New Arrivals
And IV (Inertia)
With And IV (Inertia), Grischa Lichtenberger presents his first full-length record on Raster-Noton after his participation in the Unun series. For his musical production, he uses field recordings of his environment which are manipulated and broken down to their bare nakedness until only fragments are left. Apart from analog sources, he also uses digital sound data which is likewise turned and twisted until the boundaries between analog and digital are blurred. The arrangement of these atom…
Celeste
Another Tompkins Square reissue of early James Blackshaw material, and this is about as early as it gets: Celeste originally surfaced on Celebrate Psi Phenomenon a full five years ago and set the blueprint fr just about every solo recording he's made since. While the first part of the album finds Blackshaw in solo 12-string mode, the second deviates from the well-trodden Takoma-styled path and heads into an effects-laden drone composition. This sort of style-melding approach would come to…
Myriad
Mayas frames her instrument not as 88 keys arranged in tidy scales, but as a sonorous tangle of wood and wire, she produces sounds with a wide dynamic range, playing the whole piano, inside and out, including dramatic percussive effects from banging and scraping the frame of the instrument and the strings. Abdelnour has developed extended techniques and complex patterns of sound production, exploring the microtonal aspects of the saxophone and its high-pitched tones. she employs subtle tonguing…
The Tale Of The Heike
An epic concept album narrated and performed by Akira Sakata, Heike Monogatari ("Tale of the Heike") is the most disturbing entry so far in the DoubtMusic catalogue. This work is an expression of the philosophy of impermanence. It's also a vision of Hell. Woodwinds signify madness. Bells accentuate silence. And Sakata's voice unleashes a phantasmagoric torrent of shomyo (Japanese Tantric Buddhist chanting), death metal growls, and pure pandemonium. Is he serious? Or not? One thing is cert…
The Resurrection And Revenge Of The Clayton Peacock
Michael Chapman, one of the finest acoustic guitar innovators borne of the late '70s UK folk scene, was in Philadelphia early 2010, paying tribute to his good friend, the late Jack Rose, a mighty six-string alchemist in his own right, and a youngster wholly inspired by Chapman's critical recordings. While sharing in the good light of friendship backstage, we asked Michael if he'd ever recorded an LP of purely improvised guitar music. It seemed feasible, as the current state of acou…
Stasis
Zbeen is an electro-acoustic project by Gianluca Favaron and Ennio Mazzon. Zbeen’s improvisational approach is developed from the human-machine paradigm which is represented by the interaction with digital instruments specifically designed and developed for this project. K-Frame, Zbeen's debut EP, was released by Ripples in January 2012. Unlike K-Frame, which was developed as a sonic counter-part to the linear algebra concept of an ordered set of ‘k’ linearly-independent vectors, Stasis elabo…
Fe3O4 - Magnetite
Vainio is back with his fifth album for the esteemed Touch label! Currently based in Berlin, was one half of the minimal electronic duo Pan Sonic from Finland, (with Ilpo Väisänen). Before starting Pan Sonic in the beginning of the 90's, Mika Vainio has played electronics and drums as part of the early Finnish industrial and noise scene. His solo works, under his own name and under aliases like Ø, are known for their analogue warmth and electronic harshness. Be it abstract drone works or m…
Privilegium Martyrii
Thick and spectral dark ambient, soaked with soft and flowing pads stratifications, wrapped in deep and penetrating low frequencies spires, enlightened by delicate and touching melodic inserts, profaned by echoes of reverberating metallic noises, clanging chains, circular mechanical movements, waves of indecipherable whispers, distant and suffering human voices... A great debut CD for Antikatechon, a project that showcases Davide Del Col's eclectic personality, already the unique mind of the Orn…
Hunting the Snake
2012 repress, originally issued pre-9/11. "Astounding 1975 Radio Bremen session from Germany -- never before released, by one of the greatest working bands in the history of European improvised music is offered for your consideration on Hunting The Snake. How can you lose? This all-star ensemble features Alexander von Schlippenbach on piano, Evan Parker on saxophones, Peter Kowald on bass, and Paul Lovens on drums and singing saw. A brilliant, previously unreleased 77 minute program fr…
Papercuts Theater
AWESOMEEEE!!!! The construction of this latest opus from C. Spencer Yeh's Burning Star Core comes from the collaging of sixty-six live recordings, captured over the course of an eleven year-period. The editing time for this monstrous undertaking was fairly substantial too, taking up two further years of on-and-off assembly. In addition to Yeh himself, the list of contributors takes in an expansive cast of notable noise and improv artists, including Hair Police's Mike Connelly, Trevor Tre…
Northern
The inspiration behind Northern (including its music, title and photography) comes from Deupree’s recent relocation from the heart of urban activity in Brooklyn to the tranquility of the forest in upstate New York. Inspired by nature and the winter during which it was created, Northern, like much of his recent work, explores Deupree’s interest in stillness and a slowed sense of time. Through quiet textures, subtle movements, faint loops and echoes, it was his goal to create the type of music tha…
Nothing Special
The best-selling instrumentalist in the world, with over 70 million albums sold to date, Kenny G. is an international superstar who has earned countless prestigious awards throughout an illustrious career that spans three decades. He has distinguished himself as a master craftsman and one of the most gifted artists in the world, through nineteen best-selling releases. Now add one more to that list of multiple-platinum chart-topping records: NOTHING SPECIAL. Kenny's first album in at least…
Plekzationz
CD version. This recording contains seven remixes by UK-based artist and electronic musician Mark Fell of the first three 12" singles released on the record label Sensate Focus in 2012. These were called 10, 5 and 3.3.... The first of these, 10, was itself a reworking of materials from an earlier project by Fell and Terre Thaemlitz, released on Comatonse Recordings in 2012. The seven remixes were written and recorded in June 2012 at the Upper Lounge, Chatham Street (UK) using a MacBook Pro ru…
Mind Ctrl: Psychic
A new label (The Fader) brings a deluxification of 2009's Psychic Chasms, which now also contains the bonus album Mind Ctrl: Psychic Chasms Possessed, featuring nine exclusive remixes and cover versions by Toro y Moi, Body Language, Javelin, Bibio, Yacht, Darby Cicci of The Antlers, Twin Shadow, Dntel, and Anoraak!An elusive new project from composer Alan Palomo, Neon Indian delivers equal parts synthetic nostalgia, dream-pop lullabies, and grinding guitar noise to create something eerier t…
Walküren am Dornenbaum
This three year-long collaboration begun in 2006 when Korber and Wehowsky embarked on intense recording sessions in Eggenstein, where the latter resides, lasting several days. The output from these sessions forms the basis of this work, augmented by additional field recordings and various electronic manipulations. Korber and Wehowsky used the same software which allowed them to exchange the pieces at any stage of the compositional process, so that every detail of the music could be shaped in a t…
Grisp
Running the gamut of improv, concrète, industrial tape music, and cut-up sounds. Featuring appearances by MITCHELL BROWN (GASP), AARON HEMPHILL (LIARS), PETER KOLOVOS (OPEN CITY), RICK POTTS (LAFMS, SOLID EYE, AIRWAY), and source material by SMEGMA and the HATERS. Partially collects material from the Beat (777 Was 666), Grisp, and DDT (Chondritic Sound) cassettes. For those that say things like, "I don't really listen to CDs"—you're totally lame.
Nature Data
Why is the phoneme the most 'ideal' of signs? Where does this complicity between sound and ideality, or rather, between voice and ideality, come from? When I speak, it belongs to the phenomenological essence of this operation that I hear myself [je m'entende] at the same time that I speak. The signifier, animated by my breath and by the meaning-intention, is in absolute proximity to me. The living act, the life-giving act, the Lebendigkeit, which animates the body of the signifier and tra…
Map in hand
Seaworthy, a three piece collective based in Sydney, Australia that revolves around core member Cameron Webb as well as Sam Shinazzi and Greg Bird, was formed in early 2000 to explore melodic and experimental approaches to the construction of minimalist sound scapes from looped guitar, warm drones, piano, electronics and field recordings.Map In Hand often blurs the lines of conventional categorisation with elements traditionally considered part of “indie” or “post” rock blended with processed mu…
Stop Playing
Wolfgang Mitterer is playing the organ and leaves no tone unturned. The composer beams the traditional instrument straight into the 21st century – feel free to follow suit!The organ is a machine, and Wolfgang Mitterer certainly knows how to operate machines. Quite early on his passion for this complex instrument got hooked up to the manifold possibilities available in a digital studio setting; so, meanwhile the Austrian composer has become both: a much admired contemporary organist with a pencha…
(Old school) Alvin Lucier
The internationally acclaimed 'hilarious releases' [vital weekly] of zeitkratzer records go on. This is the third release in the new series [old school]. The first two CDs, dedicated to the music of John Cage [zkr0009] and James Tenney [zkr0010] have been highly acclaimed. London's Wire Magazine wrote: 'The rigour and discipline they collectively bring to this compositions make both discs utterly enthralling, from start to finish.' The new release is dedicated to the music of Alvin Lucier. In 20…