New Arrivals
Debris
Field recordists Douglas Quin and Cheryl Leonard have gone to great lengths to capture their Arctic and Antarctic field recordings, spending countless frigid days with frozen fingers trying to hold tightly to hydrophones dangling amidst the ice floes and slushy waters. It's no wonder those two present their work in such an unadulterated fashion when the work came at such cost and at such peril. But Jana Winderen is far more creative in her approach to field recordings, only too happy to …
White Bird Release
Vinyl! The sixth album from Mark Nelson's longtime solo project following Quiet City. A mix of warmth & foreboding expansiveness, neither of which is minimal nor overdone.
Beguiled Entropy
Expo '70 has garnered a great deal of notoriety over the last few years in certain circles in which the moniker is usually mentioned to describe types of cross-genres. After completing a couple US tours and a handful of limited releases and re-releases in 2010, a short hiatus was in order. During this time last year Justin Wright, sole operator of the project, recorded tracks for an upcoming release. Wright entered a basement studio and improvised over two nights layered recordings for the first…
Nero\'s Expedition
Tetuzi Akiyama - guitars. Johan Arrias - saxophone, electronics, no input mixingboard. Leo Svensson - cello, organ. Henrik Olsson - drums, electronics, piano. Artwork and screenprint by Peter Larsson. Mixed by Giuseppe Ielasi. Mastered by Daniel Karlsson. Produced by Johan Berthling. Album and songtitles are inspired by the lyrics of Moondog (Louis Thomas Hardin). Recorded in Stockholm 2006. Limited edition of 250 hand numbered copies. The cover is hand printed by its author on recycled covers c…
Asleep On The Floodplain
Ben Chasny has spent many years at this point perfecting his very personal vision of the American landscape. With his early LPs he managed to grab a groundswell of support for his distinctly lo-fi recordings, and since hitting the Drag City label with the breathtaking 'School of Flower' he has managed to extend his vision to countless others. 'Asleep on the Floodplain' continues his exploration, and while it doesn't change up the formula too much (apart from the odd analogue synth blurt here and…
Untitled
Edition of 380 copies** Powell marks up the 2nd release on The Death Of Rave, following Mark Leckey's debut entry, 'Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore'. Powell's 3rd release refines his ascetic blend of lawless New York no wave, cold European electronics and late '90s D&B with incisive vision and propulsive torque. The EP's standout 'A Band' emphasises a chimeric indistinction between the "real" textures of sample-spliced guitars and drums and the gritted tension of painstakingly processed electr…
Babylon bypass
“Janne Martinkauppi (as, bs), Taneli Tuominen (ts), Sami Pekkola (as, ts), Jaakko Tolvi (dr), Petri Pirtilä (dr). Recorded 12.Dec. 2007. Recording, mixing and mastering Marko Yiianttila at Studio Kuu, Helsinki, Finland. TAKE YOUR DISSONANCE LIKE A MAN : From time to time, I suddenly realise just how differently it is possible to hear exactly same sounds using the exactly same, god-given hearing devices – your ears, that is. Of course, it's never about JUST hearing, it's always linked to w…
Counterfeit Memories
Garbage freedom noise & riffage from Rochester gents John Schoen, R. Nuuja and Jason Finkbeiner. Liner notes are some sort of prose poetry (translated into arabic; including a reference to Armand Schaubroeck, no less) from everybody's batthroated hero Dylan Nyoukis
In
'Jean-Luc Guionnet (alto saxophone), Will Guthrie (drums) and Clayton Thomas (double bass). Taking the form of a minimalist power trio of saxophone, bass and drums. Recorded in 2009, IN focuses on the tour that nearly killed them - Jean-Luc couldn't eat, Will couldn't walk and Clayton couldn't call an elevator. Niort - recorded at the festival NPAI, caused METEO festival director Adrien Chiquet to complain that the best gig of the festival was 'fucking jazz!'. In Poznan they were attacked…
Ever And Anon
The mythical LAFMS collective Smegma really needs no introduction, where would we all be without them? How many bands were so ahead of their time (1973!), and have been for so long, like Smegma have? Well, here they are with a brand new LP of their famous mix of free jazz, industrial noise, improvisation, straight-up weird music so typical of these masters / US freaks. On the opening track, they are riding on the amazing drums of historical member Dennis Duck (of Dream Syndicate) to pay h…
Heaven's Youth (Reptilians Demos)
Starfucker’s highly regarded full-length LP Reptilians was originally titled “Heaven’s Youth”. Like most artists, song ideas, the album concept and even the artwork continued to evolve. The band changed the title, continued to edit and develop the songs until the final version (Reptilians) was released in 2011. The original versions of the songs, that were until now only heard by the band, are being released for the first time in a very limited edition of white vinyl. Heaven’s Youth (Re…
And
Derek Bailey, electric guitar. Pat Thomas, keyboards. Steve Noble, turntables. Recorded at Moat Studios, London, August 1997.
Slit And Pre-Slit
Reissue limited to 200 copies, originally released as private press in a limited edition of 100 copies in 1977, this ia a Major historical reissue: Slit And Pre-Slit was Jim Shepard’s first ever release, privately pressed in an edition of only 100 copies in 1977 and mostly given away to friends and musical/cultural heroes like Lester Bangs, Todd Rundgren, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Brian Eno, John Cale etc. Its extreme rarity has meant that few have had the chance to wrap their ears around it, …
Rocket Ship Rock
...a set of totally twisted sides called Rocket Ship Rock featuring Yochanan 'The Outer Space Vocalist' (with his demented Saturn 45 Muck Muck/Hot Skillet Momma) and his way out friends backed by Sun Ra and his Arkestra! Atomic outer space genius from yet another Norton turban headed star!"
Nigeria Afrobeat Special
Nigeria Afrobeat Special is the fourth addition to the Nigeria Special series, a project initiated by Miles Cleret, owner of the Soundway Record label back in 2004. Cleret’s ambition to distinguish the blossoming music scenes of 1970s Nigeria has lent to an indispensable series of CD and LP compilations documenting the influence of western blues, rock and disco amongst artists and musicians versed in the local musical styles of highlife and juju. It was Fela Kuti and his musical and politi…
Mekanïk Destruktïw Kommandöh
This is an identical 180-gram vinyl reissue of the 1973 Vertigo release, wich is possibly Magma's great opus. Whether one prefers one of their other studio or live releases to it, there is no doubt that Mekanik Destruktiw Kommandoh is the most original, definitive Magma album around (although this reviewer personally prefers the Mekanik Kommandoh version!).Featuring a cast of thousands including a choir, brass section, flute and tuned percussion, Mekanik Destruktiw Kommandoh marries the stripped…
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…
Basement Recordings 1978-1982
A while ago one of the members of the youngest antwerp based free jazz band SHELDON SIEGEL (all 16 year olds..) visited me, I had just met them and he wanted to come by to get some records. We spoke about free jazz for a while, then he said the magical words "My dad use to play free jazz in the 70's as well".. I was like "ow, and if that was in antwerp, was it with WIM?", he said "Yes yes, he's on one of their tapes with Fred Van Hove, Ivo Van Der Borght etc". My heartbeat went a little faster, …
(Fake) The Facts
After the runaway success of the Akita/Gustafsson/O'Rourke LP One Bird Two Bird (DEMEGO 016LP), Swedish sax legend Mats Gustafsson returns to Editions Mego with another storming collaboration. Now a resident of Vienna, he teamed up with experimental artists dieb13 and Martin Siewert for a live and studio session. (Fake) The Facts is the result. A dense fog of sound comes from all directions, but whereas the general impetus is a full-on attack, the trio finds enough restraint to create a deepe…
Always Wrong
f you're wondering whether record labels still matter, consider the case of Wolf Eyes. Their last two widely distributed albums, 2004's Burned Mind and 2006's Human Animal, came out on Sub Pop and got lots of media attention, even landing the band on the cover of The Wire. Three years later, Wolf Eyes return with Always Wrong, a follow-up of sorts after reams of smaller-run releases. It came out on Hospital in May, and I can't find a single review beyond a few blog entries and tweets. Even The W…