Reissues
Spiral I & II, Pole, Wach, Japan, Zykus,
amazing (an cheap) double CD set featuring most of the Stockhausen "intuitive music" (ie quasi improvised). The first piece is Zyklus for solo percussion performed here by Tristan Fry in 1974. Zyklus was one of the first works with a graphic score allowing the performer some freedom to improvise. In the late 60s Stockhausen developed the idea of scores which determined a process rather than the exact content & his group toured the world playing this music. Several pieces are included her…
Ligeti Edition
Terrific nine-CD box (digipack CD sleeves!) at a fantastic price! The heart of Ligeti's output, and the basis for the consensus that places him among the 20th Century's most important composers, is the series of masterworks written during his middle period, which lasted from roughly 1957 (after his escape from Hungary) to 1977 (marked by the completion of his opera Le Grand Macabre). The "sound surface" compositions from the period, including Atmosphères, the Requiem, Lux Aeterna and much of the…
Earle Brown Contemporary Sound Series Vol. 2
3-CD Set. Recorded between 1960 and 1973, the original eighteen LPs that comprise Earle Brown's legendary Contemporary Sound Series have been highly sought after in the secondary market since 1978 when they were discontinued. These rare and historically important recordings of international avant-garde music have been carefully digitized and remastered by the Earle Brown Music Foundation. Volume two includes music by Nono (Polifonica-Monodia-Ritmica), Bruno Maderna (Serenata No. 2), Luciano Ber…
Klavierstücke I-XI / Mikrophonie I & II
Beautiful double CD set, containing a mindblowing Mikrophonie version... Mikrophonie is the title given by Karlheinz Stockhausen to two of his compositions, written in 1964 and 1965, in which “normally inaudible vibrations . . . are made audible by an active process of sound detection (comparable to the auscultation of a body by a physician); the microphone is used actively as a musical instrument, in contrast to its former passive function of reproducing sounds as faithfully as possible” (Stock…
Symphonie Pour Un Homme Seul / Concerto Des Ambiguites
Electronic / avant-garde music pioneer and founder of the French musique concrète movement, Pierre Schaeffer, a radio engineer, believed that any sound could be music, and was one of the first to experiment with tape looping, splicing and sampling. He was also one of the first to record music on magnetic tape. Drawing inspiration from the Italian Futurists, he emphasized the double meaning of the word "play", meaning to play an instrument, but also to have fun and enjoy oneself. Pierre Henry, a …
Musique Sans Titre / Spatiodynamisme
Pierre Henry was a student and collaborator of Musique Concréte pioneer Pierre Schaeffer. The first side of the LP, composed in 1951 at the Studio d'Essai of the RTF, is notably one of his earliest attempts at the discipline. 'Spatiodynamisme' however, is based on 1954 recordings of a Nicolas Schöfer sculpture and was elaborated in his first private studio APSOM while he was still under the tutleage of Pierre Schaeffer's Groupe de Recherche de Musique Concréte. It was intended to as a sou…
Haut-Voltage / Coexistence
Accompanying the Doxy's coverage of early Henry recordings, 'Haut Voltage' is his 22 minute composition made in 1956, featuring his own vocals and designed to soundtrack a stage production by French choreographer Maurice Béjart. The second composition was written in 1959 after Henry had left Pierre Scaeffer's RTF and set to work in his own studio. During the period he realized that in order to evolve Musique Concréte it would have to begin to use electronics. 'Coexistence' is his first at…
Kevin Drumm
** 180 gram vinyl housed in a heavy textured glossy gatefold de-bossed and spot finished with 2 full page full color glossy inserts. Includes a sealed envelope containing a card with free download code ** The expanded and definitive double LP edition of Kevin Drumm's groundbreaking first album, originally released in 1997. Featuring some of the most fiercely abstract and organic guitar work ever heard, Drumm's debut is both jarring and completely alien. Dubbed by some as the greatest prepared gu…
Gene-P
'Gene P' was released as a cassette in 1980, and among the true Bianchi devotees old = best.On the first track (both tracks are untitled) Bianchi uses tape-loops of what could vaguely sound like gamelan music, or wind chimes. Its music with not many changes, music that is not loud and actually quite pleasing.The other side is more experimental. It uses vinyl, scratchy vinyl that is, with the needle jumping all over the place. Its a bit much experiment for the sake of experiment for me here. A mo…
Atrocity exhibition
Here's an unmissable and collectable 150 copies limited edition CD album, released to celebrate our fifth year of activities and available only as a free "bonus" included in the "bag" that contains the latest 13 Silentes releases. Born from an idea by Stefano Gentile, who also actively participated to the making of the album, the Maribor project brings together for the first time in a collaborative CD some of the most remarkable names of the Italian experimental and avantagarde scene: Maurizio B…
Menses
Originally released in a private edition of 300 copies in 1982. This vinyl re-issue comes in a beautiful picture disc and includes a replica of the original and hard to find insert. The copies I have here include a page of a medical book handsigned by Maurizio Bianchi himself.
Endometrio
First ever vinyl reissue of the highly coveted classic LP by Italian noise composer Maurizio Bianchi. Originally released in an extremely limited quanity in 1983, Endometrio showcased M.B. at his most crucial turning point, delving into the uncharted waters he aptly titled ‘bionic music’, blending organic electronics with contorted sounds of the human body to compose one of the most interesting ambient records to date.copies of the original lp are practically non-existent and hard to co…
danza meccanica
Gorgeous collection of rare and early italian wave releases from 1982 - 1987, after an exhausting work of "archeological" research, selected by Danza and with intro text by Fred Ventura in a limited run of 500
Coffret 1 Afrique
Beautiful 4xCD set with mid 70s radio pieces and radiophonic creations commissioned by France-Culture and realized with the assistance of Radio France Internationale. A very nice mix of fild recordings and diary travel CD1Le Transcamerounais (En suivant le train qui traverse le Cameroun / 1977) - Le Brûleur de pluie de Konsamba (Conte) CD2L'Opéra du Cameroun (Ville, savane, forêt / 1976) CD3Les petites filles au clair de lune (Conte) - L'arbre Acajou (L'arbre qu'on abat / 1975) CD4Le Sult…
Rainy Day Raga
Peter Walker was the quintessential psych-folk guitar player to come out of the '60s. Revered by Timothy Leary, who had him program the music for his TURN-ONS, Walker was one of the first to take the Indian tradition of ragas and channel them through the guitar into a sound that is pure heaven. His exotic, state-of-the-art finger-picking transcends description and has influenced such artists as Ben Chasny of Six Organs of Admittance.Vanguard Records originally released the record in 1966, …
The Death of Don Juan
CD debut of this 1985 post-minimal landmark by Elodie Lauten, featuring performances by Arthur Russell and Peter Zummo. Lauten has been active in the downtown New York classical and punk scenes since moving from France in the 1970s. The Death of Don Juan is a breakthrough for its bold, lyrical minimalism in concert with a dramatic sensibility that is deeply faithful to the modern existential emotional experience. Originally self-produced and released as a small LP edition on her own label, it ha…
135 Grand Street, New York, 1979
AMAZING!!! Dug out of storage after 30 years in a basement, Soul Jazz present '135 Grand Street New York 1979', Ericka Beckman's thrilling document of downtown New York during the infamous No Wave period of late 1970s. Over 60 minutes she features better known names like Rhys Chatham and the legendary Ut next to lesser known but no less intriguing acts like A Band, Chinese Puzzle and the brilliant Youth In Asia. On 8mm film she captures the raw energy of a scene in the ascendant, in flux b…
Life Review (1993-2003)
The Shadow Ring formed in the seaside town of Folkestone, England in 1993. Over the course of a decade, and through eight LPs, Graham Lambkin, Darren Harris and later Tim Goss scraped out a unique musical pathway for themselves, armed with only the barest of tools. With each release the Shadow Ring presented themselves as a group in constant flux. Naive acoustic improvisations, dour bedroom sci-fi epics, cryptic D.I.Y. theatre and glacial electronic soundscapes all became fair game in the…
An Attempt To Record Coincidence
Pictured in all its tantalizing, eye-popping glory in Hans Pokora's 1001 Record Collector Dreams, this hellishly-rare Austrian avant garde LP from 1972 is nothing short of astonishing. There are no instruments, but rather varying configurations of solo, duo and ensemble vocal improvisations, presumably informed by the aforementioned (and nearly impenetrable) code (or "charts"). Although this might be seen as part of an interesting continuum, this unique and prescient music will stun even the mos…
Wayfaring Strangers: Guitar Soli
another gem, a wonderful collection of obscure solo acoustic guitar tunes from the mid 60s up to the dawn of the 80s -- beautiful work from a slew of players we've never heard of -- but we'd put right up there with Fahey and Basho in the way they reach from the back porch to the cosmos with just their fingers and some strings! One thing we love about this set, and the Numero Group releases to date, is how deep they dig and what beauty they unearth, somehow with impeccable sound quality. Some tun…