In stock
LP
Francis PLAGNE
“Udge”
Melbourne-based Francis Plagne returns to Horn of Plenty with possibly his strongest statement to date, Udge.
Since his appearance on the Australian scene in the early 2000’s Francis has pursued a unique trajectory, bridging left-field song-craft, experimental electronic composition and improvisation. In addition to solo works issued by Black Truffle, Penultimate Press, and his own Mould Museum imprint, he has worked in various collaborations with Andrew Chalk, crys cole, James Rushford, and Joe Talia. Defining the entirety of his output is the pursuit of radical autonomy, sculpting musical gestures, spanning numerous idioms, which take nothing for granted and manage, in each iteration, to declare their own territory and terms while acknowledging their place within a long continuum of musical practice.
Udge takes us further along the path carved out on the Rural Objects LP. Employing a similar palette of sounds, including that wild guitar synth, and a cameo from Joe Talia on drums. The record takes the form of two untitled side-long suites built from a series of portastudio jams and miniatures. Played against bristling passages of acoustic and electronic textures, fragments of melody and rhythm thread their way across the album’s length only to be broken and undermined by interventions into the tape onto which they were laid. Similar to Teo Macero’s electric Miles tape treatments or John Oswald’s restitching of The Grateful Dead, Udge is a deceptive work of musique concrète that sits adjacent to some of the more singular prog / RIO records by Nascita della Sfera, Albergo Intergalattico Spaziale, Roberts Owen, and Look de Bouk.
27,00€
In stock
LP
Francis PLAGNE
“The Refrain”
"Black Truffle proudly present The Refrain from Melbourne-based artist Francis Plagne, whose growing catalog of collaborative and solo releases range from song-based work to abstract audio collages. Closely aligned with Plagne's Moss Trumpet LP (released by Penultimate Press in 2018, PP 038LP), The Refrain's two side-long tracks mix sounds of the mundane with the otherworldly; rising, receding and overlapping. The result feels like being led through a series of scenes devoid of context or direction. Furthermore, it's hard to define the scenes as either inviting or disconcerting, as they're often both at the same time. As the record progresses sounds reappear and are juxtaposed so as to only hint at the familiar. A hall of mirrors, perhaps? Completed in 2020 using material recorded from 2012-2020, the record uses tapes of shelved, unfinished, and forgotten projects that featured field recordings from various locations, domestic sounds of plastic bottles, bubble wrap, creaking chairs, voice, and instrumental recordings, including an appearance from crys cole on Casio. These pieces were re-amped, processed and edited, then additional instrumental pieces featuring synths, guitars, plastic saxophone, melodica, and percussion were added, the results shaped into drifting, episodic assemblages. Although essentially a tape piece, The Refrain presents as a crude, non-idiomatic composition that feels both timeless and transitory. It's a million miles from the polish and rigor of GRM, perhaps more in line with Jacques Bekaert's eponymous Igloo LP, or Costin Miereanu's Luna Cinese. The Refrain could be read as a psychedelic Krapp's Last Tape; one man's response to listening through forgotten and discarded tapes, reflecting, reconciling, and forging a new path. A potent tonic for these absurd times." --Nick Hamilton, August 2021
25,00€
In stock
LP
Francis PLAGNE
“Moss Trumpet”
Having released four full length albums framed around more ‘‘song’ orientated spheres, Melbourne artist Francis Plagne has concurrently moved around collaborative endeavours with Andrew Chalk, Joe Talia and Crys Cole. He was also a part of that Food Court record released on Graham Lambkin’s Kye label in 2014. Which brings us to Moss Trumpet. Plagne’s first solo album which exclusively orbits a more abstract domain.
Taking inspiration from Costin Miereanu’s Luna Cinese this gentle curiosity records the private use of flute, harmonium, keyboards, microphones, organ, paper, percussion, recorder, synthesizer, tapes, tuba, voice, whistle and zither. Like Miereanu’s master stroke these recordings were then collated in semi-random layers creating shifting beds of subtle startling sound.
Moss Trumpet is a timeless affair, warm and woozy as if it is drifting over two sides where each could be either, where the audio perpetually falls in on itself creating a bed of sound inexplicably eschewing standard movement and progression as it unfolds out and around the listener.
Artwork by John Nixon. Mastered by Joe Talia.
Limited edition of 250 copies.
19,90€