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Some Blood Will Stick
Hototogisu is Matthew Bower (Skullflower/Sunroof!) and Marcia Bassett (Double Leopards). They've been laying down billowing sheets of Teutonic guitar drone-noise since 2003 with the thickest possible helpings of vocals and electronics. Some Blood Will Stick is a collection of tracks from their ultra-limited self produced label Heavy Blossom. Songs were taken from Swoon Scream (2004) and Awful Symmetry (2005) with one additional track. What makes this disc more than a simple re-release is the ext…
The Echo From The Purple Dawn
The Echo From The Purple Dawn is a brand new full length from C.C.C.C. member Hiroshi Hasegawa's solo project, Astro. Using a battery of oscillators, ring modulators and field recordings, Hasegawa has created an engaging and versatile album that masterfully drifts between spaced-out analog dream drone and a more extreme form of harsher droning. As Astro, Hasegawa is able to combine some of the harsher influences of C.C.C.C. into the world of analog space music to create the signature sounds of A…
3. Telepathics Meh In-Sect Connection
This is Important's second release in a 4 record series, each featuring the work of the enigmatic Japanese artist Kouhei Matsunaga. Telepathic full length collaborative release from Kouhei Matsunaga, Sean Booth of Autechre and Pan Sonic's Mika Vainio. Using space, silence and electronic tones, these three electricians rewire your brain for a new comprehension of sound.
We Are All One, In the Sun: A Tribute To Robbie Basho
In Robbie Basho's lifetime he set out to champion the steel string guitar as an expressive and dignified concert instrument. His guitar playing was first brought to light in 1965, when John Fahey released Basho's debut The Seal Of The Blue Lotus on Fahey's own Takoma Records. Armed with a unique and powerful singing voice, his 6 & 12 string guitar and a collection of special guitar tunings that he created (even originating a unique chart titled 'The Esoteric Doctrine of Color and Mood,' denoting…
IMPREC300
IMPREC300 is a vinyl only collection of exclusive live tracks from a handful of Important bands including Master Musicians of Bukkake, Grails, Mugstar, Cave, NHK yx, Bardo Pond, Chord & Bass Communion.
Important was started in 2001 in a small house on the beach along the New Hampshire seacoast. The first two releases, from Daniel Johnston and Merzbow, stated the breadth of intentions and we set out to run a label that would function much like a good record shop with a wide range of interesting r…
The Garden of Forking Paths
"I leave to several futures (not to all) my garden of forking paths" - Ts'ui Pen
The Garden of Forking Paths was compiled for Important Records by guitarist James Blackshaw. Compositions were recorded especially for this collection by Helena Espeval (Espers), James Blackshaw, Jozef van Wissem and Chieko Mori. Beautifully assembled, The Garden Of Forking Paths serves as a singular and particularly unique musical statement.
"The story of how this compilation came into being is, unlike many other s…
Constellation Of Tragedy
Constellation Of Tragedy is the sixth full length album from Japan's LSD March. Apt comparisons are often made of LSD March being a cross between the Velvet Underground and Les Rallizes Denudes. Constellation Of Tragedy is their most well recorded and refined album to date coming to a climactic close and featuring leader Shinsuke Michishita playing guitar, theremin, musical box, bass, harmonium, & harmonica. Recorded by Richard Horner at Snowflake Sound in Saporro Japan. Cover artwork by Darryl …
Non Meters Volume One
Risil is a collective of musicians that are all somehow connected to each other in some form or fashion. Risil's membership includes Guillermo Herren (Prefuse 73/Savath & Savallas), Zach Hill (Hella), Tyondai Braxton (Battles), John McEntire (Tortoise), Alejandra Deheza (School of Seven Bells), Eva Puyuelo Muns (Savath & Savalas).The project started as a chance for a large number of people to freely collaborate without a set goal for the end result or achieving a certain sound. This turned into …
Admira
Previously unreleased recordings from 1971. Admira is sourced from original master recordings discovered by Kluster member and Tangerine Dream engineer Klaus Freudigmann. Along with Vulcano, also being released at the same time on Important, Admira is presented here for the first time in this deluxe package. These intense sessions were made with Schnitzler at the helm, as always, after the departure of Mobius and Roedelius from the group. Conrad Schnitzler founded Kluster in 1969 along with Roed…
A Rock In The Snow
Together Chris Corsano and Paul Flaherty have re-written the concept of modern free-jazz with their post-hardcore punk style approach of euphoric togetherness. Ferocious, spontaneous, explosive and aggressively lyrical, they've established their groundbreaking duo with loads of shows and a host of tremendous recordings.
When tales of C. Spencer Yeh's Burning Star Core project reached Corsano/Flaherty, the duo were eager to see him jam. Fortunately, fate brought them together at the DeStijl/Freed…
Viva Negativa! A Tribute to the New Blockaders Vol. III
Viva Negativa! A Tribute To The New Blockaders: Volume III: USA. Volume III in a series of UK-European-US and Japanese artists' tributes to the pioneering UK Noise group The New Blockaders including exclusive tracks by Z'ev, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Alan Courtis, Controlled Bleeding, Plethora, Macronympha, Prurient, Richard Ramirez, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, Carlos Giffoni, AMK, Aaron Dilloway, Wolf Eyes, Idea Fire Company, Mnortham, Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke, Damion Romero, The Haters, Emil …
Stop Time
Robin Hayward plays microtonal tuba in Catherine Christer Hennix's ensemble and Stop Time is his first composition to be released on Important Records. Stop Time was commissioned for a festival of the same name taking place in Leuven in 2013. It is the first piece to use a subset of the three-dimensional physical version of the Hayward Tuning Vine, invented in 2012, as a musical score. The harmonic space implied within the four cubes contained within the subset, based on prime numbers two (octav…
Winter Songs
A reissue of the brilliant second album by Art Bears, a band/project featuring Fred Frith, Chris Cutler and Dagmar Krause, formed in 1978 after disputes over the musical direction within Henry Cow. 'Winter Songs', originally released in 1979, placed Art Bears in the forefront of the Rock In Opposition Movement. Art Bears' intense and brutal avant-garde approach on the album comes across as primordial expression, which is nailed down by Krause's violently charismatic voice. As a piece of music re…
Benzaiten
Another smoker from Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O., in typically fine form. Benzaiten is an In C-style homage to the classic Osamu Kitajima record Benzaiten (1973). Acid Mothers Temple covers the title-track and reprise using Kitajima's original composition as a departure point to explore the outer realms of AMT territory. Further instrumental explorations reveal textures of the original composition while launching out further into the cosmic domain. Numerous Acid Mothers origi…
Complete Studio Recordings
Overhang Party is criminally overlooked. From the heavily psychedelic noise-rock of their first album to the piano-rock anthems of 4, Overhang Party was somehow impossibly consistent and seamless. This box set flows as an even, open document of this fearless and inventive Japanese rock group. For a quick reference of the sonic distances this group has traveled (and the skills they possess) stream Bass Oscillations from the first record and then skip straight to Kizashi on 4.
The Complete Studio …
Merzbear
Author, activist, painter, and sound artist Masami Akita has been at the foreground of experimental music for over twenty-five years. Inspired by psychedelic rock, free jazz, and early electronic composition as well the physical arts (especially Kurt Schwitters's Merzbau), Masami Akita has created a musical language all his own. Merzbear, the sixth Merzbow release in his utterly essential Merz series for Important Records, pulses and pounds with distorted droning guitar feedback, pulsing noise b…
Secret Photographs
Beautiful new work from Machinefabriek. Secret Photographs was composed as a soundtrack to accompany a film made by Mike Hoolboom using photographs taken by notorious bank robber Alvin Karpis.
Filmmaker Mike Hoolboom discovered a batch of Karpis' photos for auction on eBay. He was the lucky winning bidder. With his newly found treasure, Hoolboom began working on a film consisting of still images, slowly dissolving one into another. Intensifying the slow, hypnotic pace and transitions, the musica…
Cassette Memories Volume 3: South of the Border
"South of the Border is the third installment of my Cassette Memories album series. All field recordings were taped in Mexico, a country I've had a special fondness for since I was a little child. My first memory was watching photographs and Super-8 films my father shot in Mexico City from his time there during the 1968 Summer Olympics, where he competed as a member of the Japanese national hockey team. It made me realize there is a place completely different from Japan, and I started dreaming a…
Mara
* Picture disc edition of 300 copies * Maja S. K. Ratkje is at the forefront of the musical avant-garde. Her music is bold, original and it is meant for sharing. At its heart lies Ratkje’s own voice, an open door to her individual musicianship and a constant tool for realigning her work with natural expressions and human truths.
On Mara, layers of vocals overlap and layer their way through the reverberant woodwork of an early baroque parish in Austria. At times slow and beautiful, other times fr…
Further West Quad Cult LP
Prefigured by the inclusion of a secret extra pocket in the original packaging of Far West (IMPREC 386CD/LP, 2013), this painstakingly crafted complimentary LP is intended for synced playback with that release. With two turntables or other playback devices, the listener can experience fully unique quad playback. Further West Quad Cult LP offers deeper journeys into the cave where the self dissolves. It also stands alone as an inverted Far West universe, and the listener is invited to enjoy it…