L' Instruction Oratorio
Frederic Rzewski is an American composer, now resident in Belgium, of mostly chamber, vocal and piano works that have been performed throughout the world; he is also active as a pianist. Prof. Rzewski studied music privately with Charles Mackey in Springfield as a child and studied composition with Walter Piston and Roger Sessions, counterpoint with Randall Thompson and orchestration with Claudio Spies at Harvard University from 1954-58. He studied composition with Milton Babbitt and the music o…
Helix Parasites
"HELIX PARASITES": built on the idea of genetic modification via new channels, this is probably our most diversified and composite work so far. With a strong trend for rhythms and subliminal pipes, it has at the same time some of the most outlandish moments in digital psychedelia, where tons of events seem to happen in parallel. This is the voice of the incisive nucleus of newly born cells, extracted from the dreams of an artificial intelligence still to be conceived: lines of atomic maps draw t…
Theater Works
Roedelius (who is one-half of the legendary German electronic band Cluster) has had a solo career for many many years. Alas, his solo work tends to be less electronic and more keyboard easy listening fare. "Theatre Works" is a departure from that trend, with modern classical overtones and a modulated sense of drama. But the real surprise here lies with two of the tracks which are unreleased performances by Harmonia and Brian Eno--truth! Astute audiophile historians will recall the two remarkable…
Five Manifestoes
Meanwhile hard to find collaboration release. Swirling und grinding sounds in spooky layers. A rather dark and moving release.
DBL_FDBK
Asmus Tietchens and Arcane Device’s debut, ‘DBL.FDBK’, does not fit easily into one genre. If you want to hear real Ambient, get this record now! This is the most melodic ambitious and satisfying track in DBL.FDBK. It’s also one of those rare songs that touchingly comfort the listener. T4-M1-4 is a pleasing, and full of overall coherence that goes beyond other creations. I was truly moved when I heard T5-M2-1. T6-M2-2 - My least favorite song on this album. T13-M3-4 is possibly the best song Asm…
Hotel Hotel
Idiosyncratic French musical provocateur's finest moments and laden with ace contributions from an international cast of oddballs including Pierre Bastien and Clive Bell, the provisional constructs Berrocal and co. jerry-rig around the free floating music signifiers that comprise Berrocal's aesthetic M.O. are slippery, beautiful things, riding across the seams of art song, meditative orientalia, drunken free jazz bleat, dark electropop, hazy jazz reverbed into Hassell-esque fourth-worldisms and …
L’âme de l’objet
With L’âme de l’objet, percussionist Michel F Côté reached his artistic maturity, delivering his best achievement, at least with his project Bruire. For this third album, Bruire has really become a band, as the same group of musicians appear on every track: Jean Derome (sax, small instruments, flutes), Claude Fradette (guitars), Serge Boisvert (trumpet), Martin Tétreault (turntables) and Côté (drums, live electronics). Another change is the fact that the musical approach is now rooted in jazz in…
Iva Bittovà j.h.
Iva Bittová has been the guest of many artists all over the world, but this compilation mostly explores her work with her Czech compatriots, including Ida Kelarová, Pavel Fajt and Pluto, Nederlands Blazers Ensemble, Krajinka and Vladimír Godár, as well as some film and theater music and one unique Gregorian chant experiment made expressly for this release. It's a wild range of emotions, techniques and sounds.
Variety of Moods
This eleven-song debut EP shows the promise that Hans Joachim Roedelius has. This album has some very good songs like Muy Encantado and Bons Jours. Hans Joachim Roedelius’s debut, ‘Variety Of Moods’, does not fit easily into one genre. Unappreciated gift to Ambient Song Bons Jours is actually a funny song. A great put together song. Mattgold is the song that really did it for me. Music and lyrics of Der Mann Aus Lodz creates, for me, fertile ground for daydreaming. Albumblatt is one of those son…
Hot Stuff
German percussionist and Guru Guru founding member Mani Neumeier on drums, percussion, tapes, trombone, vocals, steel drum, Gamelan & radio. Swiss improviser Luigi Archetti on guitars, bass, tapes & mandolin. Totally flipped out rock/improv hybrid that is quite effective.
infrantumi
Starfuckers are an Italian collective...they create self-described 'concrete rock' that is at times so severely disconnected and minimal that the listener must mentally piece together the fragments. Imagine a place where This Heat and Oval meet.
Per Aspera Ad Astra
The unique pairing of the tonal feedback duo Stars of the Lid and NYC minimalist line painter Jon McCafferty. McCafferty (best known for the cover art of R.E.M.'s Green album) approached Stars of the Lid in the summer of 1995. McCafferty had done a series of paintings influenced by Stars of the Lid's Music For Nitrous Oxide. After discovering the similarity in McCafferty's paintings to the colors of sound in Stars of the Lid, Adam Wiltzie contacted McCafferty and collaboration began. In an attem…
Gravitational Pull vs. The Desire For An Aquatic Life
Reissue of the very limited LP that was on Sedimental label, with additional material added.
Stars of the Lid and Their Refinement of the Decline
The long awaited new album from Stars of the Lid is finally ready for your sonic immersion. Painstakingly recorded, processed and assembled over the last five years, SOTL once again deliver a massive work filling two compact discs and three vinyl albums, clocking in at over two hours. While most albums of this length would be considered tedious at best, SOTL are arguably the only contemporary composers who can seemingly alter the time-space continuum simply through the playback of their organize…
Klavierhelm
Conrad Schnitzler is a genuine legend in the krautrock and electronic music worlds. Schnitzler studied under Joseph Beuys before joining an early Tangerine Dream. Their first album Electronic Meditation shows a band highly influenced by Schnitzler's unique, singular approach. Schnitzler left Tangerine Dream to form Kluster with friends Dieter Moebius and Hans Joachim Roedelius. When Schnitzler left Kluster they changed their name to Cluster, eventually merging with Michael Rother (of Neu!) to fo…
Music For The Gift
This CD brings together four seminal tape works of Terry Riley. The Gift music was performed in Paris 1963 by Chet Baker, with tape manipulations by Riley-- the first use of tape delay to fragment, attenuate, and return time, looping tape through twin-tape recorders. The Gift recordings, referred to often by Soft Machine members, is the precursor to the landmark that launched the minimalist movement In C. "Bird of Paradise" is a radical tape-manipulation work, the earliset known plundering that …
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…
Nah Und Fern
The Kompakt label presents the work of Wolfgang Voigt's Gas -- a remastered deluxe package that includes all four of his Mille Plateaux albums: Gas (1996), Zauberberg (1997), Königsforst (1998) and Pop (2000). Wolfgang Voigt, in the past known under a great many pseudonyms such as Mike Ink, Studio 1 or Grungerman, is the driving force behind the rise of Cologne minimal techno and also Kompakt's co-founder and co-owner. In the 1980s, Voigt began working under a concept he named BLEI -- extracting…
Live at Federal Hall National Memorial, 1981
Arnold Dreyblatt is one of the most engaging of the second generation of New York minimalists. During a three decade career he has developed a distinctive -- and delightfully accessible -- approach to composition and performance. Employing modified and invented instruments and a unique tuning system, his music is a vigorously rhythmic and richly textured romp through the natural overtone series. This live CD celebrates the 25th anniversary of Dreyblatt's historic concert at Federal Hall in New Y…
Quartet (GTM) 2006
Quartet (GTM) 2006 is Anthony Braxton's first release for Important Records. GTM stands for Ghost Trance Music and this four CD box set contains four Ghost Trance compositions recorded in quartet with Anthony Braxton playing reeds, Carl Testa on bass, Aaron Siegal on percussion and Max Heath on piano. This 4CD box also contains a definitive essay by Braxton on his Ghost Trance compositions.