Early in 2000, Scott Herren delivered a fine serving of organicmulti-instrument post-Tortoise rock on his Hefty debut, "Folk Songs forTrains, Trees and Honey" as Savath + Savalas. Less than a year later,he surfaced with mayhem electronics as Delarosa and Asora for the"Blacksome" EP and "Agony" LP on Schematic. 'Vocal Studies' is theintroduction of his hip hop persona, Prefuse 73, something he's beentouring the country with and releasing limited runs of 12" singles.Here, Herren flexes his muscles as a one-man wrecking crew, pulling indeep grooves, broken beats, melodic samples and just enough electronicglitchery to make it listenable. It's a mishmosh of influences howeveras elements of smooth low-end grooves, sneak in between the bombasticbeats The disc opens with a bit of hip hop radio scanning and the cutup collage madness begins. Guest appearances are made from rappersMikah 9, Rec Center, MF Doom & Aesop Rock and even Sam Prekop. Ifyou were a fan of the Deltron 3030 Instrumentals but wanted a littlesomething more but not an all-out guest fest, this one's for you. Oncenotable producer/musician types like U.N.K.L.E., Bomb the Bass and Khanhave destroyed their street cred by flooding albums with a differentguest on every stinking track, and in turn minimalizing the quality andimportance of the music itself. Herren's not only got a proven talentas a musician and producer, but is smart enough to know at which pointis enough to make it great without overkill. The disc is just over 18minutes and is truly a fabulous trip, well-equipped for those summerdrives with the windows down and the music loud.
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The 7th CD from this ambient/electronic/space music collective isimpressive and shows yet again how easily this group can createstunning visual imagery through their often-improvised electronicsynthscapes. SPACECRAFT's evocative and deep-listening music conjuressome really filmic essences, from a peaceful celestial orbit to thephysical and tactile space of the Mother Earth herself. For example,the rustic guitar of 'Anima-Machina' evokes images of a dusty westernscene--complete with quaint ghost towns and tumbleweeds. Yet, later, inthe same track, sequenced percolations resonate with a similar vibe toprime TANGERINE DREAM, and bring to mind visions of free flight. Thistype of journey is what SPACECRAFT excel at, and listeners are able tojoin in, albeit in the comfort of their own personal space. In fact,this music was created for the Cybersphere Planetarium in Tennessee,and I can only imagine the visions the patrons had during theperformance, especially as this music stands so well on it's own.Gorgeous sounds that certainly warrant further investigation by fans ofanyone from ENO to soundtracks to Projekt to STEVE ROACH. (Space ForMusic) contact: http://www.spaceformusic.com 
In 2000, the Reykjavik-based Kitchen Motors began a series of monthly events, featuring collaborations with various musicians and artists who would most often not be collaborating together outside of the live venues. The goals were to be somewhat improvisational, yet somewhat tied into each artist's discipline, while most importantly having fun. The curators documented these events and have compiled various moments onto two CDs now available through a combined release effort through Bad Taste.
Childhood, adolescence, adulthood. As humans, some of the most noticeable maturation into adulthood comes in the late teenage years into the early twenties. It's not so different when you observe the works of an artist - whether it be a musician, writer, painter, etc,... Most musicians aren't good enough to be picked up and noticed from a young age, but a person both as talented and fortunate as Baltimore's Rjyan Kidwell has achieved quite a bit of notoriety for somebody his age.
Antony of the Johnsons served as a liaison between Baby Dee and DavidTibet of Current 93 and now Tibet has brought Dee (as well as Antony)to the world through his own World Serpent distributed Durto label."Little Window" is the debut and it focuses on dramatic voice andprecious piano much like Antony's work and c93's "Soft Black Stars".Dee's voice, possessed of a husky lisp and some operatic tendencies,was an acquired taste for me the first few listens but the lyrics(included in the insert) immediately struck me as wonderful poetry.Prior to some online research, I assumed Dee is an effeminate male likeAntony, but she is actually a post-op transsexual. Her life story isalso otherwise fascinating having been music director of a Catholicchurch, a member of the Coney Island Sideshow and a performer on thestreets of New York City and Europe in a bear costume on a gianttricycle with a harp mounted on the back! Somehow it all makes perfectsense. Dee's piano playing is simply elegant as she sings of beauty andhope with a gospel virtue. "Calvary" in particular takes me back to theSunday mornings of my own childhood. "The Robin's Tiny Throat" is aclever conversation with nature while "Waiting" personifies the verynature of nature. A favored line in the former - "that same hand thatflies a million dawns formed my tiny throat and wrote my songs. Howcould I not sing?" "The Price of a Sparrow" seems to shed light onDee's relationship with her father and is further reflected upon in theextended lullaby of "What About My Father?" The disc begins and endswith solo accordion pieces accompanied by bird song and gigglingchildren. Stunning. The more I listen to "Little Window" the deeper Ifall in love with it. A launch party for "Little Window" will takeplace September 29-30 at Joe's Pub in NYC with performances by Dee andCurrent 93. And oh how I wish I could be there,...
Gosh, it only seems like last year the 19 yr old kid from San Diego was peddling his compilation with his friends. Hey, it was the beginning of last year! _Almost_ two years later, Tigerbeat6 offices have moved to San Francisco, racked up about 20 releases (and a good amount of press) through various old friends and vicious young upstarts. Taking form of a double CD release, 'Tigerbea6 Inc.' celebrates the incorporation of his booming young enterprise with 44 fresh new hits from a couple old cronies like Lesser, Pisstank, Pimmon, Electric Company, Goodiepal, Twerk, Steward, DAT Politics and Blectum from Bledom along with some fresh new faces like Stars as Eyes, Geoff White, Joseph Nothing, Com.A, Gold Chains, and many others.
This is the final installment of the Hushush 'Threesome Series' involving Ambre (members of Snog and Imminent Starvation among others), Mark Spybey (Dead Voices on Air) and Mick Harris (Scorn). "Dys" pairs Ambre and Harris with Harris in the driver's seat weaving together the samples from Ambre into 5 tracks over 48 minutes. The sound is similar to the textured, ambient headphone mindfuck of Harris' Lull project and the more sinister surrealist moments of Nurse With Wound.
Do some noise makers seem to have everything but thekitchen sink? Manchester's noisiest CD-R labelwww.pigdogrecordings.com has spewed a disc over thegrubby tiles that has not only the sink but all theother utensils and fittings slamming and clatteringaway and mixed down to hard drives. Inspired by BananaYoshimitsu's book 'Kitchen', four noise-smiths eachdeliver lengthy constructions made from quite likelythe most ominous sounds to emanate from cookery everrecorded.Anaphalaxis chase a bee swarm stuck in the drainwhilst hot fat gets poured down the plughole. Then thepoor old bees get mashed in a liquidizer, and thingsget bubbly for a bit (warning: do not drink). Thisleads to a cleaner, more efficient kitchenette afterthe white noise whoosh repairman calls. Thehousewife's bleach isn't enough to shift Drozophyllfrom the drains, where they lurk rattling manholes andteapots and hammering on the metal piping, in whatmight be mistaken for homage to early Neubauten. Thismight be made on a computer, but the primitive rhythmssound as corrosive if comparatively clipped. Can theyreally be playing the spoons? Ominous stereo panningoccurs latterly.13th Hour make like Digital Hardcore beats stuck inwinter molasses, taking a slow morning to drip ontocold porridge. They do not like their porridge cold,hence the malicious atmosphere and the tortured shardsof breaking glass in slo mo that rumble over themassive doom beat.Something crawls across the kitchen tiles...With all the windows shattered and the wind howlingin, Phroq is left to flutter about in the breezetrying to make a nice cup of tea. But its no usebecause by the end of it the metal teapot's beenhammered to hell and all the cups are broken, so hejust leaves the taps running and floods the feedbackscream beast out of hiding and fries it on the stovewhich is thankfully still working even if it makes abit of a squeal.
Phroq has his own release on the same label, featuringanother three long looping post-industrial noisecollages, which are slightly more carefully composedthan his chaotic onslaught that closes the 'Kitchen'compilation. The most amusing is the closingsoundtrack to an experimental Japanese sex film'Pudding, Pudding' with much echoing orgasmic cooingand sing song speech samples set to slow murky beatswith occasional tastefully judged appearances from ourold friend white noise. The one in the middle mixes uppainful sine tones with monochrome clicks and deepdrones and isn't funny at all, especially when itspeeds up and drops a big old lump of raging noise onthe carpet. The epic opening shot is so deadly seriousthat it calls itself 'Music for Photoperformance'. Myracist moron neighbour downstairs could howl 'Dat'snot music' til his cow comes home but music is onlymusic to a receptive mind, and to have a receptivemind you need to have a mind in the first place.Anyway initially the photo performance music has somesimple piano motiffs underpinning the scissor bagrustle and incessant throb, and field recordings cutin and out before the one fingered piano of doom holdssway yet again. The repetitious sound of a camerashutter recurs and some French shouting echoes beforeit all gets mashed into a monotone chug that stopsabruptly to let little birdies sing in the distance.Then everything builds to a camera rewind piano slamfinale. I suppose it's quite likely Phroq has heardNurse With Wound and Ryoji Ikeda at some point.
