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Frans Zwartjes (2LP)
** Numbered + handmade in an edition of 300 copies only; 180gr 2xLP vinyl in custom-made screen-printed outer ** Frans Zwartjes’ studio remains untouched since his passing in 2017. In early 2023, we returned to the studio and discovered a trunk of unlabelled 3/4 inch tapes, containing completely unheard music by Zwartjes. These works, largely synthesiser-based improvisations for films either unmade or unfinished, were played and recorded by Frans Zwartjes between the late 1960s, through his most…
Prisoner of Love: The Dead Dance
* Numbered + handmade in an edition of 200 copies only; 180gr vinyl in custom-made outer (sealed), containing extensive booklet with images from performance + installation + newly commissioned essay by Akihito Yasumi (Japanese original + English translation); no digital * Takashi Inagaki’s original soundtrack score for filmmaker Takashi Ito’s Japanese-language stage adaptation of Jean Genet’s Prisoner of Love, and its parallel video installation, The Dead Dance. Genet’s final literary work recou…
Distant Proximity: Soundtracks for the Films of Matthias Müller
* Handmade in an edition of 250 copies only; 180gr vinyl in custom-made screen-printed outer (sealed), containing Xerox-printed booklet with the words from the films of Matthias Mulle and a newly commissioned essay by S. Grisseman* The original soundtracks by Dirk Schaefer for the films of Matthias Muller: The Memo Book (1989), Home Stories (1990), Sleepy Haven (1993), Pensão Globo (1999), Vacancy (1999). Newly re-transferred from the original tapes by Schaefer himself, and remastered, these are…
Primordium
Primordial sounds created by Maurizio Bianchi/M. B. using a rudimental five strings guitar, afterwards polarized effects added by Siegmar Fricke utilizing a shapeless analogtronic apparatus. CD-R in half handmade 3 panels digipack
Skinwalker
*2024 stock* "Recorded back in 2019, in Newcastle upon Tyne, “Skinwalker” is a collaboration between noisy British punk band Bruxa Maria and Norwegian trio MoE. Between these two acts, fireworks might be expected to fly constantly but “Skinwalker” turns out more restrained and controlled than you’d expect. Four tracks, of which three exceed ten minutes, are on offer here, all of them brimming with caged fury and aggression which, if unleashed, could turn this recording into a tapestry of burning…
Drums & Octobass
*2024 stock* "A lone voice rises over the booming rumble of the octobass, a large acoustic instrument resembling a double-bass, yet twice the height. The octobass’ unusually large stature lends itself to these haunting sounds, looming over this cacophonous reverberation like a specter of monstrosity. Another voice lightly ascends, and the two vocalizations coalesce as this musical foundation crumbles along, carried by the tapping of harmonium keys, swimming and dissonant.
This patient singing b…
Double Beat Sequencer
"The fourteenth series of the Merzbow archive series, which began in 2018 and focuses on unreleased and unearthed material, is a collection of unreleased recordings from 2014 that were performed with a sequencer in the background: Double Beat Sequencer Vol. 1, Double Beat Sequencer Vol.2", "Double Beat Sequencer Vol.3", "Double Beat Sequencer Vol.4", "Double Beat Sequencer Vol.5" and "Double Beat Sequencer Vol.6". Double Beat Sequencer" is a boxed set of all six of these works. The sequencer use…
On Foot
2011 release **
"Shepard, in 2005, set himself the task of hiking 250 miles across Switzerland, composing a new piece each day (performing it as well, in some public setting). Six of these works are collected here, performed by various Wandelweiser-involved folk. The music has an aura of folk song to it, however attenuated, heard clearly in Christian Wolff's melodica rendition of "Crêt de la Neuve, le 20 juillet 2005" with it's gentle ups and downs, similarly the second brief track with Katie Po…
The chord catalogue / Within fourths/Within fifths
2013 release **
"The Chord Catalogue is sort of a sister to Music for 88. It is also an examination of pianistic possibilities done with a focus so tight that obscuring any intrinsic aesthetic qualities in the execution seems to be the intention. (Also like Music for 88, Johnson recorded the piece for Phill Niblock’s Experimental Intermedia imprint). Beginning with “The 78 Two-Note Chords” (the section titling further eliminates risk of artistic suggestion), the set of pieces exhausts its way th…
Plight & Premonition Flux & Mutability
Four beautiful, exceptional ambient nocturnes bloom again on a very welcome 30th anniversary reissue, newly packaged together by Grönland for the benefit of your health... David Sylvian and Holger Czukay’s Plight + Premonition [1988] & Flux + Mutability [1989] bouquets remain some of the most enigmatic ambient recordings of the ‘80s since their conception at Czukay’s converted cinema studio in Köln, 1986. But, while Sylvian was ostensibly coming to record vocals for the last track on Czukay’s Ro…
Chaz Underriner Reinterprets Anastassis Philippakopoulos
2015 release **
"The pieces by Anastassis Philippakopoulos that guitarist Chaz Underriner "reinterprets" here were written for instruments other than his own: flute (Song 6, which Wandelweiser Editions published earlier under the composer's name on Songs And Piano Pieces), string section (Song 8, which Underriner performs with three other guitarists: Armin Abdihodzic, Greg Dixon, and Robert Trusko), and bass clarinet (Song 9). Three songs that follow one another discreetly, moving slightly unde…
Long Courrier
Few lovers stay together for life-and beyond. Just as rare are the artists who manage to keep alive the burning flame of their creative desire. Areski Belkacem is one of those who nurtures in his heart a fire that never dies out, a passion that burns just as intensely for music as it does for his beloved. As long as the message eventually reaches its intended recipient, he cares little for how long the journey takes.
His new album, Long Courrier, is proof of this: twelve unreleased songs that …
Baraka 1980
After the groundbreaking Comme à la Radio, energized by the free jazz tumult of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Brigitte Fontaine and Areski Belkacem produced six albums together or separately between 1972 and 1977. While French pop of the time was marked by lush orchestrations, Fontaine and Belkacem’s songs were often recorded live, typically accompanied only by guitar and percussion, or performed a cappella. This minimalist approach focused attention on the subversive poetry of the lyrics and the…
In Memory Of James Tenney
2015 release **
"The tromba marina is a huge single-stringed instrument, played with a bow. For "in memory of james tenney", in four parts, Möller and Maldfeld each wrestle with one such beast, using instruments from the 17th and early 18th centuries. And f it's grain you want, step right up--this thing, especially Part I, sounds like the bow is severely serrated, close to being able to saw wood. A huge rumble that encloses myriad tones high to low. Think of an Eliane Radigue cello piece with yo…
Transparent city (volumes 3 and 4)
2007 release **
"Between 2004 and 2006, Pisaro began a series of field recordings. Each time, it consisted of a single sound recording made in Los Angeles, in a single location, strategically placed so that nothing stood out, places without a center, blurred spaces at which Pisaro pointed a microphone without moving. From this series of recordings was born Transparent City, two monumental and epic double CDs in their duration: they exceed 4 hours and 40 minutes in fact. Each disc is composed of …
An unrhymed chord
2010 release **
""sixty-five minutes long. two periods of thirty minutes each, with a five minute silence between them. each performer find one sound, preferably with pitch. the sound is played for one duration, between one and fifteen minutes, in each thirty minute period, making sure, in the first period, not to cross over into silence. the duration of the sound may change from one period to the next. one of the durations may be zero seconds. (i.e., a player might decide not to play in one of …
24 petits preludes pour la guitare
2013 release **
"True, there are 24 pieces contained on this disc, which range in duration from 2:00 to 3:45, but in part due to the large amount of silence in which the single notes are swathed and also because the composition are "of a piece", the recording reads almost as a continuous work. The preludes seem to consist of sets of two to five notes, generally, perhaps always, in a rising pattern and very often diminishing as they appear, purely struck, with incredible gentleness, so much so th…
On Foot: Brooklyn
2014 release **
"Shepard walks around, often traveling impressive distances, and composes music, generally playing on route. I had previously heard the excellent documentation of his perambulation through Switzerland in 2005, "On Foot", but in 2012, he chose to navigate far more dangerous territory, namely Brooklyn, doing so for thirteen weeks, penning a composition per week and organizing on-site performances of same by varied musicians which are heard here, usually along with the environmental…
Sileen II
2018 release **
"An adaptation from "Sileen", a composition commissioned by Musica For The Festival Oortreders at Neerpelt, Belgium, 2016 performed with 50 members of a local music school; "Sileen II" was realized with only Gareth Davis on bass clarinet plus sounds from Machinefabriek, recorded in the same pitch and tempo as "Sileen', then slowed to half its speed and one octave lower. Stunning!"
Number Pieces (Piano)
2018 release **
"Two versions of Cage's 'One' and one of his 'One5' performed by pianist Guy Vandromme. 'One' was written in 1987, a ten-minute long piece for solo piano. Per the Cage Works page, the commentary is: "This work comprises 10 systems of piano chords, varying in dynamics, selected by chance. Each system is roughly 1 minute long, and all but one is flexible. Each system contains 2 sets of chords. The order of each set is maintained, but the relationship between the two sets of chords …