New Arrivals
Split LP
Delving into the realm of deep listening, transported by way of analog synthesizers, Family Battle Snake weaves an electronic web that cocoons the listener in warm cascading frequencies. Calls to mind classic electronic composers such as Charles Dodge, Charles Wourinen and even a hint of NWW. Family Battle Snake is Bill Kouligas, a London-based Greek who also performs and records with Sudden Infant. Astro is Hiroshi Hasegawa of the legendary and now defunct Japanese noise unit C.C.C.C. Sonic wav…
Movements in Marble and Stone
While these performances occurred on opposite coasts, the source material is closely aligned in both concept and process. These works highlight Gregg's ongoing preoccupations with sound and setting, incorporating the focused blend of acoustic and electronic sources that Kowalsky is already well known for. 'Electronic Music for Square and Sine Waves' documents Gregg Kowalsky's contribution to the 2011 Activating the Medium festival in San Francisco. This commissioned piece continues Kowals…
Public Service
“Almost Washed My Hair” erupts from the stereo like some bastard child from a universe where Iggy Pop fronted The Velvet Underground and the only song in their repertoire was “Sister Ray” but they could never remember how to play it. This ear-splitting and cacophonous rock sounds as raw and powerful as anything else in my record collection. The deafening guitars dominate everything; only ghosts of vocals and a hammering beat are perceptible under the overloaded amplifiers. However…
Living: 2009-Present
Tracks:
Side A - civil / headless / lo v / wiped out / closest
Side B - break bone / end flux / without one / civilizationRecorded live 2009-Present, various locations, Los Angeles, CA.Tearist: Yasmine Kittles, William StrangelandCover Photograph: Olivia Crawford
Sound/Visual Design, Production: Peter Kolovos, William Stangeland
Vinyl Mastering: Pete Lyman at Infrasonic SoundLimited edition high quality vinyl in full color & hand-letterpressed heavy tip-on jacket.
Flammende Herzen
Michael Rother (half of the influential Krautrock group Neu! and a founding member of Kraftwerk and Harmonia) recorded this first solo album with producer Conny Plank in 1976. Rother's signature guitar sound, the mechanical percussion (Jaki Liebezeit of Can) and the simple yet outerworldly anthemic melodies make Flammende Herzen an outstanding and visionary record."Finally reissued on vinyl, this is the 1976 solo debut from from Neu!/Harmonia guitarist Michael Rother. This would be the fir…
Ausland
Just two years separate Pyrolator's 1979 debut Inland and the 1981 album Ausland. Nevertheless, they could hardly be more different from one another. If Inland reflects the industrial decay and politically-explosive atmosphere of 1977 and the years thereafter in the Federal Republic of Germany, then Ausland is a buoyant, playful and yet groundbreaking pop album. There had been some significant developments since 1979. The Ata Tak label, which Pyrolator had co-founded, had hit a rich vein of…
Here's Sunshine
This is another lost private-press gem, from a Texas singer/songwriter who is remembered for “looping, melodically through often surrealist lyrics with a strong Tim Buckley influence.” Another description drops the always-intriguing “downer” folk tag on this record, calling it “stark, edgy real-people loner vibe, reverb, acoustic instrumentation, occasional hand percussion, piano, harmonica, as that off-the-chain Texas feel that approaches solo Roky Erickson territory.” The record label, Backbea…
Black Summit
Strictly limited to 400 copies only, already sold out at source* Garden Söund is the rewarding collaboration of two hugely respected outfits: Barn Owl and Eternal Tapestry. Word of the album has spread like wildfire on a vast midwest plain, hence all 400 copies are sold out at source. 'Black Summit' finds the commonalities in Barn Owl's epic desert scapes and the crushingly potent psychedelia of Jed Bindeman's Eternal Tapestry with immeasurable success. The two characters stalk moonlit ca…
6pezzi2009+lagodelnulla
Aggressive loop music based on sounds from photographic equipment and african field recordings. Besides being an early-Reich cheap imitation, ‘lagodelnulla’ is an italian expression (roughly translated as ‘lakeofnothingness’) found in an old Banda-Ngao lullaby (Central Africa, early ’60s). An ‘objet trouvé’ elevated as social commentary by the author. Volume encouraged. 35 minutes, transparent vinyl. Edition of 100 copies in recycled chipboard sleeve with silkscreened sheet (printed by Ped…
Introducing
The Drag City / Galactic Zoo team delve deeply into the recesses of private press obscurity once again, further revealing the underbelly of American music's recorded history - this time the little known songwriter Ryan Trevor is in the spotlight, who released just one incredibly rare, homespun LP (this one, if you're wondering) which surfaced originally in 1977. Not much is known about Trevor, though the guys at Drag City bill him as a "loner genius", whose work is to be filed somewhere between …
Graf Spee
Two tracks of incredible beauty characterized by unbelievable depth and intensity, from one of the finest masters of contemporary electronic music.Deep, powerful, brutal, quietly melodic drone massages from The King. Housed in a beautifully packaged LP edition, "Graf Spee" is a collaboration between artists CM von Hausswolff, Jan Håfström and Juan Pedro Fabra for an installation commissioned by the 5th Nordic Biennale of contemporary art and by Wanas Foundation in Sweden
Bermuda Telepaths
RESTOCKED, very last copies... Brand new LP by the So-Cal recluse responsible for the recent "Matrix Metals" cassette on NNF. This one is deeper into the Vodka Soap-style ritual electronics zone.
Brooding Forest
Hunting Rituals is the moniker of Scott Johnson (also Scott Cloud, Thoughts On Air) which was inspired from many impromptu collaborations with other weirdo musicians within the city limits of Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Brooding Forest was the first recording to feature a second member, a fellow collaborator Jeremiah Buchan from Bottom Feeder who was also a main influence on the overall ritual sound process. This recording fuses Scott's focus of feral improv with Jeremy's premeditated lands…
Tnt
1986 Release, original copy. Rolf Enström can look back on a fifteen year period as a composer. His list of works includes a number of very carefully crafted compositions of high artistic quality. Several of his works have become classics; one thinks especially of Directions (1979) and Final Curses (1981). Rolf Enström is a composer who unceasingly seeks new artistic paths and new means of expression and this is something which has led him to combine music with other art forms, primarily t…
Danza Meccanica - Italian Synth Wave 1982 - 1987
Gorgeous collection of rare and early italian wave releases from 1982 - 1987 selected by Danza and with intro text by Fred Ventura in a limited run of 500 vinyl albums (hand numbered) it includes 2 inserts, LP cover on hand-made serigraphy. Highly recommended.
Anthem
Presented here for the first time on vinyl, Joe Colley's 'Anthem' LP gathers material from limited edition releases issued between 2001-2006. Side A presents Anthem a long form tonal study with contrasting climax. Side B edits together 4 shorter explorations culled from the Triptych triple business card cdr release and inserts a track from the 2001 compilation CD Coalescence. Mastered for vinyl by Giuseppe Ielasi. Pressed in a limited edition of 200 copies housed in a deluxe tip-on jacket…
Teeth Mountain
Driven primarily by neo-tribal drums, which would seemingly put them in league with the rumbling sound of Bmore's Thank You. But "12 Plus Harsh Tanz" in particular is much more reflective. The guitar brings to mind the cracked post-1960s dream-psyche hangover of Pink Floyd, I'm thinking here of an instrumental interlude that might have been on Obscured by Clouds, or perhaps the contemporaneous Eastern-infused lines of Popul Vuh's Daniel Fichelscher. It's headspace music, to be sure, but in some …
Arctic Hysteria
Original 1981 release! Slava Ranko(aka Don Philippi) released only one album, Arctic Hysteria (1981), that quotes John Cage, Brian Eno, minimalism, Indian music Don Philippi (October 2 1930-January 26 1993) was a noted translator of Japanese and Ainu and a musician.Born in Los Angeles, Philippi studied at the University of Southern California before going to Japan in 1957 on a Fulbright scholarship to study at the Kokugakuin University. In Japan he became an expert in classical Japanese an…
Test Leads
Includes digital download voucher redeemable from the label** Judging from his prolific output, L.A. dude M. Geddes Gengras must have a heavy carbon footprint. But we'll let him off 'cause he makes exceedingly good music. After techno odysseys as Personable, psych-dub trips with Sun Araw and The Congos, and duties in Robedoor, Pocahaunted and LA Vampires, he flies under his birth name for 'Test Leads', perhaps his purest and most honest revelation to date; two sprawling sides of throbbing womb b…
BloodLinks + SacredPlaces
Poet Laureate of East St. Louis+founder/editor of internationally acclaimed journal "Drum Voices Revue". Principal architect of black cultural arts movement of the 60s, teacher & acclaimed writer of countless volumes of poetry, Redmond has been called "the preacher of poetic rhythm" by Maya Angelou, "a carver of high song magic" by Quincy Troupe & "a worker & healer" by Ishmael Reed. On this spirited, funky, streetwise collection of 12 vintage cuts recorded live in the studio in Sacramento in 19…