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REDUX 010CD
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For the uninitiated Richard Youngs is a classically trained pianist and guitarist, but musically he grew up in the shadow cast by punk rock. Adopting guerrilla recording techniques, the independent DIY ethic is at his core. He is a solo artist who also works with a diverse range of artists. He has collaborated with Scottish filmmaker Luke Fowler, Arts Foundation of New Zealand Laureate Award winner Alastair Galbraith, Portuguese organist David Maranha, and Japanese guitarist Makoto Kawabata (Acid Mothers Temple) among others. Since 1985, he has performed irregularly with Neil Campbell (A Band, Astral Social Club, Vibracathedral Orchestra). He was the bassist for Jandek's inaugural live performance at Instal in 2005, and plays as a duo with Damon Krukowski (Galaxie 500, Magic Hour). He has performed floor spots at Hertfordshire folk clubs, and worked with members of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. He has recorded a modern pop album with Beyond The Valley Of Ultrahits in 2009, and composed a score titled Past Fragments Of Distant Confrontation for the BBC SSO in 2014. He was commissioned to write music for the art film The Poor Stockinger, the Luddite Cropper and the Deluded Followers of Joanna Southcott (2012), and his music has appeared in the 2013 feature film Drinking Buddies. He is the drum machinist of The Flexibles, singer of Amor, among many other things. Whether you're a long-time admirer of Young's work, or discovering him for the first time, there is much to enjoy about The Rest Is Scenery - a perfect introduction to one of Britain's great outsider artists.
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LP
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ROWF 064LP
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140-gram LP in heavyweight UV-coated sleeve. Limited edition of 300. Varispeed Etudes was conceived by revered, quixotic, Glasgow-based avant-garde populist Richard Youngs very much as an analog "record of two halves" in the spirit of David Bowie's Low (1977) and Heaven 17's Penthouse and Pavement (1981). Side A showcases Youngs's bent for electronic experimentation and those inimitable, hauntingly reedy, standard English vocal tones that have placed him squarely alongside a peer group of the UK's vocalizing weirdos that includes Robert Wyatt, Ivor Cutler, and Charles Hayward. Side B strips away the vocals and replaces the electronics with a series of shorter, dissonant, slow-moving, acoustic clatterbang soundscapes. The whole thing is "held together by the joy of varispeed pitch control -- major delight of reel-to-reel recording" and it's as rich, conceptually oblique, throwaway, but important as anything in Youngs's catalog.
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REDUX 005CD
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Richard Youngs is a British musician with a prolific and diverse output, including many collaborations. Based in Glasgow since the early 1990s, his extensive back catalog of solo and collaborative work formally begins with Advent, first issued in 1990. He plays many instruments, most commonly choosing the guitar, but he has been known to use a wide variety of other instruments including the shakuhachi, accordion, theremin, dulcimer, a home-made synthesizer (common on early recordings), and even a highway bridge -- not to mention an a cappella album. For many years, live performances were very occasional and almost always in Glasgow; he has stated publicly that he finds live performance "incredibly nerve-racking: stomach cramps, tension headaches..." However, in the 2010s, he has begun to perform more regularly (including a tour of New Zealand in 2010 and a UK tour in support of Damon and Naomi in 2011), and many of these shows have been predominantly vocal. Inside the Future is a collection of ten short acoustic songs heavy on overdubbed voice and the textures of acoustic and classical guitars. Experimental, yet firmly rooted in traditional song form, it is both heartfelt and determined by chance, improvised and carefully structured.
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7CD
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VHF 137CD
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"No Fans Compendium is a deluxe, limited-edition seven-disc set of Richard Youngs's recordings for his long-running private No Fans label. Five CDs are the artist's personal selection from his No Fans releases, all of which were issued in tiny editions (20-50 copies) and only available for sale at his rare shows or at Glasgow's now-defunct Volcanic Tongue shop. In addition, Youngs has included two full discs of material previously unavailable in any form: a recording from 1989 predating his earliest widely known work, and a new recording from late 2014. Unbeatable as a survey of Youngs's career, everything here is of equal quality to his over-the-counter releases. In keeping with his penchant for unpredictable stylistic mashups and reinventions, there are folky laments, achingly beautiful 'songs,' tape collage, rude prog noise, minimalist experiments, multi-tracked vocals, etc. Each disc is housed in an individual card folio with artwork repurposed from the original releases."
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FD 090CD
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Another solo album by the highly-prolific yet always captivating Richard Youngs, whose music can waver healthily between new forms of singer-songwriter material, lo-fi drones and all manner of avant-garde forms/non-forms. On this album, Primary Concrete Attack, he utilizes a borrowed spring reverb generator from his friend, Luke Fowler, to rise to the challenge Richo at FD set him of creating a dub record. While not liking reggae or dub himself, Richard Youngs professes a huge passion for tape echo and spring reverb, plus loves a hearty and perhaps provocative challenge. The eight tracks that make up Primary Concrete Attack, as perhaps expected, bear little in common with a dub record and fall far closer to the idiosyncratic worlds Richard Youngs generally appears to feel happiest in. Combining electronic splurge with all manner of loops and various sound sources, this album focuses very much on their effects and how to play around with them as much as the original sounds.
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2LP
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MIE 021LP
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2013 release. The first-ever solo double LP by Richard Youngs. After the mind-erasing and shamanic Amaranthine released in January 2012, MIE is ecstatic to be working with Richard again on a true magnum opus of the Youngsian experimental catalog. Regions of the Old School is an epic and proudly sprawling collection of instrumentals and songs. In a conceptual nod to the long out-of-print Festival, released in 1994 by Table Of The Elements, it features five extended tracks scored for a diverse array of instruments with guest vocals by Madeleine Hynes and additional synthesizer by Neil Campbell. Regions of the Old School plunges you into the deep with the incredibly claustrophobic and tense "Insomniac Takeover." Youngs declaims three words over and over while gongs and hand drums skitter over synths and long arcs of guitar feedback. The intense opener is a merciless ode to its namesake. The following track's opening chimes and undulating synths are sublime in their contrast to their predecessor, instead forming a gorgeous tune on a Moog Source with deep and sustained bass throughout. "Celeste" sees Madeleine Hynes on manipulated vocals alongside high-end frequencies contrasted with subdued percussion and gongs. This beautiful little paen brings the record to its epic focal point, "The Thoughtlife." The track slowly reveals a mesmerizing piece with incredible juxtaposition of styles. Gongs, shakuhachi flute, and Neil Campbell's synthesizer weave in and out in perfect symbiosis and the arrival of a long drawn-out and stuttering sub-bass kick solidifies the zen-like quality of the track. "My Love Holds the Galaxy in Her Heart" is a perfect end to this incredible record, a tender and sweet song over metronomic percussion and glockenspiel at the other side of the musical spectrum to the first track. This sprawling yet flowing piece comes to a climax as Youngs' vocals give out suddenly to an extended caustic feedback-riddled guitar solo before falling silent. Regions of the Old School is available in a run of 500 2LPs with stunning gatefold artwork by Madeline Hynes.
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LP
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MIE 009LP
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2012 release. MIE are delighted to be releasing the excellent Amaranthine by prolific UK experimental musician Richard Youngs. Bringing rhythm to the fore, Amaranthine is built around layered percussion and Youngs' ever-present vocals. The asymmetrically patterned underlay is scored for drums, household objects and handheld percussion; at points scything fuzz guitar cuts through the sense of ritual with abandon and deep synths bubble up out of nowhere before dissipating into solo shakuhachi. Amaranthine is another typically atypical Youngsian release in which he ventures deep into uncharted musical space, all the while retaining his essential Youngs-ness.
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FD 085CD
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New solo album by the highly prolific yet always captivating Richard Youngs, whose music can waver healthily between new forms of singer-songwriter material, lo-fi drones, and all manner of avant-garde forms/non-forms. Here, his music sways towards the difficult and embraces organ drones and swells, frazzled electronics, a voice that is at once unnerving and unnerved, and more besides. Anybody expecting a comfortable listen should be prepared. This is challenging music at its best; something Richard Youngs has been adept at since the very beginning. Limited to 300 digipaks.
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RS 087LP
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Last copies of this 2012 release. With scores of releases both solo & in collaboration that stretch back for more than 20 years, Richard Youngs perhaps needs the least amount of introduction of any of the artists Root Strata has worked with. The label is extremely excited to help Richard add another singular entry into his discography. Core to the Brave hits with a shock and never lets up. Composed of what appears to be blown-out bass & spastic drum rhythms, these tracks cascade into shimmering loops of distortion, their weight reaching a critical mass that often feels like it's on the verge of ecstatic collapse. Everything is elevated further in & up by that one and only voice floating over the top like a lush wind come down from the mountains.
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ALT 007LP
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At this point in time Richard Youngs should need no introduction. Through his vast discography (spanning over 20 years), he has created a fascinating body of work which has found a home on labels such as Forced Exposure, VHF, Jagjaguar and his own No Fans imprint. Like all great artists, Richard's work is hard to pin down and continues to evolve, mutate, and blossom into new forms, while at the same time bearing a unique characteristic that lets you know it could be by no-one else. Split into two parts, Rurtain is a new electronic piece which picks up from where the Core to the Brave LP on Root Strata left off, but taking a more abstract road into something more skeletal and strange. In the first part, broken beats cluster around minimal hits of percussion and wordless vocals that sound like they're trapped in a vacuum, evoking a slightly unsettling atmosphere. Things become a little more celebratory in the second part with the addition of some very erratic organ playing, giving an ecstatic and almost "free-jazz" feel to the piece. The B-side features three very different interpretations of Richard's originals by Neil Campbell (Astral Social Club), John Clyde-Evans and Daniel Lopatin (Oneohtrix Point Never). Neil's version expands the organ of the second piece into a huge kaleidoscopic drone, while John hones in on the woodblock and percussion to make something more metallic and abrupt. Finally, Daniel Lopatin closes the LP grandly by adding violent stabs of digital synth and melancholic guitar-playing to Richard's voice, almost creating a kind of futuristic ballad. Five tracks of unclassifiable electronics, limited to 300 copies. Recorded by Richard Youngs, Neil Campbell, John Clyde-Evans and Daniel Lopatin in Glasgow, Yorkshire and New York, 2011 - 2012. Mastered by John Hannon at No Recording Studio and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering.
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