New Arrivals
Freedom, Rhythm & Sound
This collection of rare album artwork reflects the independent energy of the African American jazz movement. Located in the heart of Soho in London, Soul Jazz Records is a musical oasis. While many of the quality record shops that once graced this area have closed their doors Soul Jazz seems to go from strength to strength. Stuart Baker and his partner Karen Tate oversee a thriving business which is driven by their own tastes and beliefs. A pragmatic duo, they recognize that the survival of Soul…
Lean Left, Volume 1
Earlier this year The Ex toured with a wonderful brass section, which comprised saxophonists Mats Gustafsson and Ken Vandermark, trumpeter Roy Paci and trombonist Wolter Wierbos, fleshing out the core quartet. Thrilling as that show was, however, the horn section were deployed firmly in counterpoint to the Ex’s rhythm throughout. Lean Left is another matter entirely. Recorded live in Amsterdam in March 2008, it’s an exhilaratingly vivid and spontaneous workout focused on just two or three…
Live installation at Loop-Line recorded by Toshiya Tsunoda
USW56, USW57, USW59, USW61, USW113, these five hand-made electronics hanged from a ceiling have an ultrasonic wave transmitter, a reciever and an amplifier. Each frequency of the ultrasonic wave is about 40khz but slightly different. And when each instrument swings, each frequency changes a little caused by the Doppler effect. On thier instruments we can hear beat signals between transmitted and received ultrasonic waves changed in frequency. (Manabu Suzuki) Where does art work appear? How do pe…
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…
Yaho-Niwa
Masami Akita alias Merzbow, the king of noise music, the defender of the vegan cause, the animals lover is coming back with a cosmic and devastating magma, a spinning metal tapestry-work with loops of echoes in a whale rutting way. As usual, to be listened to very loudly. Mix realized at Munemihouse in Tokyo during the month of April in 2011.
139
Six untitled pieces compiled from improvisations recorded 2–3 July 2011 at Utterpsalm studio. The sound sample is an unused excerpt from the second recording session which took place on 14–15 September 2011 at Mark Durgan’s studio in Bristol. Edited by Mark Durgan.
Sjunga Slutet Nu
Sjunga slutet nu (Sing the End Now), the new long-awaited project by Hans Appelqvist, consists of both an album and a film. The work is about the angst and silencing of death and the meeting with the final end. The film and album have the atmosphere of a fairy-tale that feels both natural and original, a world where talking levitating spheres seem as ordinary as man. In it, we meet Theodora, an elderly woman that lives in a lonely house by a lake somewhere in Sweden. We also meet her friends: th…
Luminous Night
CD edition: Luminous Night is the first set of new Six Organs Of Admittance material to leap forth from Ben Chasnys' cerebral cortex in 18 months, and what a joy it is. With the release of odds-and-sods collection RTZ earlier in the year there to bridge the gap between 2007s Shelter From The Ash it doesn't seem like he's been away for long per se but for serious Chasny-heads a new album is something to get pretty excited about and with his other musical outlet Comets On Fire either on extended h…
Opus 2
Developing on the trance-induction and brainwave entrainment techniques explored on the first Ethernet album 144 Pulsations of Light, Opus 2 moves into deeper, more introspective and emotive territory. A stronger focus on melody and harmonic structure results in pieces that almost approach, but never quite arrive at, traditional song forms, while still leaving much to the imagination of the listener, evading mental categorization and revealing new sonic experiences with each listen. The bu…
Invisible
A new series designed by Clare Cooper. Xavier Charles is an active clarinetist in the world of improvised music, known from a variety of constellations and ensembles like Dans les arbres and Contest of Pleasures. This is his first solo release for Sofa. Listening and perception are important elements in Invisible, which consists of both solo clarinet and field recordings. A total openness to moment and utterance characterizes his sound explorations, where we in a poetic fashion, are led to a pla…
Llum moll
Llum Moll is a multilayered composition made with a manipulated AM radio receiver subjected to interference by LED lamps. The combination of the lamps in tandem with the radio tuned to certain frequencies creates a phantom organ' sound, turning the receiver into an instrument with a peculiar timbre and pitch. The composition was made in two parts. The first was to record and then select fragments with different lengths, pitches and textures. The second was to readjust the pitch of the chosen fra…
13 miniatures for Albert Ayler
Would it be that when everything finishes that everything starts? Rather than a postlude or a coda, the five minutes a cappella by Joe McPhee on the tenor saxophone placed here in thirteenth position, sound like a song of love and hope coloured utopia which condenses the invisibility of lives which are here and then are no longer here.from the effervescence of an aviary where chirpings and warbling intersect (from Raphael Imbert, Urs Leimgruber, McPhee, Evan Parker and John Tchicai each sax seem…
Con 3
This album saw Conrad Schnitzler head further in the direction of pop music. Like Consequenz, Con 3 (1981) is a collaborative effort with Wolfgang Seidel, alias Sequenza. Con 3 is a really odd mixture of numerous ingredients which Schnitzler was capable of combining with dexterity and taste. His musical handwriting is immediately apparent in the foreground. Effervescent electronic sequences can be heard on all nine pieces, coming from somewhere and appearing to go wherever -- this is Schnit…
Songs of the frogs of Taiwan, vol.1
Taiwan, located between Japan and Philippines, possess a precious natural environment. This 68 minutes long Compact-Disc contains the songs of 16 amongst the 32 species of frogs that inhabit the island. Realized by a sound artist who is also an amphibian enthousiast, these recordings (devoid of vocal or musical accompaniment) are not only audio documents for natural history aficionados, but propose also some listening situation for the pleasure of the ears. This work is an invitation to the deli…
The Hexagram on Grace
Third soloist album by Roberto Opalio (My Cat Is An Alien, Painting Petals On Planet Ghost, Praxinoscope). During the same period of self isolation in the Westrn Alps that brought to life MCIAA's 'Photoelectric Season' double album, Roberto conceived the creation of his new full-lenght album, inspired by the mystic aura of the nature surrounding himself. Focusing himself on his peculiar wordless vocalizations, and using simply a mini-key…
You'll Be Safe Forever
CD version. You'll Be Safe Forever marks the first release from Locust in 12 years. Mark Van Hoen, who made a string of influential releases as Locust on R&S records in the 1990s, all but retired the alias at the end of that decade. In May 2012, Van Hoen was invited to perform a live set on WFMU radio. In order to make the set more spontaneous and add a further dimension, he asked friend and fellow musician Louis Sherman to collaborate. While improvising new material in Sherman's Brooklyn …
Rebuses
Franz Hautzinger (quartertone trumpet), Masahiko Okura (reeds) and Tetuzi Akiyama (tape delayed electric guitar). Recorded in Tokyo, 2004.A rebus is "a representation of a word or phrase by pictures or symbols", as you probably all know. Just wondering what the words might be then, on listening to this remarkably active (in its discreet lowercase way) trio outing from trumpeter Hautzinger, saxophonist Okura and guitarist Akiyama. EAI is, after all, supposed to be slow and spacious (think Hautzin…
Postepeno
poSTepeno is inspired by a multi-part collage created circa 1890 by an anonymous schizophrenic patient (known only as Frau ST) at the Viennese Oberdöbling asylum. The compositions (for piano and sine tones) morph musicalthemes through continual microtonal modifications. Sine tones are unstable, but nevertheless they consistently keep their individual frequency direction (up or down). In the chordal sense, the distance between the tones is subject to alteration. In this way the harmonic indicatio…
Early Summer
10 improvised sound collages by Wade Matthews. What this music is about and how it was made. These are 10 virtual soundscapes selected from among 14 made in Madrid in late June and early July 2009, hence the name, Early Summer. They are improvised sound collages, real-time assemblages of field recordings (manipulated to greater or lesser degrees), noises, electroquotes and digital synthesis. The field recordings were made over the last two years in the San Francisco Bay area, La Mancha, a…
Monsters & Miasmas
Brian Cook (TERMINALS) & wife Maryrose make up this long-running project who's releases on Ajax/3 Beads of Sweat & Siltbreeze have continued to tread a line between haunting country-esque ballads & the brand of noise-rock for which the Terminals is known.