New Arrivals
Twenty Systems
Twenty tracks made on 20 synthesizers spanning 20 years, accompanied by a 60-page color book with a foreword by Robin "Scanner" Rimbaud, Twenty Systems is Benge's acclaimed concept album, first released in 2008. His 10th solo album, this ambitious project combines an audio CD of new music with a hardbound full-color book containing photos and diagrams of the electronic instruments used, along with a detailed history documenting the development of synthesizers between 1968 and 1988. The purpo…
White Metal
“White Metal” is a new piece by Michael Pisaro, realised by the composer and Miguel Prado. “When I first heard that Michael was thinking of working on a project with the name “White Metal”, I contacted him, excited to know more about it. At first we talked about general aspects of the piece, without knowing the route it would take, beyond a couple of conceptual premises. At some point, Michael suggested that this project be included in his “Grey Series” a series of noise-oriented scores he was …
Jailhouse Rock
"It's been a while since Scorces sorceress, Jandek collaborator, and Volcanic Tongue branch manager Heather Leigh has ventured out on vinyl under her own name. And it may be a while longer, as Jailhouse Rock is in fact a wax reissue of a long OOP 2006 cassette classic on Michigan crud factory Fag Tapes. It was a fave of ours that year (and every year), so it feels extra celebratory to be able to offer up a freshly remastered (by Pete Swanson) LP edition of the album for global re-appreciation. S…
Bits & Pieces
The history of - behind which we find Nico Selen of O.R.D.U.C, E.M.M. and many other guises - and Freiband, the name of Frans de Waard when it comes to all sorts of computer based, goes back for over 20 years. Selen was the first to release a LP by Kapotte Muziek (De Waard's other music enterprise, among many!), in 1990 and they have been off and on in contact. Earlier 2013 released a very limited CDR, which De Waard quite liked and in the next days he kept returning to it, eventu…
Re-Engineering
Steven Warwick aka Heatsick cocks a unique and compelling perspective on contemporary dance music with his bold follow-up to 'Intersex', a gorgeous, layered work that those of you into DJ Sprinkles should check out without delay. Now woven with leaner dancefloor muscle, the deeply funked views of 'Re-Engineering' are characterised by the artist as a "cybernetic poem". We can take this quite literally in his use of spoken word in pieces such as 'Re-Engineering' with its Chris Morris-esque wordpla…
Under A Single Banner
It's been a busy couple of years for the producer behind the Shifted project. On top of an extremely well-received album for the Mote Evolver label, the producer has edged further out into the fringes of electronic music under a number of aliases, taking in noise/ambient variants as Covered In Sand, as well as more distorted, technofied productions under the Alexander Lewis moniker, a sound described by the Blackest Ever Black label as "S-M techno." His new album as Shifted, Under a Single Ba…
Mitosis
"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 infectiously strange, bleepy, and dreamy debut release. Sanae Yamasaki (Moskitoo) hails from Sapporo, Japan in Hokkaido, the country's northern-most prefecture. Perhaps a reaction to the cool climate of her home, her multi-instrumen…
The Electronic Belt
Jamal Moss aka Heiroglyphic Being presents The Electronic Belt, his second release for Alter, and perhaps his most dancefloor-oriented release. The EP is made up of three choice cuts from 2012's Man with the Red Drum transmission with each track bearing the signifiers of Jamal's rough and distinctive production; melodies twisting themselves into psychedelic wormholes, raw kicks and toms that hit hard and tight. Yellow vinyl edition in five different colored disco bags, mastered for vinyl by Step…
Outside/Inside
Charlie Nothing was the fractured-psyche pseudonym of author, father, horsekeeper, organic farmer, beekeeper, philosopher and clown Charles Martin Simon, inventor of the dingulator (guitar sculptures made out of the metal from American cars). Charlie's only visible offering to the record buying public was really anything but. Due to its rarity, The Psychedelic Saxophone of Charlie Nothing, issued by Takoma Records in 1967, has been a source of consternation for in-the-know types for years. …
Guitars From Agadez Vol. 7
In October 2012, the Tamashek community lost one of its most luminous voices when Koudede's life was cut short by a car crash during his trip home to Niger from Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. Koudede was a leading light among the myriad musical groups that have recently proliferated in Niger and Mali to voice the Tuareg struggle against exploitation and to exalt their proud but waning nomadic heritage. His outstanding reputation and corpus of songs garnered the respect of his contemporaries, and his…
The Spectacle of Light Abductions
The book is 12 full-color pages of art, text and photos in the full size LP format."After many years as half of the highly influential SKATERS with James Ferraro, 2 solo albums on Olde English Spelling Bee (BLACK JOKER and MONOPOLY CHILD STAR SEARCHERS) and countless tapes and CDs, SPENCER CLARK has taken it to the next level. Layers of cosmic and alien sounds inhabit their own world and act as metaphors you can access subconsciously or explicitly. Clearer and more lucid than previous rel…
Dance Classics Vol.II
2013 repress. Kouhei Matsunaga's Dance Classics Vol. II is the continuation of his ongoing development of his more dance-oriented material, as seen from his sets with Sensational and also his other minimal techno project, NHK. Not feeling tied down to one genre, Matsunaga nestles in the Pan roster. That isn't to say, however, that he is dance per se, as witnessed from his recent collaborations with Conrad Schnitzler. The album focuses more on bass/base electronics, music for the dancefloor …
Deviation
If “Dream Tennis” was any indication, Heatsick has struck a nerve with his singles that stretch preset washes of polyphony through sunset-hued landscapes of disco and house. Equipped with only a Casio keyboard, he has played alongside everyone from Omar Souleyman to DJ Harvey, Daniel Wang and Legowelt, and has demonstrated his ability not only to extend his keyboard to its limits, but to transcend its musical territory, opening up a diverse range of styles, genres and gestures to his danc…
When We Were Eating Unripe Pears
The seven pieces on this LP were developed over a period of about five years; 'Rain in Coffee' is built on a Hyperborean Trenchtown-era demo, while 'Pinq Drinq' -- sorrel, for the record, and neither guava nor antacid as certain wags have already ventured -- was reanimated directly from the cutting-room floor, 11th hour, 2012. As a whole, they should probably be considered the proper 'sequel' to Canzoni dal Laboratorio del Silenzio Cosmico, extending that record's preoccupation with the drea…
Character
Opportunities for introspection have come few and far between for Canadian-born, New York City-based cellist Julia Kent. After coming to prominence as a member of the cello-driven group Rasputina in the ‘90s, she went on to arrange and play on numerous recordings and tour extensively as a member of Antony and the Johnsons, among other projects.The opportunity to explore her own emotional and creative world came with her solo LPs, Delay (2007) and Green and Grey (2011), and it is something she ap…
Death Set
"JAMES JACKSON TOTH, aka WOODEN WAND, is your fearless friend, the stumbling guy who gets himself into incredibly fucked up situations but comes out shining and lives to tell about it, entertaining you safely and immensely. You should be grateful. In my view, he's a great American songwriter in full bloom. Most likely you'll think that's a preposterous claim, and I won't blame you, but you'll be totally, completely, and unforgivably wrong not to agree. To me, it's obvious Toth is animated with t…
Combines
The GGRIL is an ensemble of musicians who have decided to give a space to experiment with various forms of interactions possible in an orchestra without a conductor. The group brings together a dozen musicians from different backgrounds, but all eager to explore new territories offered by bands where the music is alive, freed from the linearity of writing. Powered by Tour de Bras, Rimouski, this set is a way to involve a large number of musicians and composers in the region around a unifying pro…
Ekin Fil
Operating out of Istanbul, Ekin Fil is the solo project of Turkish musician Ekin Üzeltüzenci. Her music first came to the ears of many by way of “Language,” a 2011 cassette release on the Root Strata label. “Language” presented listeners with a fractured, hazy soundworld in which half-remembered melodies and wraith-like vocals cohered into dark and hypnotic masses. On this self-titled album, Ekin opens the curtains a bit, letting in some light and offering up an even more refined album. This is …
Wounded Laurel
Hospital Productions present a heavy 30-minute session of layered drone and tormented, bass-heavy bombast from Max Gudmunson's Virile Games project, now available on vinyl for the first time after a sold-out micro edition of cassettes in 2013. Operating somewhere between his label-mate Lussuria's gothic ambience, the ear-bleaching concrète of Helm, and the more blown-out cinematic visions of Leyland Kirby, Wounded Laurel oscillates between sublime and wretched with a gripping night-time narrat…
Gridshifter
Stefan Nemeth: synthesizers. Steven Hess: drums (on B-Side). Bernhard Breuer: drums (on 'Dedispersion I & II'). Innode enters the world with an audacious debut of rhythm and sound, space and silence and an astonishing blend of the acoustic and the electronic. Spearheaded by Stefan Németh (cofounder of Radian, Lokai) in close collaboration with Steven Hess (Locrian, Pan American, Cleared) and Bernhard Breuer (Elektro Guzzi, Tumido), Gridshifter is an intense, astonishing sonic experience which na…