New Arrivals
Broken Bones
This latest in the Latitudes series of limited LPs comes from American noise-pop band Gowns, whose Red State album you may recall as being one of 2007's more unclassifiable recordings. A folkish spectre hangs over these pieces, particularly when it comes to the wiry, haunting violin sequences strewn liberally across the session - they bring to life the sinister spoken word of 'Dog', crowning a soundscape that's always on the precipice of turning nasty. Much of Gowns' music tends towards uncertai…
Ghost with chains
Long-running Twin Cities horsepower trio Daughters Of The Sun have been subtly chugging out their faded-tattoo spirit-in-the-sky psych exhaust for at least half a decade now but we didn’t catch the drift till March ’09, when we got to witness a packed post-midnight smoke-soaked Minneapolis loft set and waved our lighter with the masses. Ghost With Chains is their third official full-length (not including some EPs and a killer split) and it’s as beautifully moon-burnt and highway-swept as anythin…
Caesarean
As Concern, Gordon Ashworth has explored drone music through an inspection of the textural components of acoustic instruments and recording processes. On Cæsarean the palette presented is a singularly precise one. Using simple sources (piano, clarinet, banjo, shrutti box, and acoustic guitar), tape processing (1/4” and cassette), and reverberation, Ashworth crafts delicate tape music through transforming repetitions and obscured fidelity. The emotional and physical presence of Cæsarean is over…
Nova
"Soul Jazz Records are re-releasing this classic release of deep spiritual jazz by Steve Reid and The Master Brotherhood, entitled Nova available for the first-time at mid-price. There is also a one-off limited-edition vinyl repress of 1000 copies worldwide. Steve Reid is now known worldwide for his radical collaborations with Kieren Hebden on Domino Records. Nova (and Rhythmatism, also re-released) are his amazing first albums recorded in the early 1970s -- all now serious collector's al…
From The Grave ...
Expo '70 bass/synth player Matt Hill has gone solo. His debut LP under the Umberto moniker is an analog masterpiece heavily influenced by the classic film score work of Goblin, except arguably better. From the moment you drop the needle, you'll be transported to Italy as an extra in a vintage horror flick directed by Dario Argento. This is some of the most accessible, yet totally authentic sounding music of the "giallo" genre we've ever heard. It was previously only available as a hyper l…
Puech Gourdon Bremaud
Mindblowing totally acoustic drone record, musicians are Jacques Puech (cabrette), Yann Gourdon (hurdy-gurdy) and Basile Bremaud (violin). This totally acoustic set is a variation around two bourrées in triple time, both themes are taken out of the tradionnal Mont d'Auvergne repertoire. Hand made, spray painted cover
B/P/M Series 1
Absolutely mind melting release from this consistently amazing American duo. This release has a very different sound to the superb drone recordings of their recent releases, yet it is still totally immense but really quite unexpected. This was previously issued as a tour-only CDR in a press of somewhere between 20 and 30 copies. Brian Pyle and Merrick McKinlay spent sometime recording legendary Humboldt based pianist Darius Brottman, who also happens to have a radio show before Brian's own show …
Millions Now Living Will Never Die
LP version. 2012 repress. "1996 : Tortoise's landmark second album Millions Now Living Will Never Die is released. Featuring the famous 20 minute opener 'Djed' and out of print on vinyl for far too long we are happy to finally offer it again. Pressed on high quality virgin vinyl and including all original artwork - a fully artworked inner sleeve and for the first time a download coupon!"
True Breath
Stunning five-song debut EP by this young Tokyo producer. Ghost-in-the-drum-machine rhythms layered with her exquisite Cocteau Twins vocal haze, but impeccably crafted into nuanced multi-movement compositions. Will be doing a full-length later in 2012 as well. Our fave new female artist
September Cell
Absolutely KILLER new twelve from Vatican Shadow on Dominick Fernow's own, newly minted Bed of Nails imprint - his most direct dancefloor productions to date. Edition of 700* Bed Of Nails is a new label curated by Dominick Fernow of Vatican Shadow and Prurient fame. Operating from his recently consecrated L.A. compound - the label will focus on his reorientation towards industrial dancefloor rhythms and seductively isolated electronics. Fernow christens the label with 'September Cell', a…
Circo Divino
This is the first collaboration by ambient master Alio Die with soundscape creator Parallel Worlds. The unique sound achieved could be described as a hybrid sonic world, made out of bouncing electrons and air vibrations. The modular machines of Parallel Worlds are merged with the acoustic instrumentation and drones of Alio Die, joined by the ethereal voice of the Polish vocalist/composer India Czajkowska, resulting in a surreal, yet down to earth, listening experience. The compositions, b…
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 …
Red, Black And Green
Originally produced and issued by charles 'bobo' shaw himself, red, black & green, by the band "solidarity unit, inc." documents what happened at "the bag room" in st. louis, mo, the day jimi hendrix died. shaw & the ten piece group produce a raw, teeming clattering sound, captured in a gloriously blunt low-res recording as stark as the b&w cover art. lake & bowie were by this time already powerful soloists, & both declaim fervently and damn near relentlessly over shaw's swaggering themes. de…
The Painted River Of Regrets
Issued as an edition of 500 copies in a full color book bound sleeve with 180 gram vinyl. 3 Decades of sound tracking the secret psychedeli-sphere has found Edward scoring an imaginary film. Edward’s music for the movie flows with measured, stygian force; the groaning rises punctuated by that old black magic that only Ka-Spel can conjure with the smallest of sounds permeating every wave. Loops trill and sigh within virtuoso keyboard cameos. A myriad of miniature minuets thread backwards …
Chew Your Food
The performance on this LP was recorded live at Roulette in New York last year. I have appreciated Knuffke's playing and music before, and I will do it again here. His tone is always full and warm, and he's a master at taking tough bends easily. The music is jazz in its purest sense : improvisational joy and emotional expressivity in a compact form. There is nothing but pulse in the pieces they play, even if the rhythms are not always explicit or when there are no patterns, the three musici…
Bloodlines
"brad rose is an artist who is notoriously hard to pigeonhole. he might spend his days running the esteemed digitalis imprint (sidelining the wonderful foxy digitalis webzine) but his nights are wiled away chiselling at the petrified corpse of experimental music. donating sounds to ajilvsga, altar eagle, sea zombies and ossining (among many others) he has somehow found time to fashion a new solo work for type and it could hardly be further removed from his last outing. 'bloodlines' is an album r…
The Black Dirt Sessions
Displays fully honed examples of all of Rose's various styles & themes - traditional, raga & ragtime. "Cross The North Fork" - a 13-minute revisiting of a track 1st laid down on the great "Kensington Blues" is a winding, thoroughly engrossing journey. It is a welcome neighbor to the album's other spendid joys ranging from the jaunty & infectious "Fishtown Flower" to the pensive & appropriate melancholy punch of "Box Of Pine." Limited to 2000 copies on 180g RTI vinyl.
Englabörn
Upon setting out to score the music for the play Englaborn by Havar Sigurjonsson, Johann Johannsson, co-founder of the Icelandic arts organisation Kitchen Motors, came upon a text by the Latin poet Catullus which roughly translates as, I hate and I love. Why do I do it, you might ask? I dont know, but I feel it happening to me, and it's tearing me apart. This poem concisely bridges the emotional opposites which clashed within the play itself. As the play's content was extremely violent and distu…
Outdoor Spell
Rhys Chatham has trail-blazed a course through late 20th century music, equally aplomb in post-minimalist composition as he is in punk. Not since Roebling laid his span across the East River has there been an artist who builds bridges in both how we hear music and how we can appreciate art. His latest album, Outdoor Spell, is a further document in that direction. Here has has eschewed 100 guitars, or even himself playing a single guitar, for the trumpet and voice, both electrified and dry. It is…
The Diary Of The Unforgotten (Selbstportrait VI)
LP version. Pressed on 180 gram vinyl. The Diary Of The Unforgotten is a collection of recordings from the years 1972 to 1978 and was first released in 1990 (with different artwork). Between the years of 1972 and 1978, Hans-Joachium Roedelius and Dieter Moebius, later joined by Michael Rother, lived out on a country estate in the idyllic, diminutive settlement of Forst in the Weser Uplands. It was here that the Harmonia albums, legendary recordings with Brian Eno and various splendid Cluster …