In stock
LP
Iannis XENAKIS
“Hibiki Hana-Ma / Mycenae Alpha / Polytope de Cluny”
A1/ Hibiki Hana-Ma (1962)
A2/ Mycenae Alpha (1696)
B/ Polytope De Cluny (1978)
20,50€
In stock
LP
Iannis XENAKIS
“Diamorphoses / Concret PH / Orient Occident / Bohor”
A1/ Diamorphoses (1957)
A2/ Concret PH (1958)
A3/ Orient Occident (1961)
B/ Bohor (1962)
20,50€
In stock
LP
Iannis XENAKIS
“Persepolis”
2022 repress.
After “La Légende d’Eer” in 2016, the Perihel series presents one of the milestones of electroacoustic music: Iannis Xenakis’ mindblowing 54-minutes oeuvre “Persepolis”, mixed from the original 8 track tapes by Martin Wurmnest and mastered / cut by Rashad Becker.
“Persepolis” is the longest electroacoustic composition by Iannis Xenakis (1922-2001) who ranks among the most influential 20th century avantgarde composers. Commissioned by the Persian Shah, the piece was part of a multimedia performance – Xenakis’ so-called “polytopes” – which premiered in 1971 in Shiraz-Persepolis (Iran) as a performance including light-tracks, laser beams, groups of children walking around with torches and 59 loudspeakers to project the music in an open-air situation.
Xenakis had realized “Persepolis” on 8-track analogue tape in the Studio Acusti in Paris and released a stereo reduction on vinyl in the famous Philips series “Prospective 21e Siècle” in 1972, adding the new subtitle “We bear the light of the earth”, his most hymnal title ever.
Out of print for decades now, the LP became – especially the Japanese edition from 1974 – one of the most expensive collector’s item of electroacoustic music. There were some later CD versions with different durations – too long due to a wrong sample rate, others shortened by 3 minutes due to other reasons. The Perihel series now presents a new version: mixed from the original (!) master 8 track tapes by longtime zeitkratzer sound engineer Martin Wurmnest and mastered by Rashad Becker at D&M, Berlin – the same experts who had already taken care of the 2016 KarlRecords release of “La Légende d’Eer”, another milestone composition among the works of the Greek-French avant-garde composer.
20,50€
In stock
LP
Iannis XENAKIS
“La légende d’Eer”
2022 repress.
180gr LP incl. 4c insert + download code, 1000 items.
Release
2 in the Perihel series is one of the most famous electroacoustic compositions by Iannis Xenakis. Mixed by Martin Wurmnest, mastered & cut by Rashad Becker, “La Légende d’Eer” is available as vinyl (180gr, DL code, insert with liner notes by Reinhold Friedl) and download for the very first time.
When Iannis Xenakis (1922-2001), who had fought against the occupation as part of the communist Resistance, moved to Paris in 1947 it was the start of a highly creative and impressive career. Xenakis not only studied composition with Messiaen and became one of the most innovative composers of the 20th century, he also worked as assistant to Le Corbuser and realized a.o. the Philips Pavilion for the World Exhibition in Brussels 1958. His compositions often are based on mathematical principles (in 1966 he founded the CEMAMu - Centre d'Etudes de Mathématique et Automatique Musicales), which give his music an unprecedented aesthetic and “shocking otherness” (The Guardian). The most famous works of Xenakis, who won the Polar Music Prize (considered the unofficial Nobel Prize for music) in 1999, are his compositions for orchestra Metastasis, Pithoprakta and Terretektorh (where the 88 musicians are spread within the audience) and the electroacoustic compositions Persepolis (to be re-released later on as part of the Perihel series), Concret PH, Bohor and La Légende d’Eer where Xenakis integrated his stochastic synthesis sounds for the first time. As legendary as this piece itself is the impenetrable thicket of versions and stories around La Légende d’Eer - it exists in different releases, wrong sample rates, digitized backwards… this now is a new version, using the 8-track-version that Xenakis himself presented at Darmstädter Ferienkurse in August 1978. As the automatic spatialization is lost, this became the only original version of this composition and is presented here (mixed down to stereo by Martin Wurmnest who tried to preserve the spatial movements as perceptible as possible – mastered by Rashad Becker at D&M) for the very first time. La Légende d’Eer not only became a milestone of electroacoustic music but is also an important reference for noise and industrial musicians up to the present day!
20,50€
In stock
12"
Ilpo VAÏSÄNEN
“Keskipäivän hetken sumea vaillinaisuus”
"Keskipäivän hetken sumea vaillinaisuus" collects new dark ambient & industrial leaning tracks by Finnish producer Ilpo Väisänen (Pan Sonic).
21,00€
In stock
LP
Marc RICHTER
“Diode, Triode”
This album presents two multichannel works recorded at the seminal INA GRM Studio in Paris and ZKM Institute in Karlsruhe respectively, mixed to stereo at the composer's Cellule 75 Studio in Hamburg with excellent mastering by Rashad Becker. While his releases under the Black To Comm moniker often touched the fringes of acousmatic techniques and Musique Concrete this is Richter's first foray into a more abstract spatial music.
Recorded in the week leading up to the Paris terror attacks at the GRM studio, "Diode, Triode" (21:57) is loosely based on a reading of (and, in parts, a failure to understand) "Le Parasite" (1980) by Michel Serres, a philosophic metaphor about human interaction and communication (which can also be interpreted as a lyrical essay on capitalism; part confusion, part enlightenment).
As core elements Richter is using speech synthesis and the transformation and distortion of concrete sounds, instruments, voices and breathing. Abstract incognisable sounds are combined with strings, reeds and percussion while dismembered musical fragments emerge and vanish rapidly. Chunks of interfering noise are followed by long periods of silence; chaos and order are alternating. Choirs of synthetic and processed human voices are recounting stock market values, seemingly random sequences of numbers and inscrutable lyrics while parasitic sounds are trying to crack, collapse and fractionise the compositional stream and sonic interactions. Finally, a haunting piano chord is wrestling with a broken Publison machine. Like the book, it's part confusing, part enlightening - and a radical piece of sonic art.
"We are buried within ourselves; we send out signals, gestures, and sounds indefinitely and uselessly. No one listens to anyone else. Everyone speaks; no one hears; direct or reciprocal communication is blocked." (Le Parasite)
"Diode, Triode" was premiered on the Acousmonium at INA GRM's Akousma Festival in Paris, January 22, 2016 alongside new works by François Bayle, Robert Hampson, Leo Kupper and Ragnar Grippe.
The second piece "Spiral Organ of Corti" (17:00) has been composed in 2014 for the 47-speaker Klangdom concert hall at ZKM Karlsruhe at the foot of the Black Forest (where Richter was born and raised).
How does one listen with closed ears? Sine tones, alienated human voices and breathing noises build a labyrinthine puzzle alternating between the natural and the artificial. Human sounds merge with winds and strings, sine tones morph into metal sounds. Acoustic illusions confuse the listener, and dense noise-clouds slowly emerge from deceptive silence. Deep base sounds define space. Temporary focus glides into chaos. "Spiral Organ of Corti" is yet another extended composition that proves Richter is on a path of his very own.
"Spiral Organ of Corti" is dedicated to the late Gary Todd.
"Tongues that came from wind and noise. To speak in tongues after the fire." (Le Parasite)
Marc Richter records as Black To Comm for Thrill Jockey, Type and Dekorder and under the Mouchoir Ètanche and Jemh Circs monikers for his own Cellule 75 imprint. He collaborated with visual artists such as Ho Tzu Nyen, Jan van Hasselt and Mike Kelley. Under his own name he is composing for film and installations.
19,00€
In stock
LP
Luc FERRARI
“Solitude Transit”
Transversales Disques is very glad to announce the release of Solitude Transit unpublished archives by electroacoustic music pioneer Luc Ferrari. Music composed for contemporary dance, choregraphed by Anne-Marie Reynaud.
Affiliated with French Radio's Groupe de Musique Concrète, co-founder of the GRM with Pierre Schaeffer in 1958, Luc Ferrari (1929-2005) major figure of musique concrète and electroacoustic music broke away to pave his own path of individualistic expressions of minimalist music, musical theater, field recordings, orchestral music and soundtracks.
25,00€
Out of stock
LP
LETTERA 22
“Exposition of Clove”
Exposition of Clove is the new fast electro-acoustic album by the duo of Matteo Castro and Riccardo Mazza. Hailing from the farthest North-East glacial tip of Italy, Lettera 22 utilize elements of musique concrete sound sources, delicately sampled, looped and edited; resulting in five very subtle and rich compositions of textured noise and field recordings via analog tapes and feedback. Recorded and mastered in 2020 by Ricardo Mazza and Matteo Castro.
24,00€
In stock
LP
PANSTARRS
“Batee2”
Nervous + sensitive Egyptian synth wave with Arabic vocals by Panstarrs, solo project of Youssef Abouzeid who has previously appeared under different monikers such as Captain Solo or YZEID. This LP -- equal parts Suicide and Mohamed Mohie -- pushes Youssef's detached and melancholic signature sound along radical and unconventional arrangements further into bolder electronic horizons while pulverizing any notion of established verse chorus song structures. Youssef Abouzeid is a fixture of Cairo's musical underground and has been intensely active for over a decade whether via his countless musical acts -- of which, his personal project, Panstarrs is the most prolific -- or his homemade oscillator-loaded effects pedals "NMR". He is also a co-founder of the downtown Cairo independent art space, Hizz, and its affiliate cassette label. Through the years and incessantly, Youssef has not stopped refining his own idiosyncratic aesthetic and sound while going forward with his DIY activities and tours. Front cover by Hendrik Hegray. Vinyl master and lacquer cut by Frederic Alstadt, Angstrom Studio. Edition of 300.
24,00€
Out of stock
LP
Sam SHALABI
“Shirk”
Shirk is the new AOR flavored free improvisation solo album by Sam Shalabi, featuring Eric Chenaux and Nadah El-Shazly, where synth pop and sound poetry fester. Sam Shalabi is an Egyptian-Canadian composer, improviser and guitarist living between Montreal and Cairo. Starting out during the late '70s punk era, his work has evolved into an experimental synthesis of modern Arabic music that incorporates free improvisation, traditional Arabic music, noise, classical, text, and jazz. Other than his numerous solo albums, he is a founding member of Shalabi Effect, a free improvisation quartet that bridges western psychedelic music and Arabic Maqam. He has also released four albums with Land Of Kush, the experimental 30-member orchestra which he directs. He has appeared on over 30 albums and toured Europe, North America, and North Africa. Mastered by Mark Gergis. Vinyl master and lacquer cut by Frederic Alstadt, Angstrom Studio. Edition of 300.
24,00€
In stock
LP
SKULLFLOWER
“Ophidian Vibrations”
"Sound coiled and uncoiling, the (well) spring and trap set and first trilogy concluded with three wordless hymns to the Apep serpent, and the serpent power in general. Skullflower slithers and glides through their third LP for Nashazphone, always revolving like geologic time sufis, conjuring wrinkles and portals in the multiverses stiff unyielding fabric. As Brian Wilson still might sing 'she's givin' me serpent vibrations'." --Matthew Bower and Samantha Davies West Yorks, UK August 2021.
24,00€
Out of stock
LP
Tomoyuki AOKI & Harutaka MOCHIZUKI
s/t
Reissue of the now long sold-out debut album (2014) by the guitar and saxophone duo of Aoki Tomoyuki (Up-Tight) and Harutaka Mochizuki. Initially limited to 200 CD copies only, this record features nine, reverb drenched, mourning pieces characterized by this duo's specific melancholic language via guitar and alto saxophone. Immediately evoking the Velvet Underground inspired electric and echo filled ballads of Les Rallizes Dénudés, it is also augmented with haunting horn improvisations simultaneously reminiscent of Anthony Braxton and Kaoru Abe. Recorded at A.B.U. Studio, Hamamatsu: 2014. Vinyl master and lacquer cut by Frederic Alstadt, Angstrom Studio. Edition of 300.
24,00€
Out of stock
LP
Alvin CURRAN
“Drumming Up Trouble”
Black Truffle is thrilled to announce Drumming Up Trouble, the first release of previously unissued music by Alvin Curran on the label. Collecting works recorded between 2018-2021 and a side-long epic dating back to the early 80s, as the title suggests, Drumming Up Trouble focuses on a hitherto almost unknown aspect of Curran’s encyclopaedic and omnivorous musical world: his experiments with sampled and synthesised percussion. As Curran’s wonderful, wildly sweeping liner notes make clear, his fascination with drumming belongs to the radical investigation of music’s fundamental elements that has marked his output since the beginnings of MEV, who aimed (as he says in a recent interview) to return ‘in some collective way to a non-existent start time in the history of human music’. Whatever kind of music our proto-human ancestors played, he writes, ‘drums were front and centre in the mix. Drums rule!’
In a paradox typical of Curran’s approach, Drumming Up Trouble interrogates this most ancient dimension of music with contemporary technology. On the first side, we hear recent pieces performed using the sampling software and full-size MIDI keyboard setup Curran has refined since the 1980s. Two of them are wild real-time improvisations, primarily utilising an enormous bank of hip-hop samples. Building from polyrhythmic layers of drum machine fragments to wild cacophonies of clashing vocal samples, scratching, and frantic pitch shifting, these energetic and at times hilarious pieces occupy a space somewhere between John Oswald’s Plunderphonics, Pat Thomas and Matt Wand in the Tony Oxley Quartet, and the propulsive Kudoro/Grime fusion of Lisbon’s Príncipe label. They are improvisations are accompanied by two austere, minimal compositions realised in collaboration with Angelo Maria Farro: ‘End Zone’ for orchestral bass drum and high oscillator, and ‘Rollings’, where a snare roll is gradually stretched and filtered by digital means into ‘floating electronic gossamer’.
The incredible breadth of Curran’s output makes it pretty unlikely that a listener familiar with his work would be surprised to find it branching out in a new direction. But no degree of familiarity with his work can really prepare for side B’s epic and bizarre ‘Field it More’. It’s perhaps best to let the maestro describe this unhinged and infectious offering in his own words: ‘It features an 8 bar funky minimal riff à la James Brown, played on synth and an-out-of-tune piano, synced to a pre-paid patch on the Roland drum machine. Over this is laid a heavily processed track of the voices of dancer Yoshiko Chuma and movie-maker Jacob Burckhardt discussing an upcoming performance of theirs at the Venice film festival, capped by a track of my playing an increasingly out of control blues over the top of all of the above’. Only Pekka Airaksinen’s Buddhas of the Golden Light comes to mind as a reference point that might even vaguely compare to this wild home-brew of drum-machine funk, mad improvisation and squelching electronics, which eventually dissolved into a massive, layered cluster. Ancient and modern, synthetic and human, hysterical and rigorous, Drumming up Trouble is 100% Curran.
24,50€
In stock
LP
Arnold DREYBLATT & Paul PANHUYSEN
“Duo Geloso”
Black Truffle is thrilled to continue its program of archival releases from Arnold Dreyblatt with a recently unearthed concert recording from Dreyblatt and Paul Panhuysen’s "Duo Geloso". While isolated examples of Dreyblatt’s collaboration with the legendary Dutch multi-media artist appeared on the CD reissue of Propellers in Love and Black Truffle’s wide-ranging archival Second Selection, this is the first release to document the variety and playfulness of the concerts that Duo Geloso performed throughout Europe in 1987-88. Both working across sonic and visual forms, fascinated by numerical relationship and the infinite complexity of string harmonics, Dreyblatt and Panhuysen had a natural affinity for each other’s work, strengthened through Dreyblatt’s many visits to Het Apollohuis, the important experimental art space Panhuysen helped to found in Eindhoven. However, as René van Peer suggests in the liner notes enclosed within this release, Dreyblatt and Panhuysen took very different approaches to these shared interests; the wonderful energy of these Duo Geloso performances results from the meeting of Dreyblatt’s more austere, compositional process with Panhuysen’s spontaneity.
Recorded at a concert at Het Apollohuis in December 1987 (a series of beautiful photographs of which adorn the LP’s packaging), each of the six pieces presented here is distinctive in terms of instrumentation and performance approach. Using electric guitar and bass tuned by Dreyblatt and played using E-Bow and Panhuysen’s motorised plectrums, the opening ‘Razorburg’ moves slowly through a long series of held notes with a madly insistent tremolo that crosses Dick Dale with a mechanised take on the layered guitars of Günter Schickert. The same pair of instruments returns on ‘Duo for Guitars’, where the mechanised attacks dissolve into a harmonic wash, reminiscent of the machine guitar work of fellow Het Apollohuis alumni Remko Scha. On ‘Love Call’, the guitars and bass are accompanied by Panhuysen’s distant warbled vocals, familiar to Maciunas Ensemble listeners. On the remarkable ‘Synsonic Batterie’, Panhuysen begins proceedings with a solo barrage of electronic percussion on the Synsonics Drum Machine (a simple drum synthesiser produced by the toy manufacturer Mattell), joined eventually by Dreyblatt performing his signature percussive natural harmonics on pedal steel guitar. When Panhuysen adds his bird whistle to the mix, the performance becomes the perfect exemplar of the Duo Geloso’s unique mix of studious close listening and subtle absurdity.
Presented in a gatefold sleeve with archival photos and illuminating liner notes from René van Peer.
24,50€
In stock
LP
Dewa ALIT & Gamelan SALUKAT
“Chasing the Phantom”
Dewa Alit, Bali’s master of contemporary Gamelan composition, returns to Black Truffle with Chasing the Phantom, presenting two recent works played by the composer’s Gamelan Salukat, a large ensemble that performs on instruments specially built to his designs, using a unique tuning system that combines notes from two traditional Balinese Gamelan scales. Alit explains that the ensemble’s name suggests “a place to fuse creative ideas to generate new, innovative works” and both compositions demonstrate the composer’s ability to wring stunning new possibilities from variations on the traditional Gamelan ensemble. While using familiar elements of Balinese Gamelan music, such as unison scalar melodies and stop-start dynamics, Alit’s music is overflowing with harmonic, rhythmic, and timbral inventions, the latter often facilitated by unorthodox playing techniques.
“Ngejuk Memedi”, an English translation of which gives the LP its title, results from Alit’s reflection on the complex relationship between tradition and modernity in Balinese culture, particularly in the way that belief in the phantoms or spirits known as ‘memedi’ are shared through social media using digital technologies. Embodying this uncanny co-existence, the opening passages of the piece are at once immediately recognisable in their use of the metallophones of the Gamelan ensemble and strikingly reminiscent of electronics in their timbre and movement. At points, what we hear seems to have been fragmented with digital tools, or even to originate in some incessantly glitching DX7. Short melodic figures loop irregularly, with the ensemble splintering into polyrhythmic shards before unexpectedly recombining for intricate unison passages. After several minutes of this manically tinkling metallic sound world, the metallophones are joined by drums for a meditative passage of lower dynamics, as the uniformly high pitch range explored in the opening sections gradually opens up to include resonant low gong hits. Recovering some of the manic energy of the opening, but now enhanced with the full range of percussion, the piece weaves through a series of tempo changes to a stunning passage of rapid-fire melodies and ringing chords that sweep across the metallophones, their unorthodox tuning creating complex clouds of wavering harmonies.
“Likad”, written during Covid-19 lockdowns, channels anxiety and uncertainty into musical form, resulting in a piece that, even by Alit’s standards, is stunning in its complexity and the virtuosity it demands of Gamelan Salukat. Its opening section is perhaps most remarkable for its mastery of texture, with rapid transitions between dry, muted strikes and metallic shimmers calling to mind the use of filters in electronic music. At points, the complex irregular repetitions of short melodic patterns, where the music seems to get stuck or be suddenly interrupted by a skip, recall the mad sampler works of Alvin Curran or the skittering surface of prime period Oval more than anything familiar from acoustic percussion music. Moving through a dizzying series of twists and turns, the piece ends with a majestic sequence of chords possessing an almost hieratic power. A major statement from a radical contemporary composer, one cannot help but agree with Alit when he sees Chasing the Phantom as an answer to the “question of the future of Gamelan music”.
24,00€
In stock
LP
BERGISCH-BRANDENBURGISCHES QUARTETT
“Live ’82”
Black Truffle is pleased to announce a major archival discovery from the wildest outer fringes of the FMP universe, the Bergisch-Brandenburgisches Quartett’s Live ’82.
The Bergisch-Brandenburgisches Quartett (BBQ) was formed in 1980 in Rostock, East Germany, when three of the most radical and riotous members of the West German free music scene—reedist/accordionist Rüdiger Carl, percussionist Sven-Åke Johansson and Hans Reichel on violin and his modified ‘strange guitars’ — first played as a quartet with East German saxophonist Ernst-Ludwig Petrowsky. A rare example of a working band with members from both sides of the wall, during its lifetime the BBQ left only one recorded document, a studio LP on Amiga, the pop and jazz sublabel of the GDR state-run Deutsche Schallplatten Berlin. Neither pure fire music nor orthodox free improvisation, the four members of the BBQ shared an all-embracing aesthetic where quotes and jokes sat comfortably alongside radical extended techniques and sonic experiments.
Beautifully recorded at the 1982 Moers festival, the music presented here is a kaleidoscopic demonstration of what Johansson has called the BBQ’s ‘free postmodernism’. Beginning with a fractured landscape of clarinet flourishes from Petrowsky, Johansson’s spacious drums accents, banjo-esque plucks from Reichel’s handmade guitar and the groans and squawks of Carl on cuica, the music lurches between flowing melodicism and stunted locked grooves, settling after a few minutes into a lyrical clarinet and bass clarinet duet accompanied by shimmering guitar chords and some inexplicable percussive rotations. When Petrowksy starts to unfurl long, flowing flute lines accompanied by hand percussion, the music suddenly recalls Don Cherry’s global fusions, but this turn to the folkish quickly takes on a more European character when Carl and Johansson pick up accordions for the first of several comical but oddly moving duets. The more frantic second half of the set takes in a raucous digression into honking R&B, an Ayler-meets-Schlager romp with almost rockish chordal accompaniment from Reichel and an outrageous free jazz blowout with Carl on accordion, not to mention episodes of Johansson’s signature improvised Sprachgesang and antics with his expanded percussion set up, including items such as shoe stretchers and the Berlin yellow pages, which more than once cause the audience to burst into laughter. Arriving in a beautifully designed sleeve with copious archival photographs and flyers from Johansson’s collection and extensive new liner notes from Francis Plagne, Live ’82 is a major historical document that remains both musically challenging and immensely entertaining forty years on.
26,00€
In stock
2 LP
Léo KUPPER
“Electronic Works & Voices 1977-1987”
Perfect follow up to our precedent 2LP (Electronic Works & Voices 1961-1979), this release highlights Leo Kupper's earliest compositions with his GAME machine - Générateur Automatique de Musique Electronique (Automatic Generatorof Electronic Music) constructed during the 1960's. Purely electronic sounds into new structures, Leo Kupper shows through his 4 tracks a real spirit of renewal.
Leo Kupper was born in Nidrum, Hautes Fagnes (Eastern Belgium)`on the 16th of April 1935. He studied musicology at the Liège Conservatory, then became the assistant of Henri Pousseur who, in 1958, had just founded the Apelac Studio in Brussels. Kupper started to work on his first pieces there, but he would finalize them only upon putting together his own studio in 1967: the Studio de Recherches et de Structurations Electroniques Auditives (which means 'studio of audio electronic research & structuring'). That is where he would compose, to this day, over forty works, most of them on instruments of his own design. In the '70s and '80s, he built a series of Sound Domes (briefly established in Rome, Linz, Venice, and Avignon), places where every sound, every phonem uttered by the listening audience was transformed by hundreds of loudspeakers of various sizes organized in a dome shape.
This device transformed sounds through space AND time: something said could be morphed into another sound hours, days, perhaps years later.
Leo had envisioned that a device like his, a place for contemplation, would be much-needed in cities where Nature had been evacuated.
In the late '70s, after discovering Iranian music master Hussein Malek, Kupper became one of the very few Western virtuosos of the santur.
His first pieces were released by Deutsche Grammophon and, later, Igloo.
His latest works have been released by the New York-based label Pogus.
The GAME machine
In 1961, having terminated his musicology studies, Leo Kupper left Liège for Brussels. By that time, centres for music research such as those in Cologne, Paris and Milan had already produced works of experimental music, where pioneers were forging new and diverse routes in electronic music, 'musique concrète' and electro-vocal music. The GAME machine - Générateur Automatique de Musique Electronique (Automatic Generator of Electronic Music) was constructed during such period and spirit of renewal and technical exploration. The GAME consisted of a collection of variable 'sonic cells' sensitive to modulations of positive and negative voltages and programmable manually through the aid of colour-coded cables. Complex electronic loops and sound from loudspeakers and from microphone pick-ups were then either recorded by tape-machines or performed and interpreted by musicians who opened automatic channels, thus triggering automatic sound to exit the speakers. This in turn penetrated the machines by means of microphones and was replayed. Here then was an entirely new way of playing a musical instrument and how the works here were composed and performed.
20,00€
In stock
LP
COMPILATION
“Exploring Gong Culture of Southeast Asia: Massif and Archipelago”
Recorded by Yasuhiro Morinaga + intro by David Toop
Gongs have played an integral role in the mythogeography of Asia. This is not music that aligns with national borders or ideas of homogenous populations, let alone racial stereotypes and exotic clichés. What connects all of these tracks is a simultaneous feeling of entrancement and social cohesion. Communal and collaborative, its form is hypnotically repetitious, melodies and rhythms spread out among the players using the technique of hocketing in which a flowing line is distributed among all the musicians. The effect is mesmerising, immediately intoxicating to anybody who loves Chicago footwork, free improvisation, Sun Ra or young hip hop producer Jetsonmade. The music is simple yet mysterious and enveloping, a sound world in which to disappear. A theory exists but this is not explained.
David Toop (extracts from the liner notes)
This project, Massif and Archipelago, is a field recording project initiated by Japanese sound artist Yasuhiro Morinaga, documenting traditional gong music by different Southeast Asian ethnic groups. The project aimed to examine the impact of the natural and social environment on the gong music culture of Southeast Asia.
During the project, he visited over 50 different ethnic groups and made hundreds of recordings. This album presents a selection of the unique gong music from different ethnic minorities.
The selected music has been divided into two broad sections: one focussing on the music from the Massif, i.e. mainland Southeast Asia (Central Highland of Vietnam and Northeast Cambodia), the other on music from the Archipelago, maritime Southeast Asia (the Luzon Islands of the Philippines, Borneo, Sulawesi, and the Flores Islands of Indonesia).
16,00€
In stock
LP
Chantal ACDA & Eric THIELEMANS
“Koyaanisqatsi, A New Score”
Dark-folk songwriter Chantal Acda and beyond drums-percussion musician extraordinaire Eric Thielemans propose a new score for Koyaanisqatsi, re-actualising the incredibly beautiful, raw, rhythmic and touching images of this 80-ties cinematographic masterpiece.
Slow deep electric waves, lonely synths in sonic desert landscapes, rhythmic pulses, transporting drums and bells, and deeply longing sounds and voices make up the audible fundamentals of this imagined, neo shamanic, ritualistic music to accompany the Earth as it keeps on supporting our post human frenetics even today.
This release contains a selection of the musical material scored for a live performance together with the screening of the movie. The live performance premiered on Film Festival Gent and Vooruit in the fall of 2022.
16,00€
In stock
LP
Phil MAGGI
“The Encrimsoned”
Sound architect and filmmaker from Liège, Belgium Phil Maggi is known as the lead singer of heavy-rock combo Ultraphallus. He has shared the bill with Jerusalem In My Heart, Keith Rowe, Phill Niblock, Tuxedomoon, Sote, Thisquietarmy, and many others. 'The Encrimsoned' is the second part of his diptych inspired by Henry Corbin's writings, which started with his previous album 'Animalwrath' (Sub Rosa SR423).
The Encrimsoned is a four-track album, harboring a few musical friends and usual collaborators (Maja Jantar, Tom Malmendier, Radwan Ghazi Moumneh, Sebastien Schmit, Gabriel Séverin, Xavière Fertin). Ranging from free-jazz to ambient-electronic contemporary art sound, this adventurous second and final chapter is an homage to Hardy Fox, pioneer and primary composer for The Residents.
LP Milky White Vinyl
16,00€
Out of stock
LP
Konstantin RAUDIVE
“The Voices of the Dead”
Original archives from Konstantin Raudive and Gerhard Stempnik + remixes by David Toop, DJ Spooky, CM von Hausswolff, Calla, Lee Ranaldo
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 our archives.
WHO WAS RAUDIVE ?
Dr. Konstantin 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 his book Breakthrough in 1971. His early collaborator F. Jurgenson, whom he met by the very beginning of 1965, awakened Dr. 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 72,000 samples!), Raudive's mother seems to be statistically the most frequently reported contact personality. She usually addressed her son in the Latgalian
WHAT WE CAN FIND IN THAT RECORD ?
1. A self introduction of Konstantin Raudive and a large session of exemples from his archives - July 17, 1965)
2. 9 extracts from the Gerhard Stempnik experiments - musician of the Berlin Philharmonic and close friend of Raudive (tapes from 1980)
3. A Raudive celebration including unpublished material by Scanner, Paul D. Miller aka dj Spooky/That subliminal kid, Calla, Lee Ranaldo (of Sonic Youth), Ensemble, Ramdom Inc., David Toop, Carl Michael von Hausswolff and Brett Dean. They have all composed an exclusive piece of music based on the Raudive material. It goes from a close examination of the material itself (CM Von Hausswolff, Lee Ranaldo) to a more evocative mood (Calla, Scanner, dj Spooky). The last piece, for viola solo, is a global homage to all the explorators of the unknown.
16,00€
Out of stock
LP
Milan KNIZAK
“Broken Music”
*** 2022 restock ***
Milan Knizak (born 19 April 1940) is a Czech performance artist, sculptor, musician, installation artist, dissident, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art.
Before everyone else – Christian Marclay, Philip Jeck, eRikm, Martin Tétreault, Otomo Yoshihide – there was Milan Knizak. In 1964, Milan Knizak, a member of Fluxus from behind the Iron Curtain, sat down on a sidewalk near the Charles Bridge in Prague, laid down a paper carpet right into the street, and starts tearing pages out of books and burning them… Around the same time, he began to create music from defective, worn, damaged or broken LP's. These Broken Music compositions, his classic collages of noises created during performances and happenings, are widely regarded as important sound art documents on record.
‘In 1963-64 I used to play records both too slowly and too fast and thus changed the quality of the music, thereby creating new compositions. In 1965 I started to destroy records: scratch them, punch holes in them, break them. By playing them over and over again (which destroyed the needle and often the record player too) an entirely new music was created - unexpected, nerve-racking, aggressive and even humorous. Compositions lasting one second or almost infinitely long (as when the needle got stuck in a deep groove and played the same phrase over
and over). I developed this system further. I began sticking tape on top of records, painting over them, burning them, cutting them up and gluing different parts of records back together, etc. to achieve the widest possible variety of sounds’. Milan Knízak, Broken Music
16,00€
In stock
LP
GAMMELSÆTER & MARHAUG
“Higgs Boson”
Runhild Gammelsæter and Lasse Marhaug are two Norwegian musicians/sound artists. Both started in the early 1990s music underground and have worked in many constellations with a wide range of collaborators.
Despite knowing each other for a long time, Gammelsæter and Marhaug’s first collaborative work was the “Quantum Entanglement” LP in 2014. The album ignited a collective spark that both wanted to pursue further. Still, other commitments got in the way, and the project lay dormant until Stephen O’Malley, and Greg Anderson invited them to open for Sunn O))) for a special gig in the St. James Church of Culture in Oslo in the autumn of 2019. The two gathered for a long series of rehearsals, and after the successful performance, it was clear that it was time to start working on new compositions and recordings. That process initiated in late 2019 and continued to early 2021, encompassing before and after the world went through the lockdown. The result of this long development to be heard accumulated upon their new album “Higgs Boson” on Ideologic Organ Music.
Throughout the profound process of creating “Higgs Boson”, Gammelsæter and Marhaug drew inspiration from various subjects and artists. For Marhaug, it was concepts informed by the structuralist experimental cinema of Japanese directors Takashi Ito and Toshio Matsumoto, futurist worlds of French comic book artists Philippe Druillet and Jean Moebius Giraud, landscape photography of Fay Godwin, Kåre Kivijärvi, and Tamiko Nishimura, amongst others.
It became a metaphysical juxtaposition involving Gammelsaeter’s research and lyrical ideas based on several seemingly unrelated principles. A process of association inspired by “the Glass Bead Game” by Herman Hesse. The discovery of the Higgs Boson as a confirmation of the physical universe. The work of Ernst Schrödinger on the uncertainty principle. The four forces of physics. The Force. Helplessness under armed forces - as the war sailors in World War II. The influence of magic as expressed in tarot.
Gammelsæter experiments with a boundary involving the thresholds amongst various states of focus and legibility by forensic experimentation with techniques such as exclusive expression of consonants, syllabic repetition, retrograde text vocalisations and multi-lingual layering. Her vocal inspirational sources include Sidsel Endresen, Diamanda Galas, Natacha Atlas, the choral works of Rachmaninov, and the bands Carcass and Grave.
Two worlds coming together, making the music special. Mixing hard facts with science fiction helps create a kaleidoscopic cross point between the complex realities of the past and a possible future.
“Quantum Entanglement” featured two long-form pieces centred around a prepared piano and layered voice, while “Higgs Boson” developed a much more elaborate and ambitious compositional work. Across eight parts, the two artists brought a broad palette of instrumentation and sound. Electronic and acoustic, objects and field recordings, and pipe organ define the structures of which the centre is Gammelsæter’s magnificent voice. She has become known for her legendary voice, with her vast and unique range of inflective techniques and affective colour through her 30 years creating music. In the mix, Lasse approached the instrumental elements like landscapes, then Runhild’s vocals as characters that inhabit those worlds. Often, Gammelsæter multiple characters fused with the landscape. Make them occupy space, sometimes blend into it, sometimes dominate it. Constructing and setting visual guidelines helps set focus and open possibilities.
As an album, “Higgs Boson” is direct and focused, drawing on song structures. Within these tracks are vast strata of sound, an immersive multi-dimensional depth of music. Creating a feeling of depth while working with a flat two-channel stereo format - and how dimensions of texture and distortion can help develop the illusion of a space. The album structure is a story-like arc, a malleable subjective path, set as the album traverses oblique and suggestive areas, opening the concepts for the listener to unpack as they like.
– exclusive consultation with Gammelsæter & Marhaug, edited by Stephen O’Malley, June 2022
Runhild Gammelsæter – vocals, guitar, bells, digital piano/organ and processing
Lasse Marhaug – electronics, synth, objects and mixing
21,00€
In stock
2 LP
Jérôme NOETINGER
“Sur quelques mondes étranges”
The music on this long-awaited solo vinyl album by legendary tape artist Jérôme Noetinger was recorded live in the studio with no overdubs. Signals were sent through tube broadcast monitors and picked up with room microphones. Produced by Tobias Levin. Cover by Meeuw.
--
Long-time touchstone of international experimental music presents his monolithic (and first) solo vinyl Sur quelques mondes étranges on Felix Kubin’s Gagarin Records. Jérôme Noetinger is known to most for the audio-visual trio Cellule d’Intervention Metamkine, alongside his countless recorded & live collaborations, compositions for radio & stage, and breathtaking multi-channel diffusions in the acousmatic tradition.
Discovering the ReVox B77 tape machine as his tool for live electro-acoustic music in 1987, Noetinger has doggedly investigated his instrument over 35 years, establishing him as a vital contemporary composer/performer of the medium. His work is radical and interrogatory, using a pan-historical array of analogue devices to construct soundworlds which sidestep digital monochrome, landing in a galaxy of simmering malfunction, dynamic physicality & rhythmic debris. Programming Le 102 in Grenoble for over a decade, as well as directing Metamkine distribution for over three, his encyclopaedic knowledge of manifold sonic traditions is on display here; unified by a staunch discipline, impressive dedication and flat rejection of empty trends.
The results synthesise his tireless timbral research into 11 striking sonic investigations which combine modern studio possibilities with years of performance experience worldwide. An ominous malaise hovers over proceedings; yet it never feels nihilistic, presenting solutions which electrify the listener with ecstatic discovery. The perceptual orchestration therein - from throwing our ears right against the body of the tape machine to flinging them into cavernous space alive with the aurally strange - is both delirious & calming. Noetinger is all too aware things are bad, but his drive for discovery and joyous belief in music somehow coruscates brilliantly through contemporary gloom.
Meticulously recorded & produced with Tobias Levin in Hamburg, Sur quelques mondes étranges presents a detailed & rich vocabulary both real & unreal: gesture & repetition, structure & collapse, familiar & uncanny all dance with each in the most pumping discothèque concrète in this universe. This is a powerful and exacting statement from an elegant composer & extraordinary musician who has humbly dedicated his life to his practice.
– Anthony Pateras
30,00€
In stock
LP
BEUYS + PISSOFF
“Creamcheese Düsseldorf 1968”
The experimental project Pissoff was founded in the late '60s by multimedia-artist Eberhard Kranemann and some friends who studied together at the Düsseldorf Academy Of Fine Arts. The chaotic, loud, and, sound-wise, undisciplined band took part in various events at this location and other places. Due to the intense fluctuation of band-members the performances by Pissoff were characterized by continuously changing participants and variations of the involved equipment: cello, violin, clarinet, tenor saxophone, flute, vocals, electric guitar, electric bass guitar, organ, and drums.
In 1968, Pissoff performed together with Joseph Beuys, who was professor of sculpture at the Art Academy at that time. During this incomparable audiovisual interaction Joseph Beuys staged his Handaktion: in concentrated manner he moved his hands in front of his head while listening and visually reacting to the very loud and abstract staccato-rhythms by Pissoff. The event was recorded by Eberhard Kranemann on a Telefunken mono-tape-recorder and remains the only existing audio-material by Pissoff until today. On that night Eberhard played cello, clarinet, and tenor saxophone while the other members added sounds by electric guitar, electric bass, and drums.
Earliest musical experimentations that can be defined as the origins of the band Kraftwerk already started in 1967 by Eberhard Kranemann and Florian Schneider-Esleben. Sometimes Kranemann invited Florian Schneider-Esleben to join Pissoff.
22,50€
Out of stock
LP
Conrad SCHNITZLER & PHARMAKUSTIK
“Schubkraft”
“Kontraktion” and “Extruder” are the results of various tape-sessions by Conrad Schnitzler and Siegmar Fricke in Con’s former studio Leberstrasse in Berlin.The soundscapes on both records (produced in November 1986 and July 1987 with EMS-Synthi A, Korg MS 10 + MS 20 + delays) contain all the machinistic energy and infernal industrial sound-eruptions similar to Conrad’s first three albums “Schwarz”, “Rot” and “Blau” and to the rumbling train wheel rhythms of “Zug” (from the “Red Cassette” 1974). The albums also carry the spirit of the first “Cluster” album (released in 1971 on Philips) due to the imposing bruitiste elements and uneasy sci-fi atmospheres.
“Schubkraft”, the third and final album of the Schnitzler/Pharmakustik-triology (recorded during the same sessions in Berlin) contains two long pieces of thrust generated force and propulsive power. Soundwise an album combining mechanically driven rhythms and propelling velocity with rusty organic textures. The shiny yellow cover reflects the sheer explosive drive of the audio-material.
The complete session-material has been refurbished, restructured and recombined by Siegmar Fricke at Pharmakustik-studio Germany.
22,50€
In stock
2 LP
NURSE WITH WOUND
“Gyllensköld, Geijerstam And I At Rydberg’s” (silver)
Silver and black record
*
"This 1983 period in which Gyllensköld was recorded was a fantastic time for the evolution of Steven Stapleton's audio art. His collaborations with Diana Rogerson, Robert Haigh (Sema), David Tibet, and Thirlwell around this time elicited some of the most exciting work Nurse With Wound had yet recorded. Listen to this material and compare it to Chance Meeting and it becomes clear that in just a few years, Stapleton's art had grown by leaps and bounds. The production quality on these tracks is remarkable, and the widening out of the NWW soundworld opened up a whole new audio toybox that Stapleton has continued to experiment with up to today. This new sound encompasses vocal experiments, vintage LPs of easy listening music, demented nursery rhymes, lateral references to disposable pop music, avant-garde jazz and minimalistic piano composition, all glued together with evocative atmospheres redolent of things unholy, troubling and perverse, but always oddly indefinable and puzzlingly misshapen. In retrospect, Gyllensköld can be seen as the beginning of the 'mature;' period of NWW, and thus it is an indispensable release for fans of the project. Perhaps influenced by the obsessions of his friend and collaborator Tibet, Stapleton also began weaving religious and occult references into his usual name-dropping of avant-garde artists and movements . . . NWW's Gyllensköld comes across at times as the soundtrack to a schizoid episode: disembodied voices intoning nonsense, floating subliminally across the stereo channels, or cackling in evil delight. The sounds are denser here than on earlier works such as Homotopy To Marie. Areas of silence are mostly gone, replaced by layers of drone, cartoonish noises and mutated voices. 'Several Odd Moments Prior to Lunch' opens the brief album, setting the stage with its lysergically altered vocals and a frightening, yawning chasm of haunted, spectral sound. Stapleton, Thirlwell, and company learned how to wield the studio like an instrument on these and other recordings of the period. Effects such as reverb, delay, ring modulation and backwards tracking are utilized to create evolving textures and darkly psychedelic dreamspaces. 'Phenomenon of Aquarium and Bearded Lady' utilizes a number of instruments, including horns and piano, to create a bizarre dislocated funeral dirge in which the sounds of a slowly cycling jack-in-the-box are not out of place. For fans of musicians like Jacques Berrocal, who prefer their free jazz with a heavy dose of whacked-out eccentricity, this is about as good as it gets. 'Dirty Fingernails' is something else entirely, a longform exploration of outré textures, combining mysterious trebly noises with percussive bleeps of mysterious origin." --Brainwashed
35,00€
Out of stock
2 LP
NURSE WITH WOUND
“Gyllensköld, Geijerstam And I At Rydberg’s”
"This 1983 period in which Gyllensköld was recorded was a fantastic time for the evolution of Steven Stapleton's audio art. His collaborations with Diana Rogerson, Robert Haigh (Sema), David Tibet, and Thirlwell around this time elicited some of the most exciting work Nurse With Wound had yet recorded. Listen to this material and compare it to Chance Meeting and it becomes clear that in just a few years, Stapleton's art had grown by leaps and bounds. The production quality on these tracks is remarkable, and the widening out of the NWW soundworld opened up a whole new audio toybox that Stapleton has continued to experiment with up to today. This new sound encompasses vocal experiments, vintage LPs of easy listening music, demented nursery rhymes, lateral references to disposable pop music, avant-garde jazz and minimalistic piano composition, all glued together with evocative atmospheres redolent of things unholy, troubling and perverse, but always oddly indefinable and puzzlingly misshapen. In retrospect, Gyllensköld can be seen as the beginning of the 'mature;' period of NWW, and thus it is an indispensable release for fans of the project. Perhaps influenced by the obsessions of his friend and collaborator Tibet, Stapleton also began weaving religious and occult references into his usual name-dropping of avant-garde artists and movements . . . NWW's Gyllensköld comes across at times as the soundtrack to a schizoid episode: disembodied voices intoning nonsense, floating subliminally across the stereo channels, or cackling in evil delight. The sounds are denser here than on earlier works such as Homotopy To Marie. Areas of silence are mostly gone, replaced by layers of drone, cartoonish noises and mutated voices. 'Several Odd Moments Prior to Lunch' opens the brief album, setting the stage with its lysergically altered vocals and a frightening, yawning chasm of haunted, spectral sound. Stapleton, Thirlwell, and company learned how to wield the studio like an instrument on these and other recordings of the period. Effects such as reverb, delay, ring modulation and backwards tracking are utilized to create evolving textures and darkly psychedelic dreamspaces. 'Phenomenon of Aquarium and Bearded Lady' utilizes a number of instruments, including horns and piano, to create a bizarre dislocated funeral dirge in which the sounds of a slowly cycling jack-in-the-box are not out of place. For fans of musicians like Jacques Berrocal, who prefer their free jazz with a heavy dose of whacked-out eccentricity, this is about as good as it gets. 'Dirty Fingernails' is something else entirely, a longform exploration of outré textures, combining mysterious trebly noises with percussive bleeps of mysterious origin." --Brainwashed
29,00€
Out of stock
LP
Lasse MARHAUG
“Context”
Lasse Marhaug is one of those characters that operates at the nexus of so much stuff that’s important to us here - working as a producer (over the last couple of years alone he’s helped shape albums by Jenny Hval, Kelly Lee Owens, Okkyung Lee, Hillary Woods etc etc), a mastering engineer (far too many releases to mention), a prolific sleeve designer (likewise), publisher (his occasional Personal Best magazine is still going strong) and, perhaps most importantly - a recording artist in his own right. ‘Context’ is his most substantial release in years - a crushing assembly of bone-dry/darkside drone/machine malfunctions that’s bursting with a visceral, throbbing, mass of feeling. If yr into anything on the spectrum from Mika Vainio to Grouper to Kevin Drumm or Deathprod - this one’s as good as it gets
Over almost three decades of activity, Marhaug has carved out notoriety as a solo performer, a prolific collaborator (working with everyone from Sunn O))) to Jim O’Rourke) and as a busy producer, who’s notched up credits on some of the most striking-sounding albums of the last few years. This new album was created as a swan song for the infamous Oslo studio that he’s inhabited for 17 years, prior to his move back to the Arctic Circle where he originally came from. Recorded over a 14-month period and painstakingly edited from hours upon hours of material, it might just be the most impressive, moving record we’ve heard from him so far.
The interplay between piercing softness and deafening noise is the key to “Context”, displaying a philosophy Marhaug has been exploring for years. Few other artists are able to balance chaos and harmony with such ease; Marhaug does it without grandstanding, it’s music that sounds as simultaneously beautiful and as daunting as the Arctic landscape he’s returning to. At any moment a sound can be alluring or treacherous, like the frozen sun reflecting on a snowy mountaintop. Marhaug’s deftness with rhythm and bass emerges on ‘Context 3’, as he pairs Vainio-esque low-end pulses with crumpled noise and widescreen tones; as disquieting music-box chimes absorbed into the blasted soundscape on ‘Context 5’, while we’re thrust into the freezing cold on ‘Context 6’, subjected to punctuating gusts of white noise and trapped string loops.
Trust it’s a rare and near-mythical beast, conjuring vast, treacherous soundscapes illuminated with pangs of sentiment that naturally weave strands of his non-musical practice in their psychosensual lustre and gritty attrition. As he steps into a new phase of his career, we’re left with a concluding chapter that stands as a summation and open-ended post-credits reveal.
26,00€
Out of stock
LP
Pauline OLIVEROS & REYNOLS
“Half a Dove in New York, Half a Dove in Buenos Aires”
Recorded back in 1999, ‘Half a Dove in New York, Half a Dove in Buenos Aires’ is the recorded debut of a NetCast improv between deep listening pioneer Pauline Oliveros and Argentinian free music trio Reynols >> a fascinating early example of the internet’s capacity to foster remote creativity in-the-moment that deploys the slowest electronics, accordion, voice, trombone and computer sounds on a next level ritual drone incantation recorded in another era, but made for our time.
As the story goes, Oliveros first met Reynols in the mid ‘90s at a Deep Listening workshop she held in their home city, Buenos Aires, where they impressed her with an improvised brass serenade. Years later, in 1999, they met again via NetCast - a series of very early online live improvisations - to explore the Internet’s potential for collaborations between artists thousands of miles apart. Finally mixed down in 2021 and mastered by Helge Sten (aka Deathprod) after marinating in the archive for 22 years, the album resonates with the late, great Oliveros’ legendary work in exploring alternate tunings, spatial dynamics and methods of intuitive performance - a remarkable slab of omnidirectional drone bearing traces of Miguel Tomasin’s vox and Oliveros’ just-intoned accordion embedded in its cosmic roil.
Broadcasting from fabled record shop The Thing in NYC, with Oliveros (Accordion) joined by Jennifer McCoy (ICR), Kevin McCoy (Computer processing), and Monique Buzzarté (Trombone), and Reynols revolving Miguel Tomasin (Electronics, subliminal voice & Alclorse drums), Rob Conlazo electronics, leather gloves & e-gtr), and Anla Courtis (electronics, rubber foot & e-gtr) and dialling-in from Florida 943 in Buenos Aires, the results are an incredibly absorbing and consistently surprising testament to vanguard, experimental spirits prizing the internet’s nascent, unprecedented ability to connect minds and art across continents, language barriers, and modalities.
The album’s first side, titled ‘Micro Macro Wind Dance’, puts Oliveros’ accordion under a microscope, enhancing it with lower case rumble and noise from Reynolds’ arsenal. Shifting glacially over 22-minutes, Oliveros plays subtly and slowly at first, letting the accordion breathe in-and-out like a sleeping mythical beast, before she transitions to fluttering bird-like phrases by the end of the side.
‘Astral Netcast Pigeon’ expands the dissonant drones to widescreen, submerging Oliveros’ trills and drones beneath layers of dirt and grit. It’s time-altering music that dissasembles yr head before you’ve completely worked out what’s happening >> basically the perfect mid-point between Oliveros’ deep listening practices and Reynols’ wildly inspirational free-noise-drone freakouts
26,00€
In stock
2 LP
ELEKTRO NOVA
“Electro Nova”
Like a rediscovered Viking burial ship, Electro Nova compiles near-mythical drone recordings produced in 1998 and described by Helge Sten aka Deathprod as some of the most important music to ever come out of Norway. It’s the work of Kåre Dehlie Thorstad and compiles two of the earliest releases on Smalltown Supersound, back when it was basically no more than a bedroom operation. It’s taken over two decades, but finally the label have given the material a first ever proper release on vinyl, complete with mixing and mastering by Deathprod. If you’re into the ice cold swells of anyone from Thomas Köner to Harley Gaber, Biosphere, Kali Malone or, of course, Deathprod - this one’s as essential as they come.
Kaare Dehlie Thorstad’s Elektro Nova produced just two releases during the late ‘90s that have since slipped into drone lore - Trans-Inter-Ference and Elektro Nova/Electro Nova. Admired not only by Deathprod and Joakim Haugland of Smalltown, but also by his contemporaries Lasse Marhaug and Biosphere, his work has evaded pretty much any attention outside of Norway these last two decades. Following a chance meeting with Thorstad at Oslo airport a few years back, Smalltown were prompted to give the recordings a second wind, presenting what is essentially a captivating new release, and crucial addition to the Norsk drone canon.
As the story goes, Thorstad was studying photography in the late 90’s in Scotland, but instead of delivering a photo for his final exam he made a record - a double album (2CDs) and a 10” to be precise. That should provide some idea of the textural synaesthetic and landscaping qualities evoked by his music, which he ended up sending to a then-young Smalltown label, who were mostly issuing tapes at the time. With no proper distribution the records largely bypassed wider attention, and become a personal favourite of Smalltown’s Joakim Haugland, as well as avowed fan Helge Sten (Deathprod), who helped render its diaphanous scale in mix down, and Lasse Marhaug who describes them as “two perfect records that deserved much bigger attention”.
Between its jaw-dropping opener; the post-apocalyptic vision of its untitled part; and the cinematic white-out of the 10” tracks; Thorstad comes as close as we’ve ever heard to evoking the inhospitable nature and stark beauty of the wild far north. We can hear those landscapes palpably internalised and alchemically transmuted into its coarse grained textural swells and a reverberating multi-dimensionality, variously sustained to extents that evoke an abandonment of the senses, or likewise squashed and isolated to imply the relative anxiety relief of atmospheric flux, where a few degrees temperature rise or a drop in the wind speed can make the difference between life and death.
30,00€
Out of stock
LP
Ben VIDA & Lea BERTUCCI
“Murmurations”
Ben Vida and Lea Bertucci have been releasing exceptional material for years, but this collaboration - described by the two as a series of conversations that developed into a unique form of nonhierarchical improvisation - scrapes at spaces neither artist has fully explored on their own.
As the duo developed their ideas, both working from different sides of the same mountain in upstate New York, they watched as their artistic identities fell away and their language evolved into something altogether new. As a result. we get to hear two artists at the pinnacle of their respective practices rediscover the glee of improvisation and sonic experimentation.
Loosely, the pieces feature Vida working with modular synth, disintegrating a library of sounds recorded by Bertucci: bass clarinet, saxophone and wooden flute. Alongside, Bertucci stretches the limits of her instruments, eschewing harmony and expected tonality and wielding the arsenal to bring out guttural human sounds - breaths, finger presses, scraped squeals, unfurling giddy tape machine manipulations that abstract Vida’s modular concoctions to further blur the lines between the two artists.
Opening track ‘Gasps and Spasms’ sets the tone, accenting Bertucci and Vida’s voices and the interplay between mouth sounds and instrumental pops as elements tumble into each other like a snowball skating down a mountain. ‘Ghost Pipes’ splays dissonant specters of flute across rocky passes made up of ASMR particles and inverse drones to uncanny, goose-pimpling effect, somehow tangling folk, jazz, classical and avant garde traditions into ancestral sci-fi tapestries.
The album’s most surprising moments come when the duo fully lean into phonetic morphology, splattering words into dissociated delay patterns and white noise tides, dilating intimate moments (an impromptu laugh, a dropped phrase) into abstract verse. Those sounds build into the album’s title track, where a ticking clock underpins cosmic whirlpool delays and intense, hypogean groans.
28,00€