New Arrivals
Not a leaf remains as it was
In 1995 Steve Peters and Steve Roden toured as a trio with singer Anna Homler; sometimes they would vocalize behind her, and they liked the way their voices blended together. They then spent about 15 years saying that “someday” they should record a voice-based project together. Aside from the physical distance between them, the problem was always: What would we sing? Neither wanted to write or sing lyrics.Inspiration came in the form of a book of Japanese jisei – poems allegedly written by monks…
TransMongolian
TransMongolian is a composition of unprocessed field recordings composed in soundscapes. I recorded these acoustic phenomena on my journey through Russia, along Lake Baikal, through Mongolia, China and South Korea to Japan. These countries do not only have very different landscapes and ways of life, they also differ in their sounds, a dimension which more often than not goes unnoticed. The 6 acoustic portraits reflect what I found to be representative of or very special about the countries.
33 bays
Format: Glass-mastered CD. Packaging: Recycled Chipboard Sleeve. 33 bays was recorded in October 2009 in Kyoto, during a Japan tour by the duo of Tim Olive and Alfredo Costa Monteiro. Recorded live in the studio with no overdubs, the two untitled tracks were chosen from a number of pieces captured over several days, showcasing the duo's attunement and dramatic sense of structure. Olive (one-string electric guitar) and Costa Monteiro (electro-acoustic devices) produce a rough, feral music …
Medea
"Medea" by Calliope Tsoupaki is the first in a series of chamber music compositions focusing on drama; a "melodrama for 8 instruments". The composition is written for Ensemble MAE, that distinguishes itself for its colourful, direct, physical and improvisatory character. Tsoupaki uses the ensemble's palette, composing solos, duets, trios, wrapped in larger sonic fields, with a strong associative and visual impact. Further there is no story-telling for the listener to be led into the piece;…
Improvisation Anarchy
With a title like ‘Improvisation Anarchy’, you pretty much have the blessed assurance that the record will be either a right-on, spontaneous surge of electricity, or at least an entertaining disaster. Recorded in 1978-79, this patchwork quilt of straight-arrow punk and meandering synth-assisted psychedelia manages to be both at the same time. It should be noted that this kind of music was not common for 1970s West Japan before the ‘bubble economy’ of the 80’s allowed for more impulsive consumpti…
'Blow job
Blowjob’ is an album stripped of glamour, fancy artistry and advanced studio techniques. This is one man, one saxophone and the musical intentions of a modern musician. The second album in +3DBs series Music for ONE opens up a different view on improv than that of Michael Duch (Edges - +3DB009.) With Møster, an experimental attitude is mixed with an underlying sense for the history of jazz. This is not jazz anymore though, but a contemporary art form with a solid memory. Upholding a music…
Perdition Hill Radio
2nd full-length from self-styled black ambient guitar overlord. Like Earth's seminal "Hex" before it, this invokes the ghosts of a lost America & drags the rotting carcass of country music through a swamp of noise & drone. The chugging, blown-out treble & isolated darkness of Xasthur is all present & correct, but there are also echoes of William Basinski & Deaf Center hidden amongst the clouds of radio static.
Black Ohms
An edition of 500 numbered copies. Thank Expo ‘70, O Lord, for the drones you are about to receive. A deep quivering of transcendental electronic mantras pulsates to the patient beat of the third Bardo. Slow, shape-shifting ambiences expand like groaning baritone crystals crawling out from sub-oceanic ooze. Psix pstring psychedelic pspews bisect the curve of extraterrestrial buzz with a surprising terrestrial fluidity until bioluminescent fish gather to choke out quiet hymns around the th…
Portrait
The works of Clemens Gadenstätter are a wonderful example to evidence how an analytical approach to the phenomenon of hearing may result in music that sincerely moves its listeners. This production, entitled “Portrait,” represents a kind of screen capture of Gadenstätter’s oeuvre. Portraits are sometimes given away as presents in order to convey something of the essence of whom or which they portray. Clemens Gadenstätter’s music is perfectly suited as such a gift. …
The pursuit of happiness
Sylvia Hallett (violin & electronics, voice), Danny Kingshill (cello, voice), Gus Garside (double bass & electronics). First formed in 1988, arc have developed, through improvisation, a collective language that draws on the European textures of the violin family (with a little bit of voice added). This is their first album to use live electronics, at times effectively increasing the group to a quintet. They previously released two albums of acoustic improvisations in 1992-3 on Uneasy Listening a…
1979 - 1983
Michel Bertier : prepared mellotron, doublebass. Sylvain Bélot : visuals and projections. Rodolphe Blois : tape recorders, editing and mixing of tapes. Guillaume Loizillon : synthesizers, vocoder, tapes. Claude Micheli : synthesizers, sequencer, G.S.S.A (semi-random sound generator, electronic device built by Claude Micheli). A French group who existed from 1979 to 1983 in the field of electroacoustic, audiovisual and improvised musics. the group worked with a multichannel system of 10 loud spe…
Upcoming Events
Further exploring the collaborative powers of Illusion Of Safety mastermind Dan Burke and prolific sound crafter Thomas Dimuzio, Upcoming Events is an unending spur of equal parts gorgeous and uncomfortably perplexing sound spread of 15 tracks. Crackles of electronic fire, tremolo-infused waves of sustained guitar, broken music boxes and found sounds among all other sorts of unfounded wails of gargantuan melancholy drone, Burke and Dimuzio's collaboration is a forceful collection of early indust…
Spiritual Jazz
Now-Again Records, in conjunction with Jazzman Records, presents an expanded version of the compilation that introduced many listeners to the sound of the unsung musicians who - in the midst of the Vietnam War and the fallout of the Civil Rights struggle - created some of the most beautiful spiritual and meditative music of the 60s and 70s. The music was at times funky, at times contemplative, but it always strived to say something about the world in which the musicians lived.
Endless Falls
Endless Falls is the fifth full length release by Scott Morgan under the loscil moniker. The album begins and ends with the sound of rain recorded by Scott in his back yard, precipitation being a constant presence in his home city of Vancouver. Many of the other sounds on the album are derived from these same recordings, processed and combined with other harmonic sounds to create the textures and drones. Something completely new to this release would be vocals, of a sort, a first for any loscil …
OTO NO HAJIMARI WO MOTOMETE
Brand new issue of archve series of NHK electronic music studio. Contents: Toshira Mayuzumi : 'Princess Hollyhock' (1957), Shinichi Matsushita : 'Le Cloitre NOir' for voice and electronic music (1959), Toshi Ichiyanagi : 'Parallel Music' (1962), Shiro Ima : 'Music for 12 players and Electronic sounds' (1965)'.
Destroying The Night Sky
A very special release with an unusual mix of sound: Using Cadaverous Condition's "To The Night Sky" album as source material for their tracks, all the aforementioned bands have created a unique new style of music. Call it metal ambient, drone metal or electronics metal, the result is something previously unknown and exciting. Hear Nurse With Wound doing one of their darkest tracks ever - listen to Controlled Bleeding's totally insane restructuring of a rock track, or be surprised by Nocturnal E…
Recomp
Israeli bassist and Improvised Music pioneer Jean Claude Jones revisits eleven musical pieces recorded live and in studio over a period of ten years, performing, what he calls recomposition of the pieces. In his own words: 'As opposed to mere editing, recomp involves the deconstruction, subtraction, rearrangement, and reconstruction of the material. It not only changes the sequencing, but it radically affects the feeling and the flow of the music. It also changes the texture of the weave, the vo…
Birth Canal Blues
Birth Canal Blues is the first CD release on Coptic Cat, the new label started by David Tibet and Current 93. The album consists of one 20-minute song in four movements that sets the basic narrative structure of Anok Pe Current 93's new Hallucinatory Mountain trilogy, whose first part, Invocation of Hallucinatory Mountain, is due in January 2009. Birth Canal Blues was recorded by Tibet, Baby Dee, John Contreras, and Andrew Liles. The packaging includes an 8-page color booklet with photographs fr…
H\'Art Songs
Moondog's fanbase seems to be righteously on the up nowadays, with reissue after reissue re-illuminating his singularly out-there musical genius. This is a stranger album than most however: on this one Moondog sings. Yes, this is possibly the only entry into the blind Viking impersonator/singer/songwriter sub genre. Inevitably, it's really good. Even though this album (recorded in 1969, incidentally) reduces the composer's ordinarily expanded palette to little more than voice and piano, there's …
Drape
12k kicks off its 11th year with a new release that takes the label down new sonic pathways. Caught between the organic and electronic minimalism that 12k is known for and the unconventional Japanese pop musings and songwriting style of Happy, Moskitoo’s Drape is an infectously strange, bleepy, and dreamy debut release.Sanae Yamasaki (Moskitoo) hails from Sappporo, Japan in the country’s northern-most prefecture of Hokkaido. Perhaps a reaction to the cool climate of her home, her multi-instrumen…