Decibels of Gratitude
"Eighth full-length studio album by this long running Massachusetts ensemble. What to say about a band who continuously claims Otis Rush and Buddy Guy as it's primary influences, but usually finds their records filed in the 'noise/experimental' bin? Any mention of Major Stars tends to send some scurrying for the most obscure psychedelic references, but one need look no further than the Who or Cream to find the primary ingredients of melodic songwriting combined with an over-the-top instru…
Death Blues
The six songs that comprise Jon Mueller's Death Blues are each their own doorway to both a bold new musical statement from the renowned drummer/percussionist and an unprecedented journey into a conscious contemplation of death -- and the life that surrounds it. Released in tandem with a multi-part manifesto, Death Blues transcends its own existence as a 34-minute, earth-cracking rock album. Much like Mueller, whose landmark solo work stands alongside his role in notable bands Volcano Choir…
The Grief That Shrieked To Multiply
To Live and Shave in L.A. -- Illustrative presentations of critics'lipsticks and protagonists' stills; tangential bruises, ephemeral knots; an inter-generational installation view; the gulf between conscious quotation and subjective arrangement of cabinets of parasitic methodologies; tolerance and idealization via dirty electric documentation; staged symposia with supplemented acoustics; subtle modifications of unconcerned expressions; a formal repertoire in characteristic rasps; interventionist…
Ec(o)logues
During the seventies writer/poet/essayist Peter Lamborn Wilson traveled extensively in the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Nepal. He spent several years in Iran where he translated Persian Sufi poetry and worked for the Shiraz Festival of Arts. In the early eighties Wilson went to Southeast Asia studying Javanese mysticism, Kebatinan. He published numerous books on topics as pirate utopia’s, Irish soma and Islamic heresy and his philosophy is influenced by anarchism, situationism, …
The Ecstatic Exchange
A rare chance to hear Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore reading (and accompanying himself on zither) from his classic collection of shamanic poetry ‘Dawn Visions’, originally published by City Lights back in 1964, when the author was in his early twenties. The poems were written during explorations of mind and space in Mexico and California. As Moore describes it, a period of “immersion on the ocean of poetic inspiration, my near drowning in a sudden flood of imagery and pushing further and further, almos…
Moon Magic Illegal Art
People Like Us & Ergo Phizmiz composed 45 minutes of music that is simultaneously whimsical & poignant. Once the soundtrack was in place, visuals were assembled around the audio in order to create a stimulating assault on the mind that evokes a sense of the surreal and fantastical. These two cuts are pressed on limited edition 7-inch vinyl containing audio from "The Keystone Cut Ups" DVD on Illegal Art.
La Finestra Dentro
CD edition. Juri Camisasca, a reclusive and mysterious musician from near Milan, despite a very limited discography can be considered a cult figure among the progressive music followers: his “La finestra dentro”, issued in 1974 by Bla Bla, is one of the best albums on that label, strongly influenced by his collaboration with Franco Battiato, who signed Juri to the label and produced the LP, also playing the VCS3 synth on it.Though not musically as complex as Battiato's early works, “La fin…
Programme Commun
Sub Rosa presents two volumes of work from French composer Luc Ferrari and his wife and closest collaborator, Brunhild Ferrari. These two volumes are being released together and simultaneously, as a sign of continuation. For Luc Ferrari, this is the first full-length CD to come out after the trilogy Sub Rosa developed with him. What we have here is three substantial pieces: "Programme commun pour clavecin et bande magnetique" (1972), performed by Elisabeth Chonacka, "Didascalies" (1993) per…
Musique pour l'Odyssee
LP version: This second Art Zoyd cult album has been unavailable for many years. Originally released in 1979, it is now re-released with new artwork and additional tracks. Released almost three years after Art Zoyd's first LP, Symphonie pour le Jour où Brûleront les Cités (SR 330CD/LP), Musique pour l'Odyssée (trans. "Music for the Odyssey") presented a slightly different version of the band. The nucleus of Gérard Hourbette (violin), Thierry Zaboïtzeff (bass guitar, cello, vocals), and Jean-P…
Microtonal works by Partch, Cage, LaBarbara, Drummond
The debut recording of Newband, an ensemble specializing in microtonal music and focused around a unique instrument, the zoomoozophone. Invented by Dean Drummond (who was a student of Harry Partch and played in his legendary Gate 5 ensemble), the zoomoozophone looks somewhat like a marimba withwith aluminum tubes-except that it is about 20 feet long and consists of 129 tubes tuned to a 31-note scale in just-intonation. For the purposes of these recordings, the basic four-piece group, wh…
Solitude Of Sounds (In Memoriam Tomasz Sikorski)
"Solitude of Sounds: in memoriam Tomasz Sikorski" is a collection of works created in Polish Radio Experimental Studio by Polish pioneer of minimalism, Tomasz Sikorski and by his friends and followers. The American flavour of minimalism has an "urban" soundscape that emerges from frenetic human interaction. It is the environment that informs a lifestyle and thus, informs the composer. On the other hand, the Dutch style of minimalism is what I'd call "Hippie minimalism". It is informed by culture…
Ocean On Ocean
Ass-flatteningly great duo cosmo drone visions from Barbara Kinzle and Birch Cooper of Portland, Oregon that takes dream-pop and devotional choral ascensions to the very edge of euphoric body/gnosis: originally issued as a CD-R in 2010 this beautifully presented vinyl set upgrades the album with two LPs mastered at 45rpm for maximal immersion. Ocean On Ocean feels like the logic of Blinda-era My Bloody Valentine pushed to true post-rock limits, with song-forms exploded in favour of a profound, c…
Songs
Zeitkratzer releasing "songs"? Isn't Zeitkratzer a contemporary music group? Or a noise band? Songs? These songs actually have been developed over several years and evolved from a fashion show zeitkratzer was making the music for. Marc Weiser a.k.a. rechenzentrum, since then a member of zeitkratzer, sings. Marc has already caused some furore as Mark Markowitch, singing fake songs in fake languages in some hidden Berlin bars. So now all of those together: zeitkratzer's noise, zeitkratzer's…
Chiapaneca
A great, vivid recording of some wild playing, using the entire kit, rolling about on the various skins and cymbals. Recorded at Festival El Nicho Aural by Daniel Goldaracena at Centro Cultural España Mexico D.F 12 mayo 2012Mastering and cover design by Lasse Marhaug
Heat
**200 copies** Outstanding Organ-infused tropicalia and homemade ethnodelic amazonian fantasies. Piotr Kurek is a musician, composer and enthusiast collector of instruments and vintage studio equipment. He is the author of numerous pieces for theatre and contemporary dance performances. In the late 1990s he was the co-founder of the electronic group Slepcy and since then he’s been releasing music for various record labels and has participated in international theatre and music festivals.Piotr Ku…
See the World Given to a One Love Entity
Guardian Alien is a free wheeling ensemble coming into its own, having found just the right balance between structured arrangements and wild abandon. Helmed by Greg Fox, who has lent his percussive force to the likes of Teeth Mountain, Dan Deacon, and Liturgy, the ensemble was initially an extension of his solo music (GDFX). It rapidly took on its own identity and expanded to a core group of Greg (drums, vocals, electronics, arrangements), Alex Drewchin (vocals, synth), Turner Williams Jr…
Rework: Philip Glass Remixed
There are two basic reasons why composers like Philip Glass end up getting remixed: rhythm and repetition. Glass' most identifiable music is simple, or so it seems: Play a chord, break it down into its constituent notes, and repeat the notes in hypnotic succession. If there's another instrument playing, they're probably playing the same notes in a different order. At the foundation of the music, there's what's called an ostinato. One way to think of it is as a bassline; another, in the words of …
I Wish I Didn't Dream
Wish I Didn’t Dream, the new album of duets by guitarist Loren Connors and vocalist Suzanne Langille, was cut in just a few hours of studio time. But the pieces started falling into place 15 years earlier on the 10th floor of a nondescript building in the Chelsea section of Manhattan. It was there, at the old location of the Brecht Forum, that Connors got to know writer and WFMU DJ Kurt Gottschalk, who was curating a concert series there. On occasion Tom Abbs (now President of Northern Sp…
Kill The Self That Wants To Kill Yourself
Zs could quite possibly be the modern jazz equivalent of Lou Reed‘s Metal Machine Music or Borbetomagus for a new generation. Their uncompromising sonic assault commands attention, consistently leaving an impression on the listener that is not likely to be forgotten. After a couple cassette EPs, founding Zs member, Sam Hillmer, finally delivers his solo album, an introspective journey that successfully expresses Hillmer’s starkly unique vision. Rather than repeat the organic noise attack…
The Unexamined Life
Supreme Dicks put out one single in their career. It was a double B-side. Maybe they had a sense of humor, but in hindsight it's hard to tell.Falling somewhere between Captain Beefheart, Throbbing Gristle and SALEM in the lineage of musicians who've found a muse in the nasty, brutish brevity of life, Supreme Dicks chose to cloak disarmingly real paranoia and grief in the contemporary trappings of late '80s and early '90s lo-fi college rock. They may have inhabited the same sonic and physical spa…