What more can we say about Pulse Emitter that we haven't already? We can't seem to get enough of his gorgeous and epic, sweeping, soaring, krautdrone new age synthscapes, but unlike the relative tranquility of the last few PE releases (the 4 volume Meditative Music series), Cosmic Images is a much more spaced out and kosmische affair, channeling Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze as well as modern synthspace explorers like Zombi, Oneohtrix Point Never (who supplied the album artwork), Infinite Body, Innercity, and the like.
A five part song suite, each focusing on different planets and star systems and galaxies, each one a sweeping expanse of modular synth swirls and mesmerizing keyboard melodies, warm and lush and layered, slipping from propulsive and psychedelic and almost blown out, to hushed and shimmery and minimal. A series of perfect solar system soundtracks, much of the record sounding like the background music for some seventies documentary about the universe, with long droning tones, and soft shifting ambience, hazy melodies over soft muted buzz, but with a couple tracks sounding way more aggressive and distorted and tapping into a love of Carpenter and Goblin, the opener, "Eagle Nebula" is a pulsing, throbbing buzzscape, the tones sharp and distorted, lots of crunch and thrum, still spacey and dreamy, but much more intense. And the final track, "Jupiter", offers a sonically similar bookend, taking the ambient cosmic drift of the in between songs, and adding a serious dose of rumbling low end bass buzz, turning the otherwise blissy sound into something much more sinister, adding various other melodies, swirling sonic squiggles, and thick swells of distorted thrum, the perfect brooding, buzzing coda, to a fantastically epic collection of kosmische drift.
That's right. Another killer collection of sci-fi space drone synth bliss from big time aQ fave Pulse Emitter. And yeah, this one is again, crazy limited. Only 100 copies made, we got the very last 20. Which means once these are gone, we will NOT be able to get more. And since we're fairly sure there are more than 20 people out there in aQ land who wand, nay NEED, all things Pulse Emitter, we'll keep this brief.
Grass, while not as 'oppressive' as the recent Oppressive Nature release on Digitalis, and not as meditative as the three part Meditative Music series, manages to fall somewhere in between, probably a little closer to the meditative side of things, we'd say. Slow burning dreamdrones drifting through space would sum it up in a sentence, but why leave it at that. The sound on Grass is epic and expansive and space-y, definitely a Pulse Emitter disc that would hit the spot for all you Expo 70 obsessives, the same sort of space kraut vibe. Loooooong tones undulate and shift, melodies surface and dissipate, laced with some strange Morricone like faux flute melodies. The foundation is a dense throbbing low end, layered and gorgeously textured, shifting overtones and barely restrained feedback, but above and all around that main drone, various layers and melodic fragments drift and shimmer and float weightless as if in orbit around a brilliant black star. So gorgeous.
Definitely recommended, as is grabbing one of these quick before they disappear. Already out of print, these are again, the LAST 20 copies. Packaged in super nice full color sleeves.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
One of our favorite Portland Modgular synth wizards is back to business with another deeply dreamy dose of synthisizer bliss. Per usual, Sunset Into Night is limited to an edition of 100, a down-right shame considering how much we dig this spaced out new outing. Falling somewhere between his Meditation series and a loosly knit Goblin, Sunset Into Night shimmers, sails and dissipates into the cool evening air, all the while inviting the listener on a cinematic journey through analog dream zones and icey modualr drips. Deep, glacial drones lift off into infinity, gorgeous notes and sounds flutter and errupt through buzzing filters and ambient wash, so nice.
But not all is sunny and blissful in Pulse Emitter's world, the dreamworlds give way to moments of somber reflection, quiet sonic shrines to dusk and the setting sun. Moments of tension dissipate into the sinking tide, darkened tones pulse and hover in blackened ambiance, all oozing into a pool of nu new age grime. We dig Pulse Emitter's tendency to walk the line between light and dark, borrowing equaly from new age soundscaping and dark ambient synth magik, so rad and so recomended!
Latest batch of swirly swooshy, psychedelic sci-fi synth new age drift from Pulse Emitter, aka Daryl Groetsch, and since we've raved on and on about PE over the course of close to 15 releases (and those are just the ones we were able to get enough of to list) we most definitely risk repeating ourselves, which is probably okay, as this is another perfect installment in Groetsch's ever expanding catalogue of otherworldly synthscapes.
This one is crazy limited too, we only have about 15 copies, and it's already out of print so odds are these will be gone in a flash, fans, you already know what you're instore for, and probably want to grab one of these quick. Newbies, prepare to be transported to some strange futureworld, but one as envisioned by our 1980 selves, rocket cars, and space probes, cities in orbit around dying planets, whole worlds buried beneath the ruined surface. We can't help but envision Logan's Run, especially on the first track here, a percolating arpeggiating synthscape laced with laser beam effects and deep buzzing ominous basslines, super soundtracky, and evocative of some low budget sci-fi future.
The second track is a bit more sun dappled and new agey, but is cut from the same cloth, so in some ways it almost sounds like the love scene from that imaginary future, but it too is laced with weird swooping low end buzz, and strange streaks of blooping and bleeping FX, which transform the tranquility of the main synth lines into something a bit more dramatic.
After a short-ish, music box like synth ballad, thick swells beneath tinkling melodies, comes the 10+ minute closer, a sprawling expanse of sci-fi space kraut synth drone bliss, super spare and abstract, dreamy and woozy and mediative, hazy and hypnotic, and the perfect soundtrack to drifting off, and floating weightless into space. So good.
And again, LIMITED TO 100 COPIES. Already sold out at the label so these are indeed the last copies we'll be able to get...
Paralleling the meticulously abused vinyl collages of Philip Jeck and the post-Fluxus artfulness of Eyvind Kang, Pulsinger & Tunakan's "Schwanesee Remixed" is an incredible piece of electroglitchmusik that could very easily hold its sampled origins in Zorn's sublime chamber ensemble, Masada.
Having also adopted the pseudonym Ilse Gold for excursions into Rotterdam 'ardcore techno, the anomymous Austrian (?) individual (or maybe group?) behind Pure offers a debut album of experimental electronics that recapitulates a number of the abrasive strategies previously employed in '60s electro-acoustics, '80s industrial culture, and the current strain of electronica. Using such strategies as ring modulation, DSP timeshifting, FM synthesis, and occasional digital fragmentation, Pure strives for a mannerist ornamentation of layered sounds. Within "Noonbugs," Pure builds multiple layers of malleable looped samples which are mostly electronic in origin, but occasionally strident orchestral sounds emerge. These layers often overlap each others rhythms and textures without too much concern for the greater compositional context. However, such disconnections within the stereo field lend themselves to sci-fi paranoiac metaphors, common within the history of computer music. "Noonbugs" ends up sounding more antiquated than fellow Mego artists, especially when compared to the arrogant sonic overload of Pita of the brazen digital-pop smearing of Fennesz. Rather its citations are found in Pimmon, Alan Splet (the "Eraserhead" sound designer), Bernard Parmegiani, and Premature Ejaculations (the underappreciated mechanized dada-drone project for the late Rozz Williams of Christian Death). A fine album.
- RealAudio clip: Lit
- RealAudio clip: Duck
Ever since we discovered M83 and their gorgeous shimmery blissed out shoegazey electronic pop, we've been desparately trying to track down more stuff on Gooom, the French label that M83 (and Cyann & Ben as well) call home. While a lot of that stuff is already out of print, we did just manage to get a few titles in enough quantity to list. Purple Confusion actually features half of M83 as well as Gooom head honcho Jean-Philippe. So you can probably just imagine what this sounds like. Everybody who freaked out over the M83 will love this too. Take the My Bloody Valentine meets New Order sound of M83 add some propulsive Krautrock rhythms, some Stereolab rainy day mesmer, some DJ Shadow creepy ambience, and plenty of Autchere-ish skitter and glitch and you'll have a rough idea of where Purple Confusion are coming from. This is a brain bending, soul stirring blend of pop and fuzz and new wave and techno and glitchcore and dronerock and electro and all stops in between. Highly recommended.
Reissue of the classic "Cash" and "Half Dozen" eps recorded in 1995 and 1996, plus two previously unreleased tracks from producer Edgar Farinas. Very catchy, electronica with a gritty, dark undertone, and a hip hop hump. Reminiscent of Disjecta or early u-ziq.
We're pretty sure that Drucifer (Aq pal, turntablist DIe Elektrischen, head of Dielectric records, etc.) named his new band, a laptop duo with Dielectric labelmate Carson Day, ahem... Pussyfinger, just so we'd have to keep saying it out loud, inevitably causing the speaker, and the speakee, to either wince or giggle or both. It's been a running joke around the shop. "Hey did we get more of that new Dielectric record, you know, the one with Drucifer and Carson...you know... um..." We've come to embrace the name now. Pussyfinger. See? PUSSYFINGER! So besides the provocative monicker, what's all the fuss about? Well, Pussyfinger is the scientific laptop duo of Drew Webster aka Drucifer (see above) and Carson Day, who have melded their individual approaches to music and the laptop in particular and come up with something skittery and electronic enough to keep Boards Of Canada fans in a tizzy, but fucked up enough to keep em seriously confused. Pussyfinger's sound is an organic clatter, it IS glitchy laptronica, but it's arranged and presented like songs, you know like real songs. The elements are distinctly organic, but chopped and sliced and diced in a totally inorganic way. Strings resonate and buzz, but are processed into weird ambient smears of sound. Vocals are all over the place, but they are so fucked with they end up sounding like just another random sound element. The core sound is still electronica, IDM even, there is an Autechre streak a mile wide running through Chew And Swallow, and that's definitely not a bad thing. Things do get noisy at times, thick washes of digital feedback and some full on harsh noise, but there are also some truly lovely moments of tranquil ambience that sort of balance the equation. Ultimately it's the skittery shuffle that is the framework for Pussyfinger's electronic world, think BoC, Autechre, a little Aphex, a bit of Chris Clark, Pussyfinger would not be at all out of place on Warp, but they would definitely bring a bit of black humor and some serious sonic dissent along with them.
Beautifully packaged, with truly horrific, but somehow strangely striking cover art, the perfect complement to Pussyfinger's oh so problematic sobriquet!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
It is a red letter day for us here at aQ, in that we finally actually get to write about and sell you a Pye Corner Audio release instead of lamenting the fact that our supplier for PCA recordings only sent us a fraction of what we had initially wanted - or is more often the case, that it sold out completely before we could get our hands on ANY. To be sure, over the past couple of years, a few of Pye Corner's releases have slipped in and out of the shop, leaving just an ectoplasmic stain of picture-perfect electronic retro-futurism on our collective minds; and it also seems fitting that Pye Corner Audio released an album of his hauntological disco on the Ghost Box label, which again we've never gotten enough of to list. But now, hurrah, we have this!! As the title specifies, this triple cd set collects the first four volumes of Pye Corner Audio's Black Mill Tapes, which were originally released on vinyl as a couple of double lp sets which are (as noted) long gone.
Pye Corner Audio is the work of audio wizard Martin Jenkins, who is one of the in-house engineers at Miloco Studios in London where he works alongside the likes of Alan Moulder, Flood, and Trevor Jackson - yeah, top flight producers for sure. It's obvious that the work of Pye Corner Audio did not develop in a bubble, as there are very clear ideas and a fully formed sound language that is very savvy in its references to Delia Derbyshire's sci-fi electronics, the autobahn precision of Kraftwerk's songwriting, John Carpenter's bold synth melodies, and the bad-ass swagger of Detroit techno. In a rare interview, Jenkins described the working methods of PCA as being quickly sketched-out variations onto quarter inch tape and even four-track cassettes with a couple of no-name Japanese monosynths and a drum machine. He continues that "I definitely embrace imperfection. In my days as an engineer, I spent so much time polishing performances and correcting mistakes that I realised it made for pretty sterile recordings. I also felt extremely liberated after coming to the realisation that there is no absolute final version of a song. There are just alternative interpretations. Once I stopped chasing that elusive perfection, things eased massively."
Through those monosynths and simple step sequencers, Jenkins builds a unique, forgotten sound of alien ambient passages made foggy through an almost Basinski-like approach to tape disintegration punctuated with crackingly good Italo-disco jams. These rhythms are where Pye Corner Audio really shines, presenting a whipcrack / leather-glove seduction that comes straight out of the Throbbing Gristle playbook for "Hot On The Heels Of Love", but if those four somehow had an imagined electronic music summit with John Carpenter at the other side of the table trying to score a soundtrack for Cronenberg with none of those super-egos getting in the way of each other. Yeah, this stuff is timeless. Just fucking timeless.
Not much needs to be said about this in the short term (you probably know if you want it, based on if you have Volumes 1 & 2). But do not fear, we will be spewing buckets of grandeur about the FULL set of Pye Corner Audio's complete Black Mill Tapes, when it gets compiled on to a massive triple cd compendium in a few weeks. Until then, we've got less than FIVE copies of the vinyl for Volumes 3 & 4. You may notice we never got around to reviewing Volumes 1 & 2; for the same reason, it's a super fucking limited vinyl edition. Here's the shorthand description of Pye Corner Audio - brilliant retro-futurism synthesizes the analog electronic horror of John Carpenter, the hard-drive dreamspace of Autechre's first couple of records, and the cold, sleek sexiness of Italo-Disco aloofness.
As we mentioned in our review of a recent tape on The Tapeworm Label from the mysterious one man outfit Pye Corner Audio, we've had trouble getting/keeping ANYthing in stock, everything disappearing and going out of print before we could get enough to review or list. This 12" looks to be just as scarce, already on its second or third pressing, and we imagine not long for this world. The work of someone called the Head Technician, Pye Corner Audio typically exists in a space shared by such like minded outfits as Demdike Stare and the Caretaker, twisted electronics, psychedelic soundscapes, blissed out sci-fi synthiness, all of which is present here, but to a much smaller degree as Superstitious Century finds the Head Technician taking a stab at a vintage sound that's much more dancey and clubby, and somehow he pulls it off, managing to channel those sounds from dancefloors past and imbue them with the more twisted vibe of other Pye Corner jams, from pulsing slomo house music, to AFX style skitter, to gorgeous crumblingly distorted synth swells, to lilting minor key melodies, to laid back slow grooves, to softly psychedelic drifts...
Pressed on bright yellow vinyl, each one numbered, and limited enough that we're not sure we'll be able to get more of these once they're gone!
We only got a handful of these, and they're already out of print at the label, so once these are gone, they are gone for good. We've dug pretty much everything we've heard from these guys, although much of their output has been a bit tough to track down. We raved about the Black Mill Tapes a while back, and this is more of the same, the title track and extended version of a song from a recent compilation (that we never managed to get), and is a heady, hazy bit of motorik electronica, percolating melodies over a simple throbbing autobahn beat, wreathed in swaths of sinister synth, and cinematic ambience, art film chase scene music for sure with just a hint of kosmische kraut-psych.
The second track slows things way down, moody and hauntingly, the beat a woozy lope, laced with some percussive skitter, muted bassthrob, and haunted house Theremin-like melodies, the track growing ever darker, the second half sinister and shadowy, before the two halves, light and dark, merge into a sort of warmly glowing sprawl of wistful electronic soundscapery, something that wouldn't have sounded at all out of place on the last Boards Of Canada record.
Finally, the title track gets a creepy, crumbly reworking from another aQ fave, Old Apparatus, who turn the beats into crunchy blurts, add some ranting voices, dial up the low end, and quickly recast the hazy electronica of the original into something abject and seriously sinister, the beats all but buried beneath swaths of minor key synth thrum, pocked with some Carpenter like melody, ratcheting up the tension, until the sound returns to the opening, those voices return, as do the beats, dense and driving, noisy and distorted, a wild psychedelic finale, that quickly abates leaving just a slow, serene fade out. Fantastic!
And again, EXTREMELY LIMITED! We only got about ten copies and that's probably it! So act fast, these will likely disappear quick.
This album has the word "synthesizer" emblazoned on its cover, in letters as big as either the artist name or the album title. And when you hear it, you will know why. This album is all about Pyrolator putting his several synthesizers through their paces. Inland was the debut lp from Germany's Kurt Dahlke aka Pyrolator (also a member of DAF and Der Plan), originally released in 1979 on his own Aka Tak label, and its synth-noise experimentation belongs both to the spacey electronic krautrock genre and to the (currently in revival) '80s minimal-wave scene. Think DIY Kraftwerk. It encompasses the abstract experimentation of someone like Asmus Tietchens, as well as other stuff that's much more melodic and Cluster-y. There's shortwave static, distant schlager transmissions, rhythmically buzzing glitchwerks, musique concrete tape edits, some blissed out white noise soundscapes... For folks who like difficult, mad scientist music, you've got squelchy distortion laced with whining, high end tones ("Inland 1"), and for the new wavers, there's trax with burbling sequenced beats, pulsing like something Zombi or Majeure might do today ("Minimal Tape 3/7.2"). Indeed, Inland is a veritable cornucopia of such ear candy for those of us enamored with the minimal coldwave synth sorta thing, the more experimental side of which, especially. You could file this with your Axxess album (that recent Record Of The Week) though a lot of this is scarier than that - Inland apparently intended as cutting edge "protest music" (those were radical days in West Germany, the Red Army Faction running rampant). But its claustrophobic character is abstract enough for us to enjoy today without any explicit political aspects made plain. Another good reference, perhaps, being Bernard Szajner.
The compact disc version of this reissue comes with 6 worthwhile bonus tracks. Oh, and Bureau B has another early but much poppier Pyrolator reissue we'll try to get to soon...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The last few years have been pretty damn great for electronic and dance minded sounds. Folks like The Field, Gui Boratto, Hercules & Love Affair, Zomby and Subway have blown us away with their fresh approach and different shades of dance floor glory. But at the same time so much of what has been coming out really does subscribe to an instantly recognizable reference point. Whether it's retro space disco, brooding dubstep, or minimal techno, there's been so much undeniably exciting music that still doesn't really bring any new vision to the table.
With their debut 12", Q & A prove to be a duo who for sure have their own unique groove going, and it's a groove we can't get enough of! Seamlessly mixing their love of kraut, disco, minimal-funk, hacienda clouds of ecstasy, prog, Detroit techno, and dub, Quinn Luke (The Phenomenal Handclap Band, Coppa, Bing Ji Ling) and Alexis Georgopoulos (Arp, The Alps) have truly created one of the most enjoyable and memorable slabs of dance music this year. These two long tracks sound great on first listen, but the fact that we keep playing them over and over and only get more into them each time is a testament to the fact that it's possible to make groove filled dance jams that also have substance.
Alexis was one of the founding members of Tussle and you can for sure hear some of that signature Liquid Liquid inspired sound in the midst of these songs but in a much more fleshed out and flowing style. While this is their debut outing you just might have heard them before as they briefly were recording and remixing under the moniker Expanding Head Band, and had one of the standout tracks on that bad ass Milky Disco 2 compilation. One of the hottest 12"s of the year without a doubt!
No, it's not a typo, that's a Q and not a C, but this is in fact a new recording featuring Roedelius of Cluster fame, alongside new sonic sidekick Onnen Block. Block has served as musical assistant and audio engineer for the Berlin Philharmonic, and has collaborated with the likes of Zeitkratzer and Christina Kubisch. Together these two have created a record that is so ominous and engaging in its tones and texture. It continues to blow us away, how even well into his '70s, Roedelius continues to create such compelling, thoughtful and dynamic music. What's equally inspiring is his openness to collaboration, this time working with someone forty years his junior. (Hopefully Cluster partner Dieter Moebius is cool with the "Q").
The sounds of Fragen evoke a sense of slight unease, with a beauty laying just beneath the surface yet still cloaked in a mysterious darkness. It's easy to make work that makes a listener feel either happy or sad, but Roedelius has shown over the years a mastery that transcends the black and white and moves boldly into something so much more fluid and wholly satisfying. A stunning outing, and without a doubt one of the best electronic albums of the year!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Record number two from this German minimal electronic alchemist, combining the Chain Reaction style heroin house, with Pole like space dub and a pinch of super abstract dubstep into something super dreamy and divine. Definitely more for the headphones than the dancefloor, which is generally how we prefer our techno...
Collecting a handful of tracks both old and new, Cauldron Subsidence is a gorgeously seething bit of dark brooding dub-techno, the beats skeletal and ghostly, the melodies gauzy and ephemeral, the various tracks laced with chunks of strings, snippets of sparse vocals, reverb swirls and delay throbs, a cloud of FX haze seems to envelop the proceedings. Some of the tracks get downright propulsive, locking into a space-y minimal groove, while others simply throb abstractly, slipping from druggy digidub, to total retro heroin house, the record closer is a total nod to primo Chain Reaction, the surface just a patina of soft focus hiss and muted whir, while waaaay off in the distance, a slowed down 4x4 pulse wafts up, barely audible, like listening to a techno party down the block, the beats filtering their way through walls and buildings and the sonic clutter of daily life, before arriving in your earholes muted and muffled and gorgeously mumbly.
Way recommended, especially if Kompakt, and Chain Reaction, and Echospace, and Deepchord, and Echochord, and Pole and that sort of spaced out dubbed out minimal techno is your bag. But give it a try even if it isn't. It's like the techno version of late night trance out drift off dreammusic...
Another great installment in Mochilla's series of global DJ mixes documenting the crate-digging treasures of one DJ's trip to a far off land. The last one we listed was Madlib's killer Speto Da Ruo: Dirty Brasilian Crates Vol. 1 and what that was to Brazilian Popular Music, this one is to Ethiopian music of all varieties from the funky to the folkloric.
Culled from a 2004 trip to Ethiopia with the Soundway label's Miles Cleret, Quantic met Mulatu Astatke and first discussed plans for his first trip to Los Angeles for a legendary 2009 concert performed with a full orchestra and jazz legends Bennie Maupin and The Tribe's Phil Ranelin. Most of the records played on this mix are over 30 years old, and their dusty crackle is often left intact. But don't expect this to be merely an Ethiopiques series rehash. While it starts in familiar ethio-jazz territory it veers seamlessly into traditional chanting, street festivals and performers, exotic cinematic instrumentals and evocative ballads. A near hour long seamless mix of surging energy and warm beauty for hot summer nights!
Part two of my huge high school/college 'Kate' crush (the other being Kate from Haysi Fantaysee). This is Katie Jane Garside's new outfit. You may remember her as the filthy little waif in a tattered sackcloth dress and wild blonde dreads from Daisy Chainsaw. While Daisy Chainsaw was all pent up teenage agression and buzzsaw guitars, Queen Adreena is slow simmering bitterness and warm languid instruments over Portishead-y rhythms. Don't be fooled by track one, it's definitely a winner; a crashing and monstrously heavy two minute barn burner that could have been a PJ Harvey 'Dry' era outtake, the rest of the record, while not as rocking, is certainly worth a listen. Dark and brooding and intense, almost goth. Fans of Portishead, PJ Harvey and the like should check this out. Includes a video for your computer, nice Quay brothers/Charlie Chaplin mix, with a nude (!) Katie astride her bandmate. BIG import price, not sure when/if the domestic is coming.
Another gorgeous piece of kosmische electronica from the Quiet Evenings duo of Grant & Rachel Evans! For many years now, these two have embarked on an introspective take on the transcendent psychedelic electronics pioneered by Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream, and Cluster. For the most part, these two tend toward channeling those sounds through their solo projects - Motion Sickness Of Time Travel for Rachel and Nova Scotia Arms (amongst others) for Grant - but when they find themselves working together as Quiet Evenings, it can be magical. Impressions is one of the best things we've heard from them in any context, sporting two sprawling pieces for electronics, voice, and guitar. The first side "Blue Dream" settles upon a hypnotic bed of synthetic tones, out of which the pair broadcast fizzling arcs of warm static and revolving beacons of melodic phrases. As Rachel's ghostly voice settles into a narcotized sustained melody about halfway through the track, Grant picks up the guitar picking up the bittersweet, sodden vibe that Mark McGuire would occasionally create in the darker Emeralds tracks. Telepathic Heart is much more of a sci-fi excursion with its slow revolution through the sweeping ambient oscillation and twinking arpeggiations, as if they were creating the imaginary soundtrack to a documentary film about travelling through the heart of deep space nebulae. There's a considerable amount of hand-wrought melancholy that comes through Quiet Evenings productions, and this has always separated the Evans' from many of their contemporaries who are just aping a crystal dangled New Age wishy-washiness. Yeah, there's some teeth to these sounds, and we're much better off for it. Limited to 200 copies.
Perhaps the most prolific couple in music today, Rachel and Grant Evans have been sprinting ever since 2014 began. Rachel, with her Motion Sickness Of Time Travel project, has recently completed the Ballade For A Moon monthly series; and Grant has kicked out a couple of fantastically guttural, scourge-noise albums (along with his curation of the occult-informed Vaald imprint); and here they've patched the cables from one side of their rural farmhouse to another to begin their pastoral dreamtime sessions for their Quiet Evenings duet. Other Windows is a beautifully bleary proposition layered from beds of kosmische ambient tones that suspend time at the crepuscular moment right after the sun fades in the evening while the sky traces with blazing colors and shadows pock the entire landscape. Layers of washed-out guitar from Grant (we're assuming) spills upon these electric drones, offering an eerie, Aeolian drift to the first side of the cassette. By the second side, Rachel (again, we're assuming) dials in a hypnotic synth-pattern of dark burbling tones through which the allusions to a stoned sunset collapse into comparatively tense, nocturnal coda with all of the right sci-fi filmscore references (e.g. Forbidden Planet, Solaris, The Fog, etc.). Super limited pressing on the Evans' impeccable Hooker Vision imprint.
Here's a really great split cassette between Quiet Evenings and Former Selves released by the hitherto unknown Constellation Tatsu label. Quiet Evenings is, of course, the husband / wife duo of Rachel and Grant Evans - the former better known as Motion Sickness Of Time Travel, the latter as Nova Scotian Arms, Crippling, etc. and both run the exemplary cottage industry micro-label Hooker Vision. Here, the Evans produce a gorgeous, blissout, lo-fi ambience with freefloating wordless vocals, natural sounds of twittering birds (Bush Tits, if you must know), fuzzed guitar drones that brainmelt in and out of languid synth melodies, all sprialing together into more of an end-of-an-era vibe - that the dawning of the new age of the '70s was not all that it was cracked up to be. It's nice to hear Quiet Evenings engaged in a more bittersweet / darker sensibility as those are the moments that work best for both Motion Sickness Of Time Travel and all of Grant Evans various projects.
As good as the Quiet Evenings side is, Former Selves may have upped the ante with this magically, twinkling piece of lo-fi electronica. The spacious synth pads gradually lock into subtle techno rhythmic underbelly with accumulated melodic patterns that arrives at a really fantastic amalgam of Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works Vol II, Suzanne Ciani's crystal powered tonecolors, and even the early tape loop experiments from Terry Riley.
Quinoline Yellow is the brainchild of one Luke Williams. Prior to this, his first full length, Williams had two EPs on Skam which were received enthusiastically by starved IDM junkies. On his full length debut Williams sacrifices no quality for the sake of quantity. Dol Goy Assist is filled with skittery IDM rhythms coupled wonderfully with pretty minor key snatches of melody rendered in granular murkiness much like Autechre, Boards of Canada, or Richard James' Aphex Twin circa Selected Ambient Works with their trademark stamp of glacially moving melodies drifting over manic rhythms. And while some may poo poo Williams' efforts as derivitive of good ol' Autechre we might just point to the latter's dissappointing recent works. If Gol Doy Assist is merely a clone of Autchre's former glory, then is the album that Autechre should have released instead of Untilted. Thankfully Williams has picked more than one fruit off the IDM tree for his salad. Melodically he is more indebted to the formerly mentioned Boards of Canada, Bola or even Disjecta, with his alienated and lonesome warbling synth lines. His sonic palette, while similar to all three is even closer to that of grandpa Richard D. James in that much of the sounds he generates seem completely hacked from the factory presets. The cherry on the cake with this release though is the packaging: an impressive bi-fold cardboard cover printed completely on both sides (Andee frothed at the mouth when he saw that they even printed onto the inner side of the spine, that most bands horrifyingly leave bare, interrupting whatever grand vision they were trying to achieve), even going so far as to print additional liner notes on the insides of the sleeve's pockets where the booklet and disc reside. So if you're no averse to ungluing the seams of your eco-pak, you can take a gander at the hidden liner notes inside. The booklet which is included is filled with gorgeous photos of port-o-potties (the cover photo is itself a close up photo of a honey bucket).
Mick Harris of Scorn/Napalm Death steps up with drum & bass-tinged effort more on the downtempo side. Smooth latenight jungle.
We first heard this beautiful, hypnotic recording when it was reissued on compact disc back in 1997, on the Dexter's Cigar label that Jim O'Rourke used to do, via Drag City. It was one of the best Dexter's Cigar releases we remember, but sadly has been our of print for many years. But, we're certainly not the only folks to consider it a classic, as now Important has reissued it again on cd for those who missed it before. It's an album of minimalist electronics, sounding way ahead of its time, recorded in 1967 in the studio of Swedish Radio, Stockholm, by a young composer (and former jazz trombonist) named Folke Rabe. There's two tracks here, the second a half-speed (and thus, one octave lower) version of the first, for advanced exercises in drone-absorption. The first 25 minute version of "What??", originally released on vinyl by the Wergo label in 1970, consists of gentle, wavering drone-tones, shimmering blissfully, continually morphing, forming pulsating, fluttering "beats" as the various vibrations interact. The subtle shifts of these pulsations seem somehow to come into being from nowhere, even though your ears must be perceiving the gradual changes. This is active dronework, there's a lot going on here, over time, despite the "minimalist" tag. We suspect a Terry Riley influence on this piece, and not just because we know that Rabe was an associate of Bo Anders Persson, of Parson Sound/International Harvester/Trad Gras Och Stenar, also big Terry Riley fans.
Not that the first track by itself wouldn't be enough to transport you to drone nirvana with its pulsing shimmer and glimmer, but the second version of "What??" found here, 50+ minutes long, slower and lower, and if anything even more glowing, will REALLY send you into a trance!
It's so great to have this deceptively simple, but so effective, obscure avant-electronic classic back in print.
Mirroring Keith Fullerton Whitman on his stellar "Playthroughs" album, digital wizard Akira Rabelais has plugged an electric guitar into what he calls Argeiphontes Lyre, an alchemical piece of software of his own design, to produce his third exceptional album "...benediction, draw." Yet Whitman and Rabelais look toward different historical precedents in the construction of their albums, inevitably shifting the resultant sound. Where Whitman found inspiration in Terry Riley's time lag accumulators and Christoph Heeman's ambient slippages, Rabelais earnestly professes Erik Satie as his mentor, proclaiming that this album "in the best sense of a musique d'ameublement (Satie's famous aphorism for 'furniture music') shows itself as an acoustic state rather than a sonic wallpaper." True enough, Rabelais presents these digital abstractions as a fluttering series of sublimated half-melodies and tonal fluctuations that embrace the spirit of Satie's compositions. There is a jewel-like preciousness to this construction, as his digital transmutations open into cascading washes of variable glints, shimmerings, and flickers -- guitar passages that very rarely resemble anything like a guitar. This is a magical album from one of the truely unique proponents of digital synthesis. Very very nice.
The tongue-twistingly titled Spellewauerynsherde is another hauntingly beautiful record from the enigmatic electronic composer Akira Rabelais. As with his previous albums, Rabelais offers a labyrinth of elliptical allegories, subtle chance operations, and impressionistic romanticism as an accompaniment for his elegant sound constructions. Given the incredible amount of semantic engineering that went into this record, it is certainly possible that Rabelais deliberately arranged to have this album released at the same time as Bjork's Medula. You see, the source for Snellewauerynsherde is a collection of traditional Icelandic accapella songs recorded in the late 1960s or early 1970s on Ampex tapes and then forgotten about. The first few tracks of Snellewauerynsherde present the raw recordings Icelandic songs, sanitized of their tape hiss and debris. The content may remain foreign to our ears, but the songs' existential sadness transcends any language barriers. When he actually processes these sources, he extracts a mournful etherialism that he stretches into a gracefully solemn minimalism that falls between Steven Stapleton's production of Current 93's A Little Menstrual Night Music, Eliane Radigue's evocative timbral compositions, and Arvo Part's late period chorale pieces. Rabelais continues to distance himself from the clicks 'n' cuts electronica of his contemporaries and situate himself as an artist with a complex mythology, that given the right marketing climate, could be as important as Matthew Barney's.
This release from Rachel's and Matmos will undoubtedly warrant sufficient critical consternation / amazement / hate / love simply based on the unusual pairing of the two sets of musicians. Rachel's - the indierock answer to a chamber ensemble - present a shortened but reconstructed version of "Full on Night" originally found on their first album "Handwriting." This updated version dynamically rearranges the original such that it maintains its antiquited sound (delicate played piano with a reserved guitar angularity)... It's super sparse at first and mutates by the end of the track into something quite rockin', especially for the Rachel's.
San Francisco's electronica duo Matmos, by turn, apply a wealth of electronic trickery to the Rachel's sound. Scraped violin and a guitar din similar to the Moore / Ranaldo duets for guitars and screwdrivers emerge from a digidubscape that gets quite volatile by the end of Matmos' 18 minute excursion. While apparently not overly concerned with keeping the Rachel's material recognizable, Matmos mirrors the out-rock / chop-shop of Brise-Glace -- that project fronted by Jim O'Rourke many many moons back.
This is one of those records that the staff in the office is so confounded by that they have to run out to the front room to find out what's playing. I mean, you'd never guess.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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"I never really knew Ed, but i knew he could craft a story out of a math equation." Quite a telling sample from a man who didn't want his name legible on the cover, didn't want song titles, and didn't want it to sell for more than $8. Well, he got 2 out of 3. Quirky drum & bass for fans of Aphex Twin and Mike Paradinas (Mu-ziq) with a warped sense of humor like the Residents.
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Basically a compact disc issue of 2003's don't-call-it-a-comeback EP 'And I Will Eat Your Children Too', in which our modest Bogdan completely destroys the silly notion that he's mellowed out. Harder, faster, louder is the modus operandi here, and the Samurai Math Beats are in full force. Interspersed throughout the disc as a bonus are five wicked cuts from Bogdan's elusive (ie: vinyl only and extremely limited) '96 Drum N Bass Classixxx', including the DJ Scud endorsed rave anthem by Abdullah K, 'Trip To The Boom'! Also features tracks previously released in the form of 4-Cillinda, Agent 30, Re-Start and Suburban Fox.
Fans of Fourtet, head up. The mellowest album to date from Polish electronicist Bogdan Raczynski, who has been known to make drill 'n bass and other manic electronica a la Squarepusher, this is extremely serene, full of short pieces that carry on the wistful
Radboud Mens manufactures Brinkmann/Goem style post-techno monotracktion with a simple drum beat hammering an inistent rhythm, no bassline, just modulations of the chirps, tweeks, whistles, and of course clicks.
We REALLY like Viennese instrumental glitch-groove trio Radian. This, Chimeric, is their first album in four whole years. And it's awesome. So it deserves a glowing review from us. We're having trouble writing it, though. The problem is, we made the mistake of going back and looking at what we wrote about their previous albums, and feel like we already said it best about 'em then, can't really top lines like these: "Y'know how in subatomic reality, seemingly solid objects aren't solid at all, but filled with empty space interspersed with electrons and protons and such? Radian's music is kind of like that, atomized, spacious, abuzz with crackling energy", and "There's a jazz/improv element as well, but rather than rock/jazz fusion this is more like fission, breaking down elements of both musics, and releasing volts of energy in the process."
See? Good stuff, eh? And those sentiments apply here as well. Though, it's not like this is just the same as Radian's earlier work. No, their computer-processed live improv post rock electro-acoustic sound (whew!) has definitely developed, Radian themselves considering Chimeric to be more "Free", though what they mean by that we have to guess, perhaps it's why this Radian record does seem rather more noisy, raw, chaotic, rocking, & heavy than ever before, though.
Which is much to our liking, as it brings 'em even closer to sounding like some bands to which we've compared 'em in the past, a "sliced-up Circle" and, especially, a "sci fi This Heat", that uniquely rhythmic British experimental prog-rock unit from the '70s, who are really one of our "touchstone" bands here at AQ that we're always referencing in reviews, always hoping to hear something new that reminds us of 'em (we're the same way about the likes of Comus, Goblin, Earth, Magma, Black Sabbath, and Circle too). Thus, one reason we dig this Radian album so much (and Radian's other efforts too) is 'cause we can hear a lot of This Heat goin' on here. This Heat gone electronically futuristic in some mad scientist's laboratory, that is... The fractured structures, jumbled rhythms, distorted guitar stabs, and rumbling textures found here are totally hitting the spot. We mentioned it's been 4 years since their last album, and it's about time. We NEED more music like this, thanks Radian!
Y'know how in subatomic reality, seemingly solid objects aren't solid at all, but filled with empty space interspersed with electrons and protons and such? Radian's music is kind of like that, atomized, spacious, abuzz with crackling energy. We loved the last Radian album, Rec.Extern, and are mighty pleased with this new one, another dose of glitch-happy instrumental post-rock from the Vienna-based trio of Martin Brandlmayr (drums, vibraphone, electronics, computer), Stefan Nemeth (synthesizers, guitar, computer) and John Norman (bass). Yeah that's two computers, and no they're not checking their email, they're integrating their live playing with computer processing and programming droning, rhythmic soundscapes of urgent beats and simmering atmospheres... Imagine the likes of Circle, Salvatore, This Heat, and Village Of Savoonga...all sucked into a computer (kinda like Tron) to do virtual battle... There's a jazz/improv element as well, but rather than rock/jazz fusion this is more like fission, breaking down elements of both musics, and releasing volts of energy in the process. Exciting, beautiful, creative, futuristic.
Buzz whir click crackle throb. Skittery drums, lovely drone. It's Glitch, but it's Rock. Post rock, anyway. It's the new disc from Radian, the computer-aided instrumental post rock trio from Vienna. Radian have previously released two cds -- a full-length and an ep -- on the Mego and/or Rhiz labels over the past few years. Now they show up with a new full-length on Chicago label Thrill Jockey, enlisting Tortoise's John McEntire on recording/mixing duties. Drummer Martin Brandlmayr lays down the fractured beats, bassist John Norman fills out the pulse, and synthesizer coloration is provided by Stefan Nemeth. And together they use computers to process their real-time playing. Hard disc edits, electronic effects, layered textures, done with a great sense of timing and placement. At times "Rec.Extern" is propulsive and rhythm-driven like a sci-fi This Heat or sliced-up Circle, at others it's atmospheric, the background radiation of a haunted laboratory, with the sounds of burbling beakers and hissing Bunsen burners quietly rising and fading. Sudden silences, sudden sounds. We like it when today's electronic artistes step out from behind their laptops to play real instruments, and Radian falls in line with the likes of Markus Schmickler's Pluramon project and Dean Roberts' "Plays The Grand Cinema" disc on Ritornell as electro-acoustic computers-meet-rock successes. We're also put in mind of the abstract sounds n' silences of Supersilent or Starfuckers (the latter who can be much more 'out' and abrasive than Radian), and recent Dead C. We certainly liked Radian's other releases, but "Rec.Extern" seems to be even better, there's just more to it. Recommended.
Back in 1970, Eliane Radigue ran off ten copies of her final composition for feedback on magnetic tape, each of which included a small handwritten note. She intended for the piece to be played back at any speed and at any duration and either backwards or forwards. Given the smooth polish to her sustained drones that could easily blur into infinity, such instructions to her audience of ten seems quite reasonable, even if the tiny edition of 10 is far from a reasonable amount. Fortunately, the French sound artist Manu Holterbach (whose minimalist work is awe-inspiring in its own right) has been sifting through Radigue's archives and came across this incredibly rare document which Radigue originally released for the Lara Vincy Gallery in Paris as part of a group sound exhibition. For the cd repackaging of this lone composition, Holterbach curated a double disc of various mixes of the original recordings. The first disc being the straight versions of the composition, played back at the four standard speeds of a reel-to-reel tape deck; and the second disc being backwards versions, also played back at those four speeds. The longest version is a little over 13 minutes long, with the shortest being a bit under 3 minutes; and all four mixes exhibit variations in tonal colors and slight oscillating modulations not heard on previous mixes. The first mix is the longest, slowest, and thus deepest plunge into the Radigue drone, which balances an asymmetrical undulation of low end against a static vibration which sits a couple octaves higher than the super-low rumble and pushes a little farther into the distance. As the track develops, Radigue seems to be gradually increasing the tension of these pieces, as if tension were just a knob she were effortlessly twisting, but in fact she's deftly controlling all of the parameters of her feedback loop to cause such effects. The second piece clocks in under a brisk 9 minutes with that irregular hovering sounds more pronounced. The next two pieces are a bit over four and two minutes respectively, each brightening vibrations to a sharp resolution on the finale. Both discs exhibit essentially the same sounds, which might be accentuated if you were to play both discs at the exact same time. A peculiar excerpt, yes, but a wonderful record for sure from one of the finest authors of 20th Century minimalism.
As Radiohead have evolved into a band much more connected to electronica than guitar rock, we knew it was just a matter of time until they released a remix album. And their latest album King Of The Limbs, really was the Radiohead record most ripe for remix, so after several 12" releases featuring many of these remixes, they've finally put together a great two disc collection of those tracks, all songs from King Of Limbs, remixed by folks like Caribou, Four Tet, Actress, Jamie XX, SBTRKT, and lots more. While there should have been no doubt, we were relieved to find this wasn't about making cheesy dance remixes of Radiohead songs, but instead they all honor and respect the mood of the album from which these tracks come and create nuanced remixes much more suited for dark rainy nights than brightly lit dancefloors.
Moody and moving, just the way we like our Radiohead.
We first heard UK duo The Ragga Twins on the amazing Rumble In The Jungle compilation which we made our Record Of The Week back in early 2007. One of the first bands, in the early '90s, to combine the grooves and the toasting of reggae and dancehall with hip hop breakbeats, and essentially creating jungle, which as any avid reader of the aQ list knows, we absolutely LOVE.
The Ragga Twins began life right in the midst of the blossoming rave scene which makes it a bit surprising that folks got so it. But get into it they did. Along with a handful of other underground groups, the Ragga Twins helped launch a British music movement that continues to this day, as Jungle would spawn drum and bass, which would mutate into garage, techstep, 2step, and eventually grime and dubstep. Even at its very genesis, this stuff was practically perfect, funky, and loose, groovy and aggressive, totally irresistible, big beats, loping hip hop rhythms, sped up breakbeats, the music skeletal, simple loops, all about the vocals, a rapid fire dancehall toasting, delivered in a raw bark, while the beat pounded away beneath. Some of the tracks definitely display some of the surrounding rave culture, fuzzy synths, sweeping strings, bits of techno, but for the most part, this stuff is fierce and funky dancehall jungle, the sort of stuff that The Bug is giving a modern spin.
Take "Ragga Trip" with its seventies cop show groove, and squelchy synths, the toasting is incredible, rough and raw, and impossibly catchy. Or "Illegal Gunshot", with it's playful marimba melody, and skittery beat. And again, incredible vocals. Then "Spliffhead", with a reggae croon that ends up making it sound almost like Bad Brains at their most reggae. "Rudeboy" wraps techno synths and wailing sirens around a rolling breakbeat, the toasting and crooned vocals, and reggae guitar reeling it back in and keeping it from getting too ravey, while "Juggling" totally evokes eighties hip hop (especially Black Sheep) but it could just be THAT breakbeat. The second disc features older tracks, including a couple from the pre-Ragga Twins Deman Rockers, the older tracks are a bit ravier, or a bit more reggae sounding, but even then, the tracks are still pretty kick ass.
Definitely essential listening for folks into jungle and drum and bass, who loved that Rumble In The Jungle comp, and who dig all that Bug stuff, this is where it all started!
Like all Soul Jazz stuff, gorgeous packaging, tons of vintage photos and of course extensive liner notes.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
We first heard UK duo The Ragga Twins on the amazing Rumble In The Jungle compilation which we made our Record Of The Week back in early 2007. One of the first bands, in the early '90s, to combine the grooves and the toasting of reggae and dancehall with hip hop breakbeats, and essentially creating jungle, which as any avid reader of the aQ list knows, we absolutely LOVE.
The Ragga Twins began life right in the midst of the blossoming rave scene which makes it a bit surprising that folks got so it. But get into it they did. Along with a handful of other underground groups, the Ragga Twins helped launch a British music movement that continues to this day, as Jungle would spawn drum and bass, which would mutate into garage, techstep, 2step, and eventually grime and dubstep. Even at its very genesis, this stuff was practically perfect, funky, and loose, groovy and aggressive, totally irresistible, big beats, loping hip hop rhythms, sped up breakbeats, the music skeletal, simple loops, all about the vocals, a rapid fire dancehall toasting, delivered in a raw bark, while the beat pounded away beneath. Some of the tracks definitely display some of the surrounding rave culture, fuzzy synths, sweeping strings, bits of techno, but for the most part, this stuff is fierce and funky dancehall jungle, the sort of stuff that The Bug is giving a modern spin.
Take "Ragga Trip" with its seventies cop show groove, and squelchy synths, the toasting is incredible, rough and raw, and impossibly catchy. Or "Illegal Gunshot", with it's playful marimba melody, and skittery beat. And again, incredible vocals. Then "Spliffhead", with a reggae croon that ends up making it sound almost like Bad Brains at their most reggae. "Rudeboy" wraps techno synths and wailing sirens around a rolling breakbeat, the toasting and crooned vocals, and reggae guitar reeling it back in and keeping it from getting too ravey, while "Juggling" totally evokes eighties hip hop (especially Black Sheep) but it could just be THAT breakbeat. The second disc features older tracks, including a couple from the pre-Ragga Twins Deman Rockers, the older tracks are a bit ravier, or a bit more reggae sounding, but even then, the tracks are still pretty kick ass.
Definitely essential listening for folks into jungle and drum and bass, who loved that Rumble In The Jungle comp, and who dig all that Bug stuff, this is where it all started!
Like all Soul Jazz stuff, gorgeous packaging, tons of vintage photos and of course extensive liner notes.
