23 March 2015

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23 Skidoo has had a significant portion of their previous work reissued over the past few years, but Beyond Time is their first album of new material in 15 years. A soundtrack to the documentary of the same name, exploring the life and art of 23 Skidoo core members Johnny and Alex Turnbull's father, William Turnbull, it stands strongly on its own as an atmospheric work that stays faithful to the band’s roots in funk, hip-hop, and unique post-industrial noise.

Les Disques du Crepuscule

Because it is intended to accompany the documentary, the eight instrumental pieces on the album do not make any drastic jumps or shifts in dynamics, instead remaining a consistent experience.Opening piece "Dawning (Version)" stays in league with their latter day output:crackly vinyl, hip-hop loops, and a light organic electronic accompaniment.The band works with the same memorable drum loops on "Interzonal," but within a field of odd samples and heavily effected guitar.

The group uses drastically different rhythms on the misleadingly titled "Calypso," based heavily around a steel drum loop that becomes more of a melodic than percussive element.Rich synthesizers and bass fill out the remainder of the mix, and once the guitar and additional percussion are brought in, the piece sounds nothing like calypso music."Kendang" also has the band utilizing less conventional drums and percussion, with more of an ethnic touch.The jazz horns might be a bit too traditional for me, but the funk heavy guitar and keyboards work wonderfully.

A 23 Skidoo standard, gamelan percussion, appears on "Contemplation," and blended with additional bells the piece ends up taking a darker direction.While it still has the appropriate dynamics for a film score piece, the final passages are chaotic and dissonant, becoming just the right amount of uncomfortable and dissonant."AYU (Ambient)" is the only beatless piece here:with the artists blending vintage sounding analog electronics with tastefully jazzy guitar work, it results in a nice, peaceful piece fitting a film score, but also effective on its own.

For the album's final two pieces, 23 Skidoo reworks two of their older pieces.Both "Helicopterz" and "Urban Gamelan" remain faithful to their original incarnations, just with a slightly cleaner production sound and a bit more restraint befitting a film soundtrack.While I was unable to view the film that Beyond Time accompanies, the soundtrack portion stands on its own independent of the visuals.While the first 23 Skidoo recordings in a decade and a half might not be a mind blowing, revelation of their reappearance, it has the same idiosyncratic sound that has defined their career since its inception, and sits in excellently with their body of work.

samples:

• Dawning (Version)
• Interzonal
• Contemplation

 

22 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

stator (ˈsteɪtə) n

1. (Electrical Engineering) The stationary part of a rotary machine or device, esp of a motor or generator

2. (Aeronautics) A system of nonrotating radially arranged parts within a rotating assembly, esp the fixed blades of an axial flow compressor in a gas turbine

[C20: from Latin: one who stands (by), from stāre to stand]

Biosphere is the main recording name of Geir Jenssen, a Norwegian musician who has released a notable catalogue of ambient electronic music.

He is well known for his "ambient techno" and "arctic ambient" styles, his use of music loops, and peculiar samples from sci-fi sources.

His track "Novelty Waves" was used for the 1995 campaign of Levi's. His 1997 album Substrata is generally seen as one of the all-time classic ambient albums.

He has been working with Touch since 1999.

Deathprod is a musical pseudonym used by Norwegian artist Helge Sten.  Sten began creating music under this name starting in 1991, culminating with a box set of most of his recorded work being released in 2004.  Simply titled Deathprod, the collection contains three albums along with a bonus disc of previously unreleased, rare, and deleted tracks.

On recordings, Sten is usually credited with "Audio Virus," a catch-all term for "homemade electronics, old tape echo machines, ring modulators, filters, theremins, samplers and lots of electronic stuff."

Sten is a member of Supersilent and works as a producer on many releases on the Norwegian label Rune Grammofon. He has also produced Motorpsycho and has worked with Biosphere on an Arne Nordheim tribute album called Nordheim Transformed.

More information can be found here.

22 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

Based in Baltimore, M.C. Schmidt is one half of the acclaimed electronic duo Matmos. As half of Matmos, Schmidt has worked with Terry Riley, Bjork, The Kronos Quartet, Peter Rehburg, the INA/GRM, Rrose, Marshall Allen, Horse Lords, People Like Us, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Antony Hegarty, William Basinski and many more.

Batu Malablab works a dislocating magic, indulging in a tradition of western fantasy of non-western music. Recalling gamelon-inspired experimental classics such as John Cage's prepared piano work, Can's "Ethnological Forgery Series" and Jon Hassell's "Fourth World" ambient music, Batu Malablab is imaginary global music made in the Baltimore basement studio pictured on the back of the LP/CD.

More information can be found here.

22 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

John Wiese's long-awaited Deviate From Balance is the artist’s first album since 2011's Seven Of Wands (PAN).  Recorded throughout Europe/UK, Australia, and the US, the album includes scored ensemble pieces including over 20 musicians on each, recorded in Melbourne and Portland, as well as audio documentation of installation pieces "Wind Changed Direction," a four-channel sound piece presented in the garden of the Getty Center (curated by Liars), and "Battery Instruments," an eight-channel piece presented at HSP in New Zealand, now heard for the first time.  Also included are various collaborations and recordings from live performances.  At over 80 minutes, Deviate From Balance has been packaged as a 2×LP with tip-on gatefold jackets.  Musicians appearing include Joseph Hammer, Ikue Mori, Evan Parker, C Spencer Yeh, Joe Preston, Smegma and countless more.  The material is extremely diverse and services as a comprehensive and detailed document of this prolific individual's work over the past several years.

This release coincides with an artist monograph of the same title, published by Hesse Press in Los Angeles, featuring a number of pieces represented on the double-album.

More information can be found here and here.

22 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

As much as I like Boduf Songs, I have to admit that the albums began to all blur together for me at some point, as Mat Sweet’s hushed, morbid, and deliciously Lovecraftian aesthetic is an extremely specific one that he has mined for quite a long time (though 2013's Burnt Up On Re-Entry gamely tried to shake-up that formula).  I certainly do not blame him, as it is a very appealing and distinctive niche, but there is quite a lot of similar-sounding material out there as a result.  And now there is still more…sort of: Stench of Exist is a return to the "classic" Boduf sound, but with some healthy vestiges remaining from Sweet's more adventurous recent work.  The end result is probably one of Mat's finest albums to date and one that definitely features a couple of Boduf's strongest songs ever.

The Flenser

Stench of Exist begins, quite appropriately, with a disorienting minute of gnarled howls, blasts of static, stuttering mechanical noises, and an ominous hum, evoking everything from a fractured vision of the apocalypse to the fitful awakening of something large and evil.  That makes for an amusing and excellent segue into the album's first real song, the elegant, slow, and subdued "My Continuing Battle With Material Reality."  Built upon an unadorned, descending organ motif, "My Continuing Battle" gradually augments its skeletal structure with a host of inspired touches, such as a wonderfully muted and squelching pulse and some surprisingly heavy and well-timed orchestral swells.  Though it also boasts some fine lyrics, the real achievement is how all of the various components come together to form such a throbbing, simmering, and masterfully controlled whole.

The following "Thwart By Thwart," however, takes a very different and unexpectedly anthemic direction.  Though I had no idea that Mat had that type of song in his arsenal, the pounding tom-tom rhythm, fluid piano hook, and unexpected crescendo of hand claps proves to be a deliciously perverse foil for his grim lyrics.  It truly should not work, yet somehow it does.  Later, "Head of Hollow-Fill and Mountain-Top Removal" offers up yet another surprise divergence, opening with a heavy Pete Swanson-esque industrial-techno pulse before morphing into a brooding interlude in which a computer-voiced narrator shares a poetic and creepily dystopian reverie over swells of feedback and strange snatches of melody.  Stench of Exist’s final (and greatest) triumph then occurs shortly afterward with "Modern Orbita," which enhances the standard Boduf slow-motion gloom-crawl with muscular, vibrant drums and a masterfully executed swarm of fluttering, burbling psychedelic touches.  It is without a doubt my favorite Boduf piece that I have ever heard, as everything again comes together brilliantly: it is smart, melodic, bass-heavy, propulsive, hooky, warped, and unpredictable in all the right places.  I cannot overstate how eerily graceful Mat's touch can be on this album.

For the most part, the remainder of the album reverts back to business-as-usual, which is only a flaw for those expecting a start-to-finish, out-of-nowhere masterpiece or a complete reinvention.  Those who are picking up the new Boduf Songs album because they like Boduf Songs should have no problem with that.  I definitely appreciated that much of Stench of Exist transcended my expectations, but it is hard to fault Mat for sounding exactly like himself, especially since he is so good at it.  Also, some of lyrics in the more straightforward pieces are quite good as well (I especially liked "the years have razors for teeth").  The only other potential flaw is that Stench of Exist is somewhat heavily loaded with instrumentals, which could cynically be viewed as padding the album with filler.  I personally see them more as necessary transitions though: given Mat’s narrow aesthetic, 11 songs in a row would yield diminishing returns very quickly and I suspect that he grasps that.  Though they are far from album highlights themselves, the instrumentals are certainly not bad and they provide the "palate cleansing" necessary to give the more substantial pieces a chance to make their full impact (and they do).  Stench of Exist is a thoughtfully constructed and absorbing album rather than a collection of hot new singles and it is sequenced accordingly (though those looking for great singles should definitely check out "Modern Orbita").  As a Boduf Songs fan, this is exactly the kind of album that I needed to make my ears perk up again.

• My Continuing Battle With Material Reality
• Head of Hollow-Fill and Mountaintop Removal
• Modern Orbita

 

20 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

MUTATION

... the lunatics are running the asylum ...

Physically: A Mutation occurs when a DNA gene is damaged or changed in such a way as to alter the genetic message carried by that gene.

Mentally: Anything goes ... and it does.

Another collaboration from Steven Stapleton and Graham Bowers exploring their unique world of music is to be released later this month ... however the first 60 will be a limited edition containing a special original artwork, numbered and signed by Steven ... we have intentionally kept the price as low as possible ... for details follow the links below where it can be pre-ordered:

http://www.red-wharf.com/shop.htm

for audio excerpts and sleeve artwork go to

http://www.red-wharf.com/Nurse%20With%20Wound%20and%20Graham%20Bowers.htm

16 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

credits

16 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

A reissue of their debut full length LP, this self-titled album by Austin’s S U R V I V E has the quartet presenting nine distinct synth based compositions that run the gamut between prog experimentation, abstract space, and new wave-esque beats and rhythms. Their stylistic choices and approach to music are both pretty clear, but succeed where many others just try to latch on and ride out the wave of synth nostalgia prevalent these past few years.

Holodeck

As someone with an affinity for a snappy drum machine and a simple, but catchy sequencer line, "Floating Cube," having a slightly loose melody and tight rhythm programming, immediately grabbed my attention.With just the right amount of self-aware '80s nostalgia, it works rather well, embracing just enough of the style without trying too hard.On "Hourglass," percolating keyboards and rigid drums appear covered in a vintage haze of faded colors and time-worn magnetic tape.

"Black Mollies" has the band trying different structures within the same sonic palette, utilizing a slightly abstract start/stop pacing, in a complex composition that never stays in one place too long, but does not feel as if it is jumpy or inconsistent either."Omniverse" also sees the band segueing into darker moods via a slower pace and sparser mix, first showcasing the sharp drums and then the synth leads at the conclusion.

On a few of the songs, they drop the rhythms entirely and instead focus on slowly drifting and expanding synth pads and melodies.Opening piece "Deserted Skies" introduces the album with a cavernous and wide open sound throughout, until a pulsing rhythmic keyboard sequence pops up in its latter moments."To Light Alone I Bow" has a vaguely new age sound to it, but tastefully done as to avoid falling into the standard clichés.

The album comes to a fitting climax on "Dirge," with a pace befitting its title.It may have a depressive tempo, but the big, crashing drums and bombastic, soaring synthesizers are anything but dour.The song sits somewhere between a film intro theme circa 1983 and an expansive progressive rock masterpiece.Subtle it may not be, but it is exactly within that pomp and drama that the brilliance shines through.

S U R V I V E's album may have an intentionally vintage sound to it, and that sound being one that a multitude of artists have co-opted and subgenres have sprung up around.Unlike many of those projects though, it does not come across as a gimmick or bandwagon jumping at all.Those 1980s new wave elements we all know:raw synths, inhuman drum machines, and reverb heavy atmospheres all feature heavily here, but paired with a strong sense of composition and effective production, it stands out brilliantly amongst a field of pretenders.

samples:

• Floating Cube
• Black Mollies
• Dirge

 

16 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

A collaboration between Kouhei Matsunaga (who has worked with everyone from Sensational to Autechre and Asmus Tietchens) and the less prolific Toshio Munehiro, NHK’s ultra minimalist approach to techno may conjure memories of the late 90s/early 2000s glitch and microsound scenes, but their combination of erratic beats and digital expanses feels anything but dated, sounding entirely unique and fresh in 2015.

LINE

I have always had a soft spot for that short lived era that was often full of derided laptop musicians and a style that was akin IDM taken to an even further point of abstraction.So when the glitch claps and broken AM radio house synth stabs of "Ch. 2" locked into a tight groove I was pretty thrilled.On "Ch. 6" the duo works with similar components but into a more microscopic click beat framework.Made up of a series of interlocking loops, it has the essential repetition of dance music while still building and evolving the whole time to be anything but monochromatic.

Those two make for perhaps the most conventional rhythms and sounds that NHK put together here.Beats show up in other places as well, such as the wet gymnasium basketball thud of "Ch. 1" or the simple analog synth-like thump of "Ch. 3".An unconventional bit of rhythm underscores the skittering noises and simple melodies on "Ch. 5", resulting for an exceptionally strong combination.

The beat oriented pieces may be the most memorable in a conventional music sense, but when the duo abandon that and go completely into experimental sounds it is no less fascinating.Shrill noises and weird open ambient moments in "Ch. 4" are offset by speaker decimating low end drones that are as easily felt as heard.On "Ch. 8" the two string together a series of electronic hums and the occasional bit of jarring digital interference noise with a backing of what could pass for a rhythm, but is made up of a bizarre collection of tiny sounds that could just as easily be extracted from field recordings as they could be the product of extreme digital signal modeling.

One of the thing that makes Program succeed so well is Matsunagaand Munehiro’s diversity in composition.Minimalist robotic techno, ambient space and electro-acoustic compositional vibes all appear throughout, keeping the song to song progression diverse and varied, but while still sounding consistently and thematically linked to one another.The genre that is most befitting this album may not be as prominent anymore, but Program is as strong as any of those albums ever were.

samples:

• Ch. 1
• Ch. 2
• Ch. 8

 

15 March 2015

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Albums and Singles

Secrecy and solitude are the twin engines spinning at the heart of Cores/Eruct, Noé Cuéllar and Joseph Kramer's first record on their own Category of Manifestation label. By the time album opener "Bluing" has ended and "Son Form" has begun its unusual cyclic canter, they have already constructed an enigmatic and isolated atmosphere. Though clearly recorded and rigorously performed, Coppice’s songs bewilder. They teeter on the edge of the familiar and flirt with recognition, but are comprised of sounds that evade identification. Those sounds are microscopic, magnified to the point of seclusion, and hermetic, as if trapped inside a great machine churning endlessly in the dark. That sense of perpetuity is what drives the the album. It plays out like an aural mise en abyme, each song, sound, and passage opening upon some aspect itself and spiraling endlessly in a confusion of levers, springs, and eerie melodies.

Category of Manifestation

Bluing, a household product used to whiten clothes, is also the name of a process by which steel is protected against rust. The reason for its name is obvious. As a result of the iron powder or iron oxide used in the cleaning, the affected material takes on a blue complexion. "Bluing" has a similar effect on Cores/Eruct. It sets the stage for the strange and disconcertingly cryptic music that follows, music that is structured, repetitive, and translucent, and at the same time colored by ambiguity, variety, and opacity. Whatever Cuéllar and Kramer did when recording these songs, all of them compositions dating from between 2009 and 2012, it left behind a cold, woozy feeling and a dusky, unearthly glow.

The deliberate qualities in Cores/Eruct arise from Coppice’s compositional severity. These songs feature just a few sound sources and, in some cases, utilize only a few rhythmic variations. Much depends on minute changes and subtle additions. "Son Form," for instance, focuses on a single rasping figure, which turns and grinds repetitively from start to finish, becoming longer or shorter as time goes on. It sounds a little like an uncooperative engine with a faulty pull cord for a starter. This central element pans from the right to the left channel as minute noises chirp around it, but the main revolving structure stays the same throughout. "While Like Teem or Bloom Comes (Tipping)," the album’s 13 minute centerpiece, is more diverse—it is composed of more parts— but it shifts through a fixed number of identifiable sets: a melodic, somewhat droning sound, the click-clack of plastic keys against wheezing valves and escaping air, the rattle of a metal grille paired with whistling reeds and humming wooden pipes, the surface noise of plastic buzzing against plastic. This modular approach produces a controlled and song-like impression (think verses and choruses, exposition and development), emphasizing the compositional aspect of Coppice’s repertoire.

The same elements that produce that schematic quality are also responsible for the album’s most inscrutable traits. After a time, all of those whirling movements and looping parts blur and condense. The music feeds on itself, swells, and caves in, creating a bottomless sensation that is both mesmerizing and unsettling. It is less like falling into darkness and more like falling into a massive hall of mirrors; there should be a source for all of these images, but only more reflections keep coming. If there is a ghost in the machine, if someone is responsible for setting all of these events in motion, they stay constantly out of reach, haunting the music instead of staking a claim in it.

As with many of Coppice’s recordings, recycled and remixed elements play a significant role. A recognizable fragment from last year’s Vinculum (Coincidence) shows up on "Son Form," and there are likely other bits that have been pulled from the band’s deep well of sounds. This compounds the music’s fractal quality and cultivates its botanical, not-quite-wholly determined traits. Songs on Cores/Eruct grow and leap out of themselves carrying some semblance of their prior iteration with them. The arc of their evolution can be estimated at the right distance, but the details are difficult to measure precisely. Cuéllar and Kramer are responsible for performing the songs, but their content grows of its own accord and the music burrows into places the musicians could have never guessed.

samples:

• Bluing
• Son Form
• While Like Teem or Bloom Comes (Tipping)