A Pale Shelter
100 copies limited edition "A Pale Shelter is the kind of record that stops you dead in your tracks without actually really doing very much to create a sonic blockade. It ebbs and flows, glides and meanders through constant refrains, slowly pulling you deeper into thickly textured, minimal waves of ambient, chimes twinkling somewhere in a distant background, echoes of melody creating centerpieces to the arrangements. It's a classic example of what makes Past Inside the Present's output so mesmer…
Pinehaven
*200 copies limited edition* Pioneers of slow-evolving minimal drone, zakè & City of Dawn transform unadorned inputs into beautiful complexity in their latest effort, 'Pinehaven'. The drone duo is known for their carefully crafted textures, avoiding sudden shifts or abrasive sonorities. Their focus, as heard in previous efforts, offer up the steady ebb and flow of sound, cultivating a profound sense of meditative stasis and explorations of high-fidelity sound. Seven expressive ambient soundscape…
Frizzell & Duque: A Sorrow Unrequited
*300 copies limited edition* “It's not just a clever name. Zake and City of Dawn have come up with a record that genuinely sounds like the reflective moods that so often follow great loss, realised on record. Sweeping synth-strings on 'We Once Believed We Owned The Sky' only serving to reiterate the sense of lamentation that seems to pervade every corner of this album. Sometimes looking back on what was but will never be again is the only real way of making ourselves feel better - by connecting …
Process
Tobias Karlehag is a multi-instrumentalist and sound artist from Gothenburg, Sweden. With his solo project he creates spacious ambient and drone music through algorithmic compositions and improvisation. In his debut album 'Process' he shapes a still and meditative state with modular synths, electric guitar and various electronics with underlying narratives. The music is the result of a shift where the inspiration for his work comes, partially from field recordings, chance and his own reflections…
No Beauty In The World
*100 copies limited edition* 'No Beauty In The World' is a reflection of how in a world so cruel we can find beauty, with its music bouncing between beautiful ambience and piano loops, modular synth melodies to darker textural and feedback driven drones. Unlike other wøunds records where the fluidity of the entire album tells a story, 'No Beauty In The World' explore various sonic possibilities and territories. This is a culmination of over 2 years of writing and recording, constantly driven by …
Anon 1
“This is bittersweet and beautiful ambient music that combines the widescreen vision of bvdub with chemtrail atmospherics that nod to William Basinski.” —Bleep
Crossing Water
Cat Tyson Hughes is an Australian composer and artist working in experimental music and contemporary art. ‘Crossing Water’ is her debut album with Past Inside the Present, in addition to it being her first formal full-length. She has spent the last few years working on various music projects including her appearance on our compilation ‘Healing Together: A Compilation For Mental Health Recovery’ 2LP and appearing on zakè’s long-player ‘Remembrance’ 2LP with a beautiful rework. She has also worked…
The Lower Lights
*100 copies limited edition. 2023 repress on solid red vinyl.* 'The Lower Lights' is a new compilation album from 36, featuring 10 tracks of vibrant, eclectic ambient music. These are carefully chosen from a larger selection of tracks, made between April 2018 and April 2019 as part of a year-long 'Audio Diary' project. These showcase the more energetic side to 36's production, whilst still retaining that glowing melancholia, which has become the hallmark of the 36 sound. Tunes like 'Galatea' and…
Clouds Without Water
Clouds Without Water emerged from the chance meeting of two ambient experimentalists who played at an electronic music festival as solo artists and discovered a musical affinity. They decided to collaborate long distance during the loneliest months of the pandemic lockdowns, sending tracks to each other without plans or discussion, only wordless questions buried in the music. These are the answers they fashioned. Clouds Without Water bridges the gap between granularity and haze, grit and smoothn…
Sound Space Variations
“Sound Space Variations" is a delicate and restrained sound bath. A mix of atmospheric, suspenseful drone sounds and meditative aspects. It is an album made for those moments when we just are. zakè has managed to capture the moments that lie between sounds. I am sure you know those unagitated murmurs and atmospheric hisses. The artist connects this in-between-world and our earthly one with calm and sonorous scores, making us think about everything and nothing. The six pieces on the record do not…
Pyramiden
"zakè, James Bernard and Markus Guentner build a cascading and overwhelmingly beautiful record that combines the zen of the best ambient/new age music along with the “Big Sky” openness of post-rock bands like Explosions in The Sky and This Will Destroy You. You get songs with chilly names like “Polar Night”, “Seafrost”, and “Arctic Choir” – and there is a sort of vast arctic blue hue to these songs – but it lacks even a hint of desolation. I can imagine listening to something like “Assembly of L…
S.W.I.M
*300 copies limited edition* Icelandic musician Gunnar Jónsson Collider debuts on A Strangely Isolated Place with an expansive trip through six fictional environments, brought further to life through an accompanying video by artist Arna Beth. Inviting escapism through detailed, glacial textures, S.W.I.M. elevates a traditional beatless spectrum into a first-person narrative, moving across burning wastelands, miles-high sundown, a dizzying night sky, subterranean exploration, and more beautiful, …
Materia
The second instalment in the Titrate series marks the debut of Pagan Red. This 180g vinyl album, housed in 350gsm reverse board print packaging, contains three experimental compositions featuring subtly enveloping drone, weightless percussion and immersive tonal resonance. Field recordings interweave with the synthetic, sparse rhythms emerge and dissolve, absorbing textures layer and evaporate. Exploring the symbiosis between the natural and the nonmaterial, Materia guides listeners on a journey…
Orchestral Tape Studies II
Orchestral Tape Studies II is an enthralling amalgam of orchestral textures carefully crafted by zakè. It is a continuation of its predecessor, Orchestral Tape Studies which was released to high acclaim in 2019. Bringing forth pastoral meditations with becalmed, atmospheric intent, Orchestral Tape Studies II is a convincing display of beautiful scores primed for the self-reflective moments that are both contemplative and thought provoking. These delicate repetitions, reticent sound treatments, a…
Áhkká
Pauline Hogstrand's music – and Áhkká, in particular – is deeply inspired by both inner and outer influences, by the mystical as well as the rock-solid, by fictitious conversations and the queen mountain of Lappland (Áhkká).
Dual | Duel
«We find ourselves venturing into the depths of a rugged terrain. In our hands, we hold stones and minerals, each possessing its own distinct texture, weight, and sonic potential. It is through the artistic touch and through the musical instruments that these earthly treasures, once dormant, are awaken to life.» — Sara Oswald + Feldermelder
Eel
"From eel to eel," Oskar thinks, standing by the coffin, "for eel thou art, to eel returnest." --The Tin Drum, Günter Grass Eel is the second set of sound works from Berlin based Korean American composer, Hyunhye Seo. Known widely for her contributions to the now legendary unit Xiu Xiu, Seo's solo pre-occupations dwell in an altogether more timbral and gestural domain. Each of the two pieces that compromise Eel are visceral deep dives into a turbulence of sound flows. Uniting her interests in ec…
Reality Opposition
A note from Christina Giannone
Dissociation is the driving force behind the composition. The act of surrendering, the attempt to observe our existence from the outside.
Giving in feels like giving up.
Acceptance feels like resignation.
The process included digital sound experimentation by means of observance and detail orientation and the idea of sound presenting itself in different identities depending on the listener. This attention to detail acts as a hologram, changing shapes depending on th…
The Voice of Theseus
From Yann Novak In Greek mythology, the legend of Theseus describes how the king-founder of ancient Athens rescues the children of his city from King Minos’ minotaur on the island of Crete. In commemoration, Athenians began a pilgrimage to honor his victory, taking the ship of Theseus and sailing it from Athens to Delos. It was with this tradition that a philosophical paradox about the historic ship was raised: As the ship was repaired, piece by piece, until it was no longer composed of any orig…
EARTH
Marc Richter aka Black To Comm released his debut record 20 years ago. In 2023 he is still busy releasing music under various disguises and is currently signed to the Thrill Jockey label. To celebrate this anniversary his own Cellule 75 label is re-releasing some classic out-of-print vinyl albums that originally came out on the defunct Type and De Stijl labels. The LP will feature a full-colour lyric sheet / poster exclusive to this edition.