Best of 2026
Graphème Vol.5 (Book)
Fifth edition of the essential publication series for experimental and graphic music scores, from the Berlin-based collective smallest functional unit. A vital resource for performers, composers, and anyone fascinated by unconventional approaches to notation and the organization of sound.
Smu was founded in 2020 by Tony Buck (percussion), Mazen Kerbaj (trumpet, objects), Magda Mayas (piano, objects), Ute Wassermann (voice, objects), and Racha Gharbieh (organisation) with the aim of performing an…
For the Birds
Edition of 250. Deluxe edition + insert. For eighteen months, between 1984 and 1985, Patrick Lysaght played flute, strings, and percussion inside the Rainforest Birdhouse at the Rio Grande Zoo in Albuquerque, New Mexico. His audience and collaborators: 150 birds of 42 species.
The result is one of the earliest and most radical documents of interspecies improvisation. Predating the current wave of sound ecology by decades, For The Birds sits comfortably alongside the biophonic research of Bernie …
Signals
Huge tip! Following her 2025 minimalist/ambient album ‘just like any other day (어느날): background music for your mundane activities’ on Shelter Press, Okkyung Lee moves in another direction with London’s Explore Ensemble. Flung is proud to present Signals, a release that eludes categorisation while shifting between electronics, acoustic composition, and improvisation. It places Lee’s improvisational language in dialogue with the instrumentalists of Explore Ensemble’s sextet, whom together become …
Particularly Dangerous Situation
*150 copies lmiited edition* Ian Wellman's “Particularly Dangerous Situation”, his first release for Elevator Bath and first vinyl LP, is a meditative, at times harrowing, interpretive document of the catastrophic California wildfires of 2025. Wellman's stunningly descriptive field recordings plus his signature tape loop textures and sampled drones combine for a dramatic ten-part narrative that is both frightening and sorrowful in its depiction of calamitous events. "On January 7, 2025 Southern …
Monkey's Birthday
The collaboration between Anthony Moore and filmmaker David Larcher began in the late 60s, at the start of both their respective careers and lasted many years. Following on from last years release of the soundtrack to Mare’s Tail (the first collaboration with Larcher), this year sees the release of the soundtrack to his 2nd film, Monkey’s Birthday. This LP is a condensation of the essence of this 6 hour film. The sound is partly taken directly from the existing soundtrack and partly from stereo …
Disappointment - Hateruma
Wewantsounds is delighted to announce the first vinyl reissue of Disappointment–Hateruma, the 1976 ALM Records release by percussionist Toshi Tsuchitori and Ryuichi Sakamoto. The album is notable as Sakamoto's first recording issued under his own name and represents one of the few occasions he explored fully improvised music during the 1970s. It provides a vital document for understanding Sakamoto's early development as a composer and performer, capturing a period when he was experimenting with …
ryūhyō
To mark the UN’s International Year of Glaciers' Preservation, sound artist Yoichi Kamimura presents “ryūhyō,” a rich sonic portrait of Japan’s drifting sea ice. Blending underwater and aerial recordings, the album reveals the melting voices and fragile ecology of Ryūhyō’s vanishing world.
Kino Variants 1967-1986
Continuing their longstanding explorations of unexpected and adventurous territories of sound, Von - the imprint run by filmmaker and sound artist Carlos Casas - is pleased to present Kino Variants 1967-1986, the first-ever collection to illuminate the vast body of work created by the Uzbek composer Rumil Vildanov during the second half of the 20th Century. Offering a rare glimpse of liberated creative spirit operating behind the Iron Curtain, this engrossing double LP - complete with printed in…
On the Edge of the Outside
Vasopressin presents On The Edge Of The Outside, collecting four works by Nurse With Wound — three composed in response to texts by Kafka, Tzara, and Forneret, one previously unreleased — on vinyl for the first time. Electroacoustic abstraction, minimalist drones, and grimy ambience, in a limited edition of 300 black and 100 clear vinyl copies.
Die Dritte Ebene
On Die Dritte Ebene, Emilio Gordoa and Sven‑Åke Johansson let vibraphone, drums and accordion run in seemingly parallel lines until a mysterious “third layer” appears - a ghost‑music of overtones, pulse and texture that neither player could summon alone.
La Donna del Lago
** Edition of 100. Beautifully designed sleeve by Bruno Stucchi/Dinamomilano. ** Die Schachtel's latest follows naturally from the sonic territory explored within the label's Decay Music series, while pushing well beyond. La Donna del Lago is the debut release from the geography-spanning trio of the Italian bassist and composer, Massimo Pupillo; the Canadian soprano singer and conductor, Barbara Hannigan; and the French composer, sound engineer and musician David Chalmin. An immersive tapestry o…
My Shadow
One of the most striking and enigmatic works to appear on Discreet Music in recent years. There is a long tradition of artists who have tried to set scripture to music and failed magnificently - the failure itself becoming the subject, the wound becoming the work. Carrie DeCunzo Mirande's debut album belongs to this lineage. In the twenty-four days before Christmas 2024, she read the twenty-four chapters of the Book of Luke and attempted to respond in sound. Two piano pieces emerged - one inspir…
Alle Sorgenti Delle Civiltà - Vol. 3 - Africa - Australia - Nuova Zelanda
Black Vinyl. Two giants of Italian library music. Two continents. Fourteen tracks of tribal, ritualistic sound. Musica Per Immagini presents the first-ever vinyl reissue of Alle Sorgenti Delle Civiltà Vol. 3, the final chapter of the legendary Folkmusic triptych originally released in 1971.
Somewhere between the editing suites of Cinecittà and the ethnographic archives of a parallel universe RAI documentary department, two of Italy's most prolific sonic chameleons shed their studio pseudonyms li…