Music from Germany

With ‘Terrain,’ Joachim Spieth presents the fourth long player on his Affin imprint. The follow-up album to ‘Ousia’ (2021), ‘Terrain,’ reflects on the human relationship with nature. The album title is a reference to a musical language that layers Spieth’s music production practices and intimacy with nature.‘Terrain’ was forged in deep solitude.“ It’s an interplay of euphoric flashes and introspection” – says Spieth. The eight compositions take the listener into a captivating cascade of sonic te…

"Two grand pianos, quasi two orchestras, driven by two of the most distinguished personalities of contemporary jazz: Aki Takase and Alexander von Schlippenbach -- they are having a conversation within the medium of sound. But they complement one another in a way that makes any stylistic differentiation irrelevant. With all the transparency in the course of their playing the dialogical principle opens out into a holistic piano language. What counts is freedom and the responsibility to create some…

Rüdiger Carl and Sven-Åke Johansson are two fellow travelers on the path of experimental music who have worked together since the late 1960s in many formations, most notably as the wild-card Fluxus pranksters on Peter Brötzmann’s legendary 1969 recording Machine Gun, and on many more recordings and stagings of sonic interventions over the decades.  In the words of Peter Margasak writing in the Chicago Reader in 2012: “Where to begin with percussionist and polymath Sven-Åke Johansson: Is he a beb…

The sum to infinity of a sequence is the sum of an infinite number of terms in the sequence. It is only possible to compute this sum if the terms of a sequence converge to zero. "sum to infinity" is also the second release from Gamut Inc, the retro-futuristic ensemble around composers and curators Marion Wörle and Maciej Sledziecki.

Arovane's acclaimed 2004 album »Lilies« has been out of print on vinyl for nearly 2 decades now. It finally gets a well-deserved reissue through the Berlin based Keplar label. The new version has been remastered by Kassian Troyer at Dubplates & Mastering and comes with a brand new cover artwork.

2023 Repress **Remastered from the original master tapes, 180 gram reissue of the original vinyl release with gatefold cover** 1973s brilliant Celestial Ocean, by the legendary Swiss krautrock band Brainticket, is a concept album that details an ancient pharoahs journey into the afterlife (substitute the word "journey" for "trip" and youll get what they were driving at). However, Brainticket were not mere products of their time, they explored some truly compelling musical territory and produced …

Can, live from Soest, Rockpalast, Germany in November 1970. This remarkable set is the earliest full concert recording of the mighty Can. Performed in November 1970 for broadcast on the WDR TV show Karussell für die Jugend (‘Youth Carousel) in Soest, 80 miles north of their base in Cologne, it features vocalist Damo Suzuki (who’d replaced Malcolm Mooney in May), alongside Michael Karoli (guitar), Irmin Schmidt (keyboards), Holger Czukay (bass) and Jaki Liebezeit (drums), and is presented here wi…

The third album from Wallenstein, originally released in 1973, stands as the band's definitive statement and one of the peak achievements of the entire Kosmische Musik movement. Led by keyboardist Jürgen Dollase and guitarist Bill Barone, the group had evolved from their earlier heavy progressive sound into something far more expansive and cosmic in scope. Cosmic Century is exactly what its title promises - a journey through infinite space rendered in swirling synthesizers, celestial guitar work…

NOTON is pleased to announce the release of "Kinder der Sonne", the new album by Alva Noto featuring music composed for the score of the theater piece Komplizen by Simon Stone. The title comes from Maxim Gorky's play Children of the Sun, written in the context of the 1905 Russian Revolution. Simon Stone wrote the new play for the Burgtheater ensemble based on this drama. The single Die Untergründigen unveils a romantic space, charting a sublime path with a new depth of harmonics and vibrant colo…

Faitiche presents Jan Jelinek's soundtrack for Seascape – polyptych, an audio-visual software developed in collaboration with Canadian new media artist Clive Holden

Recorded live at k.e.o. 15.03.85 at the 'night of poets' was originally released in 85 as an addition to 100. The recordings were remixed in 1989. Released in a double-sided black on grey photocopied cover with original photo attached to the front. Grey ferro cassette with little translucent stickers lettered in outlined black (letters appear as white). The spine credits this "ration-skalk". The title on the cassette stickers and on the back flap of the j-card is listed as "RemixximeR", with the…

*2023 stock* The Dried Rat-Dog is a free jazz energy wallop from the duo of multireedist Peter Brotzmann and percussionist Hamid Drake. It kicks off with the title track, a cavorting of saxophone and drums that tears off, speeding over the hills and through the woods with fierce intensity. Both musicians are in excellent form and incorporate all sorts of techniques from their vast respective vocabularies. The energy inverts for the next piece, "It's an Angel on the Door," as Brotzmann holds note…

*2023 stock* This live recording from a 1996 Austrian music festival is a powerful interaction of three musicians from different countries, each of whom have extraordinary improvisational abilities and deep, grounded technique. A somewhat unusual instrumentation is heard from this free jazz trio: German saxophonist Peter Brotzmann also performs on e-flat clarinet and tarogato (a Hungarian single-reed woodwind), American percussionist Hamid Drake plays a drum kit, a frame drum, and tablas, and Mo…

Featuring Ken Vandermark & Mats Gustafsson. Recorded live at Victoriaville in May of 1999. Fantastic live material from a very unique group – the instantly-legendary meeting of reedman Peter Brotzmann with the leading lights of the Chicago avant jazz scene in the 90s – brought together into a tremendous tentet that's maybe even better than the sum of its parts! The group features Brotzmann on tenor and clarinet, Ken Vandermark on tenor and bass clarinet, Jeb Bishop on trombone, Fred Lomberg-Holm…

Dieter Moebius (Cluster, Harmonia) and Asmus Tietchens share an outtake of their album Moebius & Tietchens with us for this Record Store Day exclusive 12". Joe Watson (Stereolab) aka Junior Electronics recorded a new song and reworked the Moebius & Tietchens song "Herrlichkeit" by adding vocal overdubs.

The first collaboration between Ulrich Schnauss & Mark Peters, “Underrated Silence” has been one of Bureau B’s most successful releases so far. Ulrich Schnauss (famous for his three solo albums as well as for his remix work) teamed up with Mark Peters (bass player, guitarist and singer of the British band Engineers) to create a bacchanalian instrumental combination of ambient, electronica and shoegaze sounds. “Balcony Sunset” is a track from this session that was not released on the album. Kurt …

*2023 stock*The former Der Plan man and NDW legend offers more sleek experiments in mesmerizing Techno minimalism on the 2nd 'Neuland' session. A-side 'Minato Mirai' is a beautifully fluid Teutonic techno groove with a rolling, elliptical bassline and tranced-out melody while the scuttling, insectoid hi-hats balance the slickness with a bit of much needed grit. Meanwhile 'Vostok' is like a less subtle version of The Field's sophisticated Trance arrangements, stirring up some ecstatic, almost exp…

*2023 stock* This LP by German synth music pioneer Hans-Joachim Roedelius features almost no synthesizers at all. When they do appear (most prominently on "Über den Wolken"), they're a background instrument, supporting his piano. At other times, Roedelius duets with saxophonist Alexander Czjzek. But the primary instrument is his grand piano, and the pieces aren't the droning marathons of 1970s German "kosmische" music, they're three- and four-minute vignettes (some tracks are in the six-minute r…

*2023 repress. 300 copies limited edition* Faitiche release a short version of the radio play Zwischen (German for "between"). Devised and produced by Jan Jelinek for German public broadcaster SWR2, Zwischen brings together twelve sound poetry collages using interview answers by public figures. Each collage consists of the brief moments between the spoken words: silences, pauses for breath, and hesitations in which the interviewees utter non-semantic sound particles. These voice collages also co…

* 75 copies limited edition * In times of vinyl shortage and production backlog, resourcefulness is key. In keeping with his well-established practice of replacing original materials with surrogates to generate new sonic experiences, Sven-Åke Johansson has devised a digital reinterpretation of the historic flexidisc in the shape of a 10inch rubber disc with engraved QR codes that let buyers access the music online. About the music: "The six compositions titled ‘stumps’ are based on a potential f…