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EMEGO 284LP
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$23.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 7/31/2020
The Oystercatcher is the first collaborative LP from Cucina Povera (Maria Rossi) and ELS (Edward Simpson). Recorded in London over two days during the summer of 2019, hours' worth of improvisations has been edited down to form these six tracks. A fragile interplay is at work between Maria's drifting vocals and the ominous churn of Edward's modular synth. Each sonic element takes a turn at leading the way. The opening track "Mantle" is formed from sparse, monolithic electronics, woven gently with a thread of vocals. In the closing track "Eon" Maria's voice shepherds spontaneous bursts of sounds, almost rave-like if order were imposed, through 15 minutes of turmoil and resplendent until the end. Maria's vocals make their own trails amongst the noise, bringing to mind the exploratory language from Ursula K. Le Guin's album Music and Poetry from the Kesh (1985), recalling the same understated mystery. The overall effect of this collaboration is a completely unique creation albeit within a recognizable lineage of predecessors. The artwork reflects the vision of these two artists, collaged together. Both images are from a trip to Helsinki. Edward's photograph of tulips caught after dark are reviled by a flash. Maria's seemingly abstract drawing is a graphite rubbing taken from a granite slab of a pavement somewhere in Kallio. Together the two images represent two different methods for capturing a city's haptic landscape. The album moves with a feeling of transience, which is no surprise given that the idea to collaborate was formed in Helsinki, realized in London and edited together in Rotterdam. The Oystercatcher tells a fragile tale, one that spins out into the unknown. A cold union of voice and machine, still tentative and probing, learning to co-exist. A kind of fundamental shift whereby shared moments have been turned to sound. The Oystercatcher is a bird that can freely travel between the earth, sea and sky. The motif is taken from a Tove Jansson short story. A dead bird washes ashore, two different versions of events are presented to how the bird came to die. The album feels like two different stories being presented on top of one another but ultimately coming to the same tragic conclusion. Cucina Povera is Maria Rossi - vocals; ELS is Edward Simpson - synthesizers. Mastered by Russell Haswell.
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EMEGO 276LP
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$23.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 7/10/2020
France Jobin on the release: "The last two years have seen me maintaining an association with an unusual bedfellow, death. The loss of Mika Vainio, as well as three members of my own family, has had a profound effect on me and spurred a lengthy reflection on life, death, and everything in between. Parallelly, while studying the philosophy of science, I came across shadow photons:
'Tangible photons are the ones we can see or detect with instruments whereas shadow photons are intangible (invisible) detectable only indirectly through the interference effects on the tangible photons. There is no intrinsic difference between tangible and shadow photons: each photon is tangible in one universe and intangible in all the other parallel universes. They travel at the speed of light, bounce off mirrors, are refracted by lenses, and are stopped by opaque barriers or filters of the wrong colour. Yet, they do not trigger even the most sensitive detectors. The only thing in the universe that a shadow photon can be observed to affect is the tangible photon that it accompanies. This is the phenomenon of interference. Shadow photons would go entirely unnoticed, were it not for this phenomenon and the strange pattern of shadows by which we observe it. Thus, the existence of a seething, prodigiously complicated hidden world of shadow photons has been inferred.' --The Fabric Of Reality, David Deutsch, Penguin Press 1997.
I have drawn a parallel between shadow photons and death. The interference phenomena, parallel universes, and how shadow photons affect tangible photons they accompany, offer, in my opinion, similarities, an unknown universe which is death and how we, remaining tangible human beings, are affected. This quest has led me to be more willing to accept chaos in my life and to conclude that Death is perfection, everything else is relative."
All sounds recorded at various locations in Europe, South America, and at EMS, Stockholm using the Buchla 200 modular synthesizer. All sounds recorded with Klara Lewis in Montreal 2018. Mastered by Russell Haswell, January 2020. Cut at Schnittstelle, Berlin by Andreas Kauffelt, January 2020.
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EMEGO 272LP
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Second outing from Kassel Jaeger and Jim O'Rourke following the release of Wakes on Cerulean on Editions Mego in 2017 (EMEGO 223LP). Covering a vast terrain with delicacy and poise this new release unveils a spectral showcase for all manner of deep abstraction. The first side positions itself somewhere between stoned komische synth and more nuanced electroacoustic tactics, all weighted by a melancholic undertow. The second side builds on the tension of the former as an undulating drone teases all variety of matter to rise and fall amongst the foreign space it inhabits. The effect creates an enormous sense of deep space before subsiding into a smaller more anxious flickering world. All manner of machines fold into play; digital machines, industrial and analog machines. The seemingly random yet ordered nature of events is reminiscent of the behavior of the natural world providing this machine driven release a convincing organic feel. Whether invoking mirrors, distant galaxies, or a pond of frogs, it is a delightful challenge to focus and locate what is nature and what is nurture. To play this loud is to immerse oneself in a fascinating journey which carries the listener through an array of dizzying emotional states.
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EMEGO 281LP
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C. Lavender is a New York based sound artist and sound healing practitioner whose third full-length album explores meditative physical rituals of sound with binaural recordings from inside a geodesic dome in the Catskill Mountains of New York. "The future is a choice between utopia and oblivion," noted architect, futurist, and geodesic dome theorist Buckminster Fuller. Myth Of Equilibrium delves into these divergent paths by featuring equal parts of pastoral raw acoustic percussion combined with C. Lavender's signature "devastating caustic drones" (Ad Hoc) via her custom bass guitar and synthesizers. An assistant to the late pioneering electronic composer and Deep Listening founder Pauline Oliveros, C. Lavender's astute editing and the binaural recording process places the listener within the heady fluctuating underworld she has created on this album. The recording environment of the geodesic dome allowed for sounds to transfer out beyond the confines of the walls as well as allowing outside sounds from the surrounding wilderness to permeate in like that of a mutating cell. The album suggests "headphone listening" for the full hypnotic experience Myth Of Equilibrium presents to the listener. C. Lavender is a 2020 Pioneer Works (New York) Music Artist-in-Residence. Photography: C. Lavender; Design: Richard Chartier. Recorded 2018-2019 at the Outer Inn Studios Dome (Catskills, NY). Mastered by Taylor Deupree at 12k Mastering.
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EMEGO 277LP
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Upside Down Smile was recorded and produced by Ewa Justka and by self-designed, self-made, selfselfself, odd looking slightly dysfunctional synthesizers and by a trance purple killer Roland JP8080 and by his brother Virus and some other Roland Brothers. No sisters included during the time when Ewa Justka, who currently lives in Glasgow, Govanhill, Allison Street, where recently her passport was stolen due to the burglary, where she lives in joy, although sometimes the floor gets wet due to the leaking windows and sometimes one can find dead pigeons laying on the staircase. But it's nice and cozy and Ewa Justka, highly influential person in the deep dark transistor ladder circuits, lives there since she is studying PhD at Edinburgh College of Art where she thinks a lot about imitation in synthesizer design and filters and VCOs and formants and acid and hardcore music and Twin T filters and operational amplifiers. She turns knobs and thinks and the Upside Down Smile album was made in the depth of those thoughts, quite often sad thoughts. Upside Down Smile is a bit of a cynical smile but an honest smile. Cynical but honest Upside Down Smile is a smile through tears but tears of joy, Scottish joy. Upside Down Smile is upside down acid one could say. Upside Down Smile could be interpreted as a sad smile but it is a smile in the end of the day. Mastered by Russell Haswell. Download card includes three additional tracks.
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EMEGO 275LP
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Finlay Shakespeare is a freak. With this, his second album for Editions Mego confirms this. As a one man band it often strikes the listener as bewildering that he can do all this; the programming sits firmly in the realms of genius, the constant punch of melody upon melody leaves a pleasant sting of surprise and as a lyric writer there's a part of his moniker that seems apt. Solemnities is more gritty than his previous outings as a more raucous industrial edge is grafted on to his epic electronic pop leanings. "Occupation" launches proceedings as a snarling electro pop monster. Finlay's vocals have never been delivered with such urgency. From here it's one melodic banger followed by another as Shakespeare truly hones his voice and craft into something utterly of his own devising, despite, or as a result of, the specific world of electronic music he is referencing. Covering a wide range of emotional states, from anger to euphoria this is a wild complex dip into one man's world perfectly crafted into an external release. "She Says / Nothing Ends" concludes proceedings with an anthem so bold it would be a worldwide hit if the world could be told. Find a comfortable position, turn Solemnities up loud and let Finlay take you on this startling spectacular trip. All material written, performed, produced and recorded by Finlay Shakespeare. Mastered by Cicely Balston. Artwork by Meggie Wood.
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EMEGO 270LP
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Following 2018's acclaimed collaboration with Simon Fisher Turner, Care (EMEGO 253LP), Swedish sound artist Klara Lewis returns with Ingrid, her third solo release for Editions Mego. Ingrid is a departure from Lewis's previous solo outings, drifting from the eerie rhythmic variations of Too (EMEGO 210CD/LP, 2016) and Ett (EMEGO 190LP, 2014) and moving assuredly into long-form experimentation. The piece retains those records' pulsing core and builds on a single cello loop that is steadily enveloped by a surge of distortion. It's almost like a voice or chant, shifting pointedly from a whisper into a scream before singing peacefully into the light. At times, Ingrid is reminiscent of William Basinski's looping melancholy or Steve Reich's controlled and innovative phase experiments, while at others, it recalls the chaotic Scandinavian physicality of black metal. Yet, the entire composition is anchored in Klara Lewis's distinct emotional world. By dissolving familiar and beautiful strings in baths of noise, Lewis allows something violent but tender to grow in its place. In a society struck through by cynicism, Ingrid is a cathartic listening experience and a beacon of hope. One-sided LP. Mastered by Sarah Register. Cut by Andreas Kauffelt at Schnitstelle, Berlin.
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EMEGO 278LP
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"Produced within the context of 'The Guidebook of Church Burners' publication release, this performance was recorded at visual arts institution LE BAL in Paris, May 4th 2018. Published by Païen in a limited edition, the book explores and transforms into an abstract narration the multiple facets of black metal iconography and history. Emerging from a dialogue between sound and image, the otherworldly piece created for that evening by Stephen O'Malley is a result of this collaboration." --Emilie Lauriola Cover photo by Elodie Lesourd, Charleroi 2017. Mix and mastered by Stephan Mathieu, Schwebung November 2019. Vinyl cut at Schnittstelle, Berlin December 2019.
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2LP
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EMEGO 271LP
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Ferrum is a large-scale exploration of inharmonic timbres, oscillating between brutal grinding textures and intricate percussive singularities, created by digitally transforming recordings of various metallic objects. Susanne Kirchmayr's new album takes a close personal look at the spectral richness of iron and other metals, in various shapes and sizes, recorded, processed, and arranged to a carefully curated selection of musical miniatures. Some of the results are an obvious nod to her Electric Indigo DJ alias, music that could be played on the dancefloor of an alien cargo ship, both highly familiar and foreign at the same time. Others offer almost steady-state like meditative qualities, vibrations from deep within, on a sub atomic level, full of light and motion on the tiniest possible scale. The limitation in material opens up a seemingly unlimited world of colors and rhythms, oscillating, resonating, and highly immersive. Mastered by Rashad Becker. Artwork by Tina Frank.
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EMEGO 273LP
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Editions Mego release the new album by Australian producer Jasmine Guffond. Developed over a two-year period, Microphone Permission is an unsettling musical journey utilizing contemporary tools of communication to display Guffond's ongoing research into online surveillance and sound as a method of investigation. Source material on Microphone Permission are from various projects Guffond has been working on; a commission to sonify the data of the city of Melbourne, a dance performance about the future sounds of an extinct forest, an installation that sonifies Twitter meta data in real time, a job as a composer for a theater work about music and feminism by five young female identifying performers in Western Sydney and a site specific installation at the Linachtalsperre dam that employed the harmonic frequencies of electric currents. The results are a stark, brooding, disorientating journey into a paranoid musical field that sits somewhere between ambient club music and a dystopian soundtrack. Elements of techno, classical music, and sound art form a dark intriguing masterwork that questions the nature of invasive, algorithmic, and computational listening practices. For example, Microphone Permission refers to the consent we routinely give when installing various apps onto our smart devices. Inspired by a 2018 scandal in which fans of Spain's most popular soccer team were effectively turned into unwitting spies by granting the La Liga application microphone permission. No matter which make or model, all smart devices are built with a microphone that is by default, forever listening. Listening in these situations often takes on an algorithmic form that enables tech developers to bypass public response to what is intuitively considered invasive practice, that is, traditional modes of eavesdropping such as using the microphone to listen and record audio. Composed, recorded, and produced by Jasmine Guffond. Image by Ilan Katin; layout by Nik Void.
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EMEGO 265LP
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Molocular Meditation is a bespoke light and sound environment featuring the voice of the Fall's Mark E Smith. Smith is heard making observations on mundane objects, events, and a range of meditation techniques basically associating his discontent with an apolitical British upper class. His voice forms the narrative component of an electroacoustic composition by Jan St. Werner placed in a hyper-real scenario evoking a state of transformation and deceleration. "Molocular Meditation" premiered at Cornerhouse, Manchester in 2014. This album presents a re-edited and remastered stereo version of the original multi-channel piece. Voice and guitar feedback were recorded at Blueprint Studios Manchester, electronics in Werner's studio in Berlin. The B-side consists of unreleased new work partly written around the same time as Molocular Meditation in context of Werner's Fiepblatter Catalogue on Thrill Jockey. "Back To Animals" is a non-metric rhythmic exercise frantically hybridizing percussive accents with synthesized pulse. "On The Infinite Of Universe And Worlds" is an electronic opera based on Giordano Bruno's Renaissance writings which Werner was asked to conceptualize for new music festival Music Nova in Finland. "VS Cancelled" finds Mark E. Smith reading an email from Domino Records explaining their discontinuation of the Von Sudenfed project a band Mark E. Smith had founded with Mouse on Mars' Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma in 2006. Their debut album Tromatic Reflexxions came on Domino out in 2007. Artwork by Rupert Smyth Studio. Pre-master Andi Toma; Master Zino Mikorey.
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DOME 004LP
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With the demise of the group Wire in 1980, founder members Bruce Gilbert and Graham Lewis joined forces to create Dome. With the assistance of engineer Eric Radcliffe and his Blackwing Studio Dome took the ethic of "using the studio as a compositional tool" and recorded and released three Dome albums on their own label in the space of 12 months: Dome (July, 1980), Dome 2 (October, 1980), and Dome 3 (October 1981). A final fourth album, Will You Speak This Word: Dome 4 was released on the Norwegian Uniton label in May 1983. These albums represent some of the most beautifully stark and above all timeless exercises in studio experimentation from early 1980s alternative music scene. Personnel: G. Lewis and B.C. Gilbert - instruments, voices, production; Vincent Clarke - voice, Fairlight computer synthesizer, track 1; Deborah Danahay - voice, track 1; David Drinkwater - violin, track 1; Terrence Leach - saxophones tracks 1, 3, 4, and 6; Eric Radcliffe - engineer. Previously issued in the out-of-print Dome 1-4+5 box set in 2011. Floating-point re-master by Russell Haswell, August 2011. Cut at Dubplates & Mastering by Rashad Becker, August 2011. New artwork by Dave Coppenhall. Includes download card.
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EMEGO 255LP
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Second phantasmagorical audio outing from Oto Hiax, the duo of former Seefeel and Loops Haunt members, Mark Clifford and Scott Gordon. Two expands the duo's unique take on spectral synthesis incorporating a diverse amount of approaches to experimental sound. Two expounds a hybrid mix of acoustic based audio design, ambient tonality, sound effects, music, abstraction, and world's hybrid video game soundtrack. There is something of an onomatopoeia quality to the release as the six tracks take on the character of their individual title. "Silt", "Dapple", "Overcurve", "Scutter", "Strain", and "Plates" appear as extremely well executed versions of the inferred intent of their namesake. This inquisitive approach will appeal to those interested in the more exploratory end of sound production providing hope as newly formed methods and colors are exposed from the duo's contemporary audio tactics. Seasoned veterans can lie in a bed of laurels whereas Two is an exemplary release reveling in the enthusiasm that comes from the joy of unabated exploration.
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2LP
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RD7
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The Elbow Is Taboo was Renaldo & The Loaf's fourth and last album of their initial phase prior to their return in 2010. Released by Ralph Records in America and Some Bizzare in the UK in 1987, this work represents a development in the overall sound as they utilize an 8-track recorder along with early digital effects. A large arsenal of acoustic instrumentation gives the record an additional unsettling atmosphere. Recorded over a three-year period this remains the definitive statement by the group in this early period. As clarified by Brian from the band, the themes remain as obtuse and alluring as ever with each song containing its own story: "be it a child's desire to control ('A Street Called Straight'), the ridiculous purdah of an innocent part of the body ('The Elbow Is Taboo'), a call for help in times of angst ('Here's To the Oblong Boys'), the rigours of a bread fetish ('The Bread Song'), the anger of a dance teacher to the terminally inept ('Critical/Dance') or a ritual call to prayer, somewhere ('Extracting The Re-Re')". Disorientating and delightful, this is a must for all fans of the Loaf and for those tickled by the more deranged spectrum of song. Remastered for vinyl and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin, Nov 2018. Original album recorded Chez Struvé 1984 to 1986. Cover design & layout by Nik Void. Original cover concept by Renaldo & The Loaf.
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EMEGO 252LP
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Editions Mego present the latest addition to the compelling discography of Thomas Brinkmann. Throughout his career Brinkmann has focused on the human operating amongst industry alongside rhythms that manifest as a result of technological advancement. With this new release Brinkmann makes a U-turn, looking back to the early industrial age. Comprised of recordings of various looms, Raupenbahn investigates the sonic properties and consequences of the first automatic loom as constructed by Jacques de Vaucanson in 1745. Thomas Brinkmann once again adheres to his tendency for clarity and simplicity whilst further investigating not only the sound and rhythms of the machines (looms) but also what role they serve in society and what consequences they have on the environment. Raupenbahn presents 21 tracks in total, 11 featured on the vinyl, the remaining ten as digital bonus tracks. The majority of recordings were undertaken by Brinkmann in 2017 with a Neumann KM 184 stereo set. Additional recordings were sourced with permission from Monika Widzicka recs. from 2014 Central Museum of Textiles Łódź, Poland. Each piece presents a diversity of material which borders on the breathtaking and beautiful in richness and complexity. The various looms unravel rhythms and patterns unexpected from machines of the early industrial age. The loom holds a significant role in shaping our world being the catalyst for Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine which, alongside the subsequent work of Byron's daughter Ada Lovelace, paved the way for modern computing. There is a linage of the loom that fits succinctly in Brinkmann's overall argument. Here we encounter a parallel between machine driven economies and the music that rose from such places, consider the Sheffield steel industries, the Manchester weaving industry or the Rhineland/Düsseldorf loom and machine industry. Is it a coincidence that the practice of such machines in the environment gave rise to today's predilection for electronic dance music, in pop, soundtracks, etc. Raupenbahn features no treatment or processing and explicitly displays varying tempo and timbres which ascertain a wide range of acoustic structures. The artwork features Ingrid Wiener, Rosemarie Trockel, and Alexandra Bircken, three different generations who would with ideas of fabric weaving, looming, and the like. This exceptional release works on a number of levels alongside it's striking sonic palette. The digital bonus tracks (and the LP tracks) can be redeemed with download card that comes with the LP.
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EMEGO 269LP
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With over two decades of formal exploration and exhilarating abstraction, Get On is, somewhat surprisingly, only the fourth solo Pita full-length. Peter Rehberg has always been vouched for pushing the very limits of the technology du jour, be it software or in recent years a complex modular set. Rehberg's motives are one of unbridled exploration often resulting in extreme and exhilarating audio works. Having spearheaded the contemporary electronic sound with his uncompromising explorations of noise, rhythm, and extreme computer music, he has also worked with numerous experimental musicians in collaboration. Rehberg stands in the wake of a sonic revolution, once fringe, which transformed over time into the sound of a generation of experimental geeks and club freaks worldwide. Get On follows on from the 2016 release Get In (EMEGO 218CD/LP, 2016). As with other titles in his Get series, Get On in an unwieldy blend of noise, abstraction, gnarled rhythm, and blurred melody. Both analog and digital tools are deployed as a means of expressing something outside of everyday electronics. "AMFM" launches proceedings with some delightfully disorientating ricocheting electronics setting off a subversive sonic spectrum. "Frozen Jumper" presents some ugly skittering electronics which rotate into exquisitely mangled forms before launching into an unsettling euphoria. The last piece "Motivation" is a towering sensitive work, simultaneously haunted and emotionally moving. Get On marks another monumental work in the ongoing evolution from one of the ground zero pioneers of contemporary radical electronic music. As uncompromising as ever, this is Pita in his prime. Emotion rung from the most twisted of frames. Artwork by Tina Frank. Recorded and mixed by Peter Rehberg at Twisted, Wien, 2018/2019; Mastered by Russell Haswell, July 2019; Cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin, August 2019.
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EMEGO 266LP
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"Heaven is a work of contemporary church music. Centrally occupied with the subject of death, its conceptualization was catalyzed by Dino Spiluttini's discovering his mother's preparations both for her own death and for his. He arrived at her home in 2015 to be led into the local church and shown the two adjacent places she had reserved for their urns. The tracks on Heaven together consist of an analogously personal and anticipatory negotiation with death. Partly derived from organ recordings made in the same church, the album frequently enlists Arvo Pärt's compositional method of tintinnabuli. Aside from the thematic logic of its sacred associations, the method suits Spiluttini's tendency, in spite of heavy and dynamic passages, to minimize tonal complexity. His characteristic uses of gnashing bass, restlessly irregular pacing and serrated distortion return. This time, they combine with pads, harps, fluttering organs and swooping choirs. Track titles throughout Heaven conjure intense emotional conflicts, especially those arising from experiences of embodiment. Touch isolation is a term for the toxic masculine stigma against platonic touch between men. If such a reference on an album preoccupied with death and afterlife raises the question of whether Spiluttini considers any touch -- let alone platonic -- to be possible in Heaven, the title 'Flesh Angel' perhaps answers it. As with 'Body at War' and 'Weakened Centurion', such a title positions the agitation of its music among ongoing struggles with body acceptance. Meanwhile, 'Rainbow Bridge' recalls the 1980s prose poem promising an eternal reunion in death with one's beloved lost pets. In context, these various indices seem to capture the yearning speculation that, as the nexuses of experience, bodies are not discarded in death; on the contrary, they achieve a state of perfection. Heaven revolves within dramatic and ever-changing vignettes. As church music, it lacks real communal participation or fidelity to hymnal text. Instead, it must come to terms with negation and eternity as dependable threats to generational and spatial distance, to personal struggles with earthly embodiment and to the anxious, hyperactive navigation of identity in late modernity." --Edward Trethowan Front photos and layout by Dino Spiluttini. Recorded, produced and mixed by Dino Spiluttini. Mastered by Rashad Becker.
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DOME 003LP
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With the demise of the group Wire in 1980, founder members Bruce Gilbert and Graham Lewis joined forces to create Dome. With the assistance of engineer Eric Radcliffe and his Blackwing Studio Dome took the ethic of "using the studio as a compositional tool" and recorded and released three Dome albums on their own label in the space of 12 months: Dome (July, 1980), Dome 2 (October, 1980), and Dome 3 (October 1981). A final fourth album, Will You Speak This Word: Dome IV was released on the Norwegian Uniton label in May 1983. These albums represent some of the most beautifully stark and above all timeless exercises in studio experimentation from early 1980s alternative music scene. Previously issued in the out-of-print Dome 1-4+5 box set in 2011. Floating-point re-master by Russell Haswell, August 2011. Cut at Dubplates & Mastering by Rashad Becker, August 2011. New artwork by Dave Coppenhall. Includes download card.
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EMEGO 268CD
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"Masochism is cruel because, in subverting the model, it imposes it with exaggerated severity..." --Amy Ireland
Florian Hecker's latest CD release continues his work with computational techniques for analysis and re-synthesis. In Inspection II, you hear the progressive reconstruction of original source material using algorithms based upon human hearing and designed to capture timbral characteristics of sound. As the source is iteratively extracted from featureless noise, a complex ongoing dialogue commences between formal model and empirical experience of sound. Like Charon, the boatman who ferries souls of the dead across the styx, Inspection II crosses perpetually from one bank to the other: from the formal anticipations of analysis to the unexpected artefacts of synthesis. In Robin Mackay's libretto, recited by a synthetic voice, this inspective dialogue is transferred to the introspective psychoanalytic situation, where the continual re-narration of the self creates further disturbances and transformations -- to attain a definitive image of oneself would be to face one's own death. As discussed in Amy Ireland's essay "Beside a Cold Statue" commissioned for the CD sleeve notes, this process, whose symptomatology is recognizably that of masochism, sees the coldness of the formal model subverted as Hecker's continual re-synthesis delivers up a series of harsh, tantalizing, and bewildering textures and timbres. 16-page booklet. Written and produced by Florian Hecker, 2016-17. Synthetic Voice: Christophe Veaux, CSTR, The University of Edinburgh. Liner notes: Amy Ireland. Mastering: Rashad Becker.
"Inspection II is a very particular composition which deserves a privileged position not only in relation to attempts to exhaust and remove the unknown borders of the sonic universe, but also among the various endeavors of Expanded Psychoanalysis. By transcending the unique authority of Freudian discourse, by alienating and synthesizing the dialogue of analyst and analysand, by penetrating the realm of that babble that is the obvious origin of human language and communication, designated by Jacques Lacan as lalangue, Inspection II discloses a space beyond representation, and hence beyond sense, intelligibility and significance. In order to imagine the inconceivable and unattainable unconscious of an apparently amorphous real that lies outside the structured network of reality with its mediating instances of the imaginary and symbolic orders, Florian Hecker's project suggests an all-pervading realm of sounds and noises considered as one of the purest utterances of existence. Closing the screen of the cerebral computer, psychoanalysis emerges as the hard disk's synaptic music, echoing the big bang of our psychic genesis." --August Ruhs (Psychiatrist, Psychoanalyst, University of Vienna)
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2LP
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EMEGO 262LP
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First time outing from two ardent explorers of peripheral sound tactics. Cylene is the first collaboration by François J. Bonnet (Kassel Jaeger) and Stephen O'Malley (Sunn O)))). Laid bare, you have a subtle and nuanced study of their individual practices forming a titanic whole. O'Malley's guitar inscribes a void that patiently opens up a spacious universe for Bonnet to discreetly alter with perception re-orientating studio maneuvers. Cylene is infinitely rewarding for those that succumb to its delicate detours. A vast glacial plain unfurls slowly upon the listener invoking a mood similar to the stillness found following despair. As Joseph Ghosn succinctly outlines in his liner notes, "Stephen and François deal in those moments and instants that happen after the violence, and the ugliness and the mess. Their music is about chaos being summoned and ordered. It is about the noise that nurtures your ears after a long heartbreaking pain. I have heard the sounds of wars being fought and the noises of hearts being broken, and I have never found a shelter as soothing as this music which makes me think of sunken ships and beauty found in the depths of oceans long forgotten." Art direction: Stephen O'Malley. Portrait photographer: Eléonore Huisse. Recorded at GRM Studios, Paris May 2018. Edited and mixed by François Bonnet at GRM studios, Paris August 2018. Mastering by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin January 2019.
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EMEGO 263CD
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On Proxy States, his third release on Editions Mego, Jung An Tagen continues to expand his unique vision of oblique electronic music mixed with future dance club sound. On Proxy States techno is evolving into another realm, manifesting as his most formulated attempt to combine modern composition techniques with ritualistic techno aesthetics. Here he takes his obsession with structure to a more narrative build-up, creating new paths and textures around his infectious beats. With this structure, Jung An Tagen develops an emotional relationship between repetition and dissonance -- it's addictive music, music in constant explosion. The 12 seconds of the first track, "Spill (False)" sound like a recreation of The Big Bang, creating the perfect intro for this molecular polyrhythmic adventure. It also creates the connection/disconnection with his previous work, Agent Im Objekt (EMEGO 248LP, 2018), bridging the two but also creating a space to embark on a new sonic trip. This self-contained explosion offers the right coordinates and propels the listener to Jung An Tagen's sonic realm. All of this is done with his usual fearless but mindful approach. His unique exercises with structure, time and sound create an ecstatic familiarity with the sounds while at the same time inducing a creeping physical alienation. In other words, some parts may be rhythmically infectious, others will give you no chance to immerse. The stimulation is astute and continuous, encouraging an out-of-this-world experience. The main arc of Proxy States consists of a 16 against 17 poly-rhythmic synth line that through different intonations of the kick drum always transforms its syntax. This synth line always scales up 1 key, in the middle of the track, foreseeing the upcoming structure. While these tracks (3, 4, 5, 6: "Wreath Products") follow an almost obsessive-compulsive order, the remaining tracks seem to blow up the structure entirely like the last scenes of the 1970 Michelangelo Antonioni's film Zabriskie Point, creating an event inside the event. Proxy States was impossible to press on vinyl but the fast, sharp and wild grooves of Jung An Tagen's new album are incredibly synched with the concept of an ever accelerating future. Mastering by Cam Deas, artwork and layout by Stefan Juster.
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LP
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EMEGO 264LP
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LP version. After a trilogy of spectacular explorations of relentlessly driving rhythms -- Sagittarian Domain (EMEGO 144CD/LP, 2012), Quixotism (EMEGO 202CD/LP, 2014), and Hubris (EMEGO 227CD/LP, 2016) -- Simian Angel finds Oren Ambarchi renewing his focus on his singular approach to the electric guitar, returning in part to the spacious canvases of classic releases like Grapes From The Estate (BT 036LP/TO 061CD) while also following his muse down previously unexplored byways. Reflecting Ambarchi's profound love of Brazilian music, Simian Angel features the remarkable percussive talents of Cyro Baptista, a key part of the Downtown scene who has collaborated with everyone from John Zorn and Derek Bailey to Robert Palmer and Herbie Hancock. Like the music of Nana Vasconcelos and Airto Moreira, Simian Angel places Baptista's dexterous and rhythmically nuanced handling of traditional Brazilian percussion instruments into an unexpected musical context. On the first side, "Palm Sugar Candy", Baptista's spare and halting rhythms wind their way through a landscape of gliding electronic tones, gently rising up and momentarily subsiding until the piece's final minutes leave Ambarchi's guitar unaccompanied. While the rich, swirling harmonics of Ambarchi's guitar performance are familiar to listeners from his previous recordings, the subtly wavering, synthetic guitar tone you hear is quite new, coming across at times like an abstracted, splayed-out take on the '80s guitar synth work of Pat Metheny or Bill Frisell. Equally new is the harmonic complexity of Ambarchi's playing, which leaves behind the minimalist simplicity of much of his previous work for a constantly-shifting play between lush consonance and uneasy dissonance. Beginning with a beautiful passage of unaccompanied percussion dominated by the berimbau, the side-long title piece carries on the first side's exploration of subtle, non-linear dynamic arcs, taking the form of a gently episodic suite, in which distinctive moments, like a lyrical passage of guitar-triggered piano, unexpectedly arise from intervals of drifting tones like dream images suddenly cohering. In the piece's second half, the piano tones become increasingly more clipped and synthetic, scattering themselves into aleatoric melodies that call to mind an imaginary collaboration between Albert Marcoeur and David Behrman, grounded all the while by the pulse of Baptista's percussion. Subtle yet complex, fleeting yet emotionally affecting, Simian Angel is an essential chapter in Ambarchi's restlessly exploratory oeuvre. Personnel: Oren Ambarchi - guitars & whatnot; Cyro Baptista - percussion & voice.
Recorded by Randall Dunn, Joerg Hiller, Iuri Oriente, and Oren Ambarchi. Photography by Traianos Pakioufakis. Design by Lasse Marhaug. Edited by Joerg Hiller and Oren Ambarchi at Choose Studios, Berlin. Mixed by Joe Talia and Oren Ambarchi at Good Mixture, Tokyo. Cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Executive Producers: Konrad Sprenger and Dick Wolf.
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Cassette
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EMEGO 263CS
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Cassette version. On Proxy States, his third release on Editions Mego, Jung An Tagen continues to expand his unique vision of oblique electronic music mixed with future dance club sound. On Proxy States techno is evolving into another realm, manifesting as his most formulated attempt to combine modern composition techniques with ritualistic techno aesthetics. Here he takes his obsession with structure to a more narrative build-up, creating new paths and textures around his infectious beats. With this structure, Jung An Tagen develops an emotional relationship between repetition and dissonance -- it's addictive music, music in constant explosion. The 12 seconds of the first track, "Spill (False)" sound like a recreation of The Big Bang, creating the perfect intro for this molecular polyrhythmic adventure. It also creates the connection/disconnection with his previous work, Agent Im Objekt (EMEGO 248LP, 2018), bridging the two but also creating a space to embark on a new sonic trip. This self-contained explosion offers the right coordinates and propels the listener to Jung An Tagen's sonic realm. All of this is done with his usual fearless but mindful approach. His unique exercises with structure, time and sound create an ecstatic familiarity with the sounds while at the same time inducing a creeping physical alienation. In other words, some parts may be rhythmically infectious, others will give you no chance to immerse. The stimulation is astute and continuous, encouraging an out-of-this-world experience. The main arc of Proxy States consists of a 16 against 17 poly-rhythmic synth line that through different intonations of the kick drum always transforms its syntax. This synth line always scales up 1 key, in the middle of the track, foreseeing the upcoming structure. While these tracks (3, 4, 5, 6: "Wreath Products") follow an almost obsessive-compulsive order, the remaining tracks seem to blow up the structure entirely like the last scenes of the 1970 Michelangelo Antonioni's film Zabriskie Point, creating an event inside the event. Proxy States was impossible to press on vinyl but the fast, sharp and wild grooves of Jung An Tagen's new album are incredibly synched with the concept of an ever accelerating future. Mastering by Cam Deas, artwork and layout by Stefan Juster.
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CD
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EMEGO 264CD
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After a trilogy of spectacular explorations of relentlessly driving rhythms -- Sagittarian Domain (EMEGO 144CD/LP, 2012), Quixotism (EMEGO 202CD/LP, 2014), and Hubris (EMEGO 227CD/LP, 2016) -- Simian Angel finds Oren Ambarchi renewing his focus on his singular approach to the electric guitar, returning in part to the spacious canvases of classic releases like Grapes From The Estate (BT 036LP/TO 061CD) while also following his muse down previously unexplored byways. Reflecting Ambarchi's profound love of Brazilian music, Simian Angel features the remarkable percussive talents of Cyro Baptista, a key part of the Downtown scene who has collaborated with everyone from John Zorn and Derek Bailey to Robert Palmer and Herbie Hancock. Like the music of Nana Vasconcelos and Airto Moreira, Simian Angel places Baptista's dexterous and rhythmically nuanced handling of traditional Brazilian percussion instruments into an unexpected musical context. On the first side, "Palm Sugar Candy", Baptista's spare and halting rhythms wind their way through a landscape of gliding electronic tones, gently rising up and momentarily subsiding until the piece's final minutes leave Ambarchi's guitar unaccompanied. While the rich, swirling harmonics of Ambarchi's guitar performance are familiar to listeners from his previous recordings, the subtly wavering, synthetic guitar tone you hear is quite new, coming across at times like an abstracted, splayed-out take on the '80s guitar synth work of Pat Metheny or Bill Frisell. Equally new is the harmonic complexity of Ambarchi's playing, which leaves behind the minimalist simplicity of much of his previous work for a constantly-shifting play between lush consonance and uneasy dissonance. Beginning with a beautiful passage of unaccompanied percussion dominated by the berimbau, the side-long title piece carries on the first side's exploration of subtle, non-linear dynamic arcs, taking the form of a gently episodic suite, in which distinctive moments, like a lyrical passage of guitar-triggered piano, unexpectedly arise from intervals of drifting tones like dream images suddenly cohering. In the piece's second half, the piano tones become increasingly more clipped and synthetic, scattering themselves into aleatoric melodies that call to mind an imaginary collaboration between Albert Marcoeur and David Behrman, grounded all the while by the pulse of Baptista's percussion. Subtle yet complex, fleeting yet emotionally affecting, Simian Angel is an essential chapter in Ambarchi's restlessly exploratory oeuvre. Personnel: Oren Ambarchi - guitars & whatnot; Cyro Baptista - percussion & voice.
Recorded by Randall Dunn, Joerg Hiller, Iuri Oriente, and Oren Ambarchi. Photography by Traianos Pakioufakis. Design by Lasse Marhaug. Edited by Joerg Hiller and Oren Ambarchi at Choose Studios, Berlin. Mixed by Joe Talia and Oren Ambarchi at Good Mixture, Tokyo. Cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Executive Producers: Konrad Sprenger and Dick Wolf.
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2LP
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RD6
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A biomedical scientist and an architect form a band in the early '70s with nothing by the way of traditional musical talent or skill but with endless enthusiasm and their own unique musical sensibility. The ensuing career and creative output of this ongoing home studio/bedroom band remains one of the most significant song based 'outre' catalogs ever produced in the United Kingdom. This comprehensive two LP set contains their first official LP (originally released on The Residents' legendary Ralph Records label) along with an extra album of different versions and extra tracks which reside here for the first time on vinyl. The duo Renaldo & The Loaf, originally Portsmouth-based, and now in Portsmouth and Mid-Wales, remain an enigma whilst amassing an enormous cult following worldwide. Their singular take on music encompasses wit, strange melodic construction and an off-kilter sensibility which successfully rendered them engaging for each emerging generation. The ability of Renaldo & The Loaf to unnerve and entertain in equal measure is what binds these songs to a musical universe outside of all other forms that existed around the time of release -- The Residents are obvious spiritual heirs. Songs For Swinging Larvae is a classic collection of confounding songs which lead the listener into a surreal world of twisted tunes and perverted pop. Songs From The Surgery is made up of improvisations, early/alternative versions of various Larvae tracks and unreleased pieces from the same period. The results leave one laughing through a thick veil of unease. As the original Ralph Records press release said of Songs For Swinging Larvae: "This is an album of primitive modernism, energetic obnoxious noises, manic high pitched vocals and sweet brilliance." All tracks written and produced By Renaldo And The Loaf, originally mixed at Elephant Studios, London, November 1980. Cover and layout by Nik Void, original album artwork by Gary Panter. Re-mastered for vinyl and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates and Mastering, Berlin, November 2018.
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