New Arrivals
You Are The One I Pick
"Nottingham duo Felix make their Kranky debut with this fine and idiosyncratic collection of songs. The main focus here is the vocal/piano/cello talents of Lucinda Chua, whose sparse yet quirk-loaded minimalism receives guitar and bass backing from Chris Summerlin, who's probably best known for his work in the rock band Lords. Chua's writing is quite unlike anything else currently out there; her lyrics convey strange or often very simple, domesticated ideas delivered in a pared-down, plaintive f…
The outer darkness
"Our third volume of Sun Ra spoken word opens with a rare space story that I discovered on an unmarked five inch reel of tape. When I played the recording, I discovered an incredible story recited by an unknown artist, with Sun Ra going beyond the call of duty on keyboard. Included are two complete lengthy performances from this 1967 session.... The group recitation, 'The Outer Darkness,' is a reworking of the poem 'I Seek A Better World' originally recited by Ray Stubbs on the first volume.... …
Thing
For fifteen years, Trans Am has forged a musical legacy that has consistently confounded those who would confine them to generic indie-rock labels and rather spoken for itself. Trans Am a-la 2010 is a band of veterans unafraid to contradict themselves, one that has grown stronger in its music and more confident in its identity over the course of now nine full length albums.
Awakening
Long out-of-print cassette originally released on Sloow Tapes (Belgium) in an edition of 70 with hand colored inserts. Cassette sold out within a week and has become quite collectible. Recorded after Expo '70 played France in 2008, just weeks after the IAO festival where the label owner and musician met. Upon returning to the states, the experience spawned the 2 day recording session materializing these 2 improvised tracks with no overdubs. Both tracks begin with rhythmic beats and slowly …
Spoils
Sacred Bones is proud to present The Spoils from Zola Jesus. Hailing from the unsuspecting locale of Madison, WI, Zola Jesus—the alter ego of Nika Roza Danilova—occupy a sphere of sparse industrial rhythms, no-fi drones, and ethereal femme vocals. Those who have seen her handful of live shows, heard her WFMU set, or caught any of the acclaimed, sought after, and now mostly out of print releases on Die Stasi or Troubleman Unlimited already know. For those uninitiated The Spoils may be the m…
Vessel
Vessel: a sonic narrative. Through physical confinement and isolation a threshold is penetrated and a vast new world is suddenly accessible. Pressed in a limited edition of 200 copies housed in a deluxe tip-on jacket.
Signs of a perfect disaster
**Limited edition of 300 copies on acid yellow wax with photocopied A4 insert** Rome, Italy's Sea Dweller make a gorgeous racket on their heavenly 2nd album of shoegaze dreampop. Returning to Upside Down Recordings after 2008's 'Underwater Town', they've seriously refined their sound in line with their too-obvious-to-mention influences. Head-flossing melodies made from reverb-effected and delayed guitar treatments swoon about vintage Alesis drum machines in clouds of old Crumar synths and…
ladybird labyrinth
orphan fairytale is the solo monniker of eva van deuren, member of the lady folk troupe MASKESMACHINE, who started blowing my mind 12 years ago as a street performance troupe in antwerp. besides my own ladyfriend, i don't think i know anyone better than eva, and her boyfriend (audiobot madman) carlo steegen. for some reason this makes it even more difficult to write a decent description for this record, we live in the same mansion, and i could write a lot of stories about doing the dishes togeth…
Vadelma/Hawaii
Surprisingly good free jazz from this Finnish combo. Very organic sound, there's something unique about them. "One of the hottest shows of recent memory was seeing this burning-free ecstatic force in TAMPERE back in 2008. One of those nights where you just feel that you are beyond this planet's laws of nature and in a world you did not know existed. Now the other foot has dropped, and what seemed impossible now can be held on this beautiful LP. Side Vadelma recorded January 26 in Helsinki. Side…
Midnight At Mary's House
"Vagabond American legend Carlos Gonzalez drops his first NNF full-length, and it's 10 of his greatest junkyard surf-slime tunes of all time. Edition of 500."
The Very Heart Of The World
LP version. Edition of 500 copies. On The Very Heart of the World, Burning Star Core (BXC) has created an incredibly heavy record, built on dense, layered drones, pulses, splintered vocals, and deep rhythms that euphorically build to total overload. With a line-up including the Hair Police front line and other luminaries from across the exploding Midwestern psych-noise-folk underground, BXC's C. Spencer Yeh has assembled a group that seamlessly shifts through epic movements and pushes pure elect…
Piano Piano
Bureau B reissues Piano Piano by German keyboardist Hans-Joachim Roedelius, originally released in 1991 on the Italian label Materiali Sonori. In classical music, "pp" (piano piano = pianissimo) is a dynamic indication of particularly soft music. And Piano Piano is a very soft, quiet album. Roedelius assumes the role of a fairytale character with his piano music, transported to a strange, fantastical landscape where, filled with awe and amazement, he tries to get his bearings. What he see…
Against the Day
Since Sam Shalabi enjoyed his mini-breakout in 2004 with the Shalabi Effect's The Trial of St. Orange, the Montreal composer has explored the overlap between popular Western music and traditional Middle Eastern musics, particularly those from Egypt, the country from which Shalabi's parents hailed. These projects tend to be diffuse and ambitious: Shalabi works with dozens of musicians on long, brash drones, or plays meditative oud pieces in comfy theaters. Land of Kush, …
Teils teils
The first track of this is the side-long "Teilmenge 20," which begins as a set of indecipherable static electricity clicks that are quite warm and engaging, which quickly builds to a rhythmic cycle, continuing to mutate and diverge throughout the entire track. Most interestingly, as the rhythm sets in it truly begins to resemble a traditional 4/4 techno beat. The tempo and percussive elements are there, but the sounds in no way resemble the stale drum machines and overwrought synths. As the pi…
Filtre de Realite
The 'Filter of Reality' is a machine imagined and built by Jacques Brodier - Le Havre, France. Penultimate Press is proud to publish the first ever collection of recordings by this unique French artist, researcher, writer and inventor. Between 3 and 30 MHz, radio waves have the property to travel around the Earth by bouncing on the ionosphere, which acts as an imperfect mirror, wave-agitated under the flux of sun's particles. The machine explores this boundless electromagnetic ocean, wher…
VPRO RadioNome
Luc Van Acker is all except an obscure musician. Already from his solo records in the early 80's he has been building a name for himself as a multi talented musician and performer. While his early works are rather experimental he later joined forces with other musicians (who have become famous with bands like Front 242 and Ministry) to create a more rock orientated industrial / electronic act called Revolting Cocks. The session on this record is from 1981 and thus a very early piece of music in …
Bildnerei die GeisteskrankenVol. 1. Es ist so
This is Mama Br solo with voice, tape, guitar, feedback. Limited to 300 copies. White vinyl. Cover from the artist."Frau Hjuler has few equals when it comes to shrieking like someone's tickling her with a hot poker. Here you start out with sound effects, in the form of cat meows & nippy dog barks, and move through some swooping feedback before the yowls and huffing noises begin in earnest" Weirdo records
Dog. Tree. Satellite Seers...
Limited reissue of their 2nd LP from '87.
Sun Circle
The most recent release on the lichen label; all releases are hand-assembled by zach wallace in his native ann arbor environs and offer of a lovely wave of art-sound, field recordings, improvisation with natural non-instruments, and, in the case of this particular title, a pair of pieces by greg davis and zach himself on farfisa, distorted vocals, and bells. the first appears to be a zonked “cover” of lamonte young’s “31 vii 69 10:26 - 10:49 pm munich from map of 49's dream the two systems of el…
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…