New Arrivals
History Of The Units - The Early Years: 1977-1983
first ever legit reissue of THE UNITS. This genre-defying band, from San Francisco's barely-documented synth/punk/art underground of the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, combined sarcastic humor with deadly serious cultural critique, and synthetic experimentation with the bombast of punk. Includes the most sought-after early singles and selections from their first LP, Digital Stimulation, along with unreleased demos, and more. Remastered audio. Packaged in gatefold LP style sleeves with 32-page booklet…
I Know When it's Time To Get The Fuck Away
From the initial sonic assault of “Apocryphal” to the final “Wrong Affection”, the five tracks guide the listener through shades of early nineties electric blues (think Palace, Songs:Ohia and fellows), sixties psichedelia flavoured from the spirit of Skip Spence. Rella's singing is rich, intense and perfumed, sometimes plunged into deep trance, like in “Are You Expired?” or “Wrong Affection” where instruments and voice rise together in a psichedelic unison building from a country-like ope…
A thousand mountains
To start with, we've always commended Japan's Doubtmusic label for the handsome packaging job that each one of their digipack cd releases invariably receives. This one, though, we'd probably be inclined to buy just 'cause of the especially cool cover art alone! Done by one Tomoo Gokita, the cover suggests an arched window in a brightly patterned wall, looking out on (a photo of) some majestic snow-capped alpine mountain (the Matterhorn, is it?). But in front of the "window", the corpse-painted v…
Miniatures - Songs recycle
Pierre-Yves Macé is a young French composer, he was born in 1980, but has already released four albums on respected labels including Tzadik and Sub Rosa. Miniatures - Song Recycle is his second album for the Parisian imprint Brocoli, following the acclaimed Passagenweg. Miniatures - Song Recycle, as the title suggests, alternates musique concrète studies and songs in the form of lieder, where the voice is made of recycled, chopped and transformed a cappella vocals from YouTube, accompanied…
Ullakkopalo
This is the first release from Finland's Kemialliset Ystävät since 2007. Kemialliset Ystävät equals Jan Anderzén. He is one of the few Finnish musicians to have achieved renown in the international experimental circuit. In the case of Anderzén -- who also plies a trade as a visual artist -- this is not a matter of juxtaposition between experimental and mainstream, or a calculated career choice. Using music and images, he is busy creating a world that is a law unto itself, a world of exceptional …
For/Not For John Cage
Line is pleased to announce the upcoming release of a elegant new sound work by Australian artist Lawrence English, inspired by John Cage.In 2011, anticipating John Cage’s centenary, I began thinking about how to approach a work that might act as a homage to the aspects of his life and work that have inspired me over the past two decades (ironically, those in which he has been physical absent, but philosophically more present than ever). John Cage, with that beaming smile and trademarked c…
Prayer Wheel
The Prayer Wheel, like this CDR, spins prayers into the ether. Book of Shadows combines psychedelia, experimental music, and the pursuit of spiritual understanding, all performed together in the eternal present. For the Prayer Wheel release Sharon and Carlton Crutcher are joined by longtime guitarists Aaron Bennack, Jonathan Horne (Plutonium Farmers), and Douglas Ferguson. Also appearing on this release are percussionist Johnny McCollom of the Primordial Undermind, theremin player and fil…
Foundations
With an explorative approach Orquere organizes concrete sounds into experimental structures of cold and dry sonic landscapes where sounds appear as objects. Stripped down to their bare essence. No effects. No electronic noise. Just raw analogue manipulations with magnetic tape which carves out a sound that has its roots in both industrial, field recording and sound art. Orquere is Viktor Ottosson, a sound artist active in Gothenburg, Sweden. V O was one of the key figures of the now defun…
Time & Motion
Radio Massacre International is a British trio of Steve Dinsdale (keyboards, electronics, drums), Duncan Goddard (keyboards, electronics, bass) and Gary Houghton (guitar, synthesizers). These three musicians have worked together in various configurations since they were 16 year old students in the 70s and formed R.M.I. in 1993. After nearly 20 years together as R.M.I. and over 30 albums and hundreds of concerts, you might think that there might be no surprises left, but like their undulating, fl…
Here comes the sun
Barbara Romen, hammered dulcimer. Kai Fagaschinski, clarinet. Gunter Schneider, guitars. All music by B. Romen (AKM), K. Fagaschinski (AKM), and G. Schneider (AKM). Recorded by Christoph Amann at Amann Studios, Vienna, May 31st, 2008. Mixed and mastered by Christoph Amann with Schneider and Fagaschinski on October 31st, 2011. 300 copies.
Schindler house
This cd documents a series of 3 sound installations originally presented at the Schindler house / MAK center for art and architecture Los Angeles in 2001. Garden was placed near the back of the lot facing the house in a bamboo grove via 8 small speakers. A quiet flexible background for a harmonious life was placed in a small hallway of the house on headphones. Pathway was placed along the front path to the house on 4 larger speakers. The outdoor works were set to relatively low volume lev…
Hairdryer Peace
Finally available on CD. Ranked 3rd best album of 2008 in The Wire magazine. Intensely psychedelic and mixed for maximum hallucinations, this marks a pretty heavy departure from the Hospitals of old. Heavy tranced-out riffs, weird pop, cracked folk, disorienting noise, paranoid vibes. Main Hospital Adam Stonehouse with Rob Enbom & Rod Meyer from Eat Skull and Chris Gunn from The Hunches. The most forward-thinking album of 2008 but also an album of songs with actual emotional intensity. Not a par…
Peace Conference
"Mountain Ocean Sun is a project fronted by His Name Is Alive main man Warren Defever, who collaborates with three like-minded drone artists for an hour-long recording of shruti box, harmonium, bells, gongs and violin. The group's first performance was at a 500 year old Buddhist temple in Osaka, and that pretty much sets the tone for the quartet's quasi-mystical approach to soundscaping. Defever himself continues to mythologise, describing the recording as having been made "on a mountain, in the…
Air Museum
Air Museum blurs the lines between acoustic and electronic music even more without sacrificing melody or the delicacy of their sound. It is an album of firsts. It was the first album that the acoustic instruments were not processed via a computer. Instead, the processing of the instrumentation (acoustic and electric guitar, cello, accordion, piano, bass etc.) was done using a variety of pedals, modular synths, and other analog techniques. While acoustic instruments were used extensively, …
Ekhnatòn - Ricerca Italiana Semplice Numero Uno
This compilation, originally released in 1984 as a vinyl LP by Multiple Configuration in collaboration with the legendary ADN label, is finally available again in a completely remastered CD version. "Ekhnaton" collects tracks recorded by the most daring and remarkable bands that were active in the experimental Italian scene during those years. "Simple Italian Research Vol. 1" was (and still is) the subtitle of an album that includes two tracks from each of the following bands: Maze 1066, Tasaday…
Spiritual Jazz 2: Europe
As the '60s progressed, cultural and political revolutions occurred both in the U.S. and in Europe. Jazz was both a victim and a savior, with radical developments in the music occurring on both continents. In the U.S., artists took control of their own musical destiny as small labels broke away from the mainstream, expressing new and creative visions of freedom and peace against a backdrop of civil unrest, repression and war. In '60s Europe, the jazz community forged ahead with a different…
Absolutely Nothing
This is a collection of previously-unreleased studio and live material. Originally released in 2002 and deleted for years -- this collection is now made available again in 2012 due to demand. The studio material is as beautiful and sad as "Dirty Old Town," made famous by The Pogues, which is released on CD for the first time here. The oldest song, "Willie Boy," was recorded during the 1991 session for Documentary but didn't make it onto the record. "German Mustard," "Where I Lead Me," "Heav…
The Visitor
The Visitor is a seriously all-O'Rourke affair: all the sounds you hear are Jim and Jim alone, recontextualizing everything he's done over the years & throwing out the bullshit. The one thing you won't hear is his voice. Some of The Visitor is tracked so deep, it took two hundred tracks to hold it all. It doesn't sound like it though - to Jim's credit, the mix sounds very minimal, very straightforward. There's moments of low comedy next to high drama & juicy melancholy with a seeming lack of reg…
All Is Falling
The ultra savant of 12-string mantra cycles expands further into cinematic, orchestral glory - an orgy of organic, deeply felt & exquisitely played pathways to the sublime. His 1st foray into the realm of the electric 12-string guitar. Comprised of one slowly evolving, shifting piece of music in eight parts, replete w/ swirling string cycles & wind instruments augmenting his extended pointillist flurries w/ clouds of sound, sometimes adding delicate counter-melodies but just as often feed…
Life (...It eats you up)
Whereas previous works by Mika Vainio have utilised guitar Life (… It Eats You Up) is the first to use the instrument as its primary sound source. A fascinating, sometimes disturbing and deeply personal work this new 10 track set bears all the hallmarks (exacting attention to detail of tone, rhythm and texture) of Vainio's previous works with some stunning surprises, such as his cover version of The Stooges' 'Open Up and Bleed'.Tracks such as ‘Mining’ hark bark to the banging beat exces…