Artist: VITIELLO, STEPHEN
Title: Listening to Donald Judd
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 245CD
Stephen Vitiello is a sound/media artist based in Richmond, Virginia, and this is his seventh full-length release -- his first for Sub Rosa. Vitiello is an established name in electroacoustic sound experimentation, having collaborated with artists, musicians and choreographers including Pauline Oliveros, Tony Oursler, Constance De Jong, Nam June Paik, Eder Santos, Scanner, Andrew Deutsch, Yasunao Tone, Frances-Marie Uitti, Dara Birnbaum and Jem Cohen, etc. This piece is a work in progress evolving from the numerous recordings Vitiello made of the sculptures of American artist Donald Judd (1928-1994) in Marfa, Texas. Judd challenged the artistic convention of originality by using industrial processes and materials such as steel, concrete and plywood to create large, hollow minimalist sculptures, mostly in the form of boxes, which he arranged in repeated simple geometric forms. High-precision microphones are placed directly on the surface of Judd's "specific objects," which capture a subtle combination of sounds resonating through the artwork, as well as ambient sounds. Vitiello sees this work as a tribute to one of the greatest American artists of the 20th century. These recordings were created during an impromptu residency sponsored by the Marfa Theater and the Chinati Foundation. The results were a performance (with and without Tetsu Inoue) and two fairly large sound installations. As Vitiello himself explains: "Sounds were captured in and around the Donald Judd installations at Chinati, in a glider, in fields of grasshoppers and along some unknown street. Marfa is a very quiet town. The most significant sound event is when the train comes through each day, which can happen at any time of day or night. Three years after my visit, most of what I experienced in Marfa has probably been modified by memory. The sound of the train is the only recognizable source sound that has been left fairly unhurt by time-stretching and other forms of electronic and mental processing."


Artist: FELDMAN, MORTON
Title: For Bunita Marcus
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 246CD
Morton Feldman (1926-1987) remains a legendary and key figure in modern American composition. A pioneer of aleatoric and indeterminate music, he was a master of minimal improvisation. Despite many thematic fluctuations in Feldman's compositional style throughout his career, a significant turning point took place in 1949, when he met John Cage, commencing an artistic association of crucial importance to music in America in the 1950s. Cage was instrumental in encouraging Feldman to have confidence in his instincts, which resulted in totally intuitive compositions. He never worked with any systems that anyone has been able to identify, working from moment to moment, from one sound to the next. His friends during the 1950s in New York included the composers Earle Brown and Christian Wolff; painters Mark Rothko, Philip Guston, Franz Kline, Jackson Pollock and Robert Rauschenberg; and pianist David Tudor. As Feldman himself stated, "My past experience was not to 'meddle' with the material, but use my concentration as a guide to what might transpire. I mentioned this to Stockhausen once when he had asked me what my secret was. 'I don't push the sounds around.' Stockhausen mulled this over, and asked: 'Not even a little bit?'" The piano music on For Bunita Marcus slowly draws you towards silence by a process of atomization or repetition -- as do some of Beethoven's or Schubert's late compositions. You realize therefore how useless it is to try to act, to push his music against its own will. Playing or listening to Morton Feldman leads you to very unique moments, like those you feel when you look at a starry summer sky, unable to measure its dimensions because it is beyond your understanding. A sense of infinity within a finite space. This particular piece was written in 1985 and named after a composer and student of Feldman's. Performed by Stephane Ginsburgh on a Bösendorfer 225, and recorded in 2006.


Artist: GYSIN, BRION
Title: Live In London 1982
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 247CD
In Autumn 1982, in Brixton, London, Brion Gysin, the eternal accomplice of William Burroughs, renewed the methods of performance by reciting texts, hastily brought together with this performance, accompanied by Slits-member, Tessa, Steve of Rip, Rig and Panic, Gile of Penguin Café Orchestra, and Ramuntcho Matta on guitar. Ramuntcho, in the style of Brion, called this session "White Funk." Most of the texts were written upon meeting Burroughs, at the time of the invention of the cut-up. The influence that Brion Gysin has had on contemporary music may never be taken fully into account, particularly when he introduced Brian Jones of The Rolling Stones to the shepherd's music of Joujouka. Those times were still audacious: the music was created during the sound-checks! Musically, the choice of traditional instruments expresses the desire to be free of machines (because, as Burroughs says, "We ourselves are machines."). This recording is evidence of the extraordinary creativity and spontaneity of the musical and artistic scene at that time, and it refuses to age a bit. Beyond the nostalgia inspired by the invocation of that bygone cultural scene, this is a renewed wake-up call for a kind of creativity that is terribly difficult to find today.


Artist: RADULESCU, HORATIU
Title: Intimate Rituals
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 248CD
Switzerland-based Romanian composer Horatiu Radulescu presents the premiere recorded release of Intimate Rituals, his mystic travel into Sound (the original sound icons composed in 1986) for one or two violas. Horatiu Radulescu was born in Bucharest in 1942, and is a noted composer, having developed his spectral technique of composition in the late 1960s. This technique, according to Radulescu "comprises variable distribution of the spectral energy, synthesis of the global sound sources, micro- and macro-form as sound-process, four simultaneous layers of perception and of speed, and spectral scordaturae, i.e. rows of unequal intervals corresponding to harmonic scales." The first work to result from these new ideas was Credo for nine cellos, composed in 1969. Radulescu developed these ideas further in a large catalog of works (now spanning more than 100 compositions), including work for six string quartets, five piano sonatas, a piano concerto, and many works for unconventional ensembles. "In 2003, I composed Intimate Rituals XI (a work for viola) using the tape of the pre-recorded sound icons with a viola in a spectral scordatura, a very special tuning-chord. The viola is in a constant dialogue with the sound icons (I don't like to think of the piece as viola and tape; ideally the sound icons would be live). The viola and the sound icons are dependent on each other, sometimes crossing, sometimes not. There are very intense moments as the sound icons describe a high register climax at the Golden Section; the viola attains its highest sounds there too and then decays, very strangely, reaching again the low and the richest timbres. 'Intimate Rituals' are very private, maybe even erotic, situations. From the original recording of the sound icons in the Lucero studio in Versailles in 1986 to the live premiere in 2003 is a big span of 17 years, but the same atmosphere should be achieved, a sort of spiritual intimacy." Intimate Rituals is here performed by noted French musicians Gérard Caussé and Vincent Royer.


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 4
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 250CD
2010 repress, originally released 2006. Sub Rosa presents the fourth volume of the highly-acclaimed and successful Anthology of Noise & Electronic Music series. This installment promises to be the pivoting axis in the seven volume set, with 75% rare tracks and music never before heard. In the previous three anthologies, Sub Rosa outlined the historical sites at the advent of concrete and electronic music: Pierre Schaeffer's workshop studio (Vol. 1), the Princeton Electronic Music Center in Columbia, New York (Vol. 2), and the WDR Studio in Cologne (Vol. 3). After the pioneering work of these formative studios, their was a quick worldwide development of similar-intent facilities, popping up throughout Europe and America, but also in Brazil, Mexico and Japan -- countries where there was a will to create music that was radically new. This compilation features a classic cadre of artists from all over the globe, who are true cultural instigators in the field of electronic sound experimentation. Including new creations from China, Brazil, Norway and Hungary, as well as some classic and unpublished material from legendary composers such as Ligeti and Lucier and very rare documents from Robert Wyatt and François Bayle. Like the previous three volumes, this fourth installment is an absolute must for anyone interested in the roots and history of electronic music. The 2CD comes in a deluxe digipack with an informative 40-page booklet. Featuring: Steve Reich, Gyorgy Ligeti, William Burroughs, Alvin Lucier, Olivier Messiaen, Vibracathedral Orchestra, François Bayle, Robert Wyatt, Kevin Ayers, James Whitehead, Loop Orchestra, Halim el-Balh, Jean-Claude Risset, Beatriz Ferreyra, Maja Ratkje, Laurie Spiegel 6, Stephen Vitiello, Erik M, Wang Changcun, Chlorgeschlecht, Gottfried Michael Koenig, Milan Knizak, Rallizes Denudes, Andy Hawkins, John Watermann and Jean-Marc Vivenza.


Artist: FERRARI, LUC
Title: Son Mémorisé
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 252CD
This is the second of three Sub Rosa releases of instrumental works by this important artist. Luc Ferrari is considered one of the most legendary musical figures of the twentieth century, whose work and aesthetic continues to influence several generations of contemporary composers. Director of the Groupe de Recherche Musicales which he established with Pierre Schaeffer in Paris from 1958-1966, he is also one of the masters of musique concrète who influenced and expanded the genre with electro-acoustic instrumentation. Right from the start, the idea had been to release three very different CDs: one hörspiel, one of concrete music (new and older pieces) and one CD of instrumental works. Les Anecdotiques was the first step: a vast sound-film of more than an hour that explores in 15 steps the intensity of re-composed sounds from his continual travel around the world, with electronic additional structures. This album is the second step -- one that offers a retrospective -- the previously unreleased "Promenade Symphonique dans un Paysage Musical" from 1976-78, the final "Presque Rien #4" and a fresh reflection dating from the last months of 2002, "Saliceburry Cocktail," a large-scale composition exploring the idea of hideout, scrambled listening -- a tortuous entanglement of concrète and electronic. The forthcoming third and final release will be three recent instrumental compositions for electronics, piano and viola which were recorded under Luc's supervision -- the last works he ever recorded, as he passed away in August 2005.


Artist: MAN
Title: Helping Hand
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 253CD
Man is a duo consisting of French multi-instrumentalists François Rasim Biyikli (piano, Rhodes, melodica, guitars, noises) and Charles-Eric Charrier (acoustic bass, guitar, toys), who produce a rare and elegant form of electroacoustic music that touches base with unchartered territory where anything is possible. Simple, disquieting and friendly, absent yet abominably present, the duo achieves an even more liberated form of music on this third opus. After two instrumental albums for Les Disques du Soleil et de l'Acier (Man and Main Gauche), three years spent playing concerts throughout Europe and multiple collaborations in film (about a dozen original soundtracks), fashion (Cartier), television (Arte), theatre, dance and visual arts (Pierrick Sorin), Man returns with some of their most arresting music yet.


Artist: VA
Title: Musics in the Margin
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 254CD
Sub Rosa presents a compilation of outsider music from different parts of the world that helps realize the continued connection between contemporary and older musical artists on the fringes of society. The composers on Musics in the Margin live(d) in highly individualistic, self-taught worlds, making their music outside the customary commercial production and distribution channels and with the determination and creative gifts that stem from unmistakable artistic talent. Artists include: Jacques Brodier (b. 1946): a French inventor who collects radio waves and weaves them into blankets of sound that remind us of Tod Dockstader; Galaxia, (b. 1966): the project name of Steve Wallis, a Glagow-based revolutionary socialist who crafts slanted, acoustic protest songs; Anton et Quentin (b. 1971, 1973): two brothers (one who has great difficulty expressing himself, but responds passionately to music) who communicate through lovely, drifting acoustic melody and atypical vocal language; Wesley Willis (1963-2003): mentally-challenged keyboard street performer who has since become a huge cult classic; André Robillard (b. 1932): a visual artist who makes percussion improvisations on iron dustbins; Dr. Konstantin Raudive (1909-1974): famous for his recordings of Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP); Daniel Johnston (b. 1961): now-legendary, cult/indie singer-songwriter; McSpeedy (b. 1966): founder of a radiophonic trio and "human jukebox"; Reinilde Tastenoe (b. 1960): a Belgian therapy-based singer/performer; Marcella Dumarey (1937-2006): a psychiatric patient who, for most of her life, wrote songs for Jesus and Mary; Dagboek: a musical project which enables psychotic adolescents to express themselves with various musical instruments; Chantal Robette (b. 1948): a Belgian songwriter who attends the Zonnestraat music therapy workshop; Martha Grunenwaldt (b. 1910): the daughter of a street musician who composes on a violin; and Oscar Haus (b. 1939): a musical therapy attendee who composes with an accordion. Compiled by Belgian association "Art en Marge," the recordings on Musics in the Margin are of several kinds: in some cases less than 100 copies were pressed, and some are exclusive recordings that have never been distributed outside a circle of family and friends. Like the surrealist and expressionist artists, who were amazed by the strangeness and authenticity of work made in asylums, many members of today's music scene get inspiration from such music and feel it comes from another world.


Artist: BARUCH, BEN
Title: The Complete Recordings 1949-50
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $16.00
Catalog #: SR 255CD
This box set reissues the complete recordings of legendary Brussels-based Jewish cantor, Yitshak Jacques Zaludkowski (Ben Baruch), originally published on 78 rpm picture discs by Saturne in 1950. Nine discs were recorded under René Cloërec's direction, the other two under Léon Algazi's. Also included are "Yehi Rotson" and "Shabes Baym Shalesh-Shudes," two songs found on a non-picture disc record released by Le Disque Folklorique Yiddish. This singer's repertoire is diversified: synagogal-like religious songs in Hebrew, Yiddish songs, songs about religious topics in Hebrew or Yiddish and songs in Hebrew about the inception of the State of Israel. Haunting, ancient and mesmerizing.


Artist: BATES, MARTYN
Title: Your Jewled Footsteps
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 257CD
This is a long awaited Martyn Bates best-of collection, sampling a wide selection of his solo and collaborative work from 1979 to 2006. UK-based Martyn Bates founded the post-punk duo Eyeless in Gaza in 1980, along with Peter Becker. During his 20+ year career, after countless releases and against all odds, Bates managed to shape a unique, instantly recognizable form of music based on a deeply rooted, 100% English folk tradition. Often underrated as a songwriter, in his solo work and in EIG, he has developed what can be called an almost Elizabethan style: a combination of angst (a working-class hero) and pure melancholia (time irremediably lost, the loss of idealized love), mixed in with an unconditional love of poetry (Keats, Yeats, Joyce) and authentic popular song stylings. In addition, he possesses one of the most strangely compelling voices imaginable. Your Jewled Footsteps journeys through made-in-England pop, folk, poetry recitation and reconstructions of songs whose origins are long forgotten. In addition to Bates' essential pieces, the collection also includes several previously unreleased tracks, including some pre-industrial sound works predating EIG's formation, in the late '70s.


Artist: PHON°NOIR
Title: The Objects Don't Need Us
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 258CD
This is the second full-length release from Berlin-based electronic artist, Matthias Grübel aka Phon°noir. Following up Putting Holes Into October Skies, Phon°noir once again raises his antennas towards the sky, into the snowflakes, where somebody is singing through the wires. This time he fits more instruments, more twists and turns into his tunes, more rhythms and more voices with greater and greater passion. We find him dueting with Marie-Sophie Kanske on "My Paperhouse on Fire," Anna-Lynne Williams assists in measuring a future we once had, and Calika sends over some droning chords from the British Isles. While somewhere in the distance we hear the sound of a cello, bowing the cello, acoustic and electric. And through all this, it suddenly seems like the snow is slowly melting as the music comes closer and closer. This is the movement of the new Phon°noir record: closer and closer, through the wires, and into the heart. At first we are far from a world we know, but soon we forget about the distance, we can walk from here. Now we are invisible -- the only thing that is not is our ears.


Artist: WINTER FAMILY
Title: Winter Family
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $16.00
Catalog #: SR 260CD
Winter Family is a duet of spoken text and music, and this is their debut album, which Sub Rosa has audaciously released as a full-length double CD, packaged in a deluxe fold-out digipack. Born on January 2004 in Jaffa from the meeting of the Israeli artist Ruth Rosenthal and the French musician Xavier Klaine, they recorded their first album in three apartments, a parking lot, a club in Tel-Aviv and a church in Lorraine. Rosenthal writes and performs her texts in English and Hebrew while he composes and plays the piano, harmoniums and pipe organ. They have been playing live since June 2005 in concert rooms, galleries, clubs, churches and theaters in Paris, New York, Milan, Gent, Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem and more. They have played live on several radios in France and Israel, on the TV channel France5 (in a show together with Arthur H. and Brigitte Fontaine), on HotTv in Israel and composed the theme song for the movie A Corps Defendant by Raphael Etienne. Winter Family have scored dance pieces, and have collaborated with various artists such as Norsola Johnson (Godspeed You! Black Emperor). These songs are singular meditations in sound and text: rich, contemplative, and thrillingly abstract.


Artist: FERRARI, LUC
Title: Didascalies
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD/DVD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 261CD
This is a new version of Didascalies, previously released as SR 259CD. This version has the same music as SR 259CD, but with new cover artwork, plus a bonus DVD disc (European PAL-format only, sorry). Didascalies is the last release in Sub Rosa's three-part series of instrumental works by this important artist, now packaged with a DVD featuring Luc Ferrari at work on this -- his last experiment. Luc Ferrari is considered one of the most legendary musical figures of the twentieth century, whose work and aesthetic continues to influence several generations of contemporary composers. Director of the Groupe de Recherche Musicales which he established with Pierre Schaeffer in Paris from 1958-1966, he is also one of the masters of musique concrète who influenced and expanded the genre with electro-acoustic instrumentation. Right from the start, the idea had been to release three very different CDs: one hörspiel, one of concrete music (new and older pieces) and one CD of instrumental works. Les Anecdotiques was the first step: a vast sound-film of more than an hour that explores in 15 steps the intensity of re-composed sounds from his continual travels around the world, with additional electronic structures. Son Mémorisé was a retrospective of concrète and electronic compositions. Didascalies brings together "Rencontres Fortuites," "Didascalies" and "Tautologos III" -- two recent works for piano, viola and electronics, and one open-ended work -- which featured at a concert at the Boendael Chapel in Brussels. A few months later, this release was assembled with Ferrari's supervision at the legendary Brème studios with final development at La Muse en Circuit. This release also documents the composition of a new version of "Tautologos," Ferrari's last recorded piece, with woven piano and viola breaking down, starting anew in an opposite direction with bandoneon, DX7 and books being closed every two and a half minutes. About a month later, Luc Ferrari passed away. Performed by Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven (piano) and Vincent Royer (viola).


Artist: QUELLET, ISRAEL
Title: Soni Sclavus
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 262CD
Electro-acoustic out-sound experimentician Israël Quellet was born in Neuchâtel, Switzerland in 1972, and this is his second release for the Sub Rosa label -- the fifth volume in their Musics in the Margin series. At 16 years-old, the artist discovered sound-worlds such as Miles Davis' electric era, Sun Ra, dub, German cosmic music, Magma, Zappa, and many more. In 1997, he stepped into the musical fray and, following the advice of a sound engineer friend, bought microphones, a digital mixing board, and studio monitors, turning part of his basement into a soundsmithing studio. That is when he started to create, out of his immediate surroundings, soundworks that have little to do with what is "normally" being done. Appreciated by Ecuadoran electro-acoustic composer Jorge E. Campos, Quellet is supported by the Centre Pierre Schaeffer in Paris. This second work for Sub Rosa explores common objects and the problem of saturation and noise. The artist explains in his own words: "I made the sounds while I was recording, either alone or with the help of my wife. Once a piece has been edited together, the final mixing is performed live, without automation. In order to retain the original dynamics, I do not use compression or any other specific mastering technique designed to equalize the sound or spatialize the stereo image. However, the heavy saturation used in some pieces limits the range of dynamics. The diverse sounds and the diverse means used to capture them give each piece a different overall sound and stereo image. Therefore, the pieces are not standardized or calibrated systematically; they do not all sound the same."


Artist: EYELESS IN GAZA
Title: Plague Of Years
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $13.00
Catalog #: SR 263CD
Eyeless in Gaza is UK-based post-punk duo Martyn Bates and Peter Becker and Plague Of Years collects some of their most riveting work from 1981-2005. This CD deals with two sides of the group. First is its deeply lyrical vein, with summits like "See Red" and "Lights of April," tracks that have almost never been included on "best-of" projects, despite the fact that they represent some of the most moving songs these musicians ever wrote. This collection also explores the group's more adventurous side through a number of instrumental pieces. This aspect of their output is little known and often neglected, even though it was there from their very beginnings. These two combining currents, where experimentation precedes lyricism (and the other way around), turn this album into a truly new way of (re)discovering Eyeless in Gaza. This unique architecture creates the impression that each side strengthens the other one's presence. Probably for the first time ever, the 21 tracks so redistributed provide the band with irrefutable arguments toward its rebirth. Yes, Eyeless in Gaza is one of the most underrated groups -- with this release, and the forthcoming Martyn Bates collection from Sub Rosa, hopefully this will no longer be the case.


Artist: RIMPOCHE, BOKAR
Title: Sacred Chants & Tibetan Rituals from the Monastery of Mirik
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 264CD
Recorded in Mirik Monastery (located in the Himalayan Mountains in Northern India, between Bhutan and Nepal) with the total collaboration of meditation master, Bokar Rimpoche -- all pieces edited by the filmmaker Guy Maezelle. Bokar Rimpoche (1940-2004) is acknowledged as a Great Master of Tibetan Buddhism who devoted his whole life to meditation. Having fled Tibet in 1959, he lived in exile, isolated in a little monastery in the mountains. The spiritual son of Kalou Rimpoche, a close relation of the Dalai Lama and Meditation Master of the 17th Karmapa, Bokar Rimpoche was the heir and representative of an ancestral knowledge (of the Kagyü line) passed along from generation to generation and holding wisdom that still enlightens today. These recordings make up the soundtrack to Guy Maezelle's film, Bokar Rimpoche: Maître de Méditation and feature sacred chants recorded by Bokar Rimpoche himself and ritual music from the Mirik Monastery. A message from Bokar Rimpoche: "We, practicing Buddhists, must understand that all that we accomplish in this life results originally from our mother's goodness. For it is first thanks to her that we are able to survive. It is her that fed us, clothed us, and who took care of our education. But in reality, our whole life depends on all the other beings and their activities. For example, meat, milk and butter are given to us by the animals. Our food, our clothes, our home depend on the work and effort of many other beings. In other words, on this earth, every day of our lives is lived depending on an infinite number of other beings for no one, since their birth, can survive alone. They would have no food and no clothes. So we must be aware that our life depends on the contribution of many other beings who show goodness towards us. Therefore it is all beings, without exception, that we should hold dear! Even without referring to the word of Buddha, this interdependence between all beings is easy to understand."


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Chinese Experimental Music 1992-2008
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 4CD
Price: $31.00
Catalog #: SR 265CD
Sub Rosa presents a 4CD anthology of experimental music (1992-2008) from Mainland China (Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Guilin, Hangzhou, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Fuzhou, Shanxi, Harbin), and from countries within the Chinese area of influence, such as Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, and Malaysia. Featuring 48 diverse artists, this collection is designed as a journey through what is currently happening underground in these regions, tapping a seemingly endless wellspring of new, hidden talent. It also looks at the recent past and the key role of pioneers like Wang Fan, Dajuin Yao, and also Hong Kong-based Li Chin Sung aka Dickson Dee who, for almost two decades, has been spreading the word about experimental music in Mainland China. This album was curated by Dickson Dee on Guy Marc Hinant's invitation and includes an enlightening presentation on the short yet intense advent and history of the Chinese noise explosion, co-written by Zbigniew Karkowski and Yan Jun, The Sound of the Underground: An Overview of Experimental and Non-Academic Music in China. The Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in one way or another eradicated most of the existing and emerging culture in China. At the same time as intellectuals were sent to rural labor camps, countless ancient buildings, antiques, books, paintings and various artifacts were destroyed. This period created an enormous intellectual, cultural and artistic vacuum in China -- destruction that in a sense, time is still healing. So the tradition of music culture and especially non-academic, purely experimental music, started from scratch sometime in the '80s. With the market economy introduced in that decade and further media developments in the '90s, there was an explosion in youth culture that had been held back for decades. Movements and music scenes that previously never reached China -- for instance, psychedelic music, punk or neo-Dada -- started to appear and expanded at an astonishing pace. The birth of these alternative rock and punk music scenes that later developed into even more experimental trends is a direct result of global capitalism and profound change in China's position within the World Order. Documented for the very first time, this release provides a complete panorama of the roots and buds of an ever-growing, promising experimental community in China and beyond, with nearly 5 hours of music.


Artist: VA
Title: Bôkan! Musics in the Margin
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 267CD
Bôkan! is second volume in Sub Rosa's Musics in the Margin series, showing the particular and complex relationships in the creative process as a fundamental characteristic of outsider art. This CD, a second opus of musical art brut, has been produced as part of the music workshops at the French school and institute, La Porte Ouverte. During part of a workshop, youngsters are given access to a microphone, percussion, guitar, piano, and other instruments -- a musical exposure that is very often occurring in their life for the first time. They quickly make these music implements their own, using them in surprising ways. Slowly, artists emerge and truly musical personas are built as recording sessions progress. Over weeks, years, with every workshop, a monstrous pile of material accrues, hours upon hours of recordings featuring residents wholeheartedly diving into a journey of sound. A work on voice, with voices. Crazy, raucous, unreleased covers, melodies made out of raw soul -- these recordings undoubtedly hold a few invaluable gems, testifying to these moments when, turned on to music and their instruments, the youngsters inhabit a soothing project, away from aggressiveness and violence. Sometimes it took a day of work to produce some of these pieces, but usually the live takes were left alone, with no additional work. However, some people close to the organization have obtained copies of workshop recordings and were able to work on them and develop electronic versions. A striking experience if there ever was one -- full of surprises, mysteries, and meetings, Bôkan! is an excerpt, a trace, a marker of a destabilizing yet stimulating musical experience, an endearing record because it was produced under very special conditions, with very unique young people.


Artist: VA
Title: Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me!
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 268CD
...Female Blues Singers - Rarities 1923-1930. The Sub Rosa label presents a collection of works from obscure and forgotten female blues singers, exploring the question: what can be said about a singer whose entire work fits on a single-sided 78rpm record? What circumstances led to this recording? Who decided to do it? For whom was it intended? Why wasn't it followed by more recordings? Hypotheses get lost in places and moments themselves forgotten. What remains are these miraculous voices that have survived, through hardship and death -- these voices that have gone through the dark years of The Great Depression, when profoundly sincere and ferociously ironic blues were at their peak. However, this selection does not constitute a theme-based anthology: it is simply a few little-known or forgotten female blues singers whose ambiguous leanings, double-entendres, and uncompromising crudeness had been censored by the propriety of their times ruled by sanctimonious prudishness and despicable segregation. This collection focuses on the darker, coarser and grittier than what was being performed for the popular crowd in vaudevilles and medicine shows. These women were expressing a radically new form, or perhaps an ancient, primitive one that plumbs the depths of a universal heartache. Featuring Lucille Bogan, Virginia Liston, Lil Johnson, Margaret Johnson, Monette Moore, Margaret Carter, Jenny Pope, Lena Henry, Anna Jones, Rosa Henderson, Coletha Simpson, Martha Copeland, Ivy Smith and Memphis Minnie.


Artist: VA
Title: Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me!
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 268LP
...Female Blues Singers - Rarities 1923-1930. LP version, previously issued on CD. The Sub Rosa label presents a collection of works from obscure and forgotten female blues singers. These voices have survived, through hardship and death, through the dark years of The Great Depression, when profoundly sincere and ferociously ironic blues were at their peak. However, this selection does not constitute a theme-based anthology: it is simply a few little-known female blues singers whose ambiguous leanings, double-entendres, and uncompromising crudeness had been censored by the propriety of their times ruled by sanctimonious prudishness and despicable segregation. These women were expressing a radically new form, or perhaps an ancient, primitive one that plumbs the depths of a universal heartache. Featuring Lucille Bogan, Virginia Liston, Lil Johnson, Margaret Johnson, Monette Moore, Margaret Carter, Jenny Pope, Lena Henry, Anna Jones, Rosa Henderson, Coletha Simpson, Martha Copeland, Ivy Smith and Memphis Minnie.


Artist: VA
Title: Le Groupe Surréaliste Révolutionnaire...
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 269CD
...Dotremont et Broodthaers Volume 3. This third volume aural document is devoted to the evolution of Belgian surrealist groups spanning the years 1939-1978, following in the surrealist footsteps that Dada, Pansaers et Correspondance Volume 1 (1917-1926) and Magritte, Le Groupe Surréaliste de Bruxelles, Rupture Volume 2 (1926-1938) established. This third volume gathers rare archival recordings and excerpts from The Groupe Surréaliste du Hainaut, 1939 (with Achille Chavée, Fernand Dumont, Pol Bury, André Simon, Marcel Lefrancq), The Groupe Surréalisme Révolutionnaire, 1948 (with Christian Dotremont, Marcel Broodthaers, Paul Colinet, Achille Chavée), the Revues : Temps Mêlés, 1952 (with André Blavier), Phantomas 1953 (with Marcel Havrenne, Théodore Koenig, Marcel Piqueray), Les Lèvres Nues, 1954 (with Marcel Mariën), Daily Bul 1957 (with André Balthazar, Pol Bury, Marcel Havrenne, Paul Colinet, Marcel Piqueray), and the two outsiders: Marcel Broodthaers and Jean-Pierre Verheggen. The Groupe Surréaliste du Hainaut, first incepted in 1934, was a slow blinding light in Belgium's culture of thought. Seen from the industrial landscapes, and so close to the French borders, it was more accepting of French theories than the surrealists in Brussels. These Walloon Surrealists remained rather faithful to the methods preached by Breton (automatic writing, against which Nougé became strongly opposed to early on). Hennuyer, Magritte, Scutenaire, and Souris all had a similar perspective, but eventually moved to Brussels where that identity clearly demarcated itself in a nationalist move towards establishing the differences in Belgian tradition and identity. This final volume of this compilation series, and the project as a whole, is an urgent attempt to document an important aspect of surrealism that most surely would have disappeared into dusty archives, if not released to the world.


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 5
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 270CD
2010 repress, originally released 2008. Sub Rosa presents the fifth volume of the highly-acclaimed and successful Anthology of Noise & Electronic Music series. This installment highlights pieces illustrating a technique (Claude Ballif's "Points, Mouvements"), a country ("Shur, Op. 15" by Alireza Mashayekhi), a studio (Helmut Lachenmann at the IPEM), and historic (François Bernard Mâche's "Prélude"), and radical ("Spectrum Ripper" by Masonna/Yamazaki "Maso" Takushi) works that have ripped apart ancient definitions. All this organized with internationalism in mind and, for once, a focus on the voice -- not as sung words, their traditional facet in music (from pop songs to lieder and operas), but as the word itself, recited, distorted, rendered abstract or disaggregated and screamed (the incantation so often a part of rock and noise music). Like the previous four volumes, this fifth installment is an absolute must for anyone interested in the roots and history of electronic music, with many previously unpublished, rare tracks comprising more than 2 ½ hours of music. The 2CD comes in a deluxe digipack sleeve with an extensive 54-page booklet. Other artists include: Charlemagne Palestine, Pere Ubu, Sutcliffe Jügend, Li Chin Sung aka Dickson Dee, Rogelio Sosa, Christian Galaretta, Richard Maxfield, Wolf Vostell, André Boucourechliev, Mauricio Kagel, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Raoul Hausmann, Gil Joseph Wolman, Leo Kupper, Josef Anton Riedl, Sten Hanson + Henri Chopin, Dajuin Yao, Ground Zero, Club Moral and Dub Taylor.


Artist: HITE, BOB
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 271LP
LP version.


Artist: PALESTINE, CHARLEMAGNE
Title: From Etudes to Cataclysms
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 272CD
This is the first solo work by Charlemagne Palestine on Sub Rosa -- the first but probably not the last -- the label would also like to re-release a series of his classic works, which have previously been unavailable. From Etudes to Cataclysms is one of Charlemagne's most important works. An impressive composition of more than 140 minutes based on a unique instrument -- a double piano on which one keyboard is played by the feet. "Several years ago, Martin Kaufmann of Kaufmann Pianos in Brussels told me he had seen and heard an amazing and unique instrument in Italy. A piano with two separate bodies! One with a normal grand piano body having 88 notes to be played with the fingers, and below this piano was a second piano also with a grand piano body that could play simultaneously the lower 37 notes of a grand piano with pedals for the feet. Having known my music for years and that I had been a carilloneur where one plays with both fists and feet simultaneously, Martin Kaufmann thought that the Borgato would be perfect for my music. The inventor of this unique instrument was Luigi Borgato from Padua, who developed this instrument with his wife, Paola. I was intrigued, and through an intermediary, the Italian pianist Roberto Posseda visited the Borgatos in Lonigo where they have their workshop and found that their instrument was perfect for my body and my music. We immediately decided to organize recording sessions in a local church for one week and From Etudes to Cataclysms is the result!" --Charlemagne Palestine, October 2007


Artist: VA
Title: Ibimeni: Garifuna Traditional Music From Guatemala
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 273CD
The Sub Rosa label presents the Garifuna musicians and dancers from Livingston, Guatemala. Ibimeni, a term associated with childhood and youth, means honey or sweetness in Garifuna. Ibimeni is also the name of a group of Garifuna musicians and dancers from Livingston, Guatemala, who interpret their traditional sounds on this album. This collection includes lullabies, festive chants, processional marches, and songs of religion and labor. Livingston is a small region located on the Caribbean coast at the mouth of Rio Dulce, Guatemala. It is accessible only by boat or airplane. This isolation allows the conservation of many cultural elements, such as music and dance. Ethnogenesis and location of Garinagu: A series of villages inhabited by the Garifuna (plural, Garinagu) are located throughout the coasts of the Gulf of Honduras, (Belize, Guatemala, Honduras and the Laguna de Perlas -- Nicaragua). The Garinagu are the Afro-Amerindian people with the most transnational presence in Central America. With a particular ethnogenesis, produced by the encounter of Caribs and Arawaks in the Lesser Antilles, they remained throughout the conquest period, due to race-mixing with black slaves. Constituted as "Maroons," as a clear resistance against the English, they were the protagonists of the so-called "Caribbean War" during 1795 and 1796 in Saint Vincent Island, from where they were defeated and later deported to Central America in April 1797. After being abandoned in Roatán (Bay Islands), they negotiated with the Spanish crown to be transferred to Puerto Trujillo, in continental lands, where they started to scatter to the east and west. They established their own lands on the edge of the coast of the Honduras Gulf. Halfway through the 20th century, they began their migration to the United States. Music and dancing -- vehicles of religiosity -- are central in the Garifuna culture. This musical expression is based on the group of two, three, and even four drums, garaon (primera -- the high pitched and segunda -- the lowest), and sonajas sisiras that interpret rhythms accompanied by a solo singer and a choir that repeats a verse. The relationship between the primera drum-rolls and the dancer is that the dancer responds to the movements made by the drum as if it were a dialogue. In tandem to the polyrhythmic universe of Garifuna drums, they cultivate another intense field of musical expressions that plays an important role in society, most of the time of ludic and recreational character.


Artist: WILD CLASSICAL MUSIC ENSEMBLE
Title: Musics in the Margin
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 274CD
This is the fourth volume in Sub Rosa's Musics in the Margin series. Faithful to their concept, Sub Rosa searches out self-taught musicians -- people who make contemporary music outside the customary production and distribution channels, with the determination and creative gifts that stem from unmistakable artistic talent. Some of these musicians operate in mental or social isolation and make their music in special workshops, while others can be classified as spiritualist or visionary artists. This particular relationship with the creative process is a fundamental characteristic of outsider art. Sound is an energy, a power. The ability to handle that power is perhaps what so many musicians, artists and writers lack -- they are too referential, have no universe of their own, are pushing to get their particular insights recognized (through art-historical criteria). Whereas here, everything is marked by the spirit of a chaotic intelligence. Four mentally-challenged musicians, Johan, Linh, Kim and Rudy jam together with their artistic mentor and drummer, Damien -- there are drums, trumpets, violins, melodica, samplers and an electric guitar. Concentration, suspense, beads of sweat, a sigh, a cough, and then -- the scream. For over 40 minutes, they pour a sauce of punk, rock, noise and free music all over the audience. There's no beat, no biz, no schmalzy popular songs here. This music is neither contemporary, nor popular. It can't be labelled as subversive outsider nor as avant-garde. This music is the fantasy and emotion of five musicians, directly translated into sound and color. Their exploration of their musical instruments and the way they deal with sounds is inspiring and contains a hidden structure -- a new rhythm. It is just a simple must to encounter this group.


Artist: Z'EV
Title: as/if/when
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 275CD
Sub Rosa presents works by industrial music pioneer, Z'EV. The physical vibrations of the objects in his works with both text and sound has been influenced by the Middle Eastern mystical system best known as Kabbalah, as well as -- but not limited to -- African, Afro-Caribbean and Indonesian rhythms, musics and cultures. He has studied Ewe music, Balinese gamelan, and Indian tala. From 1959-1965 he studied drumming with Arnie Frank, then Chuck Flores and then Art Anton at Drum City in Van Nuys, CA. In 1963, he abandoned Judaism and began his life-long relationship with World religions and esoteric systems. 1964 saw the beginning of his initial attempts at writing poetry and explorations of both two and three-dimensional artforms. After studying at CalArts from 1969-1970 with poets Emmett Williams and Michael S. Bell and writer/critic Sue-Ellen Case, he began producing works using the name S. Weisser, primarily concentrating on visual and sound poetries. In 1975, he was included in the "Second Generation" show at the Museum of Conceptual Art in San Francisco. In 1976 he moved from Los Angeles to the Bay Area, ending up with a storefront studio on MacArthur Boulevard in Oakland, pretty much midway between the headquarters of the Black Panther Party, (who dissolved that year), and the Hells Angels (still extant). A primary reason for this move was his association with the San Francisco Alternative exhibition space La Mamelle (run by Carl Loeffler and Nancy Evans). In 1977 he presented his first solo percussion performance under the project title "Sound of Wind and Limb." In 1978 he began developing an idiosyncratic performance technique utilizing self-developed instruments formed from industrial materials such as stainless steel, titanium, and PVC plastics. Critic John Buckley described his performances in this era: "the instruments are collections of objects ... strung together with ropes and swung at varying speeds and directions to produce a fairly astonishing range of pitches and timbres. And the moves the guy goes through to manipulate these instruments are, for grace and athleticism, strong stuff. Z'EV is also interesting for the close correlation of visual and musical aspects, since the physical vibrations of the objects you see are the same as those picked up by the ears as sound. Also, since the rhythms of the work are dictated by the performer's every and any movement, an inevitable integrity unifies the act." This release presents pieces from the artist's early sound experiments: "As," recorded in 1978 at the KPFK radio station in Los Angeles; "If," recorded in 1982 at Savoy Tivoli in San Francisco; and "When," recorded in 1983 at Shaffy Theatre, Amsterdam.


Artist: COLLARD-NEVEN, JEAN-PHILIPPE
Title: Incidental Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 276CD
Belgian composer, improviser and pianist Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven presents music for an absent film, Incidental Music -- 33 miniatures for piano and chamber orchestra taken from theater performances or documentaries. These pieces find new life here, released from their original context, inviting the listener's imagination to recreate their story, perhaps from a long-lost French film of the 1970s. As the composer contextualizes, "I was born, musically speaking, with film music. George Delerue, Philippe Sarde, Ennio Morricone, Michel Legrand, Francis Lai, Gabriel Yared, François de Roubaix, Antoine Duhamel, and many more are responsible for my first musical emotions. Those childhood evenings lying flat on my belly in front of the family's TV screen watching the films of Sautet, Lelouch, Verneuil, De Broca, Truffaut, Audiard, Almodovar and so many others were an endless spring of emotions at which -- I understand it now -- I quenched my thirst for the deepest emotions buried within myself. It is almost surprising that I have not tried earlier to practice what I have considered since childhood to be the most beautiful profession in the world: to be a composer of film music." Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven treads the career path of an atypical musician where classical, contemporary, electroacoustic, jazz and improvisation, French chanson, theater, dance, cinema, and literature coexist side-by-side. Far from being a mindlessly voracious form of eclecticism, his penchant towards diversity is the expression of a single-minded passion, an open-minded spirit which steers clear of pigeon-holing and weaves connecting threads between styles, genres and periods.


Artist: MASHAYEKHI & ATA EBTEKAR/SOTE, ALIREZA
Title: Persian Electronic Music: Yesterday and Today 1966-2006
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 277CD
The Sub Rosa label presents the work of Alireza Mashayekhi and Ata Ebtekar/Sote, two essential, key luminaries in the so far very unknown electronic music scene as composed in Iran from the '60s until today. These Iranian music masters work on ancestral structures to create something radically new, travelling around the world as vivid creators, working through the hazards of history. Alireza Mashayekhi (b. 1940) is a pioneer Iranian avant-garde composer whose ideas and works have been performed in his home country and abroad for more than 35 years. Ata Ebtekar aka Sote (b.1972) is an electronic composer, sound artist and recording engineer who is interested in recasting the tuning of Persian classical scales (radif) and melodies from old Persian folk songs within a new electronic framework. Since he has a firm conviction that rules and formulas have to be deconstructed and rethought, he alters some of these modal systems from their original tonality and rhythm. He has released several CDs and vinyls on Dielectric/RLR, Spundae and Warp. Sub Rosa offers you a Persian history lesson that finally exposes this region's rich and significant contribution to the realm of electronic music. "This feels like the historical electronic music reissue of the year." -- Mimaroglu Music Sales.


Artist: POUSSEUR, MARIANNE
Title: Only
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 278CD
Pieces by John Cage, Morton Feldman, Hanns Eisler, Giacinto Scelsi, György Kurtag, Frederic Rzewski, Henri Pousseur, Théodore Botrel, Rudolf Siecynski, and Sephardic songs. Performed/interpreted by vocalist Marianne Pousseur.
"I like to listen to music in places that haven't been designed for it. I like when music mixes in with noise. Only came from a very personal desire to open the doors of my musical world to the concreteness of daily life, to tear down the fictional barriers between places and times of rehearsal and performance. Here I try to relate simple pieces to 'serious' works, sophisticated styles that are familiar to me with simple songs; I try to present them in unexpected places, familiar places that may enrich, impregnating these musical movements with all the fullness of their own lives -- a school, a car in motion, the train station. The story this ensemble tells may not be the classical contents of the works featured here, but it is a fiction -- different, less pure, contaminated, and open-ended on the world of what is around us, a world excluded from the sacred universe of music. Maybe it tells a contradictory idea of wonder and discomfort, of the necessity of an essential starting point: memory, journey, and an impossible quest for beauty and balance." --Marianne Pousseur


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Shim Sham Shimmy
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 279CD
This is the third volume in Sub Rosa's collection devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, following Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults and Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me! Female Blues Singers -- Rarities 1923-1930. Shim Sham Shimmy has been assembled by Belgian radio personality, musicologist, and Canned Heat devotee, Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie. Is it really possible to imagine what modern music would sound like if a few pioneering geniuses had not had the idea of electrifying their instruments, especially guitar and harmonica, between 1945 and 1950? Some purists pan this evolution, but, in the '50s, the new sound was heard and embraced at all the studios and night clubs in the United States; it would become a staple on the radio, and in pop culture in general, radically transforming the blues, boogie and country into acts of rebellion. This collection pays tribute to about thirty artists, some of whom later became known, like "Master of the Telecaster" Albert Collins, boogie-woogie and blues pianist Champion Jack Dupree, slide guitar innovator Homesick James, harmonica and blues singer, Sammy Myers, "The Boogie Disease" author Doctor Ross, and one-man band wild-man, Joe Hill Louis. However, the real treat is having an opportunity to hear fabulous unknowns who all, one day, had the chance to be recorded, either in a studio, on the street, or on a back porch, before returning to anonymity shortly after. Almost all of the artists presented here hailed from the Southern states; some of them stayed there their whole life, others emigrated up North, moving up the Mississippi, or toward the West to settle in California. The music included here is part of the foundations of all the modern music that would take the world by storm up to our present time. Other artists include: Charles Sheffield, Ramblin Hi Harris, Bobo Jenkins, Clarence Lockley, B. Brown & McVouts, Wright Holmes, Gunter Lee Carr (aka Cecil Gant), Moses Williams, Haskel Sadler, Larry Dale, Baby Boy Warren, Eddie Snow, Guitar Slim Green, Slim Gaillard, Blue Charlie Morris, Willie Egan, W. Harris, Jake Jackson, Morris Pejoe, Papa George Lightfoot, Pat Hare, Big John & The Dallas Playboys, Lonnie Johnson, and Bob Kelly.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Shim Sham Shimmy
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 279LP
Limited edition vinyl version; CD version previously released by Sub Rosa. This is the third volume in Sub Rosa's collection devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s. Shim Sham Shimmy has been assembled by Belgian radio personality, musicologist, and Canned Heat devotee, Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie. This collection pays tribute to about thirty artists, some of whom later became known, like "Master of the Telecaster" Albert Collins, boogie-woogie and blues pianist Champion Jack Dupree, slide guitar innovator Homesick James, harmonica and blues singer, Sammy Myers, "The Boogie Disease" author Doctor Ross, and one-man band wild-man, Joe Hill Louis. The music included here is part of the foundations of all the modern music that would take the world by storm up to our present time. Other artists include: Charles Sheffield, Ramblin Hi Harris, Bobo Jenkins, Clarence Lockley, B. Brown & McVouts, Wright Holmes, Gunter Lee Carr (aka Cecil Gant), Moses Williams, Haskel Sadler, Larry Dale, Baby Boy Warren, Eddie Snow, Guitar Slim Green, Slim Gaillard, Blue Charlie Morris, Willie Egan, W. Harris, Jake Jackson, Morris Pejoe, Papa George Lightfoot, Pat Hare, Big John & The Dallas Playboys, Lonnie Johnson, and Bob Kelly.


Artist: FELDMAN, MORTON
Title: Triadic Memories
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 280CD
"In the summer of 1990, I released on Sub Rosa a recording of Triadic Memories by Morton Feldman (1926-1987). It was one of the first recordings of this long work for solo piano completed on July 23, 1981. The score I used had been published by Universal as number UE17326 in 1987. Shortly after my CD came out, Universal published a new edition. At the bottom of page 2, under a dedication to Aki Takahashi and Roger Woodward, is a small-print mention: 'corrected edition: 14.2.1991.' I disregarded it for a long time. I had carefully read, annotated, analyzed, labored over, performed live, and recorded my 1987 score. The work sounded great, the design of the edition was flawless, the composition was coherent from A to Z, and no erratum had been published. In my eyes, that score was the work. Many listeners said they liked my meditative album, and I was pretty proud of it. But there was something lingering in my mind... I went on to several other projects, and I considered the matter closed. However, much later, due to a few incomprehensible exterior signs, I decided to order a new score of Triadic Memories. I immediately noticed the 'corrected edition' mention. The score's layout looked exactly the same -- except for a tiny detail: starting on page 5, small digits start to appear above most of the repeat marks. These numbers, which were omitted in 'my' score, obviously indicate the number of times some passages should be played - not twice, but 3, 4, 5, 7, up to 11 times! This tiny notation detail has tremendous consequences on the form of the composition. Universal had not even cared to inform me of this issue. I was mortified. With incredible generosity, Sub Rosa offered me the chance to produce a new recording of this work, exactly 20 years after the first one. So here it is. I did everything possible to tap into the spirit of the 1990 recording: same piano, same recording engineer, same working method, same approach to the keyboard, but now with the right score: my own 'corrected version.' The truth is, it's all different. To me, there is no possible 'corrected version.' The 1987-1991 edition was simply a different work, one that had not been completely drawn by its maker, and which presented different issues to its performer." --Jean-Luc Fafchamps
       
       Morton Feldman was born in New York on January 12, 1926. In 1949 the most significant meeting up to that time took place -- Feldman met John Cage, commencing an artistic association of crucial importance to music in America in the 1950s. Cage was instrumental in encouraging Feldman to have confidence in his instincts, which resulted in totally intuitive compositions. He never worked with any systems that anyone has been able to identify, working from moment to moment, from one sound to the next. His friends during the 1950s in New York included the composers Earle Brown and Christian Wolff; painters Mark Rothko, Philip Guston, Franz Kline, Jackson Pollock and Robert Rauschenberg; and pianist David Tudor. Today he is considered one of the most important composers of the century.


Artist: KARKOWSKI & TETSUO FURUDATE, ZBIGNIEW
Title: World As Will III
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 282CD
"Mergence," "Below The Demarcation" and "Mix White" concludes the World As Will project, started ten years ago, the result of a collaboration between Polish acoustic and electroacoustic sound artist/composer Zbigniew Karkowski and Japanese noise progenitor Tetsuo Furudate. Named after the philosophy coined by Arthur Schopenhauer, the first two parts in the World As Will series have been dramatic explorations of majestic dissonance, orchestration, and looped deconstruction that are powerful challenges to any modern orchestra. Part three is commissioned and performed by the Berlin-based ensemble Zeitkratzer, who proved the impossible possible with their capable rendering of Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music for a 2002 Berlin Opera House performance. The first piece in World As Will III arises from an infrabass ocean to crudely develop through a series of distant explosions, percussive energy, and short open cuts. As a whole, the structure is reminiscent of a slow, crawling process. Tremors follow (with Karkowski, something always ends up shaking). The second piece is both the imprint and the development of the first one. Furudate's contribution to this joint venture is also easier to grasp. A menace passes by, and the listener should be more than happy to remain hidden in their hole, letting the musical beast move along in short, rusty, metallic, torn, scorched bursts. This third piece provides a cathartic and tragic conclusion to the release and to the series, achieving what could be called a sketch of absolute chaos. Zeitkratzer: Reinhold Friedl (piano/artistic director), Burkhard Schlothauer (violin), Anton Lukoszevieze (cello), Uli Phillipp (bass), Frank Gratkowski (clarinet), Franz Hautzinger (trumpet), Melvyn Poore (tuba), Marc Weiser (electronics), Maurice de Martin (percussion), Ralf Meinz (sound).


Artist: QIZILBASH, ASAD
Title: Sarod Recital/Live In Peshawar
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 283CD
Asad Qizilbash has been the only master of the sarod in Pakistan since 1992, keeping this traditional instrument and its music alive. Asad was born in 1963 to the famous violinist K.H. Qizilbash, who was responsible for closing the gap between Western and Eastern classical music. After attending a concert performed by his future Master, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Asad decided to devote himself to the instrument. Today, Asad Qizilbash has the honor to perform regularly at his President's house where Head of State Representatives, monarchs, diplomats and guests from all around the world have witnessed and appreciated his unique style of classical narration. Peshawar is the capital of the Northwest Frontier Province in Pakistan. The city, once called Purushapura, "City Of Flowers," was the capital of the ancient Greco-Buddhist center of Gandhara. Over the centuries, it has been the entry-point to invaders, conquerors and refugees. It remains an important military crossroad today. This, Asad Qizilbash's sarod recital in Peshawar, was carried out under extremely perilous and rather singular circumstances. An outstanding performance -- a moment of freedom from war. Asad Qizilbash (sarod), Mustafa Khan (tabla).


Artist: EBTEKAR & THE IRANIAN ORCHESTRA, ATA
Title: Ornamentalism
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 284CD
Subtitled: Ata Ebtekar and the Iranian Orchestra for New Music Performing Works of Alireza Mashayekhi. The follow-up to the highly-acclaimed Persian Electronic Music: Yesterday and Today 1966-2006 (SR 277CD), Ornamentalism features Ata Ebtekar and The Iranian Orchestra for New Music performing works written by legendary Iranian composer Alireza Mashayekhi. Iranian electronic composer Ata Ebtekar (aka Sote) was granted complete creative freedom by Mashayekhi himself to transform these older compositions into fully-realized pieces using his techniques of synthesis and electronic manipulation. It's an organic electrocution without sacrificing the beauty of the performance. These sound sources and compositions were metamorphosed via electronic processing, rearranged and decomposed using sound generators, effects boxes, modular synthesizers and samplers. Finally, Ebtekar programs synthetic sounds and adds new electronic harmonies, melodies and soundscapes to the sonic palette of Western classical music and Persian instrumentation for a unique musical experience. He unites the grace and symmetry of noise and silence inside the magic circle of electronic music composition. His pieces are sonic tales synchronously decoding and regenerating customary patterns of thought in nature; aural designs of crisis and harmony where contemporary life meets folklore, orchestrating an artificial saga with a variety of illuminations and analysis. He believes that music is a cultural habit of sound and anti-sound (silence). Therefore, he generates music without a specific culture, which he believes to be "The Other Sound."


Artist: ANARCHIST REPUBLIC OF BZZZ
Title: Anarchist Republic Of Bzzz
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $12.50
Catalog #: SR 285LP
Anarchist Republic Of Bzzz is the exceptional and ephemeral reunion of two cult guitarists, Marc Ribot & Arto Lindsay and two inspired and engaged rappers, Sensational & Mike Ladd, with Seb el Zin at the helm. The group displays a level of urgency too rare nowadays. These five musicians break free from all the music rules and transcend all styles. This isn't free jazz per se, nor free improvisation or dub or hip-hop -- actually, the Anarchist Republic Of Bzzz's sonic manifesto is simultaneously all that. This album is released exclusively on LP, housed in a scandalous sleeve designed by Kiki Picasso, who is the founding member of Bazooka, the punk graphic design team that revolutionized the art of illustration as a whole in the late-'70s.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents 26 Deranged And Smokin' Cool Cats
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 286CD
This is the fourth volume in Sub Rosa's collection devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, following Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults (SR 271CD/LP), Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me! Female Blues Singers -- Rarities 1923-1930 (SR 268CD/LP), and Shim Sham Shimmy (SR 279CD/LP). This time around, musicologist and radio personality Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie focuses on the rocketing rise and fast decline of rockabilly (1954-1959), whose name derives from a combination of "rock 'n' roll" and "hillbilly," which may be a reference to the country music that contributed to this genre's development. Dr. Boogie explains, "This form of musical expression can be summed up as a white, typically southern, and rural kind of rock and roll born in Memphis in 1954. The lyrics are often about recurring themes in '50s American pop culture, like cars and teenage love. Young people identified with rockabilly in large numbers, forming gangs that could terrorize a neighborhood by facing other gangs. Leather, Brylcreem, and motorcycles were the signs by which they defined themselves. As a trend, rockabilly lasted only a few years, but it generated a near-unmatched number of recordings from hundreds of studios from as many American cities and small towns. Back then, you could very easily improvise yourself a record producer or label owner: all it took was a little bit of equipment and a small garage, basement, or backstore space. You started by pressing a hundred-copy run for the artist's family and friends. Sometimes, the product reached the ears of bigger label owners who would ensure its wider distribution." Rockabilly almost completely vanished in the late '50s, being replaced by other forms of rock 'n' roll. There was a rockabilly revival in the '70s, spawned by pop culture's nostalgic interest in '50s culture, and rockabilly bands of all stripes and sub-genres keep this important piece of early rock history alive today. The energy, boldness, wildness, and talent of these young pioneers can all be found on this compilation, which rediscovers 26 of these rock adventurers. Artists include: Johnny Jay, Jimmy Edwards, Curly Coldiron, Danny Verne, Eddie Cash, Chuck Dallis, The Cals, Al Urban, Bill Logsdon & The Royal Notes, John Friis & The Valiants, Ronnie Haig, Jimmy Evans, Jimmie Dee, Johnny Knight, Harvey Hunt, Wayne Haas, Bill Moss, Ronnie Allen, Jay Brown & The Jets, Gary Hodge, Charles Senns, Charles Page, T.K.Hulin, Gene Maltais, Bing Day, and The Trashers.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents 20 Deranged And Smokin' Cool Cats
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 286LP
LP version. This is the fourth volume in Sub Rosa's collection devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, following Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults (SR 271CD/LP), Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me! Female Blues Singers -- Rarities 1923-1930 (SR 268CD/LP), and Shim Sham Shimmy (SR 279CD/LP). This time around, musicologist and radio personality Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie focuses on the rocketing rise and fast decline of rockabilly (1954-1959), whose name derives from a combination of "rock 'n' roll" and "hillbilly," which may be a reference to the country music that contributed to this genre's development. Dr. Boogie explains, "This form of musical expression can be summed up as a white, typically southern, and rural kind of rock and roll born in Memphis in 1954. The lyrics are often about recurring themes in '50s American pop culture, like cars and teenage love. Young people identified with rockabilly in large numbers, forming gangs that could terrorize a neighborhood by facing other gangs. Leather, Brylcreem, and motorcycles were the signs by which they defined themselves. As a trend, rockabilly lasted only a few years, but it generated a near-unmatched number of recordings from hundreds of studios from as many American cities and small towns. Back then, you could very easily improvise yourself a record producer or label owner: all it took was a little bit of equipment and a small garage, basement, or backstore space. You started by pressing a hundred-copy run for the artist's family and friends. Sometimes, the product reached the ears of bigger label owners who would ensure its wider distribution." Rockabilly almost completely vanished in the late '50s, being replaced by other forms of rock 'n' roll. There was a rockabilly revival in the '70s, spawned by pop culture's nostalgic interest in '50s culture, and rockabilly bands of all stripes and sub-genres keep this important piece of early rock history alive today. The energy, boldness, wildness, and talent of these young pioneers can all be found on this compilation, which rediscovers 20 of these rock adventurers. Artists include: Johnny Jay, Curly Coldiron, Danny Verne, Eddie Cash, Chuck Dallis, The Cals, Al Urban, Ronnie Haig, Jimmy Evans, Jimmie Dee, Johnny Knight, Wayne Haas, Bill Moss, Ronnie Allen, Jay Brown & The Jets, Gary Hodge, Charles Page, T.K.Hulin and Gene Maltais.


Artist: VA
Title: I'm Going Where The Water Drinks Like Wine
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 287CD
Subtitled: 18 Unsung Bluesmen: Rarities 1923-1929. Sub Rosa presents another volume in their "Fundamental" collection, devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20 to the '60s. While artists such as Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Bukka White, Sleepy John Estes, Skip James, etc. became legendary in their lifetime (due in part to their discovery by the 1960s British rock scene), the musicians highlighted here, similarly to Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me!, are the ones that didn't become major figures, either constructed by myth or defined by history. These musicians didn't meet their destiny at a crossroad; no folk or blues label rediscovered them. They never got a second chance. They had to accept lowly jobs unrelated to their art. They survived. Most of them came from Mississippi, Memphis, St. Louis, etc. They were all highly unique, and they recorded at a young age -- a very young age in some cases -- in the '20s. They would walk into a hotel, guitar in hand, for a recording session or two. For some, we don't even know their real names, since they cut a few 78rpm sides and left for who knows where. Their traces get lost in the Great Depression. May their voices resound once more and keep the flame of our belief burning a little more, our belief in the beauty of the struggle. Presented in an 8-panel digipack with extensive notes on each of the artists. Artists include: Sylvester Weaver, Bo Weavil Jackson, Richard Rabbit Brown, Andrew Baxter, Willard Ramblin' Thomas, Luke Jordan, Buddy Boy Hawkins, Ishman Bracey, Arthur Petties, Rube Lacey, Tom Dickson, Freddie Spruell, Jesse Babyface Thomas, Willie Baker, Kid Bailey, Willie Blind Joe Reynolds, Henry Townsend, and Noah Lewis.


Artist: VA
Title: I'm Going Where The Water Drinks Like Wine
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 287LP
Subtitled: 18 Unsung Bluesmen: Rarities 1923-1929. LP version. Sub Rosa presents another volume in their "Fundamental" collection, devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20 to the '60s. While artists such as Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Bukka White, Sleepy John Estes, Skip James, etc. became legendary in their lifetime (due in part to their discovery by the 1960s British rock scene), the musicians highlighted here are the ones that didn't become major figures, either constructed by myth or defined by history. Artists include: Sylvester Weaver, Bo Weavil Jackson, Richard Rabbit Brown, Andrew Baxter, Willard Ramblin' Thomas, Luke Jordan, Buddy Boy Hawkins, Ishman Bracey, Arthur Petties, Rube Lacey, Tom Dickson, Freddie Spruell, Jesse Babyface Thomas, Willie Baker, Kid Bailey, Willie Blind Joe Reynolds, Henry Townsend, and Noah Lewis.


Artist: POUSSEUR, HENRI
Title: Electronic Experimental and Microtonal 1953-1999
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 289CD
This is the fifth Henri Pousseur CD in Sub Rosa's Early Electronics series, exploring the work of this Belgian theoretician and experimental/avant garde composer. Along with previous releases in this series, Electronic Experimental and Microtonal (1953-1999) is comprised of 5 rare pieces that span over 45 years of microtonal and electronic work. Performed by Rohan de Saram (Quatuor Arditti), Evert van Tright (who played mainly Stockhausen), Brigitte Foccroulle, Danielle Dubosch, Isabelle Schmit (three great Belgian pianists) Sumila Goto, Mikoto Jakahata, Shuzan Morita (from the Japanese Yonin No Kai Trio) and for the first and only time, Henri Pousseur himself. These recordings are a continuation of Sub Rosa's earlier releases, namely: Musique Mixte, Liège à Paris, 8 Études Paraboliques and 4 Parabolic Mixes. Henri Pousseur studied at the Academies of Music in Liège and in Brussels from 1947 to 1953, and was closely associated with Pierre Froidebise and André Souris. He encountered Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luciano Berio, and thereafter devoted himself to avant-garde research. As Posseur describes of his music: "When I first met Pierre Boulez in 1951, we both agreed that the materials of the young serial music had to be renewed, both on a purely acoustic basis (electronic music) and in the relationships between its components." Generally regarded as a member of the Darmstadt School in the 1950s, Pousseur's music employs serialism, mobile forms, and aleatory, often mediating between or among seemingly irreconcilable styles, such as those of Schubert and Webern, or Pousseur's own serial style. From 1970 until his retirement in 1988, he taught at the University and Conservatory of Liège where he also founded the Centre de Recherches et de Formation Musicales de Wallonie.


Artist: VA
Title: An Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music Volume 6
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 290CD
Sub Rosa presents the sixth volume and penultimate installment of the highly-acclaimed and successful Anthology Of Noise & Electronic Music series. As usual, it culls old historical pieces, little-known gems, and even a few previously-unreleased tracks from the greatest Japanoise bands, a few representatives of the younger generations (from all around the world), and some rare tracks from the '80s, and it all ends with a lull that lets transpire what may be felt as a kind of indefinable mystery. The avant-garde ushered in the possibility of a new music, then it scattered into small communities whose best-known protagonists are totally unknown to people outside that particular circle. We are facing this fragmentation, and one form of avant-garde ends up scattered into several (not exclusively musical) forms. It is not in avant-garde's nature to create one elementary form for each individual. Other phrases used include "forays," "breakthroughs," "pushing the envelope," and then, of course, "going too far." Tracks on this sixth volume comprise more than 2 1/2 hours of music, with many rare and unpublished tracks. Housed in a 2CD digipack sleeve, including a 52-page booklet full of notes and biographical info. Artists include: Tetsuo Furudate, Stephen O' Malley (Sunn O)))), Pain Jerk, Z'ev, Hijokaidan, John Duncan, Manuel Rocha Iturbide, Robert Piotrowicz, Incapacitants, Sachiko M, Torturing Nurse, Israël Martinez, Ata Ebtekar/Sote, Daniel Menche, John Wiese, Joseph Nechvatal, Henry Cowell, Pain Barrier, Julie Rousse, Dick Raaymakers, Ultraphonist, Tzvi Avni, Else Marie Pade, ILIOS, Bird Palace/Cristian Vogel + Pablo Palacio, and Stummer + Liesl Ujvary.


Artist: STADE
Title: Freewheel
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 291CD
This is the debut full-length release by Swiss electronic duo, Stade for the Sub Rosa label. Stade is Pierre Audetat and Christophe Calpini, and in 2004-2005, several strings of meetings (including rehearsals, concerts, and studio sessions) were set up with French trumpet player Erik Truffaz, New York-based free-guitarist Elliott Sharp, and American-Swiss harmonica player Grégoire Maret. Stade later made slight edits to these recordings, without adding any overdubs. the result is Freewheel, a brilliant blend of Christophe Calpini's live drumming and Pierre Audétat's live samples and concrete sounds, a set-up that allows Stade to improvise like a conventional rhythm section with electronic devices. This brand-new electroacoustic composite is resolutely jazz, yet flirts with the syncopated vocabulary of hip-hop and the beats of electronica, all combined with the acoustic input of the guest musicians. Heavy organ stomps blend with screeching guitars in freakout-mode and harmonica passages teeter next to thunderously black beats and tinpan percussion in a totally unique sound-blend. The heir of Miles Davis' electric experiments, Stade creates the resolutely electronic side of improvised jazz music.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents Heavy Jelly: Essential Instrumentals
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 292CD
This is the fifth volume in Sub Rosa's collection devoted to rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, following Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults (SR 271CD/LP), Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me! Female Blues Singers -- Rarities 1923-1930 (SR 268CD/LP), Shim Sham Shimmy (SR 279CD/LP), and Dr. Boogie Presents 26 Deranged And Smokin' Cool Cats (SR 286CD/LP). This time around, musicologist and radio personality Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie has assembled a collection of hot-shot instrumentals culled from the original 45s -- tunes mainly dominated by a sax and organ, and always backed by a strong rhythm section. The first half of the '60s was a perfect test ground for whoever wanted to make a record for a fistful of dollars. The 45 rpm was king, and among the other genres of the day, instrumentals occupied a sizeable chunk of production. The best-known instrumentals came from California in the late '50s, thanks to the surfers who quickly adopted a new guitar sound from Texas. Simultaneously, all over the United States bands started recording lots of diverse and surprising instrumental tracks. They did so for various reasons: lack of a good singer, as filler for a B-side, or for a shot at the charts with a different, jukebox-ready mix of an already-released song. The mark of a good instrumental was often a gimmick, i.e. that little something -- a riff, an intro, a repetitive chord -- that would act as the piece's signature item. The tracks here were shamelessly designed for no other reason than to fill up the dancefloor, to great effect.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents Heavy Jelly: Essential Instrumentals
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 292LP
LP version.


Artist: DOWNSBROUGH, PETER
Title: And That
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 293LP
Music: Benjamin Franklin & Xavier Garcia-Bardon. Elements assembled by Peter Downsbrough. The work of visual artist, photographer and film artist Peter Downsbrough has had a major impact on the perception of art. In the early-'60s, Downsbrough interrupted his studies in architecture at the University of Cincinnati and Cooper Union in New York in order to work as a sculptor. A decade after his first exhibition in New York (1962), the artist gained international recognition, and has been exhibiting regularly in the United States and Europe since 1972. The varied work of the artist -- ranging from sculpture and books to photography, video, and film -- maintains a complex relationship with architecture and typography, while also drawing on the achievements of the early avant-garde (Bauhaus, De Stijl) and minimal art. In terms of form, the work of Downsbrough is highly rigorous and exhibits a powerful geometric sense, restricting itself primarily to the use of line, plane, negative space (cutting away), and delimitation. In addition to his spatial manipulations, the artist also has a keen interest in place, as is evidenced in his cartographical works and city photographs. The music that Downsbrough commissioned for the final edit of this recording, a mix of ambient electric guitar, sweet electro, street field recordings, treatments and voices, was composed and recorded in 2007 by Xavier Garcia-Bardon and Benjamin Franklin (a modus operandi they first experimented with in the Brussels improv collective Buffle). As is often the case with Downsbrough, the final piece seems to be emerging from a world put between parentheses -- music that could last forever, where fragments seem to be missing (just like in his typographical work). It's those missing bits we ceaselessly try to find in this music without beginning or end. This work is only available on vinyl and is housed in a gatefold sleeve.


Artist: SATIE, ERIK
Title: 42 Vexations (1893)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 294CD
Erik Satie's 1893 Vexations; performed by pianist Stephane Ginsburgh. This piece is musique d'ameublement -- literally, "furniture music," the phrase coined by Satie in 1917, where he identifies sound as drapes, tiling, wallpaper -- items belonging to the environment and changing it simply by being in it, by actually becoming elements of the space. This recording is the second installment in a series of furniture music (after Marcel Duchamp's Musical Erratum), and is unique in that it calls for 840 repetitions of a single motif. John Cale recalls a particularly grueling 1963 performance under the direction of John Cage: "Between 9 and 10 September 1963, I was one of a relay team of pianists, under the direction of John Cage, who played Vexations by Eric Satie at Pocket Theatre, 100 Third Avenue near 13th Street, in 18 hours and 40 minutes. The 180 notes of this 80-second work were played 840 times. The whole thing was John Cage's idea. The admission was $5, but members of the audience got a refund of five cents per 20 minutes, and those who stayed to the bitter end got a 20 cent bonus." Had Satie envisioned playing the piece? Who knows. Neither do we know if Duchamp's Erratum musical was meant to be executed. What can be said, however, is that when played in its entirety, Vexations inevitably becomes a performance for both players and listeners. An experience in repetition -- repetition without the slightest variation, except for the unavoidable tempo shifts that occur over such a lengthy performance, alterations in how the piano keys are hit, in other words, everything that falls within the realm of the mechanically involuntary. What would you say about a ritornello that lasts between 18 and 24 hours? Includes a 16-page booklet containing the essay "Cage's Place In The Reception Of Satie" by Matthew Shlomowitz.


Artist: LETORT, BRUNO
Title: Lignes
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 295CD
Bruno Letort is a French composer born in 1963 in Vichy. This guitarist published a series of albums on the border of jazz and rock in the early '80s with Manu Katche, Noël Akchoté, and Didier Malherbe. His discography from the '90s contains more "scored" music for orchestra (Pièces pour les pays baltes, 1992; Le Continent obscur, commissioned by the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, 1998-1999), his Fables électroniques (2001) blended concrete/electronic sounds with a symphony orchestra. In 2004, Bruno Letort recorded a new album called E(a)st, the fruit of many trips to East-European countries. That same year, he became "composer in residence" at the National Orchestra of Belarus. Bruno Letort's approach has always referred to multidisciplinarity. Witness the number of works he has composed for dance, theater, cinema, video and scenography. Closely related to Benoit Peeters and Francois Schuiten (emblematic figures of the Belgian comic strip), he co-composed L'Affaire Désombres. In 2000, he founded the Radio France label Signature which has recorded artists as diverse as Pierre Henry, Fred Frith, Hector Zazou, Elliott Sharp, Jean-Luc Godard, Luc Ferrari, Christian Fennesz, Mika Vainio, and Christian Zanési. Lignes is a complex piece composed by Bruno Letort, based on the eponymous novel by Murakami Ryù. Performed by the chamber ensemble Musiques Nouvelles, conducted by Jean-Paul Dessy with the voice of the legendary Klaus Blasquiz (historical voice of Magma) and Japanese pop singer Kumi Okamoto. This last opus is a synthesis of the scored orchestral music, electronic composition and voices.


Artist: BERTHET, PIERRE
Title: Extended Loudspeakers
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 296CD
Pierre Berthet is a Belgium-based musician, composer, inventor, sound installation artist and craftsman, and this is his second release on Sub Rosa. He studied percussion with André Van Belle and Georges-Elie Octors, improvisation with Garrett List, composition with Frederic Rzewski, and music theory with Henri Pousseur. He designs and builds sound objects and installations (made with steel, plastic, water, magnetic fields, etc.), and presents them in exhibitions and solo or duo performances. He has worked with Frédéric Le Junter, Pierre Bastien, DJ Low and Rudi Trouvé and played percussion with Arnold Dreyblatt. On Extended Loudspeakers, jerrycans (fuel containers made from pressed steel) are connected by a network of steel wires, with each wire length and can location adapted to the space. A loudspeaker is slipped inside one of the cans; the sounds it broadcasts make the wires vibrate. When these sounds are modulated (pitch, timbre, volume, density), the cans produce various resonances, which can be injected back into the speaker (feedback). The cans are hanging, so that listeners can circulate and choose different listening perspectives.


Artist: PALESTINE, CHARLEMAGNE
Title: Strumming Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 3CD
Price: $20.00
Catalog #: SR 297CD
Subtitled: For Piano, Harpsichord And Strings Ensemble. 2012 repress. Sub Rosa presents mostly unpublished works by minimalist composer/vocalist/performer Charlemagne Palestine. Charlemagne Palestine wrote intense, ritualistic music in the 1970s, intended by the composer to rub against audiences' expectations of what is beautiful and meaningful in music. A composer-performer, he always performed his own works as soloist. His earliest works were compositions for carillon and electronic drones, and he is best known for his intensely performed piano works. These unpublished pieces from the mid-'70s are works built on the same principles that he developed and established over the years for the piano. This is a unique variation on composition that introduces a perpetual rise inside a continuum of sound. "All of the Strumming Music manifestations seem to have originated from Charlemagne's physical relationship with the colossal carillon bells in the tower of St. Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue in New York. I met Charlemagne Palestine in 1968. The intensity of his listening impressed me as the intensity of his playing would later, when I heard him play on the carillon and the bells to 'his church.' I realized later, when Charlemagne had started to develop his series of piano pieces called Strumming, that he was assaulting that concrete ceiling and literally pushing through its three feet to release the sonic energy in the piano, much as he had with the carillon. Charlemagne's interest and work in electronic music increased in the late '60s, and in 1970, he decamped to southern California where he became a graduate student working with Morton Subotnick. It was during this year at CalArts (1970-71) that Charlemagne developed an approach to the piano that was not only extremely repetitive and physical, but predicated on the theory that, given the right stimulus, the instrument had a voice of its own and could produce a whole array of high overtones that seem to jump out on their own as if by magic. Over the next few years, he developed and polished the music that came to be known simply as 'Strumming.' The rapid alternation between single notes and chords and different registers became a technique that he seemed to own, and it really only worked with this magic piano. 'Strumming' was the physical technique; the melodies and harmonies that resulted made the music breathe and feel alive. After a while, the ear doesn't distinguish between notes that are sounded by hammers and those which are." --extract from the liner notes by Ingram Marshall. Housed in an 8-page digipak including a 16-page book. Please note that disc 1 is the original recording of "Strumming", as originally issued by Shandar on LP (and later, New Tone on CD). Discs 2 and 3 are previously unreleased in any form.


Artist: PSEUDOCODE
Title: Slaughter in a Tiny Place
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 298CD
2CD version, including two CD bonus tracks. Pseudocode was a Belgian electronic improvised music band, active from 1980 to 1982, featuring Xavier S (Thrills), Guy-Marc Hinant (Sub Rosa co-founder) and Alain Neffe (Insane Music, Bene Geserit). While Xavier S contributed most of the lyrics and vocals, it was Guy-Marc Hinant who often played the core melody on his Pianet electric piano. Neffe's contributions are particularly noteworthy throughout, as he weaves together the bulk of the sonic cloth through overdubbing and mixing. None of his parts are remotely virtuosic (hence his self-identification as a non-musician), but they are always unexpected and perfect in and of themselves, emotionally and sonically, and in that sense, they are deeply musical. "In that time, the onset of the '80s, we had the opportunity to create from sound itself instead of notes, from noise, screams, any chord, relevant or irrelevant. Xavier (with Stéphane Barbery, Digital Dance), had been in one of Brussels' first punk bands, Thrills. Alain had over 10 years of music experience and was influenced by kosmische musik and all kinds of weird and experimental music; he had put together several improvisation ensembles in the area, including the noisy Kosmose, which I joined as a teenager. Now that I had digested punk, I was into Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, The Pop Group, Red Crayola, This Heat and all these influences show up upon listen." --Guy-Marc Hinant


Artist: PSEUDOCODE
Title: Slaughter In A Tiny Place
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2LP
Price: $20.00
Catalog #: SR 298LP
Pseudocode was a Belgian electronic improvised music band, active from 1980 to 1982, featuring Xavier S (Thrills), Guy-Marc Hinant (Sub Rosa co-founder) and Alain Neffe (Insane Music, Bene Geserit). While Xavier S contributed most of the lyrics and vocals, it was Guy-Marc Hinant who often played the core melody on his Pianet electric piano. Neffe's contributions are particularly noteworthy throughout, as he weaves together the bulk of the sonic cloth through overdubbing and mixing. None of his parts are remotely virtuosic (hence his self-identification as a non-musician), but they are always unexpected and perfect in and of themselves, emotionally and sonically, and in that sense, they are deeply musical. "In that time, the onset of the '80s, we had the opportunity to create from sound itself instead of notes, from noise, screams, any chord, relevant or irrelevant. Xavier (with Stéphane Barbery, Digital Dance), had been in one of Brussels' first punk bands, Thrills. Alain had over 10 years of music experience and was influenced by kosmische musik and all kinds of weird and experimental music; he had put together several improvisation ensembles in the area, including the noisy Kosmose, which I joined as a teenager. Now that I had digested punk, I was into Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, The Pop Group, Red Crayola, This Heat and all these influences show up upon listen. This double vinyl was made with the urgency of these times in mind. All tracks are unpublished and in this sub-collection, we intend to release a series of LPs as they would have been released at that time." --Guy-Marc Hinant. Presented in a deluxe gatefold sleeve.


Artist: VA
Title: Musik Oblik: Musics In The Margin 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 299CD
This is the second volume of the Musics in the Margin compilation series. Like volume 1 in 2006 (SR 254CD), this new production mixes visual arts with music, focusing on the affinities existing between three visual art fields considered on equal terms: modern art, contemporary art, and outsider art. Decompartmentalization is the key word, and this record offers unique approaches transcending the simple question of the insider/outsider classification. Based in Berlin, Klaus Beyer is mostly known for his unusual performances of Beatles songs, but this musician's talent is larger than that, as he also writes his own songs, makes short films and animated films, and works as an actor. Normand Cournoyer launched his music career around the age of 70. Self-taught, he has since written an incredible number of songs (more than 1,500 in over 75 languages) using a piece of random composition software. Installation artist, performer, illustrator, sculptor, sound collector, and globe-trotter Baudouin Oosterlynck expands listening capabilities by creating prostheses and musical objects to multiply and increase our ears. The Wild Classical Music Ensemble is headed by musician/audio artist/experimentalist Damien Magnette and four artists with learning disabilities. Othin Spake is an improvisatory project between drummer Teun Verbruggen (Flat Earth Society), guitarist Mauro Pawlowski (dEUS) and Rhodes pianist Jozef Dumoulin (Magic Malik). A major representative of the Italian madrigal style of the Renaissance, Gesualdo's position in music history has been largely re-assessed in the 20th century. Once seen as a marginal, unbalanced composer, Gesualdo is hailed by some as a visionary. The first composer, 300 years before Wagner and the post-Romantics, to make significant use of chromatism and dissonance, and a precursor of the Moderns in his use of extreme contrasts and unusual rhythmical breaks. A composer, violinist, and teacher, Baudouin de Jaer created multidisciplinary works adapted to a complete space. A major artist of the 20th century, Adolf Wölfli was committed to the Waldau Mental Asylum, near Bern, in 1899. Wölfli started drawing, writing, and composing music at the age of 35, working all day long on a colossal body of work, comprising 25,000 pages of graphic compositions, collages, literary works, and music scores. Jacques Brodier, artist and researcher, is the inventor of the "Filtre de Réalité" ("Reality Filter"), whose antennae, using the ionosphere's reflection, receives the electromagnetic noise broadcasted by Earth in deep space. This airwave noise consists of radio signals from everywhere, music and voices in multiple languages lost in a sea of cosmic noise, distorted by untraceable causes or the mishaps of dissemination.


Artist: NOVI_SAD
Title: Inhumane Humans
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 301CD
Part 4 of Sub Rosa's Framework series. Novi_sad is the guise for Thanasis Kaproulias who holds a degree from the Economic University of Piraues. He lives and works in Athens, Greece. Influenced by the pioneers of audio assault, he began generating sounds in 2005. No studies, no academic education, no scholarships, just pure learning by doing. Amplified environmental recordings, drone manipulations, structured ambient soundscapes, microtones vs. overtones, all come together in a hyper-structure of iconoclastic form. Novi_sad's artistic output displays a high level of technical ability, as well as a sensitivity to the nuances of location. The strength of his soundscapes works in the same elaborateness for the whole creation process, starting from a basis of very strong conceptualism, the intense examination of field recordings over the actual composition work, to the point of performing back the result onto location. Every sound that occurs is treated with a sculptural integrity and his sonic power operates on a level in which the audience participates as transcendental listeners. Novi_sad is the mutated body that stands on the tips of its toes to look over a wall of white noise. It reaches the edge, almost getting a glimpse of what is on the other side. It almost sees. And when it almost sees, then it hears. And when it hears, it hears the sudden attack of static. And as it hears it looks: the sky is static and falls like a sonic ceiling collapsing on its sole inhabitant: Novi_sad. Novi_sad is the sound of the shadow of the body that faces the wall of sound. The mutated body steps back from the wall. It is not a wall, it is a mirror. The mutated body looks at itself. It sees: an open mouth that is shouting to itself and is not heard, it sees closed ears bleeding for themselves that do not hear. It says: lift sonic ceilings up over my head, push them up over the sky, as far as my arms can reach, as far as my eyes can see. I will hear, I will here.


Artist: SCELSI, GIACINTO
Title: Tre Canti Popolari + Due Componimenti Impetuosi
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $17.00
Catalog #: SR 302CD
2CD collection which re-releases two previous Sub Rosa CDs Tre Canti Popolari (SR 051CD, 1992) and Due Componimenti Impetuosi (SR 063CD, 1995), now remastered and with a new design. This is the vocal and piano music of visionary Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi (1905-1988). Performed by: Marianne Pousseur, Lucy Grauman, Vincent Bouchot, Paul Gerimon, Georg Alexander Van Dam, Jean-Paul Dessy, Jean-Luc Fafchamps, and Johan Bossers. Scelsi will always be known as an atypical composer. Throughout his life, he carefully stepped away from the obligatory musical currents (dodecaphonism, serial music etc.), using his fascination with tone and pure sound and asceticism to create naked, painful music on which silence has no appeasing effect. Extremely secretive (refusing to be photographed or even to sign his name), resolutely focused on mysticism, maybe converted to Buddhism, Scelsi has left a body of work that remains little known. However, his work is perhaps some of the most beautiful and uncompromising works of our time. He had no mentor, no pupils, but he did shed a lasting light on upholders of spectral music, verifying that sound is the cosmic force underpinning everything. Vocal and piano pieces that submit to the eternal tone.


Artist: VOGEL, CRISTIAN
Title: Black Swan
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 303CD
Sub Rosa launches a new series called Framework -- an extension of their releases of concrete electronics noise -- a brand new mix-up of unusual conceptions of sound material by young, unknown composers, well-known not-so-young composers, and old but clever composers. Includes one photograph and a geometric form. Limited to 700 copies.
Cristian Vogel was born in Chile and moved to England in the mid-1970s. He first began working with electronic compositions in the late '80s with the Cabbage Head Collective (working with Si Begg, among others). He attended the University of Sussex, under the tutorship of composers Martin Butler and Jonathan Harvey, and graduated with a degree in 20th Century Music, suffusing his techno compositions with influences from musique concrète and other avant-garde styles. In the early '90s, Vogel issued two EPs on Dave Clarke's Magnetic North Records, the first of which was the underground hit, Infra. After further solo EPs and collaborations with emerging UK techno artists such as Russ Gabriel, Neil Landstrumm and Dave Tarrida, Vogel released his debut full-length, Beginning To Understand, in 1994 on Mille Plateaux, and subsequently became the first UK techno artist to be signed to Berlin's Tresor Records. He also started the vinyl-only label Mosquito with Si Begg, on which he released both his own music and other artists'. He is considered to be one of the main founders of the No-Future collective that was active in Brighton during the mid-'90s. In 2001, Vogel moved to Barcelona, where he set up the Erutufon 5 studio, and later Station 55 Electronic Music Studio. He currently lives and works there, managing Station 55 Records and studio. Alongside Jamie Lidell, he formed the group Super_Collider, who released two albums. Vogel currently sings and plays guitar in his band project Night Of The Brain, while continuing to maintain a presence on the underground techno scene. Vogel is sought after as a remixer and album producer, having worked with artists such as Radiohead, Maxïmo Park, Chicks On Speed, and Thom Yorke. The artist says this about Black Swan: "For the curious, the seed audio recordings which I analyzed and modified to resynthesize the score to Black Swan; a few seconds of Awa Odori and Mugiya-Bushi Odori traditional Japanese dance recordings, a Flying-V howling on a Swiss mountain pass in the Val Calanca, two EMS Synthi connected in a voltage feedback loop, a fragment of pachinko hall sound."


Artist: LOPEZ, FRANCISCO
Title: Untitled #244
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 304CD
Part 3 in Sub Rosa's new series Framework is an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series, a brand new mix-up of unusual conceptions of sound material by young unknown composers, well-known not-so-young composers and old but clever composers. Limited to 700 copies.
       

       Francisco López is internationally recognized as one of the major figures of the sound art and experimental music scene. Over the past 30 years, he has developed an astonishing sonic universe, absolutely personal and iconoclastic, based on a profound listening of the world. Destroying boundaries between industrial sounds and wilderness sound environments, shifting with passion from the limits of perception to the most dreadful abyss of sonic power, proposing a blind, profound and transcendental listening, freed from the imperatives of knowledge and open to sensory and spiritual expansion. He has realized hundreds of concerts, projects with field recordings, workshops and sound installations in 60 countries of the five continents. His extensive catalog of sound pieces (with live and studio collaborations with over 100 international artists) has been released by more than 200 record labels worldwide, and he has been awarded three times with honorary mentions at the Ars Electronica Festival. Untitled #244 was created with the evolution of original environmental recordings done at multiple underwater and abovewater locations in the Paraná and Paraguay rivers (Argentina and Paraguay).


Artist: FERRARI, LUC
Title: Didascalies 2
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 305LP
Vinyl-only release. Performers: Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven (piano); Claude Berset (piano); Vincent Royer (viola). Sub Rosa presents the first release after their Luc Ferrari trilogy. Didascalies 2 is not to be confused with 2007's Didascalies (SR 261CD) -- this is another composition entirely, never published before. "The other day I found a file from 1993, a score for two pianos entitled 'Revenir à la Note de Départ' (trans. 'Getting Back To The Initial Note'). So I decided to turn it into a new composition without changing a single note in it -- it contained very little notes actually, which suited me just fine. So I called it Didascalies 2, in memory of what I had done the previous year: a piece for piano and viola entitled 'Didascalies Tout Court.' That piece was played on two notes, one for the piano and the same one for the viola. It had an obsessive feel. Very, very obsessive!" --Luc Ferrari
       Upon his last visit to La Chaux-de-Fonds in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, the composer specifically asked for Didascalies 2 to be performed by La Chaux-de-Fonds pianist Claude Berset and Brussels pianist Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven. The performers developed an event around the world premiere of this release -- the last work by Luc Ferrari not yet played in front of an audience. Didascalies 2 was premiered on October 25, 2008 as part of an anti-tribute to Luc Ferrari in La Chaux-de-Fonds in a version for two pianos and viola. Luc stipulated that toward the end of the piece "an instrument comes in (I don't know which one yet). This instrument should be very powerful and be able to sustain a very loud note (I don't know which one yet)." The musicians chose the viola.


Artist: KRIEGER, ULRICH
Title: Fathom
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 306CD
Installment in Sub Rosa's new Framework series. Ulrich Krieger studied classical saxophone, composition, electronic music and musicology at the Manhattan School of Music (New York), the Universität der Künste (Berlin) and the Freie Universität (Berlin). Since the late 1980s, he became more and more interested in American music and its different approaches (chance music, process music, just intonation, multi-stylistic, minimalism, drone). In 1991, he moved to New York. In the Cage Of Saxophones series, Krieger recorded the complete saxophone and any-instrument works of John Cage for Mode Records. The first one focuses on drone music (Cage, Tenney, Niblock), while the second focuses on pattern music (Reich, Glass, Riley). In the early 1990s, he started working on a more electronic approach. He began developing an original amplification for the saxophone and various live-electronic signal processing set-ups. In the electronic experimental field, he collaborated with rock, noise and ambient artists like Karkowski, Merzbow, Köner, Toeplitz, etc. He also worked with the Berlin ensemble Zeitkratzer, for which he transcribed Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. In 2001, he formed Text Of Light with Lee Ranaldo and Alan Licht, performing along with the films of experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage. Metal Machine Trio began in 2008 together with Lou Reed and Sarth Calhoun as an experimental free-rock project.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents Wasa Wasa
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 307CD
Subtitled: Fabulous Rhythm'n'Blues Shakers On The Dancefloor! 1952-1968. This is volume seven in Sub Rosa's series of rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, following Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults (SR 271CD/LP), Oh, Run Into Me, But Don't Hurt Me! Female Blues Singers -- Rarities 1923-1930 (SR 268CD/LP), Shim Sham Shimmy (SR 279CD/LP), Dr. Boogie Presents 26 Deranged And Smokin' Cool Cats (SR 286CD/LP), I'm Going Where The Water Drinks Like Wine (SR 287CD/LP) and Dr. Boogie Presents Heavy Jelly: Essential Instrumentals (SR 292CD/LP) -- assembled by Belgian radio personality, musicologist, and Canned Heat devotee, Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie. "Wasa Wasa" means "what's up?" and invites you to put on your dancing shoes. A fine opportunity to remind everyone that what was called rhythm and blues in the late '50s and came from "race music" was the marriage of the word "rhythm," which designated a fast tempo, and the word "blues," which brought to mind the unmovable 12-bar rule. Rhythm'n'blues would become the vector that would let black music infiltrate white popular music and pave the way for the emergence of rock'n'roll. All tracks are taken from the original, authentic 45 rpms.


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Dr. Boogie Presents Wasa Wasa
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $14.50
Catalog #: SR 307LP
Subtitled: Fabulous Rhythm'n'Blues Shakers On The Dancefloor! 1952-1968. This is volume seven in Sub Rosa's series of rare and lost recordings from the '20s to the '60s, assembled by Belgian radio personality, musicologist, and Canned Heat devotee, Walter De Paduwa aka Dr. Boogie. "Wasa Wasa" means "what's up?" and invites you to put on your dancing shoes. A fine opportunity to remind everyone that what was called rhythm and blues in the late '50s and came from "race music" was the marriage of the word "rhythm," which designated a fast tempo, and the word "blues," which brought to mind the unmovable 12-bar rule. Rhythm'n'blues would become the vector that would let black music infiltrate white popular music and pave the way for the emergence of rock'n'roll. All tracks are taken from the original, authentic 45 rpms.


Artist: COLLARD-NEVEN, JEAN-PHILIPPE
Title: Fleeting Music
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 308CD
Belgian composer, improviser and pianist Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven presents seven fleeting compositions for piano. Collard-Neven treads the career path of an atypical musician where classical, contemporary, electroacoustic, jazz and improvisation, French chanson, theater, dance, cinema, and literature co-exist side-by-side. Far from being a mindlessly voracious form of eclecticism, this diversity is in him the expression of a single-minded passion, an open-minded spirit which steers clear of pigeon-holing and weaves connecting threads between styles, genres and periods. "When I came up with the project of this improvisational album, recorded in Brussels in March 2009, my first intention was to compose written music. At the moment of writing, I realized that all that I had been dreaming of laying on paper, all these fleeting moments of sound which go through me and which I had been striving to capture by writing them down, as one would in a musical photograph, all these moments vanished as soon as I attempted to hold on to them, to place them in the golden cage of a music score. Reality escapes us the moment we choose to tell it rather than live it. I understood that all that had seemed so urgent to write down was already there, as a seed, in these moments when I sit at the piano to improvise freely, I mean without a canvas, or anything pre-determined. It is in this spirit that I have tried to record this new CD, free of any will to play this or that, annihilating as much as possible all 'will' to express anything in particular. To be merely a channel, through which flows an energy springing out of a certain constellation, made of a place, a specific moment, the energy emitted by those present, all the circumstances which make each moment unique. It is utopic, a state which I would like to come close to. But there are blessed moments, moments of pure abandonment, when one forgets to will, to think, to want to be intelligent, to have control. It is for the sake of such moments of inner truth, that I do what I do. Should they be extremely rare." Housed in a 4-page digipack with a 12-page book.


Artist: NONO/HANS VAN ECK, LUIGI
Title: La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura/Nuctemeron
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $17.00
Catalog #: SR 309CD
CD1 is a Stereo/5.1 multichannel hybrid CD/SACD release that can be played on any CD player. CD2 is a standard CD. CD1 features Luigi Nono's "La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura" (1992), an original title, a unique aesthetic metaphor even: one could say that the past reflected in the present (nostalgica) brings about a creative utopia (utopica); the desire for what is known becomes a vehicle for what will be possible (future) through the medium of distance. Performed by Tiziana Pintus (violin) and Hans Van Eck (sound projection) (The Schreck Ensemble). CD2 features Hans Van Eck's "Nuctemeron" (2008), a spiritual voyage as described in the text of Apollonius of Tyana (93 AD), which serves as the basis for the performance, connected by intermissions. Aspects of number symbolism, the four elements and the road to spiritual perfection have found their way into the music. Luigi Nono (1924-1990): Italian avant-garde composer of classical music who remains one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century. Nono studied with Malipiero at the Venice Conservatory (1941-5) and with Maderna and Scherchen, both of whom oriented him towards 12-note serialism (he married Schönberg's daughter Nuria in 1955). His avant-garde partisanship was inseparable from a commitment to socialism, twin aspects of a revolt against bourgeois culture: hence his avoidance of normal concert genres in favor of opera and electronic music, his frequent recourse to political texts and his work in bringing music to factories. His works include the operas "Intolleranza 1960" (1961) and "Al gran sole carico d'amore" (1975), the cantata "Il canto sospeso" (1956), orchestral works and tape pieces. Much of his music of the 1950s and 1960s has a fervent lyricism; later works tended to be more pessimistic ("Ein Gespenst geht um in der Welt," 1971). The Schreck Ensemble: "The magic of sounds is for me the most important aspect of music. The foremost goal of my compositions is to make the listener experience sounds as they are, taking him beyond the surface of the music. My musical style might be described as lyrical and colorful. The use of live electronics and soundtracks is so integrated in my way of making music, that I cannot do without it. I co-founded the Schreck Ensemble with the late Arie Van Schutterhoef in 1989 in order to perform music that combines the use of acoustic instruments with the new sounds offered by modern computer technology." --Hans van Eck; Comes with a 16-page booklet.


Artist: MINTON + AUDREY CHEN, PHIL
Title: By the Stream
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 310CD
These recordings in two movements can be taken as, on the one hand, pieces for two voices and improvisation chamber orchestra (which is what the musicians felt throughout the recording session) and, on the other hand, pure free improvisation. Both voices in interaction, perpetually urging the other on, producing more than their simple addition, producing a third voice -- like a semi-autonomous organism. Very difficult to explain how -- why -- as if what had been mostly deeply burrowed was surfacing. An ur-song, like Schwitters' "Ursonate"/"Their Breath." The importance of scat, the rhythm from beyond language. Phil Minton (1940, Torquay, United Kingdom) is a jazz/free-improvising vocalist and trumpeter. Minton is a highly dramatic baritone who tends to specialize in literary texts: he has sung lyrics by William Blake with Mike Westbrook's group, Daniil Kharms and Joseph Brodsky with Simon Nabatov, and extracts from James Joyce's Finnegan's Wake with his own ensemble. Between 1987 and 1993, Minton toured Europe, North America and Russia with Lindsay Cooper's Oh Moscow ensemble. He is perhaps best known, however, for his completely free-form work, which involves "extended techniques" that are extremely unsettling. His vocals often include the sounds of retching, burping, screaming, and gasping, as well as child-like muttering, whining, crying, and humming; he also has an ability to distort his vocal cords to produce two notes at once. Audrey Chen is a Chinese-American musician who was born into a family of material scientists, doctors and engineers, outside of Chicago in 1976. She turned to the cello at age eight and voice at 11. After years of classical and conservatory training in both instruments, with a resulting specialization in early and new music, she parted ways again in 2003 to begin new negotiations with sound in order to discover a more individually honest aesthetic. Now, using the cello, voice and analog electronics, Chen's work delves deeply into her own version of narrative and non-linear storytelling. A large component of her music is improvised and her approach to this is extremely personal and visceral. Chen has performed in Europe, Russia, Australia, New Zealand, China, Japan, Taiwan, Brazil, Canada, and the USA during the last years.


Artist: MINTON + AUDREY CHEN + GUY SEGERS + PETER JACQUEMYN + TEUN VERBRUGGEN, PHIL
Title: Quintet
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 311CD
These recordings in two movements can be taken as, on the one hand, pieces for two voices and improvisation chamber orchestra (which is what the musicians felt throughout the recording session) and, on the other hand, pure free improvisation. Performed by Phil Minton (voice), Audrey Chen (voice + cello), Guy Segers (electric bass), Peter Jacquemyn (double bass), Teun Verbruggen (drums + percussion). Things get dislocated, gather themselves, spread across areas of varying intensities. More intimate or more complex songs. Closer to the sacred, left untouched by mediation, even slightly incomprehensible, though mostly ambivalent and reality-piercing. At times, the music seems to lead us to a meaning that is deeper than the textual level. Or is it the depth of another possible song? That's when the music takes us to areas that seem perpetually urging, more than their simple addition of voices and instruments. Phil Minton (1940, Torquay, United Kingdom) is a jazz/free-improvising vocalist and trumpeter. Minton is a highly dramatic baritone who tends to specialize in literary texts. He is perhaps best known, however, for his completely free-form work, which involves "extended techniques" that are extremely unsettling. His vocals often include the sounds of retching, burping, screaming, and gasping, as well as childlike muttering, whining, crying, and humming; he also has an ability to distort his vocal cords to produce two notes at once. Audrey Chen uses the cello, voice and analog electronics, delving deeply into her own version of narrative and non-linear storytelling. A large component of her music is improvised and her approach to this is extremely personal and visceral. Guy Segers is best known for his bass work with Univers Zero (one of the most important and influential Rock In Opposition acts). Peter Jacquemyn moves easily between the visual arts and music (he plays double bass). He is a longstanding member of the Belgian WIM (Werkgroep Improviserende Muzikanten, or "Association of Improvising Musicians"), playing concerts since 1984. Searching for a personal touch and wanting to explore all possibilities of playing music and drums, Teun Verbruggen's lack of boundaries and styles and trying to find fresh sounds and freedom in collective improvisation made him work (as sideman) with Jef Neve Trio, Alexi Tuomarila, Jimi Tenor, Steve Houben, Othin Spake, Mauro Pawlowski, and Karanova.


Artist: WÖLFLI, ADOLF
Title: The Heavenly Ladder
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD/BOOK
Price: $29.00
Catalog #: SR 312CD
Subtitled: Analysis Of The Musical Cryptograms. Belgian composer Baudouin de Jaer was completely moved by the artistic and human dimensions of the mystery surrounding the gigantic and universal body of work created by Adolf Wölfli within the Waldau hospital in the early 20th century. He managed what none other had accomplished before: to decode Wölfli's hermetic and emblematic scores. Adolf Wölfli (Bern, February 29, 1864 - Waldau, November 6, 1930) was a Swiss artist who was one of the first artists to be associated with the Art Brut or outsider art label. Wölfli was abused both physically and sexually as a child, and was orphaned at the age of 10. Institutionalized in 1895 at Waldau psychiatric asylum near Bern (Switzerland) where he spent the rest of his adult life, he suffered from psychosis, which led to intense hallucinations. Wölfli started drawing in 1899, but no work prior to 1904 has been preserved. In 1908, Wölfli started developing what would become a potentially endless narrative stretched across 25,000 pages interrupted only by Wölfli's death in 1930. His images also incorporated an idiosyncratic musical notation. This notation seemed to start as a purely decorative affair but later developed into real composition which Wölfli would play on a paper trumpet. After his death, the Adolf Wölfli Foundation was formed to preserve his art for future generations. Today its collection is on display at the Museum of Fine Arts in Bern and can be seen in many museums in the world. Baudouin de Jaer's approach gives a new dimension to this unique artist. Interpretation/composition from Wölfli's works and violin: Baudouin de Jaer. Contains only previously-unreleased material. All tracks exclusively recorded for this project. Includes a full-color 52-page book in French and English. Book size: 136 x 187 x 10 mm (5.35 x 7.36 x 0.40 inches).


Artist: FAFCHAMPS, JEAN-LUC
Title: KDGhZ2SA, A Six-Letter Sufi Word
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 313CD
Belgian composer and pianist Jean-Luc Fafchamps initially devoted himself to writing for small groups in which the piano plays a central role (Dynamiques, for two pianos; Melancholia Si..., for two pianos and two percussionists; Neurosuite, for a keyboard trio), before his interest in non-tempered harmonies and polyphonies of timbres led him towards other sound combinations (a garden, for wind quintet; Bryce, for clarinet quintet, etc.). He is currently moving towards working for larger formations in which his taste for paradoxical constructions and his sense of synthesis are blossoming into mutually-referential pieces. He is working on the development of a vast network of cycles -- the Lettres Soufies -- a manifesto for writing, stylistic openness as rhetoric and the use of analog correspondences as the basis for a system: "T" for ensemble and electronics, "K" for orchestra, "A" for ensemble and orchestra, "Z3" for trombone and electronics, and so on. "In total darkness, or in a very large room, very quietly since 2000, I have been spending much time writing Sufi letters, despite the fact that I am not a Sufi, or even Muslim, and I do not speak Arabic. They are based on a Sufi chart connecting a vast system of symbolic interrelations to the 28 letters in the Arabic alphabet -- a sort of methodical summary of metaphorical and mystical thinking, as it has been drawn once by Sheikh Abul-Muwwayid of Gujarat (India) for incantations. So Sufi Letters is a common work process, not a cycle in the classical sense of the word. The pieces are written for different instrumentations, according to the needs of the selected letter and the vagaries of life, and the global project is not a priori-unified. Each letter is both unique -- and so could be performed on its own -- and deeply connected to all the other letters -- and as such designed to be combined and form words. Meanwhile, I am moving and changing, possibly maturing, certainly aging, and so this project also comes as a tale of initiation, to music and things. It took me ten years to write the first 13 letters and it is safe to say that I will probably need that much time to write the other 15." --Jean-Luc Fafchamps


Artist: WINTER FAMILY
Title: Red Sugar
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 315CD
This is the long-awaited second album by Winter Family -- a rare and unique audio worldview expressed by the singular approach of Ruth Rosenthal (voice) and Xavier Klaine (harmonium, organ, etc.). This new album creates glowering and intense atmospherics, part nightmare, part uplifting dreamscape, permeating and building into a compelling whole. A reference point might be some of the output of Constellation records -- and indeed, Godspeed! You Black Emperor's Norsola Johnson plays on this record. However it is doubtful whether any of those artists ever produced anything to match the taut tension of the title track "Red Sugar," a hymn to absence. The ambition of Winter Family is evident on this expansive, orchestral epic dancing in the sun. Crank your speakers, sit back and open your mind. It WILL blow you away.


Artist: THIGPEN, BENJAMIN
Title: Divide By Zero
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 317CD
This is #7 in Sub Rosa's Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Benjamin Thigpen, nomad, born in the United States, immigrated to Paris at the age of 31. He studied music, literature, philosophy and aesthetics. He now composes in European studios such as GRM, EMS, Visby and STEIM, as well as in his bedroom and on the train. After six years as a teacher at IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique), he currently teaches computer music in Italy, Belgium and occasionally Sweden, while also working as a freelance musical programmer and consultant. He makes music for loudspeakers: electroacoustic works, live computer performance and interactive music for instrument(s) and computer. His music is concerned with energy, density, complexity, movement, multiplicity and violence, and often incorporates space as a primary compositional parameter. He thinks that music does not exist in time but rather creates it, and considers that music is not the art of sound but the art of the transcendence of sound. This release includes music from 2003-2007. Limited to 500 copies.


Artist: POUSSEUR, HENRI
Title: Parabolique d'Enfer
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 318CD
This recording will be Sub Rosa's first posthumous recording of Henri Pousseur. It is the sixth release (out of eight) in their catalog devoted to this composer's experimental and electronic works. It also marks the end of the trilogy of the Parabolic works (following the 1972 unreleased recordings and the 2001 collective performance). This time around, we have a piece built through another major Pousseur work: Leçon d'Enfer (composed in 1990-1991 around Arthur Rimbaud). This previously-unreleased version was realized by Henri Pousseur in Cologne in 1992. This release was important to Henri Pousseur, as it concludes, in a sense, the Paraboles trilogy, after 1972's 8 Etudes Paraboliques (released as a 4CD box set comprised of all the études to be used as the basis for all current and future mixes) and 4 Parabolic Mixes (2001), on which four composers -- Robert Hampson, Philip Jeck, Markus Popp, and Pousseur himself -- tackled those source tapes. This suite of works was gradually pushing composition further into the territory of destruction and abstraction. This final installment, a mix made from the 1972 Études, as it should be, integrates a major external element (something already planned in the initial design), another work by Pousseur, "Leçons d'Enfer," a complex piece of musical theater dedicated to the memory of Arthur Rimbaud and composed in 1991 for the centennial of the poet's death. This work, over 100 minutes long, was written for two actors, three singers, seven musicians (clarinet, alto saxophone, tuba, harp, piano, and two percussions), tapes (including traditional Ethiopian music and field recordings from that area), and electroacoustic devices. With this version, Henri Pousseur shows how the deep impression left by a work in constant mutation can take different guises. The Rimbaud pictured in this flux is neither the promising teenager, nor the striking genius, nor even the desperate man struggling in vain in an empty landscape; it is an appeased hybrid breathing the ebullient air of the final times.


Artist: MARTINEZ, ISRAEL
Title: El Hombre Que Se Sofoca
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 319CD
This is #5 in Sub Rosa's Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Israel Martinez (Guadalajara, Mexico 1979) is a sound artist, empirical composer and has developed his works in different fields: electroacoustic and experimental music, composition, sonic installations and sculpture. He has participated in several festivals in Mexico, such as Radar, Mutek, Muestra Internacional de Arte Sonoro, Interface, Estacionarte, and also in one of the most important art & technology events worldwide: Austria's Ars Electronica Festival, where he was awarded the Award of Distinction in the Digital Musics category in 2007, with his work Mi Vida. He has performed and his work has been played live in Mexico, England, France, the U.S., Austria, Spain and Colombia. He's co-founder of the electronic music label Abolipop, producer of the Nebula 3 project and also half of the electronic improvisation duo Lost Martínez. Limited to 700 copies only.


Artist: VULTURES QUARTET & PHILIPPE PETIT
Title: Tourbillon d'Obscurité
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 320CD
This is #6 in Sub Rosa's Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Philippe Petit is interested in soundtracks; even if he creates original music, he'd rather be introduced as a "musical travel agent" than a composer. He uses a computer to build up electronic layers and process acoustic and field recordings. To accompany the machine, he likes to move various glasses or percussive objects, and take advantage of vinyl material. A journalist for various magazines and radio as well as a musical activist, he has celebrated his 25th year of sharing his musical passions as the man behind the cult labels Pandemonium Rdz. and BiP_HOp. This release features a collaboration between Petit and London-based Vultures Quartet, whose musicians come from industrial, jazz, improv, rock, classical and various other style backgrounds. Limited to 700 copies only.


Artist: BERROCAL, DAVID FENECH & GHEDALIA TAZARTES, JAC
Title: Superdisque
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 321CD
Superdisque is the first album from the French trio formed by David Fenech (electric guitar) with Jac Berrocal (trumpet) and Ghédalia Tazartès (vocals). Somewhere beyond the borders of rock, jazz, punk and sound poetry -- the vocals seem to come from another planet, with lyrics in an improvised language. The winds are blown from Tibetan human bones and conch seashells. Guitars sound like rubber and steel. Expect the unexpected. Special guest Zap Pascal (accordion) appears on one track. David Fenech is a French musician living in Paris. He has played and recorded with musicians such as Felix Kubin, Jad Fair, Tom Cora, Rhys Chatham, Bérangère Maximin, James Plotkin, Shugo Tokumaru, Ergo Phizmiz, and many others. His baroque style has been described as "a kind of punk musique concrète." He is the origin of the Superdisque recording project, using his own home studio as an instrument. Jac Berrocal is a cult trumpet player living in Paris. He has played with various musicians including Pascal Comelade, Jaki Liebezeit (Can), Nurse With Wound, Sunny Murray, Jacques Thollot, James Chance, Pierre Bastien, Aki Onda, Lol Coxhill, Catalogue, Christophe, etc. He's also known for his famous Rock And Roll Station, recorded with Vince Taylor. Ghédalia Tazartès is an orchestra and a pop group in one person. His voice shifts constantly from child to diva, from African sorcerer to Tibetan monk. His hypnotic, disturbing polyphonies draw us into an emotional universe. It's punk, sound poetry, folklore and electroacoustics rolled into one. Ghédalia has been recording music in his Parisian home studio for more than 40 years. He has also worked for theater, dance and more recently for cinema. Both Jac Berrocal and Ghédalia Tazartès appear on the famous Nurse With Wound list. CD version includes one bonus track not included on the LP.


Artist: BERROCAL, DAVID FENECH & GHEDALIA TAZARTES, JAC
Title: Superdisque
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 321LP
LP version. Superdisque is the first album from the French trio formed by David Fenech (electric guitar) with Jac Berrocal (trumpet) and Ghédalia Tazartès (vocals). Somewhere beyond the borders of rock, jazz, punk and sound poetry -- the vocals seem to come from another planet, with lyrics in an improvised language. The winds are blown from Tibetan human bones and conch seashells. Guitars sound like rubber and steel. Expect the unexpected. Special guest Zap Pascal (accordion) appears on one track. David Fenech is a French musician living in Paris. He has played and recorded with musicians such as Felix Kubin, Jad Fair, Tom Cora, Rhys Chatham, Bérangère Maximin, James Plotkin, Shugo Tokumaru, Ergo Phizmiz, and many others. His baroque style has been described as "a kind of punk musique concrète." He is the origin of the Superdisque recording project, using his own home studio as an instrument. Jac Berrocal is a cult trumpet player living in Paris. He has played with various musicians including Pascal Comelade, Jaki Liebezeit (Can), Nurse With Wound, Sunny Murray, Jacques Thollot, James Chance, Pierre Bastien, Aki Onda, Lol Coxhill, Catalogue, Christophe, etc. He's also known for his famous Rock And Roll Station, recorded with Vince Taylor. Ghédalia Tazartès is an orchestra and a pop group in one person. His voice shifts constantly from child to diva, from African sorcerer to Tibetan monk. His hypnotic, disturbing polyphonies draw us into an emotional universe. It's punk, sound poetry, folklore and electroacoustics rolled into one. Ghédalia has been recording music in his Parisian home studio for more than 40 years. He has also worked for theater, dance and more recently for cinema. Both Jac Berrocal and Ghédalia Tazartès appear on the famous Nurse With Wound list.


Artist: MENCHE, DANIEL
Title: Feral
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 322CD
This is #8 in Sub Rosa's Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Portland, Oregon-based sound artist Daniel Menche has established himself as a musician with a sense of focus and determination uncharacteristic in a genre known for its randomness and chaotic structure. Rather than creating "noise," he strives for order and cohesiveness. His presentation of sonic structures is similar to the way a writer depicts a story, an allegory seems to arise, which uses confusion as a symbol for the imaginative process of total sound purity; aural intensity is not a representation of confusion or the chaotic, but a concerted effort to provoke and stimulate the listener's imagination by generating intensely powerful sounds and music. Daniel Menche's work originates from the idea that there is no restriction to the potential sound sources and especially sonic energy. Any sounds -- all sounds are used and exploited to create the music. There are absolutely no barriers or biases in what can be used and have been used. Self-made and recorded sound sources, percussion and instruments are the main emphasis in creating a living and emotional feeling to Daniel Menche's form of contemporary music. Subtle and patient compositions rely on long, dense layers of droning sounds, while abrasive pieces rely on sounds amplified and processed to extreme levels, pushing the full spectrum of frequencies to the most threshold of limits. Menche has amassed a sizable discography on some of the most discerning independent labels in the world and is constantly performing live extensively throughout North America, Europe and Japan with performances that are intense and powerful. Characterized as both extremely loud and patiently subtle, Daniel Menche's live performances define their own sonic presence, an entity that gives form to an emotional rawness with highly textural and dominating sounds. Limited to 700 copies.


Artist: HELVACIOGLU, ERDEM
Title: Timeless Waves
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 323CD
This is #9 in Sub Rosa's limited edition Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Erdem Helvacıoğlu was born in Bursa, Turkey in 1975. He is one of the most renowned "contemporary electronic music" composers of his generation in Turkey. His music has been broadcast on national radios such as BBC, ABC, WDR and Radio France, among others. He has received commissions from the 2006 World Soccer Championship, T-B A21 The Morning Line, Borusan Center For Culture & Arts, Arter "Space For Art," The Association For The Art Of The Harp, Novelum Contemporary Music Festival, International Istanbul Biennial (IKSV) and the world-famous new music ensemble Bang On A Can-All Stars. His sound installations have been included at museums and galleries such as the 10th International Istanbul Biennial, Los Angeles Track 16, Indonesia Soemardja, Köln Museum Für Angewandte Kunst and London's Menier Gallery. His film music has been heard at Cannes, Sarajevo, Locarno, Seoul, São Paulo, and Sydney film festivals and he received the "Best Original Soundtrack" award in the 2006 Mostramundo Film Festival. He has received prizes for his electroacoustic compositions from the Luigi Russolo, MUSICA NOVA and Insulae Electronicae Electroacoustic Music Competitions. Timeless Waves, originally composed for a 47 channel/53 speaker diffusion system running on The Morning Line, is a sonic work based on six basic human emotions. The CD is a stereo version of this multichannel work. The piece was inspired by W. Gerrod Parrott's book Emotions In Social Psychology and has been commissioned by Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary (T-B A21) for The Morning Line -- an interdisciplinary art project by Matthew Ritchie, Aranda/Lasch and Arup AGU -- and premiered in May 2010, when the project was exhibited at Eminonu Square in Istanbul. Sonically, Timeless Waves is based on the timbres of Togaman GuitarViol, Gibson Les Paul electric guitar, sine waves, various analog pedals and hardware fx processors. The music combines elements from genres such as electroacoustic, drone, noise and contemporary music blended with minimal melodies. Cover photo by Jakob Polacsek.


Artist: NETTLE
Title: El Resplandor: The Shining In Dubai
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 324CD
Nettle is a band project led by DJ Rupture. For this album, Nettle imagined a remake of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining set in a luxury hotel in Dubai, U.A.E. El Resplandor: The Shining In Dubai is their soundtrack for that nonexistent film. Cello, violin, guembri, guitar, and voice combine with digital processing to create a complex sound-world whose acoustic and electronic elements are in intimate dialog. Produced and arranged by Rupture, El Resplandor offers vivid, haunting pieces that draw on the band's various backgrounds in North African folksong, experimental electronics, contemporary classical, and free improvisation. The album features photographs by acclaimed Emirati artist Lamya Gargash, who was the U.A.E.'s featured artist for the 2009 Venice Biennale, and liner notes by architecture writer Geoff Manaugh (BLDGBLOG). Nettle began as DJ Rupture's duo with Moroccan violinist Abdelhak Rahal and has since evolved into a five-piece. They have performed at Spain's Sónar festival, Rome's Maxxi Museum of 21st Century Art, and at Morocco's Cinematheque de Tanger, and have toured the UK and Belgium with Nass El Ghiwane. Nettle's work foregrounds issues of friction, translation, and displacement as necessary counter-narratives to the standard paradigms of "cross-cultural exchange" and metaphors of mixing or hybridity.


Artist: DR BOOGIE
Title: Bear Traces: Nuggets From Bob's Barn (Second Paw)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 325.2LP
Sub Rosa presents part two in a two-part vinyl version of the Bear Traces compilation culled from the legendary collection of Bob Hite, founding member and singer of Canned Heat. Compiled by DJ Dr. Boogie. "Although it stems from the same artistic process as Volume One in the Dr. Boogie Presents series, this is not Volume Two of a series devoted to Bob Hite. The process WAS different in that here I focused on much more obscure tracks taken from the very small portion of what remains of the collection of 78rpms owned by the late and legendary Bob Hite. The collection of this boogie music ogre reached 20,000 78rpms in 1968. However, toward the end of his life, Hite was forced to sell chunks of his treasure to pay off debts, and the leftovers were literally pillaged after his death. Canned Heat's drummer Fito de la Para managed to salvage a tiny slice of this collection. The first compilation album devoted to Bob Hite's records focused on a handful of blues giants, including six titles from Elmore James' repertoire. Here, since there will be no sequel, I decided to pack as much music as I could on 2 LPs vinyl (first one/Paw 1 has already been released and this is the second, Paw 2). I didn't want to alter the dynamics of these fabulous 78rpms, so I opted for only a very light mastering, keeping the inevitable audio defects, artifacts and surface noise occasionally heard on the tracks that were more damaged. Bob "The Bear" Hite was a crucial part of the West Coast blues revival of the late '60s. Along with fellow musicologist Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson, he helped formed the first incarnation of the legendary Canned Heat as a jug band. Their performances at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and the 1969 Woodstock Festival put them on the map as true bluesmen seeking to revitalize an art form. Hite toured nonstop with Canned Heat and performed as the group's barrel-housing lead singer until his death of a heart attack on April 5, 1981. He helped revitalize the careers of John Lee Hooker, Sunnyland Slim and Albert Collins, and produced the now-legendary Hooker 'N Heat double album in 1971. Hite is most remembered for his endless on-stage boogie jams. Enjoy this burning selection and most of all... don't forget to boogie!" --Dr. Boogie


Artist: DR. BOOGIE
Title: Bear Traces: Nuggets From Bob's Barn
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 325CD
Sub Rosa presents another compilation culled from the legendary collection of Bob Hite, founding member and singer of Canned Heat. Compiled by DJ Dr. Boogie. "Although it stems from the same artistic process as Volume One in the "Doctor Boogie Presents" series, this is not Volume Two of a series devoted to Bob Hite. The process WAS different in that here I focused on much more obscure tracks taken from the very small portion of what remains of the collection of 78 rpms owned by the late and legendary Bob Hite. The collection of this boogie music ogre reached 20,000 78rpms in 1968. However, towards the end of his life, Hite was forced to sell chunks of his treasure to pay off debts, and the leftovers were literally pillaged after his death. Canned Heat's drummer Fito de la Para managed to salvage a tiny slice of this collection. The first compilation album devoted to Bob Hite's records focused on a handful of blues giants, including six titles from Elmore James' repertoire. Here, since there will be no sequel, I decided to pack as much music as I could on a single CD. I didn't want to alter the dynamics of these fabulous 78 rpms, so I opted for only a very light mastering, keeping the inevitable audio defects, artifacts and surface noise occasionally heard on the tracks that were more damaged. Bob "The Bear" Hite was a crucial part of the West Coast blues revival of the late '60s. Along with fellow musicologist Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson, he helped form the first incarnation of the legendary Canned Heat as a jug band. Their performances at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and the 1969 Woodstock Festival put them on the map as true bluesmen seeking to revitalize an art form. Hite toured nonstop with Canned Heat and performed as the group's barrel-housing lead singer until his death of a heart attack on April 5, 1981. He helped revitalize the careers of John Lee Hooker, Sunnyland Slim and Albert Collins, and produced the now-legendary Hooker 'N Heat double album in 1971. Hite is most remembered for his endless on-stage boogie jams. Enjoy this burning selection and most of all... DON'T FORGET TO BOOGIE!" --Dr. Boogie


Artist: DR BOOGIE
Title: Bear Traces: Nuggets From Bob's Barn
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 325LP
Sub Rosa presents another compilation culled from the legendary collection of Bob Hite, founding member and singer of Canned Heat. Compiled by DJ Dr. Boogie. "Although it stems from the same artistic process as Volume One in the 'Doctor Boogie Presents' series, this is not Volume Two of a series devoted to Bob Hite. The process WAS different in that here I focused on much more obscure tracks taken from the very small portion of what remains of the collection of 78 rpms owned by the late and legendary Bob Hite. The collection of this boogie music ogre reached 20,000 78rpms in 1968. However, towards the end of his life, Hite was forced to sell chunks of his treasure to pay off debts, and the leftovers were literally pillaged after his death. Canned Heat's drummer Fito de la Para managed to salvage a tiny slice of this collection. The first compilation album devoted to Bob Hite's records focused on a handful of blues giants, including six titles from Elmore James' repertoire. Here, since there will be no sequel, I decided to pack as much music as I could on two LPs (this is the first one, 'Paw 1'). I didn't want to alter the dynamics of these fabulous 78 rpms, so I opted for only a very light mastering, keeping the inevitable audio defects, artifacts and surface noise occasionally heard on the tracks that were more damaged. Bob 'The Bear' Hite was a crucial part of the West Coast blues revival of the late '60s. Along with fellow musicologist Alan 'Blind Owl' Wilson, he helped form the first incarnation of the legendary Canned Heat as a jug band. Their performances at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and the 1969 Woodstock Festival put them on the map as true bluesmen seeking to revitalize an art form. Hite toured nonstop with Canned Heat and performed as the group's barrel-housing lead singer until his death of a heart attack on April 5, 1981. He helped revitalize the careers of John Lee Hooker, Sunnyland Slim and Albert Collins, and produced the now-legendary Hooker 'N Heat double album in 1971. Hite is most remembered for his endless on-stage boogie jams. Enjoy this burning selection and most of all... DON'T FORGET TO BOOGIE!" --Dr. Boogie


Artist: PALESTINE & JOACHIM MONTESSUIS, CHARLEMAGNE
Title: Voxorgachitectronumputer
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 326CD
Charlemagne Palestine: (voice/organs), X Joachim Montessuis: (voice/computer). After two massive works, From Etudes To Cataclysms (SR 272CD) - for the Doppio Borgato and Strumming Music (SR 297CD) for piano, harpsichord and strings ensemble, Charlemagne's work is now rooted in Sub Rosa for good. But next to his solo records, the label wants to continue to publish collaborative works: they started with An Aural Symbiotic Mystery (SR 204CD) featuring Tony Conrad. This time, Joachim Montessuis is the special guest on another magical night with Mr. Palestine. Charlemagne Palestine wrote intense, ritualistic music in the 1970s, intended by the composer to rub against audiences' expectations of what is beautiful and meaningful in music. A composer-performer, he always performed his own works as a soloist, but he enjoys new experiences, too. His earliest works were compositions for carillon and electronic drones, and he is best-known for his intensely-performed piano works. Since his birth in 1972, Joachim Montessuis has lived in 15 different cities, including Bordeaux, Strasbourg, Marrakech, Abidjan, Besançon, Rotterdam and Cologne. He is currently based in Paris. He is interested in the links between art, sound, science and spirituality. Since 1993, he has been developing a transversal sonic poetry praxis focused on experimental voice processing and immersive concert installations. His noise and video events are devised as panic-poetic spaces in which sensorial disturbance and blurring occur, starting from silence to a wall of sound. His current work is oriented towards a reflection process on the observation and perception of reality through a non-dual approach. This collaborative live performance occurred at Eglise Du Gesu, Toulouse, France June 29, 2007.


Artist: TAYLOR, DUB
Title: Lumière
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 327CD
This real masterpiece of concrète and synthesized music hasn't been available since its original manufacture in 1973, originally released by Varèse International Records. Dub Taylor is a U.S. composer, producer, engineer and designer born June 22, 1948 in Burbank, California. He has many creative facets: recording and mastering engineer, record producer as well as composer, graphic designer and visual artist. He has studied with pianist Richard Bunger and composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. Not long after the release of Lumière, Taylor established Vargod Studios for electronic music and recorded sound, where in 1974 he created his second work, Variations On The "Dudley Do-Right" Theme for sampled and processed sound (never released before, this exclusive track is included on the CD version). Taylor has bounced between the music world and the visual arts for most of his life and continues to pursue diverse creative projects. "Lumière evolved over a period of three years from 1969 to 1972. I started by recording random sounds: jets taking off at LAX, my girlfriend laughing and screaming, my cat Bartok biting a microphone, conversations, etc. I also sampled music, film soundtracks and TV and radio broadcasts. During this period I acquired the first self-contained portable synthesizer, the newly-designed ARP 2600. I began to envision an electronic and musique concrète piece combining various natural and processed sound recordings with synthesized sound into a suite of noise. In June of 1972, I did a preliminary version of elements of the piece. By October I was ready to put it all together. I set up all these reel-to-reel machines with tapes I had pre-recorded and plugged them into a mixing board, feeding stereo to a two-track master 15 IPS Revox A77 tape deck. My idea was to create a sound collage with form but without losing spontaneity and an element of randomness. So I rehearsed my fade-ins and fade-outs and the starting and stopping of the various playback decks and when I was ready I went for it, "playing" all these machines like a musical instrument in this mad moment of creation. In effect, Lumière was a "live" performance. The only later additions were the silence gaps inserted near the end of the piece using pieces of blank leader tape." --Dub Taylor


Artist: TAYLOR, DUB
Title: Lumière
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 327LP
LP version. This real masterpiece of concrète and synthesized music hasn't been available since its original manufacture in 1973, originally released by Varèse International Records. Dub Taylor is a U.S. composer, producer, engineer and designer born June 22, 1948 in Burbank, California. He has many creative facets: recording and mastering engineer, record producer as well as composer, graphic designer and visual artist. He has studied with pianist Richard Bunger and composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. "Lumière evolved over a period of three years from 1969 to 1972. I started by recording random sounds: jets taking off at LAX, my girlfriend laughing and screaming, my cat Bartok biting a microphone, conversations, etc. I also sampled music, film soundtracks and TV and radio broadcasts. During this period I acquired the first self-contained portable synthesizer, the newly-designed ARP 2600. I began to envision an electronic and musique concrète piece combining various natural and processed sound recordings with synthesized sound into a suite of noise. In June of 1972, I did a preliminary version of elements of the piece. By October I was ready to put it all together. I set up all these reel-to-reel machines with tapes I had pre-recorded and plugged them into a mixing board, feeding stereo to a two-track master 15 IPS Revox A77 tape deck. My idea was to create a sound collage with form but without losing spontaneity and an element of randomness. So I rehearsed my fade-ins and fade-outs and the starting and stopping of the various playback decks and when I was ready I went for it, "playing" all these machines like a musical instrument in this mad moment of creation. In effect, Lumière was a "live" performance. The only later additions were the silence gaps inserted near the end of the piece using pieces of blank leader tape." --Dub Taylor


Artist: SOSA, ROGELIO
Title: Raudales
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 328CD
This CD is a selection of recordings and electroacoustic music from 2003 to 2009. During this period, Sosa Rogelio has explored different approaches to music creation such as the micro-deconstruction and transformation of music recordings, the development of software that synthesizes organic sound compounds using digital signal feedback and voice improvisations with multi-processing workstations. Nevertheless, all these explorations have shared the same interest during these years: to create a visceral music that expresses itself through intense and complex sound flux and aims to vibrate and resonate within ourselves. Rogelio Sosa was born in Mexico City in 1977. His work explores a wide range of aspects that deal with sound morphology, structures of auditory reference, intensification of the acoustic space and performativity. His projects include solo and collective improvisations, music compositions, sound actions and sound installations. All of these are produced using electronic media. Part of Sub Rosa's Framework series. Limited edition of 400 copies.


Artist: HOUSE OF LOW CULTURE
Title: Poisoned Soil
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 329CD
Like many a musical endeavor before it, House of Low Culture began as an experiment. In this case, Aaron Turner was making guitar recordings in his bedroom in the Mission Hill neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. The then-ISIS vocalist/guitarist was, as always, looking to expand his musical horizons. "At the time I was enjoying my participation in ISIS and a couple other more band-oriented type settings, but also felt the need to stretch out a bit more without the judgments or limitations imposed by working with other people and also outside the confines of conventional songwriting," he explains. And so, HOLC was built with the empirical process at its foundation. "It was about literal play with my instruments, about trying out any idea that came to mind and letting everything in as a possible influence, whether it was comic books or Penderecki or doing bong hits in my bedroom with a Roland digital 8-track." Turner broadened HOLC's sonic palette considerably over the course of the next several years, incorporating voices, keyboard textures and other non-guitar instrumentation. As of late, Faith Coloccia, Turner's wife and bandmate in MAMIFFER, has become a regular contributor. Her presence can be heard and felt on Poisoned Soil, as can that of percussionist B.R.A.D (Asva, MMOB, Burning Witch, etc). The three lengthy compositions within conjure a wide variety of spatial effects and spectral imagery when experienced under headphones: distant rumblings, ominous premonitions and strange equilibrium disturbances, all underscored by the hiss of naked electrical current. The bleak sonic furnishings and deep chants of "Spoiled Fruits of the Kingdom" preside over windswept tundra where David Lynch and Loren Connors dream of permanent midnight. The cavernous vocal symphonies and nerve-rattling drum buildup of "The Ladder That Leads to Nowhere" decay into stereophonic gulls and mangled electronics. The blinking notes of a solitary guitar descend into the ether before "Inappropriate Body" immerses the listener in an uneasy kind of percussive mania. From there, a lugubrious torch light leads the way though chambers and caves ringing with the echoes of strange devotional chants and all the attendant speaking-in-tongues. There is static, and then silence.


Artist: ART ZOYD
Title: Symphonie Pour Le Jour Où Brûleront Les Cités
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 330CD
Sub Rosa presents this cult album that has not been available in years. Re-released with new artwork, the CD version includes 7 bonus tracks. Sub Rosa presents this cult album that has not been available in years. Re-released with new artwork, this is the 1980 version of Symphonie Pour Le Jour Où Brûleront Les Cités (the original version was released in 1976 and was later re-recorded). Pioneering Rock In Opposition filled with clashing percussion, frenetic orchestral motifs and apocalyptic brass. Not for the squeamish. It features the line-up of Thierry Zaboïtzeff (cello), Alain Eckert (guitar), Gilles Renard (saxophones), Jean-Pierre Soarez (trumpet), Frank Cardon (violin) and Gérard Hourbette (alto violin).


Artist: ART ZOYD
Title: Symphonie Pour Le Jour Où Brûleront Les Cités
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 330LP
LP version. Sub Rosa presents this cult album that has not been available in years. Re-released with new artwork, this is the 1980 version of Symphonie Pour Le Jour Où Brûleront Les Cités (the original version was released in 1976 and was later re-recorded). Pioneering Rock In Opposition filled with clashing percussion, frenetic orchestral motifs and apocalyptic brass. Not for the squeamish. It features the line-up of Thierry Zaboïtzeff (cello), Alain Eckert (guitar), Gilles Renard (saxophones), Jean-Pierre Soarez (trumpet), Frank Cardon (violin) and Gérard Hourbette (alto violin).


Artist: KARKOWSKI, ZBIGNIEW
Title: Nerve Cell_0 (For Cello And Computer)
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 331CD
"This work is not music in a conventional sense, it does inhabit that world, but in a new way. The cello is treated fundamentally, as a resonating body, transmitting sounds elementally. The bow on a string, the flux of weight, pressure, speed and angularity releases a myriad of complex sound phenomena. The juxtaposition of multiple sounds on adjacent strings creates fluctuating and rhythmical beatings. The detuning of the instrument increases its pitch potential and basso profundity. In combination with computer electronics, these elements are multiplied, extended and enriched. Nerve Cell_0 is a joyous, ecstatic, exhilarating and epic vista of sound. It defies categorization. Play it very loud." --Anton Lukoszevieze; Performed by Zbigniew Karkowski (computer) & Anton Lukoszevieze (cello).


Artist: WYNNE, JOHN
Title: Installation For 300 Speakers, Pianola And Vacuum Cleaner
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 332CD
John Wynne's untitled installation for 300 speakers, pianola and vacuum cleaner is at once monumental, minimal and immersive. It uses sound and sculptural assemblage to explore and define architectural space and to investigate the borders between sound and music. There are three interwoven sonic elements: the ambient sound of the space in which it is installed, the notes played by the piano, and a computer-controlled soundtrack of synthetic sounds and gently-manipulated notes from the piano itself. Because none of these elements are synchronized, the composition never repeats. "Integrating composed sounds along with the sounds of the pianola, and in correspondence with the acoustical play of the space and the exterior environment, the installation is a sort of live organic composition of varying input and output. The constellation of elements at play in Wynne's installation engage the temporal and the environmental, composing them into an unsteady musicality: the delicate unfurling of sounds as they arise from different points in the room find both support and rupture from the trains passing by outside; the bulky mass of loudspeakers, with their plastic and wood surfaces and dusty odor, command attention while attempting to integrate with the pianola's sculptural melodies." --Brandon LaBelle; This is an enhanced CD whose contents altogether include: an audio CD with a 45-minute recording of the installation; Bouncing Off The Walls, a split-screen video by Pete Gomes; and "An Aesthetics Of Pressure," an essay by Brandon LaBelle.


Artist: JAMKA
Title: Pari Passu
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 333CD
Pari Passu is Jamka's fourth full-length album. It was recorded live with minimum overdubs in London between summer 2010 and spring 2011. It relies heavily on the use of hardware equipment, delivering a focused and full sound rich in detail, color and dynamics. Jamka is a music project set up by Monika Subrtova and Daniel Kordik, who first met as philosophy students in Slovakia. After playing in various hardcore and punk bands, Kordik had gradually become more interested in the idea of making music with electronic devices, and when Subrtova began to share his enthusiasm for synthetic sounds and misleading compositions, they decided to explore this territory together. Jamka played their first gig in autumn 2001 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava. Using a sequencer and a sampler, they generated raw-sounding rhythms and structures. In the same year, together with RBNX and Urbanfailure, they released their first common CD-R/tape, Urb Sound Systems, and founded the Slovakian Urbsounds Collective. Jamka now reside in London, where they have established themselves as part of the local experimental scene. Using synthesizers, sequencers, samplers and various FX boxes, they touch on the darker side of techno, industrial and noise music, approaching it in their own uncompromising way. Their music is a whirlwind of colliding rhythms and fractured structures, punctuated throughout with hard-hitting sounds. Sub Rosa's Framework series; limited edition of 400 copies.


Artist: PRESTON, DON
Title: Filters, Oscillators & Envelopes 1967-82
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 334CD
Previously-unreleased electronic music from original The Mothers Of Invention keyboardist, Don Preston. "We're coming to the beginning of a new era wherein the development of the inner-self is the most important thing. We have to train ourselves so that we can improvise on anything: a bird, a sock, a fuming beaker. This, too, can be music. Anything can be music." --Don Preston, extracts from Uncle Meat, 1969, The Mothers Of Invention
One could hardly not see in Don Preston a key musician within Frank Zappa's oeuvre. He is not only that, but his presence has marked The Mothers' major records from 1966 to 1974. His touch was already there before the arrival of Ian Underwood, and it continued after Ian left. You all remember "King Kong" (its magnificence as interpreted by Dom DeWild) from the second Uncle Meat suite. A certain form of jubilation emanates from this track, thanks to Preston's fluid style and lightly astringent tone on the Moog synthesizer -- that instrument never sounded quite like that before or after. This might have to do with his double training, his twin interests, since he had been simultaneously working with Gil Evans and listening intensely to Luciano Berio, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and Tod Dockstader. Immersed in jazz music, he was imagining secret ties with the nascent electronic music. In the mid-'60s, Preston started developing an electronic instrument, using a home-made synthesizer and a series of oscillators and filters. Out of this instrument came "Electronic Music" (1967), his first piece. Two years later, he became a close friend of Robert Moog, and their discussions gave birth to a number of applications in relation with the flexibility of the instrument. Nowadays, you can't mention the Mini-Moog without thinking of Preston. Bob Moog himself said about his solo in "Waka/Jawaka": "That's impossible. You can't do that on a Moog." Filters, Oscillators & Envelopes features the other side, the hidden side of Don Preston: the composer of purely electronic music.


Artist: PRESTON, DON
Title: Filters, Oscillators & Envelopes 1967-75
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 334LP
LP version; limited repress. Previously-unreleased electronic music from original The Mothers Of Invention keyboardist, Don Preston.


Artist: OTHIN SPAKE
Title: The Nethack Dictionary
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 336LP
In March 2005, drummer Teun Vergruggen (Jef Neve Trio, Flat Earth Society) invited the eccentric guitar player Mauro Pawlowski (dEUS, Somnambula) and Rhodes/piano wizard Jozef Dumoulin (Määk Spirit, Magic Malik, Octurn) to play a single session based on pure improvisation. The result left most people wondering how to categorize this music, and brought Othin Spake on the stage for many concerts. Six years later, the band has played in many jazz and alternative venues in Europe, released three albums and invited several guests to play with them: bass legend Trevor Dunn (Mr. Bungle, John Zorn) extraordinary New York harpist Shelley Burgon, pianist Fred Vanhove "St. Germain Boulevard" flutist Magic Malik, and last but not least, New York sax player Andrew D'Angelo. On The Nethack Dictionary, Othin Spake captures some of the highlights of these concerts. This vinyl-only release is a compilation of live recordings made between 2006 and 2011.


Artist: MAXIMIN, BERANGERE
Title: No One Is An Island
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 337CD
This is #10 in Sub Rosa's limited edition Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Featuring Rhys Chatham, Christian Fennesz, Frédéric D. Oberland and Richard Pinhas. Bérangère Maximin was born on the remote French colonial island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean and moved to France at the age of fifteen. Performing first as a singer, she later studied electroacoustic music with the composer Denis Dufour at the Perpignan Conservatoire. Her first professional experiences occurred in Paris, and in 2002, she moved there permanently. From 2002 to 2007, while running the organizations Motus (concert production and label, Paris) and Futura (International Festival Of Acousmatic Art, Crest, France) as the assistant of Denis Dufour, she started to work as an independent composer (collective concerts and audiovisual installations). After the release of her debut album Tant Que Les Heures Passent (trans. "As Long As The Hours Go By") on Tzadik Records (August 2008), she performed a series of pieces for live voice and laptop which continued to develop on the road. In the 30-concert tour that followed in the USA, France and Italy, she shared the bill with strong personalities such as Christian Fennesz (Florence, Paris), James Blackshaw (St-Ouen), ZU (Vandoeuvre) and Fred Frith (Brest, Oakland, San Francisco). At the beginning of 2011, Bérangère Maximin completed a tour in the USA (11 concerts in New York, DC, Philly, San Francisco, Oakland) and formed a double laptop duo with Chuck Bettis (Tzadik), Pretty Clicks (first concerts in New York in February and March, and in France in September and October, 2011). Maximin has recently been included in the 2011 Residency Program Institut Français Hors Les Murs and spent two months in the USA (February and March) to write the libretto of Dora-Rose Hits New York, a piece for four actors and electronics (ongoing production, stage direction: Lionel Parlier). Bérangère Maximin (voice, guitar, laptop, various objects) featuring Rhys Chatham (trumpet), Christian Fennesz (guitar), Frédéric D. Oberland (guitar) and Richard Pinhas (guitar). Limited edition of 500 copies.


Artist: MAXIMIN, BERANGERE
Title: No One Is An Island
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 337LP
LP version. This is #10 in Sub Rosa's limited edition Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Featuring Rhys Chatham, Christian Fennesz, Frédéric D. Oberland and Richard Pinhas. Bérangère Maximin was born on the remote French colonial island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean and moved to France at the age of fifteen. Performing first as a singer, she later studied electroacoustic music with the composer Denis Dufour at the Perpignan Conservatoire. Her first professional experiences occurred in Paris, and in 2002, she moved there permanently. From 2002 to 2007, while running the organizations Motus (concert production and label, Paris) and Futura (International Festival Of Acousmatic Art, Crest, France) as the assistant of Denis Dufour, she started to work as an independent composer (collective concerts and audiovisual installations). After the release of her debut album Tant Que Les Heures Passent (trans. "As Long As The Hours Go By") on Tzadik Records (August 2008), she performed a series of pieces for live voice and laptop which continued to develop on the road. In the 30-concert tour that followed in the USA, France and Italy, she shared the bill with strong personalities such as Christian Fennesz (Florence, Paris), James Blackshaw (St-Ouen), ZU (Vandoeuvre) and Fred Frith (Brest, Oakland, San Francisco). At the beginning of 2011, Bérangère Maximin completed a tour in the USA (11 concerts in New York, DC, Philly, San Francisco, Oakland) and formed a double laptop duo with Chuck Bettis (Tzadik), Pretty Clicks (first concerts in New York in February and March, and in France in September and October, 2011). Maximin has recently been included in the 2011 Residency Program Institut Français Hors Les Murs and spent two months in the USA (February and March) to write the libretto of Dora-Rose Hits New York, a piece for four actors and electronics (ongoing production, stage direction: Lionel Parlier). Bérangère Maximin (voice, guitar, laptop, various objects) featuring Rhys Chatham (trumpet), Christian Fennesz (guitar), Frédéric D. Oberland (guitar) and Richard Pinhas (guitar).


Artist: MIKHAIL
Title: Xenofonia
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 338CD
The sound universe of Xenofonia has operatic dimensions and continues Mikhail's exploration of the musical fault-line between Middle Eastern and Western sound. Commenting on his intentions behind the album, Mikhail explains that "until a century ago, all Greek music was folk music with irregular scales and no polyphony. Greece's lengthy enslavement meant that Western musical and cultural developments of the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras left the country virtually untouched. I wanted Xenofonia to be about finding a contemporary Greek voice which wakes up to the 'alien' sounds of European instruments; a voice which is at times angry, and split between the West and the East, the past and the present." Citing rembetika, Xenakis and J. P. Rameau's dramatic works as inspirations, on this album, Mikhail's vocals are colored by his Anatolian heritage and meet electronica, avant-garde and baroque music. Xenofonia combines choir, harpsichord, percussion, glitch and environmental recordings. Migrating bird-calls and human voices play a central role heard a cappella or accompanied. Singing often ventures beyond the limits of language. The formidable choral force of ex-miners Snowdown Colliery Male Voice Choir, the intimate voice of Matthias Grübel from German duo Phon°noir, British vocal trio Juice Vocal Ensemble, and background vocals by Elaine Mitchener and Jade Pybus are heard in Mikhail's compositions alongside his wide vocal range of operatic falsetto, bass-baritone, raw shrieks and growls.


Artist: THIELEMANS, ERIC
Title: EARR Plays A Snare Is A Bell
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 339CD
"'A Snare Is A Bell' (formerly released as a single-sided vinyl on Ultra Eczema in 2008) is a solo piece for snare drum, voice and the room in which it is played. Inspired by some close encounters I had with African shamanic/trance musicians and my personal experiences with meditation and music, it also relates to a known-to-many-of-us acoustical wonder of sitting on the toilet and picking up the tone of that little room (often by accident while coughing or talking out loud to oneself) and enjoying singing that tone and letting the toilet become filled with an enormous resonance. So, the roll on the snare drum is my practice. My daily exercise and meditation. Also, it is simple: I'm playing a roll on a snare drum, which has been done many times and a long time before me. Like baking cookies with a simple recipe, right out of grandma's cookbook. This basic aspect has the pleasurable result of freeing me from the idea of needing to be special. Or in other words, the fascination of this work, for me, does not lie in its unique composition or incredible virtuosity to play a roll, but in how what I hear, when doing this roll, touches me, changes me, guides me, every time again. ('A Snare Is A Bell' is only available on the CD version, as extra bonus). EARR Plays A Snare Is A Bell, is a revisitation of the roll and its overtones by an ensemble of musicians with very different musical backgrounds. The choice of musicians is above all a heart thing. I love hearing and seeing what they play. I like their recipes and the special cookies they bake. And I like sitting down and watching the stars with them. So It started again with my snare drum and voice in a room, and we all listened and added voices and sounds to what we were hearing. As if we were all fishes in a stream. Sometimes just swimming, sometimes wanting to show ourselves, wanting to be heard, making sounds and noises, adding to that stream, sometimes just floating, breathing, hanging in there. And sometimes we heard not only single sounds but many sounds together and sometimes we heard a song. And we started to think about where all these sounds, songs and noises were coming from. And where they were going to ? Your instrument is this place and your snare drum really brings to life the surroundings like the bow enlivens the violin or a reed needs the mouthpiece of a clarinet. As a result, I've been very sensitive towards experiencing musical time and space." --(Olivier Messiaen's highly-appreciated organ player, Louis Thiry on "A Snare Is A Bell")


Artist: THIELEMANS, ERIC
Title: EARR plays a Snare is a Bell
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 339LP
LP version.


Artist: PALESTINE/Z'EV, CHARLEMAGNE
Title: Rubhitbangklanghear Rubhitbangklangear
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 340CD
For the second time in 20 years Charlemagne Palestine and Z'ev performed together, and this was the first time they recorded it. Part of the Sub Rosa/Laboratoire Central sessions, this is unreleased material from Charlemagne's lair -- a place now called "Charleworld," where both fellows spent three days in June 2010. "I first started to play the bells while at a high school for music and art in the '60s at St. Thomas Church across the street from the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan. I played every day for years. In the '80s I met Z'ev in Amsterdam. I'd known him for 20 years before he suggested one day that we perform together, which we did at Lem Barcelona in 2007. Later after seeing and hearing the carillon at my studio in Brussels he suggested that we perform and record together there, which we did in 2010. Here's/hearsz what we did." --Charlemagne Palestine


Artist: PALESTINE/Z'EV, CHARLEMAGNE
Title: Rubhitbangklanghear Rubhitbangklangear
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 340LP
180 gram LP version. Limited to 500 copies; on white vinyl.


Artist: SCANNER
Title: Colofon & Compendium 1991-1994
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 341CD
Telephone terrorism tactics and voyeuristic ambience from the Scanner archive 1991-1994. Exclusive unreleased material. An eavesdropper's delight. "In the summer of 2010, I worked through my extensive archive of DAT tapes, cassettes and mini-discs, which had accumulated since 1977, and with the help of my ever-capable and patient interns, began the process of digitizing these materials. The result -- over 600 hours of largely unreleased material -- was overwhelming to say the least, and that was only the edited highlights, as we never touched any material prior to 1991. Most of these recordings have never been heard before or released, though ideas, voices and samples may have reappeared in altered forms on future releases. Very little of it is 'finished' in any sense; it is more of a thinking process, sketches towards something else, a moment of inspiration briefly captured. At the invitation of Sub Rosa, I honed down the selection to the controversial scanned telephone call works by-passing film scores, dance pieces, remixes and so on. The shorter pieces interspersed throughout the album were originally commissioned by James Lavelle for an edition of his Mo' Wax compilation label series Headz, but for unknown reasons were never included. Two of the works, 'Blind Electricity' and 'Moth Open Math,' began life as remixes for other artists but then took on a life entirely of their own so were never issued in this form. 'Underwater' was released in an edition of 100 copies on 7" vinyl on Syntatic Records Vienna, April 1995. 'Tape Junk' and 'Who Else Is There?' were released on 7" vinyl on Soul Static Sound, October 1996." -- Robin Rimbaud


Artist: SCANNER
Title: Colofon & Compendium 1991-1994
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2LP
Price: $20.00
Catalog #: SR 341LP
Gatefold double LP version.


Artist: DAT POLITICS
Title: Blitz Gazer
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 342CD
Since 1999, DAT Politics is by far one of the most ecstatic electro party bands on the planet. Their remarkably energetic live shows explain the cult-like enthusiasm that surrounds the French electronic combo as they've been touring the world extensively over the years. DAT Politics channel a rough-edged turbo-pop mood through their laptops to create some of the most unexpectedly catchy and lively music ever assembled. The possibility of mistakes and chaos in their hot-wired dance tracks is achieved by approaching songwriting and performance the same way a garage band might. DAT Politics' new album Blitz Gazer is an exhilarating reboot in the band's career. Entirely recorded in Berlin in 2011 by the newly-formed duo, this new piece will certainly give satisfaction to the electro-maniac fanbase who will find in these 12 tunes their share of synthetic '80s hits, catchy loops and bouncy drum machines. Less expected, but pleasantly surprising, is their ability to turn the voltage level down by chanting neon-lite robo-ballads. Some dreamy melodic breaks rise in a rhythmic electric storm, exploring a brand-new aspect of the band's wide influences and possibilities. Blitz Gazer is a magnificent patchwork, a dynamic and fanciful mixture that only DAT Politics could have pulled off.


Artist: DAT POLITICS
Title: Blitz Gazer
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 342LP
LP version.


Artist: QUELLET, ISRAEL
Title: Rythmes d'etain
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 343CD
Swiss experimental electro-acoustic artist Israel Quellet has worked in the psychiatric field for several years. At 16, he discovered his own different sound worlds, such as Miles Davis' electric era, Sun Ra, dub, German cosmic music, Magma, Zappa, and many more. In 1997, he stepped into the action and, following the advice of a sound engineer friend, bought microphones, a digital mixing board, and studio monitors. Basically, he turned part of his basement into a sound-smithing studio. That is when he started to create, out of his immediate surroundings, sound works that have little to do with what is normally being done. Appreciated by composer Jorge E. Campos, Quellet is supported by the Centre Pierre Schaeffer in Paris. In 2003, he contacted Sub Rosa. Three years later, he was releasing his first public recording. This CD represents the end of his trilogy, but certainly not the end of his adventure into sound. Concerning this new opus, he says: "I was going for a raw sound, close to the actual sounds made by the instruments and sources, with minimal dressing-up. The organ's sub-bass frequencies include extremely low frequencies." His range of instruments: Church organ, tympanies, bass drum, large drum, tubular idiophones, toms, cymbals, hi-hat, voices (sped-up, slowed-down, texts in Latin) plus stokes and hits (slammed doors and various materials hit in various ways).


Artist: CAGE, JOHN
Title: Song Books
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 344CD
Works for voices & electronics, performed by Lore Lixenberg, Gregory Rose, and Robert Worby. Recorded in 2012. "This year, 2012, the maverick American experimental composer John Cage would have been 100 years old. He defined experimental music in the 1930s and, since that time, his ideas, his music and his work have been copied by hundreds of other composers and musicians time and time and time again. Anybody who claims to make experimental music today has to acknowledge their debt to John Cage. He composed Song Books in 1970. This work comprises 90 solos for voice. Ninety individual pieces of music involving the voice, electronics and theatrical action. A few of these solos have been recorded ... but only a few. Now, for the first time, all of the solos in Song Books are gathered together in a recording. This double CD features individual solos for voice and several super-mixes that simultaneously combine and layer many solos creating a typical Cage-like experience of complexity, playfulness and glorious sound. Every individual solo for voice will be downloadable from the Sub Rosa web site." --Robert Worby; "The human voice is a magical instrument and John Cage's gargantuan opus, Song Books (Solos for Voice 3-92), is a magnificent homage. These performances by Lore Lixenberg, Gregory Rose, and Robert Worby are a stunning achievement, and their first complete recording makes a welcome (and long overdue) addition to the ever-expanding catalog of Cage's recorded works." --Laura Kuhn/The John Cage Trust. Includes a 20-page booklet with notes by James Pritchett, Rebecca Y. Kim, Gregory Rose and Robert Worby.


Artist: DE JAER, BAUDOUIN
Title: Gayageum Sanjo
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 347CD
Sub Rosa presents a release by composer/violinist Baudouin de Jaer. Gayageum Sanjo: compositions for 12-string gayagrum, Prelude, 5 sanjo and 10 studies. According to legend and to recent archeological digs, the gayageum is a millennial zither-like instrument featured in all Korean traditional repertoires. "Sanjo" is usually translated as "scattered melodies." This style of music was informed by southwestern shamanic music (Sinawi) and the great epic songs (Pansori) from the same region. Melodies were improvised at first, then codified in the mid-19th century. Since then, they have evolved through lines of transmission (Ryu) from masters to pupils. "Each and every 34 pieces carries its own unique musical color sparking brightly with its distinctive luster just like a precious jewel. I think his Gayageum CD is something like a set of 34 pieces of jewels threaded onto a string. His Gayageum music opens up an unprecedented world of Gayageum music to us and each piece is as much attractive and musically tasty as other pieces. I could not help but want more music listening to the 34th track, the last piece of this CD." --Mr. Hwang Byungki, Gayageum Composer and Performer Artistic director of the The National Orchestra of Korea.


Artist: PRINS, STEFAN
Title: Fremdkorper
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 352CD
A totally original and disturbing sound world mixing acoustic and electro-acoustic pieces by the young Belgian musician of the year, Stefan Prins. Fremdkörper contains 10 brand-new recordings of acoustic and electro-acoustic compositions written between 2004 and 2010. Featured artists include Nadar Ensemble, Klangforum Wien, Champ d'Action, Nikel Ensemble, Agartha, Zwerm electric guitar quartet, Matthias Koole, Pieter Matthynssens and Stefan Prins. Comes with a 20-page booklet containing a.o., a text by Michael Rebhahn. "On this double CD (the first release to focus exclusively on my composed music) I happily present a considerable lot of my acoustic, electro-acoustic and mixed compositions up to 2010, ranging from the first piece which survived my self censorship, the 'Etude Intérieure' for inside piano and marbles (2004), to more recent compositions, such as 'Fremdkörper #2' for quartet and live electronics, and 'Fremdkörper #3 (mit Michael Jackson)' for amplified ensemble and sampler (2010). All compositions were recorded by the astonishing ensembles and performers for whom they were originally composed, after they have been intensively worked on and performed for years. Thanks to the artistry, dedication and enthusiasm of these wonderful musicians, these compositions and their performances got thus the chance to slowly grow into juicy, ripe fruits. The time had come to harvest." --Stefan Prins, May 2012.


Artist: FAFCHAMPS, JEAN-LUC
Title: Back To...
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 353CD
"For me, to write for the piano, the instrument that led me to a career in music, is always to 'get back to' something: back to my first musical feelings, but also my first writing techniques, which were quite remote from my current aesthetical concerns. Back to the music pieces engrained in my fingers through practice; finally, back to the numerous hours of free improvisation of my lazy youth. In my case, the piano, this old buddy of mine, is not the medium through which I hoped to shine in front of other people. It is the tool I keep using to meet the music of my mentors and the music of my peers. Therefore, in essence, these Back To... are works about memory." --Jean-Luc Fafchamps


Artist: FERRARI, LUC
Title: Programme Commun
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 354LP
Sub Rosa presents two substantial pieces from electro-acoustic musique concrete innovator Luc Ferrari: "Programme commun pour clavecin et bande magnetique" (1972), performed by Elisabeth Chojnacka, and another previously-unreleased piece that he held dear: "Les emois d'Aphrodite" (1986/1998), performed by San Francisco's MC Band under his direction. "'Programme commun...': Although cheerful, this piece of music asks a serious question: can one separate one's political and artistic concerns, either directly, as a film can allow, or indirectly, as in this music? Mostly though, this music is my way of commemorating the signing, in 1972, of the Programme Commun. 'Les Emois d'Aphrodite': From the 1986 version I have retained the character of this piece, a kind of disjointed rock that periodically pops up as Aphrodite's dance. I have added harmonic 'manipulations,' or a progression toward disjointed harmony, which is what I currently look for (I have not said 'which is my current aesthetics'). Finally, the introduction of samplers makes it possible to convey the liveliness of time to disjoint tones." --Luc Ferrari


Artist: ETAT BRUT
Title: Mutations et Protheses
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 357CD
Rare recordings by pioneers of industrial noise music, 1979-1983, never released before on CD or LP. Etat Brut was an industrial/noise band from Brussels that operated from 1979 until 1983. The duo (Phillippe x and Philippe X, today academic scientists) released dozens of cassettes, various flyers and Xeroxed booklets. Some collective concerts were organized at that time with Club Moral and Pseudocode. Cassettes like Emissions 1 (1981) or Géométrie d'un assassinat (1982) were released on their own label, some others in collaboration with Danny Devos (Club Moral) or Jerry WX (2Tracks, Digital Dance). EB001 was released by Club Moral in 1986, a few years after the fact. The double cassette Mutations et Prothèses was released in 1981 (Etat Brut) and re-released by Club Moral in 1986. The two bonus tracks (only on CD) "Sollicitation Extérieure" and "Psychosomatique" are extracted from 4 IN 1, a cassette released in 1982 by Grafika Airlines, Brussels, including works by Pseudocode, Human Flesh and Mécanique Végétale.


Artist: ETAT BRUT
Title: Mutations et Protheses
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 357LP
Limited edition LP version.


Artist: ROEDELIUS & CHRISTOPHER CHAPLIN, HANS-JOACHIM
Title: King of Hearts
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 358CD
Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Christopher Chaplin first met in 2010 at the "Gugginger Irritationen 2" festival near Vienna, dedicated to Art Brut. In 2011, Roedelius was invited to play a live piano set for the BBC, which would be recorded and remixed by a musician of his choice, but with whom he had never worked before. Roedelius chose Christopher Chaplin for the task. The result was broadcast on BBC Radio 3's "Late Junction Sessions" program in June 2011. Roedelius then asked Christopher to collaborate further on his material, in view of a possible album. A year later, King of Hearts was born.


Artist: FORCUCCI, LUCA
Title: Fog Horns
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 359CD
This is #11 in Sub Rosa's limited edition Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Luca Forcucci is a bi-national Swiss and Italian composer and artist. His work observes the perceptive properties/relations of sound and space (and vice versa) through sound installations, visuals, compositions, and performances. In order to explore the field of possibilities for sound in a context of music and art as an experience, the works converge with dance, digital performance, poetry, architecture and neuroscience. In this context, he is interested by perception and consciousness. His compositions have spanned through the years from electronic music, which was produced by Al Comet from The Young Gods, to field recordings collected around the world in urban contexts like São Paulo, Shanghai, San Francisco, and natural ones like the Amazon forest or the Swiss Alps, to name a few. "After 12 hours of flight and some sleep deprivation, I landed in San Francisco in Spring 2011. Because of or thanks to my state of consciousness, I heard a distinct and beautiful sound. It took me a while to understand if I was really hearing it or dreaming it: the sound of the fog horns." --Forcucci


Artist: DAVIDSON + ZBIGNIEW KARKOWSKI, XOPHER
Title: Processor
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 360CD
This is #12 in Sub Rosa's limited edition Framework series -- an extension of their Concrete Electronics Noise series. Antimatter is the sound work of Xopher Davidson -- an ongoing exploration into the material of sound. Xopher builds his experiments in electronic sound from a basis in painting, photography, and film, and through an interest in electronic circuits going back to building radios and homemade circuits as a kid. Over the last 11 years he has built and explored the sound world of a homebrew modular synthesizer comprised of surplus laboratory equipment: various oscillators, pulse generators, filters, and an "analog computer." He has released four albums as Antimatter: Transfixion, Antimatter vs. Antimatter, Our Lady of the Skies, and Reset. As an audio engineer, Davidson has worked on projects composed/performed by: the League Of Automatic Composers, John Cage, Marcel Duchamp, Subtropic, Diamanda Galas, Kid 606, DJ Rupture, Darwin's Bitch, Once 11, Mix Master Mike, Hans Grusel, Phoenecia, Jonah Sharp, We, Zbigniew Karkowski, and Iannis Xenakis. Zbigniew Karkowski is one of the most influential electronic music composers working today. Linking the worlds of modern composition and industrial music, he is a pivotal figure in the development of advanced noise. Constantly on the road, he is a frequent performer on the geographical fringes of experimental music culture as well as a mainstay on the established festival circuit.


Artist: FERRARI, LUC + BRUNHILD
Title: Programme Commun
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: 2CD
Price: $18.00
Catalog #: SR 363CD
Sub Rosa presents two volumes of work from French composer Luc Ferrari and his wife and closest collaborator, Brunhild Ferrari. These two volumes are being released together and simultaneously, as a sign of continuation. For Luc Ferrari, this is the first full-length CD to come out after the trilogy Sub Rosa developed with him. What we have here is three substantial pieces: "Programme commun pour clavecin et bande magnetique" (1972), performed by Elisabeth Chonacka, "Didascalies" (1993) performed by Jean-Philippe Collard-Neven, Claude Berset, and Vincent Royer (in 2009) and previously available only on vinyl (note that "Didascalies" and "Didascalies 2" are two different compositions), and another previously-unreleased piece that he held dear, "Les emois d'Aphrodite" (1986-1998), performed by San Francisco's MC Band under his direction. Sub Rosa is also pleased to release for the first time the solo works of Brunhild Ferrari: "Derivatif" (2008), "Brumes du reveil" (2009) and "Tranquilles Impatiences" (2010), forming a trilogy on reconstruction from a memory that is still quite alive. These works are new bricks in the erection of a liberating oeuvre.


Artist: ART ZOYD
Title: Musique pour l'Odyssée
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 364CD
This second Art Zoyd cult album has been unavailable for many years. Originally released in 1979, it is now re-released with new artwork and additional tracks. Released almost three years after Art Zoyd's first LP, Symphonie pour le Jour où Brûleront les Cités (SR 330CD/LP), Musique pour l'Odyssée (trans. "Music for the Odyssey") presented a slightly different version of the band. The nucleus of Gérard Hourbette (violin), Thierry Zaboïtzeff (bass guitar, cello, vocals), and Jean-Pierre Soarez (trumpet) is joined by percussionist Daniel Denis (who would remain a core member of the band for two decades), oboeist/bassoonist Michel Berckmans (of Univers Zero and Von Zamla), saxophonist Michel Thomas, and a second violinist, Franck Cardon. This line-up recorded an album much more cinematic than the first. The band found a new dimension in their sound, one that would remain present on subsequent releases. Art Zoyd's early and great works have been unavailable for such a long time that it's too easy to forget what a strikingly original and amazing band they were in their prime. CD version includes 7 bonus tracks.


Artist: ART ZOYD
Title: Musique pour l'Odyssée
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: LP
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 364LP
LP version.


Artist: FAFCHAMPS, JEAN-LUC
Title: YZ3Z2Z1S2, a Five-Letter Sufi Word
Label: SUB ROSA (BELGIUM)
Format: CD
Price: $15.50
Catalog #: SR 365CD
"My second complete Sufi word -- or cycle -- consists of five contrasting letters -- or movements -- calling for various combinations of soloists [2, 3, 4, 5], instrumental ensemble [1, 3, 5], and real-time electronics [2, 4, 5]. It confidently extends a global poetic design made of a quest for meaning, a taste for extraordinary adventures, an interest in the perfume of mystical ecstasy, and the pleasure of carefully sculpting the time and shapes that make up writing." Jean-Luc Fafchamps initially devoted himself to writing for small groups in which the piano plays a central role ("Dynamiques," for two pianos; "Melencholia si...," for two pianos and two percussionists; "Neurosuite," for a keyboard trio), before his interest in non-tempered harmonies and polyphonies of timbres led him towards other sound combinations ("A Garden," for wind quintet; "Bryce," for clarinet quintet, etc.). He is currently moving towards working for larger formations in which his taste for paradoxical constructions and his sense of synthesis are blossoming into mutually referential pieces. He is working on the development of a vast network of cycles - the Lettres Soufies - a manifesto for writing, stylistic openness as rhetoric and the use of analog correspondences as the basis for a system: "T" for ensemble and electronics, "K" for orchestra, "A" for ensemble and orchestra, "Z3" for trombone and electronics, and so on.

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