Who would have ever guessed that the first photo cover on the clinically sterile Ritornell label would have been this? A slickly produced cover photo of Stilluppsteypa donning faux-regal sparkling capes with huge stiff collars and one of the members (Sigmar?)
I would hazard a guess that the visual sensibility of Stilluppsteypa has been informed by the odd conceptual agendas of Leif Elggren who is responsible in part for the Kingdoms of Elgaland / Vargaland (amongst a number of other oddball projects). Both Elggren and Stilluppsteypa play with the notions of royalty, as an residual political emblem of inflated egotism as well as of self-deprecating absurdity.
With that entire diatribe on how good the cover is, it needs to be stated that artwork completely betrays the integrity of the music within. Stilluppsteypa has developed into one of the most adventurous staples of the electronica glitch community. "Stories Part Five" deviates slightly from what is expected from Stilluppsteypa with their multipled layers of electro-acoustic minutae exploding into clinical technotic escapades, rippling with deep unwavering basstones. Stilluppsteypa's forays into techno minimalism are not the smooth tendencies of microhouse, instead preferring to enhance the skeletal grooves with a psycho-acoustic tension.
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At last, we've got the new album from these witty British sampling artists. Possibly their best yet, truly the finest in dadaist electronica! Less overt spot-the-sample action than before. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for fans of electronica as well as spacerock.
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Stock, Hausen & Walkman's second volume of organ transplants is filled with lots and lots of organs. And we don't mean that in an eviscerated Hermann Nitsch kind of way... well sort of. The Manchester outfit has liberally spiked their lysergic electronica grooves with any form of organ deemed ripe for appropriation. Church pipe organs, Farfisas, hand-crank organs, Hammond organs, and tons more! Like records by fellow plunderphonists People Like Us, "Organ Transplants 2" is full of seemingly obvious musical quotations, tweaked just beyond the point of recognition. Beyond the brain-teasing / tongue-twisting frustration in trying to pinpoint the references (we're damn sure Aavikko pops up at the end of the record), this is wonderful collection of cool weirdness.
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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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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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Really nice downtempo sample-heavy trickery that grooves along, subtly minding its own business (read: doesn't hit you over the head), much like the recent Tipsy and Sukia records. And with a name like Stock, Hausen, and Walkman, you know they're on the right track. Highly recommended.
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While Andy Stott's last record, 2012's Luxury Problems moved even further into dreamlike murk, blurring his already gauzy sonic palette into something even more hazy and ethereal, there were brief glimpses of Stott's other side, weirdly mixed beats surfacing in the midst of hushed ambience, or a song suddenly splintering into blown out breakbeats. Of course those anomalies were somehow still deftly woven into the woozy fabric of that record's whole, geniusly disruptive variations, that perhaps hinted at not just what once was. But what might soon again be.
Faith In Strangers begins as we might have expected, a darkly delicate field of reverbed piano suspended in clouds of dusty, sun dappled shimmer, foghorn moans, and plenty of space, dreamlike expanses of near silence punctuated by haunting tones and subtly layered drones, melancholic melodies wreathed in a softly psychedelic haze, a faded, washed out ambience, a sound that had it stretched out for the remainder of the record unchanged, we would have been perfectly pleased.
But like Luxury Problems, Faith In Strangers seems to be more about the outliers. It's not long before delicate vocals drift in, again suspended in a softly swirling ether, but pocked by weird distorted chordal fragments, it's not until midway through the second track that the first beat surfaces, and it's a doozy, a loping, downtempo distorted dirge, the vocals much more prominent than on past Stott outings, not really that processed, sultry and witchy, the sound more like an even more abstract Portishead or Tricky's Nearly God project. Smokey and sexy, dreamily distorted, a gorgeously groovy, smoldering downtempo slab of psychedelic avant trip hop. And in fact, much of the record displays a similarly sonic trajectory, gauzy beats, sultry crooned vocals (with minimal processing, unlike the smears of collaged amorphous vocals on Luxury Problems), thick buzzing basslines, the sounds distorted, the rhythms hissy and staticky, classic drum machine sounds tangled up with some beats of Stott's invention.
A few tracks, like "No Surrender", get seriously trippy, ditching any semblance of groove, and instead unfurl a haunting and hypnotic noisescape, all cascading distorted synths, which soon fragment into jagged shards, which then in turn dissolve into blurred ambience, before a barrage of crumbling beats explode into motion, lurching and stuttering, the opening sounds resurfacing in drastically reimagined form, even more fractured and fucked up. The second half of the record is split pretty evenly between big, booming, beats and experimental electro, at times raw and rough, at others dreamy and skittery, and at others, something much more minimal, the final track in particular, mostly just a processed bassline wound around wordless female vocals, everything doused in FX and laid out into softly pulsing swells, eventually laced with spacey blips and bleeps, but for the most part hushed and super abstract, which is generally what we expect from Stott, although in the case of Faith In Strangers, it's actually an anomaly, with the bulk of the record heavy on distorted rhythms, with Stott's distinctive production/sound more in service of the beats, than the other way around.
Luxury Problems is another stunning progression in the already brilliant catalogue of Andy Stott. The game is fully upped on this one, the dark hues even more melancholic, the fogged hiss and forlorn night drones ever present buried beneath sheets of crumbling percussion and is associated ether-rag induced slo-mo ghost house lamentations. It's a haunted sound for sure, as were his previous two mini albums, Passed Me By and We Stay Together, but it seems the bleak vaporous vibes of this Manchester artist are now fully realized. The addition of Allison Skidmore's beautifully woebegone vocals on most of the tracks provides just enough emotional power to really push Stott's vision forward.
Kicking off with "Numb", beautifully dark chords swell underneath Skidmore's plaintive and gorgeous utterances, sounding like that Julee Cruise/Burial collaboration we've all been dreaming of, recorded on a cassette deck and blasted LOUD from some reverberating corner of an abandoned bus station. Sorrowful and droning, the 4-on-the-floor way slowed down, everything blurred out and disintegrated. "Sleepless" is a standout as well, starting with a hissing Zoviet France like syncopated drone, with dubbed out reverb drenched percussion and off-kilter loopy sheets of unraveling hiss, the rhythm track slowly starting to creep in about halfway through. Hitting those drugged out R&B vibes we've been digging so much, a pitched down vocal loop intermingles with the drums, creating a hypnotically swinging, yet dirge like dirt-house stomper. Everything blasted out and fuzzy, the beat goes on, never peaking but developing into a blissed out trance state, time stretched windchimes cascading from left to right as the cut up vocal samples surface from some deep subterranean sonic cavern. Exquisite. "Hatch The Plan" has a field recorded mechanics vibe, starting and ending with what sounds like a rusted squeaking conveyer belt drenched in 'verb, a totally heavy and corroded sub baseline appears. This is one of the more minimal moments of the record. Essentially a bass line, a kick drum, and some percussion, and plenty of space for Skidmore's vocals, which are multilayered to brilliant effect. Elegiac vocal passages double and triple up over this blackened percussive skitter, subtle elements of noisy details peak through the mix, building towards a break in the drums, the angelic chorus of the vocals given full reign in the mix, haunting and sonorous, before the conveyer belt sound reappears and pitches up and up til being left alone, untreated, to cap off the jam. Drugged out and woozy, layers of dirt and skree undulating, altogether creepy, yet still, somehow sublime.
The vibe of the record remains totally consistent throughout, but what's truly great is how Stott finds understated ways to insert some funk into the proceedings. Stott, after all, has some dance floor cred, gained through his garagey bassy alter ego Andrea (also worth checking out is Millie & Andrea, Stott's collab with Miles Whittaker of Demdike Stare), but this is an Andy Stott record proper, so any dance floor tendencies are going to be handled with a handful of bleak dust. The title cut offers the best example of a clever infusion of dance floor tropes. A flickering breakbeat rolls along, slow and low slug swing, stark vocal harmonies commingle with a downtuned & groovy bass guitar line. Suddenly a 'verbed out to the max disco-y conga loop shows up, WAY high in the mix, giving the whole thing a very handmade, mid nineties NYC hip hop by way of Bristol vibe. Cut up and funky, yet with all the forlorn noise dappled feeling emblematic of Stott's sound.
"Up The Box" though, at least rhythmically speaking, may be the greatest departure on the record. It starts as a grinding and mesmerizing caustic drum drone. Again with some serious Zoviet France vibes, reminding us a little of our favorite Demdike Stare moments, the otherworldly percussive grime looping on and on, swirling hissing textures building until suddenly the whole thing turns into a screwed and chopped breakbeat work out! Although dirty and decimated as hell, just a breakbeat and a handful of effects go toward creating this stark rhythmic roller. Finally, "Leaving" caps Luxury Problems with more of Skidmore's beautifully funerary vocal intonations, multilayered and of course with a healthy dose of cavelike reverb, a gloomy gothy synth bass line combined with all the gauzy heavenly texture in these final moments has our collective hearts about to break. SO FUCKING GOOD!
Luxury Problems is definitely Stott's best work to date, which obviously means this is totally essential. The sonic palette here is definitely consistent with all the various releases under his own name, but the addition of the voice adds an incredible layer of emotional depth. Inhabiting a deep and dark nighttime universe, ghostly and mourning, disintegrating and dreary, the perfect soundtrack to those moments of lonely reflection. So utterly recommended! Beautiful Modern Love sleeve design too. (FYI, the vinyl version we had for a moment, but it's now being repressed, we'll list it when we can!)
We missed the vinyl versions of Passed Me By and We Stay Together the first time around, but ended up making the double disc compilation from Andy Stott our Record Of The Week back in December of 2011, now the original lps have been repressed and are available again separately. Here's what we had to say about Stott and Passed Me By:
UK producer Stott seems to have taken the minimal downtempo soul of Burial as a jumping off point, taking that same sound and slowing it down even further, adding more grit and grime, creating a sound now twice removed from the dancefloor, a soporific, somnolent techno that fuses murky dirgey slo-mo soul with abstract house music creep, conjuring up a music that is both haunting and sinister, mesmeric and minimal, an array of looped melodies, melded to skeletal thumps and heartbeat like pulses, fragmented samples woven into the mix mostly to provide texture and melody, but for the most part all of the various elements are recruited to either become rhythms themselves, or to be blurred and smeared into a grim washed out backdrop, over which the rhythms slither and skitter. The dub element is huge, but it's a muted sublimated dub, only really showing itself, when a voice escapes the gravitational pull of Stott's black hole dub, the swirl of effects dragging it right back down into the murk, quickly disappearing into the inky blackness, leaving just the churn and lurch, and it's that balance, a delicate one to be sure, that makes Stott's sound so special. Too much rhythmic murk, and it's monochromatic and dull, too much melody, and sonic filigree and suddenly it's not nearly so dark and mysterious. Stott deftly negotiates the middle ground, dragging the more melodic elements into the dark and repurposing them, using them to infuse his sonic black energy with life.
Released on the same label that gave us all the Demdike Stare records, which should give you an idea that while this might technically be techno, it's some murky dubbed out hauntology that transcends any sort of genre classification. A brand new unanimous store fave!
Before we had actually heard Andy Stott, we had a procession of folks come into the store and tell us how incredible his stuff was, and how we should definitely get whatever we could, and yet, with every 12" release, they disappeared before we could get any copies at all, and before we knew it they were gone. We did manage to hear bits and pieces, enough that when we discovered that two of the records were being reissued together as a double cd, we could barely wait, and once it arrived, well, pretty much everyone here has been playing it nonstop. UK producer Stott seems to have taken the minimal downtempo soul of Burial as a jumping off point, taking that same sound and slowing it down even further, adding more grit and grime, creating a sound now twice removed from the dancefloor, a soporific, somnolent techno that fuses murky dirgey slo-mo soul with abstract house music creep, conjuring up a music that is both haunting and sinister, mesmeric and minimal, an array of looped melodies, melded to skeletal thumps and heartbeat like pulses, fragmented samples woven into the mix mostly to provide texture and melody, but for the most part all of the various elements are recruited to either become rhythms themselves, or to be blurred and smeared into a grim washed out backdrop, over which the rhythms slither and skitter. The dub element is huge, but it's a muted sublimated dub, only really showing itself, when a voice escapes the gravitational pull of Stott's black hole dub, the swirl of effects dragging it right back down into the murk, quickly disappearing into the inky blackness, leaving just the churn and lurch, and it's that balance, a delicate one to be sure, that makes Stott's sound so special. Too much rhythmic murk, and it's monochromatic and dull, too much melody, and sonic filigree and suddenly it's not nearly so dark and mysterious. Stott deftly negotiates the middle ground, dragging the more melodic elements into the dark and repurposing them, using them to infuse his sonic black energy with life. The bonus tracks on Passed Me By, are much more active, the pulsing house-y "Stitch House" sounds like Stott covering The Field, still all fuzzy and washed out and Pop Ambient, but much more rhythmic, and less murky, while "Love Nothing" lets the rhythms come front and center, skittering and shuffling over a rubbery low end melody, and swirling synthy chordal swells, not to mention a deep dramatic croon. It almost sounds like a sketch for a future song that would find the various elements dipped in pitch, slowed down and blackened.
The second disc does dial back the murk a bit, instead focusing on the rhythmic component, wrapping everything in a Pop Ambient haze, but letting the beats break free of the whir and thrum, opener "Submission" is all hazy swirls, the only rhythm a sort of echo drenched dubbed out ripple, very dreamlike and abstract, before slipping into "Posers" which at first sounds very much like something off Passed Me By sampled water gurgles beneath a muted techno thump, but soon, fog horn like melodies drift in, and the beat blossoms into something much more active, a shuffling crunch anchored to a house-like pulse, processed vocals drifting over the top, the vibe groovy, but still washed out and druggily abstract. Which is how the first half of We Stay Together plays out, but then about half way through, the sounds begins to veer back toward the murk, "Cherry Eye" being a fantastic bit of muddied minimalism, even at its most propulsive, it's still a muted creep, as is "Cracked", although it does crank the beat a bit, conjuring up a sort of slow motion shimmy, that remains looped and mesmerizingly motorik.
The bonus tracks on We Stay Together, in some ways mirror those on Passed Me By, in that they actually sound more like their opposite, "Work Gate" is super minimal and sketch-like, a little dubby and darkly Portishead-y, while "We Stay Together (Part Two)" begins life as a hushed blur, but gradually blossoms into another Field like chunk of looped techno mesmer.
Released on the same label that gave us all the Demdike Stare records, which should give you an idea that while this might technically be techno, it's some murky dubbed out hauntology that transcends any sort of genre classification. A brand new unanimous store fave, and definite contender for Record Of the Year!
Packed in a super striking oversized gatefold sleeve, with a different cover for each album depending on which way you're holding it, both stunning black and white photos culled from the pages of National Geographic.
We missed the vinyl versions of Passed Me By and We Stay Together the first time around, but ended up making the double disc compilation from Andy Stott our Record Of The Week back in December of 2011, now the original lps have been repressed and are available again separately. Here's what we had to say about Stott and We Stay Together:
UK producer Stott seems to have taken the minimal downtempo soul of Burial as a jumping off point, taking that same sound and slowing it down even further, adding more grit and grime, creating a sound now twice removed from the dancefloor, a soporific, somnolent techno that fuses murky dirgey slo-mo soul with abstract house music creep, conjuring up a music that is both haunting and sinister, mesmeric and minimal, an array of looped melodies, melded to skeletal thumps and heartbeat like pulses, fragmented samples woven into the mix mostly to provide texture and melody, but for the most part all of the various elements are recruited to either become rhythms themselves, or to be blurred and smeared into a grim washed out backdrop, over which the rhythms slither and skitter.
We Stay Together dials back the murk that was all over Passed Me By a bit, instead focusing on the rhythmic component, wrapping everything in a Pop Ambient haze, but letting the beats break free of the whir and thrum, opener "Submission" is all hazy swirls, the only rhythm a sort of echo drenched dubbed out ripple, very dreamlike and abstract, before slipping into "Posers" which at first sounds very much like something off Passed Me By sampled water gurgles beneath a muted techno thump, but soon, fog horn like melodies drift in, and the beat blossoms into something much more active, a shuffling crunch anchored to a house-like pulse, processed vocals drifting over the top, the vibe groovy, but still washed out and druggily abstract. Which is how the first half of We Stay Together plays out, but then about half way through, the sounds begins to veer back toward the murk, "Cherry Eye" being a fantastic bit of muddied minimalism, even at its most propulsive, it's still a muted creep, as is "Cracked", although it does crank the beat a bit, conjuring up a sort of slow motion shimmy, that remains looped and mesmerizingly motorik.
Released on the same label that gave us all the Demdike Stare records, which should give you an idea that while this might technically be techno, it's some murky dubbed out hauntology that transcends any sort of genre classification. A brand new unanimous store fave!
This one seemed so unlikely, we figured that it couldn't be right. That maybe "Batillus" was the name of the track. Or that the Batillus in question here, being remixed by minimal electronic mastermind Andy Stott, was just another beatmaker/soundscaper with the same name as the Batillus we knew, but in fact, the Batillus here IS none other than the NY metal crew whose records Concrete Sustain and Furnace we've raved about on the aQ list in the past. Apparently, Stott and Batillus shared a bill, Batillus professed their love for Stott, and a collaboration was born. And it's a doozy. The opening few minutes sound like a slightly darker version of what we're used to from Stott, all hushed staticscapes, buried pulsations, slow shifting textures, warbly minimal thrum, a sculpted landscape of hiss and hum, but soon the buzz grows more sinister, the rhythmic pulse, more ominous and caustic, the sound growing more industrial and metallic, and then the vocals come in, super processed and slowed down, a raspy, mechanical demon bellow, doused in reverb and delay and FX, dubbed out hard, and draped over a blurry tangle of tones, and a slow motion stutter step rhythm. So goddamn good. And as always, with a remix like this, it mostly leaves us wishing there was actually a proper band, that just sounded EXACTLY LIKE THIS. Who knows, maybe Stott and Batillus will join forces and make a full length together. Here's hoping...
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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Affiliated with the Manchester electronica terrorist outfit V/VM (Jansky Noise has provided additional production on a few tracks), The Stranger has produced one of the best records to emerge from that school of circuit / brain frying. Released on the outsider West Coast label Phthalo, this cdr release (limited to 250) is an alchemic concoction of boiling and crashing swells of digitized drone and sporadic post-Autechre break-skitter. Recommended!
Over the last few years, we, and most readers of the aQ list have become a bit obsessed with the Caretaker, as well as the man behind the curtain, Leyland James Kirby, who as the Caretaker, and also nder his own name, has created a body of work at once moody and mysterious, murky and out of time, a series of releases that sound like the musical version of faded photographs, old 78's spinning in ghostly parlors, that ethereal, ephemeral sound a glimpse into some lost era, or some alternate otherworld, needless to say, pretty much everyone at aQ is utterly smitten. Apparently, The Stranger is yet another moniker Kirby has employed in the past, although this is our first exposure to him as The Stranger, and maybe not surprisingly, this iteration of Kirby's The Stranger has ended up on Modern Love, home to lots of other aQ faves, including most notably perhaps Demdike Stare and Andy Stott. Which makes sense considering the sound of The Stranger, which seems to be a darkly minimal, hushed and hauntological, slo-mo electronic creep, positioning itself somewhere between the skeletal electronic minimalism of Stott, and the ritualistic psychedelic hauntology of Demdike Stare. With plenty of Kirby's washed out, faded sound, buried melody mystery lurking just below the surface. And really, below the surface is where most everything is going on here. The sound is extremely minimal, hushed and at times barely there, a few cursory listens in the store, has us thinking this was a bit boring, like nothing was going on, barring some hissy static, and buried rhythms, with all of the tracks bleeding into a single monochromatic whole. But what a difference some headphones make, and we do recommend headphone listening for this, cuz once the volume is cranked, and the rest of the world is shut out, The Stranger reveals itself as something warped and wonderful, some twisted deep listening, heavy on the rhythm and texture, in fact, it's essentially a deftly crafted landscape of slow shifting rhythms and textures, straddling some sort of avant ultra-minimal techno, and something much more atmospheric, the 'beats' are barely there, often fragmented shards of percussion, buried pulsations, clouds of static that just seem to have haphazardly formed sort-of-rhythms, on some tracks they do drive the proceedings, but on others, they simply bleed into the background, with a few tracks sounding like pure ambient field recordings of subterranean pipe fights, "We Scarcely See Sunlight" sounds like Kirby recording himself in the sewers, playing the iron ladders, creating primitive rhythms from metal on metal, while all around him the sounds of the city filtered from above add deep moans and distant rumbles, while "Spiral Of Decline", sounds almost like the gothic industrial of Vatican Shadow, albeit with Kirby's strange idiosyncratic sound design (the cool main rhythmic component that sounds like marbles rolling around in a plastic tube!).
"Providence Or Fate" comes about as close to the Caretaker as anything here, with it's crackle wreathed orchestral shimmers, the faded melodies and washed out ambience, the whole thing hushed and darkly lovely, reminding us of Tim Hecker and Philip Jeck as well, but here those dreamy swatch of sound are tethered to a primitive tribal rhythm. And so it goes, from clattery crunch to blurred thrum, tinkling chimes wreathed in rainfall like static, to glitchy avant drone dub minimalism, barely there downtempo slowcore electro drift, to groaning gothic dirge.
As always, super striking Modern Love packaging, the cd in an oversized multi-panel sleeve, both the cd and lp adorned with mysterious, dripping, grey scale images of an old abandoned building.
Paul Dickow, one of Portland's brightest musical minds, has been a part of some of the most breezy, intricate and hypnotic recordings over the last decade in bands and projects like Fontanelle, Nudge, and Emergency. His third full length as Strategy finds him sounding better then ever. Combining multitrack live instrumentation, old-school synthesizers, digital sound design, and pieces of improv sessions and practice recordings, Dickow creates a seamless sound with an organic warmth that shimmers throughout. Subtle dubby beats with washed out ambiance, dreamy drifty shoegazing, a strong sense of rhythmic melody and surprisingly subtle pop delivery. Kind of like a Kompakt record with way more tricks up its sleeves. We started thinking that this is what playing Seefeel and Pole at the same time might sound like. We've been listening to this nonstop, it's one of those rare records that's just as satisfying to have on while doing other stuff, as it is to listen to with undivided attention. So nice!
Another list, another fantastic release from local label Time Released Sound. This the latest from a one man band called Stray Ghost, who fuses washed out soft focus atmospherics, a la Tim Hecker, Machinefabriek, Jasper TX, with more modern new classical composition. Lush blurry soundscapes, ebb and flow, gauzy expanses of hushed hazy thrum, which give way to delicate pointillist piano, sweeping and darkly dramatic, haunting and quite lovely, swirling strings, the sound cinematic and at times near symphonic, a sort of faded dreamlike chamber music, shifting easily from layered ominous clouds of brooding electronics, to spare, contemplative drift, to delicate, crystalline shimmer, the sound wistful and melancholy, the spare prettiness and the lush brooding swells, continually blurring into one another, creating a gorgeous bit of electronic / neoclassical modern minimalism.
As with all TRS releases, the Stray Ghost comes in two versions, the standard, which is a proper cd housed in a heavy digipak, which subtly mirrors the meticulously designed packaging of the deluxe version, which is limited to just 100 copies, and is packaged in a handmade sleeve created from hand sewn sheets of antique Braille paper, all held in an origami style black fold up sleeve, hand stamped and Braille labelled, inside various pockets containing antique charts and drawings. As always. WOW.
Another list, another fantastic release from local label Time Released Sound. This the latest from a one man band called Stray Ghost, who fuses washed out soft focus atmospherics, a la Tim Hecker, Machinefabriek, Jasper TX, with more modern new classical composition. Lush blurry soundscapes, ebb and flow, gauzy expanses of hushed hazy thrum, which give way to delicate pointillist piano, sweeping and darkly dramatic, haunting and quite lovely, swirling strings, the sound cinematic and at times near symphonic, a sort of faded dreamlike chamber music, shifting easily from layered ominous clouds of brooding electronics, to spare, contemplative drift, to delicate, crystalline shimmer, the sound wistful and melancholy, the spare prettiness and the lush brooding swells, continually blurring into one another, creating a gorgeous bit of electronic / neoclassical modern minimalism.
As with all TRS releases, the Stray Ghost comes in two versions, the standard, which is a proper cd housed in a heavy digipak, which subtly mirrors the meticulously designed packaging of the deluxe version, which is limited to just 100 copies, and is packaged in a handmade sleeve created from hand sewn sheets of antique Braille paper, all held in an origami style black fold up sleeve, hand stamped and Braille labelled, inside various pockets containing antique charts and drawings. As always. WOW.
Another fine collection of DIY electronic pop from another minimal wave band we're getting introduced to by Dark Entries! The history of Stress began in 1981 as a musical collaboration between the editors of two fanzines -- Adventures In Reality and Damn Latin - both of which covered the darker aspects of post-punk and new wave, with interviews and features on Bauhaus, SPK, Attrition, etc. Stress kept their songs girded to the taut electronics of sequencers and drum machines with vocal melodies that expand beyond the typical monotone delivery, falling not too far from Soft Cell's earlier tapes and Attrition's less baroque leanings. They released a couple of tapes by 1982, with contributions to numerous compilations to follow, leading up to their proper album The Big Wheel in 1984, which sported the witchy chart-topping single "Elisabeth Selwyn." The band split by 1985, with a few reunion gigs popping over the next couple of decades. Conspiracy Theory compiles tracks from those two early cassettes, remastered expertly as with all of the Dark Entries recordings. Comes with a fanzine, adopting a classic punk / new wave aesthetic with all sorts of appropriated texts about Stress and a cheeky spread on all of the gear that the band used. Nice.
Another fantastic, archival synth oddity rescued from the abyss by Oakland tape label Sanity Muffin, who on the last list, brought us two fantastic early eighties releases of kosmische synthscapery and darkly propulsive kraut-age psychedelia from Ron Berry, and this time around it's a lost lp from 1982 from a woman named Anna Pauline Strom, who hailed from right here in San Francisco. Blind and obese, Strom struggled greatly with her weight and sightlessness, until one day her doting husband purchased her an electric organ, with which the untrained Strom began to create incredible, beautiful, and relaxing sounds. Sounds that helped her transcend her physical form, to reach higher planes of existence, to eventually become the "Trans-Millenia Consort"!
From the original liner notes (reprinted in the cassette's J-Card: "I consider myself the "Trans-Millenia Consort", by which title I wish to be known. This to me is a personal declaration that I have been in previous lives, that I am in this life, and that I shall in future lives be a musical consort to time."
Strom goes on: "My music is a timeless entity, clothed in the mists of prehistory, beautifully sensitive to the tortured and joyous emotions of the present, rich and voluptuously full of the glory and anguish of future worlds. And so, as the "Trans-Millenia Consort", the living incarnation of this all-embracing entity of music, I endeavor through music to delve into all time spaces to tap resources of knowledge and power as ancient as the Universe and as young as unborn worlds, in the hope that I may bring a measure of peace and joy to emotional, spiritual, material and physical complexity that is humankind."
While it's unclear if her music did in fact impact humankind on such a massive scale, it most certainly did wonders for her personally, allowing her to find peace in the present, and to modern listeners, it's easy to get lost in her lush, lullaby-like synthscapes, simple lilting melodies, subtle sound effects (like the bathtub water splashes on the first track, the simulated animal sounds on the second), the arrangements often sounding like electric harps, fields of ethereal strums, dreamy and soft focus, blooping, bleeping pizzicato melodies, stretched out over the occasional weird sort-of groovy rhythm, Casio style handclap driven primitive drum machine beats, wreathed in prismatic swirls of blurred synth shimmer, all very very new age-y of course, very soundtracky and cinematic, like the music for old educational filmstrips, easy to imagine this having found it's way onto UK weirdo reissue label Trunk, had this been from some obscure British TV show. The new age blossoms into some serious kosmische drift here and there, the whole of Strom's sound though with a serious primitive, home brewed, outsider vibe. Apparently, Strom's quick mastery of that first organ, convinced her husband to create/invent/purchase new instruments and effects and gizmos for her to explore and experiment with, all of which she quickly mastered and wove into these dreamily drifty outsider new age bliss out soundscapes.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES! Each one hand numbered, with the original album's liner notes included inside the J-card!
Members of Norwegian jazz/electronic outfits Supersilent (keyboardist Stale Storlokken) and Food (percussionist Thomas Stronen) collaborate in this duo, making their Rune Grammofon debut with Humcrush. Being fans of both Food and Supersilent (especially!) we were interested to hear this...also most Rune Grammofon stuff is pretty good. And this is! Improvised live in the recording studio but well and truly sounding like weird, tuneful 'songs', this album reminds us a bit of the Shaking Ray Levis, or maybe even a free improv version of Sagor and Swing, if you know either of them. The ramshackle rhythmic clatter of drums, the glitchy hiss and buzz of electronics, and the quirky synth tones combine quite temptingly to our ears. Not to many other 'improv' records boast cuts like "Marked East" that we want to hit repeat on right after they're over. From bright and bouncy (like that track) to moody and mysterious, Humcrush is an enjoyable ride.
Imagine if you could erase time and create a special Hacienda party on the beach that New Order ws playing, with special guests Robert Smith and Lindstrom, in an all night session under the stars as the waves crash on the beach under the glow of the starlit sky. Then you might get an idea of what this album by Swedish duo Studio is all about. Studio create a totally refreshing version of early '80s greatness that sets its focus on capturing a warm sensation akin to ending up at the beach after a night of dancing and some of those ecstatic drugs still in your system. The record is bookmarked by two long cosmic instrumental's filled with shimmering synths that sneak in some kraut and subtle afro-beat influences with total perfection. The songs with vocals really do sound like The Cure and New Order joining forces as they catch an endless groove under a spinning disco ball. While there is some similarities to what folks in the DFA camp have been doing there is a much more smooth and golden sensation to Studio's sound. West Coast also reminds us a lot of White Magic's Sorcerer album, one of our favorite electronic records of last year. Both demonstrate the perfect way of extracting the warmth from synthesized sounds to bring the dance party back to the waves and water. A record that grows deeper in our veins each time we listen, we have become hooked! Not sure why it took us so long to list this but better late than never...
In addition to crafting utterly gorgeous breathtaking minimal pop ambience as Gas, Wolfgang Voigt was also responsible for some of the most influential minimal techno of the last twenty years, as Mike Ink, M:I:5 and a handful of other monickers. It's hard for us sometimes to describe techno music, and to define just what it is that makes us love one techno record and hate another, but this comp is wall to wall genius. Out of print since 2000, this comp is finally available again, collecting some of the best 12"s Voigt released in the nineties, as well as tacking on a handful of bonus tracks, every one a spare skeletal dubbed out groovescape of simple bubbly beats, minimal percussive thumps and beeps, everything tight and clipped, hypnotic and mesmerizing, futuristic dancefloor perfection, managing to swing, within fairly rigid arrangements. Pretty much every band on Kompakt, whether they know it or not, owe everything to this man, and these tracks right here.
Each track is named for a color, although it's unclear how those tracks reflect the colors they're named for, or if it's just a simple way of codifying the various grooves, either way, it does reflect the simple spare and minimal vibe of the sounds, the layout, the whole concept. It's hard to imagine people dancing to this, although we know they do, for us though, this is perfect chill out music, the beats bouncy but muted, the basslines barely there, usually just a streak or a brief thrum, the tracks hardly shift over the course of their 7-10 minutes, the timbre subtly changing, maybe another little skitter gets tossed into the mix, it hardly matters, as these songs start out pretty much perfect, and only get more perfect as they go on. Every track here could get locked into an endless loop, and we'd happily nod off, drift off, forever, letting the beats and austere ambience just wash over us.
Some of these tracks are almost 20 years old and still sound totally fresh, and even a bit futuristic, and the perfect soundtrack for some space age dinner party or some late night chill out sesh in a bad ass satellite bachelor pad slowly orbiting the Earth.
Holy crap those suicidal black metallers have nothing on Stunt Rock. At least in terms of pure self loathing misery. They talk a good game, and the music is appropriately miserable and melancholy, but their depression is so abstract, so much so that in some cases, it sounds as much like a gimmick as 'Satanism'. But this is indeed depression. Misery. REGRET. Past Stunt Rock releases didn't really give any idea that all this lurked below the surface, but this release more than hints at it, it takes his Stunt Rock heart, and pins it open, like a high school dissected frog, letting us poke and prod, and examine all the blackness inside.
It's also pretty funny too, if you think folks like Ivan Brunetti are hilarious, which we do. In fact, this is totally the record we could imagine Brunetti releasing. And it is in fact a sort of instruction manual, covering such topics as to how to choose a new mate, and to avoid the mistakes you made in past relationships. A page of little tags to place on your belongings for after you die when people dig through your stuff (for your pornography stash, for your box of old love letters, etc.), a very Brunetti like comic detailing a botched suicide attempt among other things.
The Prescreening A Potential Love Interest multiple choice form is amazing, it goes on for pages and pages, and is so gloriously black hearted. The there's the Learning To Forget & Adjusting To Living Alone section, also pages and pages, teaching you to do just as the title says, try different routes to work, repaint, get a new social circle, new wardrobe, but it's super well written, wry and bitter, fucking brutal here and there. There's also an activity section, with a form to write down all the songs you want played at your funeral (the first is filled out for you, Creed's "My Own Prison" haha), as well as a sort of last will style form, with spaces for things you want to leave for folks, as well as spaces for the people you want to make sure DON'T get anything (and the specific things you want to make sure they don't get. There's also an amazing section called Upsetting Things You Wrote When You Were Young. Poems, letters, lists of people who wronged you. But they're all blacked out CIA document style, leaving just the caustic comments by the author. All of this is gorgeously hand drawn and printed in a 10" book housed in a super nice cardstock screen printed hand numbered cover, each one hand numbered, the front a three color illustration of a blood splattered sink.
And there's a record. a 2 song 10", two parts of the same piece, titled somewhat cryptically "Dear Christian Girl (Parts One And Two)", a DJ Shadow style indie rock soundscape, lots of amazing (and amazingly depressing) samples, funny, fucked up, sad, melancholy, the song simple and hooky, but stretched out into a more electronic sort of groove, with thick buzzing synths wrapped around the Slint-y guitars, loping rock drumming, subtle hooks, no proper vocals, instead, the tale of the mysterious Christian Girl and Stunt Rock's saga of regret is told in a continuous mix of voices and sounds, of vignettes and fragments, in shuffling beats and melancholy melodies. Pretty great. And the perfect companion for the book. And as if that weren't enough, you also get a cd-r, with the same music as on the 10". All told, you get a 10" vinyl record, a 32 page book with hand silk screened covers, 3 Stickers, 1 Button, a cd-r and 1 of 4 different hand silk screened posters.
And we know all those forms are jokes, but we're really tempted to fill them out. Fun and funny, but only if you're a twisted bitter old crank, like us!
For this new EP, Styrofoam's mainman Arne Van Petegem steps up to the microphone, introducing a vocal presence into his dreamy electronic instrumentals. This slips Styrofoam more in line with his labelmates electronic pop brethren LaliPuna or The Notwist.
Styrofoam presents A Short Album About Murder even though this isn't terribly short (7 tracks and 38 minutes) nor is it particularly murderous. Rather, this German group has produced some pleasant electronica walking between the romantic IDM sound of
We just got the new Isan / Styrofoam split album and Styrofoam's newest full length in stock which reminded us of one that slipped by us last year (although we did get the "A Heart Without A Mind" EP which was drawn from this album). I'm What's There To Show That Something's Missing is the third full length from Styrofoam (aka Arne Van Petegem). If you're not already familiar with his daydreamy music, imagine a more wispy washy Notwist, or a drowsy Postal Service. Layers of soft male vocals, delicate electronic mists, unobtrusive organ drones and gently applied acoustic guitar... get the picture?
Benjamin Gibbard fans have been tingling with anticipation for this cd for some time now and it's not even his own release! Well folks, the wait is over! We totally knew that a bunch of this Styrofoam cd were gonna fly out the door immediately simply due to the presence of Gibbard as well as some other current notable indie electronic pop darlings, but in case you're curious what the fuss is all about... here's the skinny: Consider this to be a Cinderella transformation of sorts. It's quite startling how much the spark and charm of Nothing's Lost can be so directly and audibly attributed to the talents of all the cool cats that Styrofoam (aka Arne Van Petegem) got to play on it. It's even more irksome that this release is going to be misleadingly filed under the Styrofoam name. A just-above-average electronic popster, Van Petegem gets totally gussied up by the help of many AQ faves -- the aforementioned Postal Service/Death Cab For Cutie's Gibbard, The Notwist's Markus Acher, Alias, LaliPuna's Valerie Trebeljahr, and American Analog Set's Andrew Kenny. The few tracks that are solely Styrofoam's domain are pleasant enough, but stand in stark (i.e, pale) contrast to the others. Now that's saying something right there... in almost every review I've read of Styrofoam's past releases, the word "pleasant" pops up with alarming frequency, and that's the downfall of most of his music, it never veers from the safety zone. Sorta the aural equivalent of some pretty pastel floral wallpaper. Alright, granted our expectations were somewhat raised, but overall this also pales in comparison to each of the individual artists' own work (almost seeming like their unfinished demos or cast-offs)... did they really have to put Gibbard's vocals through the Cher-style auto-tune processor?! The oddest, most jarring inclusion is the rapping by Notwist buddy Alias on the first track "Misguided". It's an eyebrow raiser, for sure. Really, the most credit that can be given to Van Petegem is for his savvy in assembling such an of-the-moment cast. We don't want to be totally down on this release, but feel the results are less (rather than more) than the sum of its parts. That said, those of you who can't stand to wait any longer for the next Postal Service, Death Cab, Lali Puna release might find just enough here to tide you over!
Styrofoam is the electronica alter-ego of Arne van Petegem, who has also made a few Krankyish space-rock records under the moniker Tin Foil Star. "The Point Misser" is another offering from Morr Records and fits perfectly within Morr's particular niche of delicate electronica favoring the more melodic aesthetics of Boards of Canada and early Autechre. Bittersweet, pleasant, and
Freshly reissued and ready to join your copy of Styrofoam's latest album Nothing's Lost in your cd library! Here's what we said the first time around:
Styrofoam is the electronica alter-ego of Arne Van Petegem, who has also made a few Krankyish space-rock records under the moniker Tin Foil Star. "The Point_Misser" is another offering from Morr Records and fits perfectly within Morr's particular niche of delicate electronica favoring the more melodic aesthetics of Boards of Canada and early Autechre. Bittersweet, pleasant and aiming to tug at those heartstrings.
Subimage has gone through quite a remarkable transformation for this third release. Following the very '80s inspired effervescent electro-poppy Etoc and Fruitpacifist, Mainman Chris Campbell has opted for more of a Brit rock approach, and expanded his lone mission into a trio with the addition of bassist Ruba and guitarist Greg. It's still got the thumpin' dancebeat, but Bernal Hill is driven more by snarly electric guitars than burbly synthesizers. That's not even mentioning the vocals. Campbell is sing-sneering up a storm. The big picture is sorta reminiscent of That Petrol Emotion and Primal Scream or the more recent sounds of Radio 4, Franz Ferdinand and The Rapture. Punchy with a lot more attitude.
Subimage mainman Chris Campbell sure loves his synthpop and it shows! This trio's debut is filled with very very '80s rubbery dance pop a la Erasure. Lots of percolating analog synth bloopiness and uncomplicated programmed beats provide the videogame-esque backdrop for the ever so slightly strained male vocals. The songs are actually from 1989 through 1992, but they were re-recorded and remastered much more recently than that (2002 to be exact). Exuberant and fun! Oh and by the way, the cd's mysterious title ETOC is simply the abbreviation of the album's sixth song "Erotic Temptation Of Creation".
Not sure how we first stumbled across Submerged, but all it took was one listen and we became kind of obsessed. A dizzying mix of ethnic dubstep, old school drum and bass, classic industrial and experimental electronica, the sounds here are heavy and hypnotic, sounding a lot like stuff we were crazy about back in the nineties, but a bit supercharged and updated for the new millennium. The opener "Space Arabs" is a perfect example, a lumbering chunk of big beat dubstep, with thick undulating bass warble, but wreathed in all sorts of Eastern melodies, and fragments of classic Middle Eastern folk music, it sounds a bit like Muslimgauze if he had been raised on jungle and dubstep. The second track features Scorn and Dr. Israel (other guests on the record include Justin Broadrick of Godflesh/Jesu and Ted Parsons from the Swans/Prong, among others), and starts off with some thick buzzing bass, wrapped in clouds of hissy static, it's noisy and distorted and crumbly, when the drums kick in, it sounds almost dancehall-y, but fused to a more dubstep beat, with those staticky clouds returning throughout, adding all sorts of grit and grime to the stuttery beat and Dr. Israel's distorted flow.
Fans of the recent dubstep and dancehall collections, who lean toward dancefloor sounds that are dark and dangerous, this will definitely hit the spot, the sort of dance music, that is less about getting bodies moving, and more about evoking dread, or creating sonic mystery, building moods ominous and sinister. Then there are the jungle jams, where the beats get cranked way up, and it's like classic jungle but way more distorted and blackened, "Transport" takes a pounding two-step beat, adds some weird gnarled percussive melodies, and a layer of grinding static, while "No One", adds chugging metal guitar and howled vokills to wild spastic drill and bass, reminding us of aQ faves like Drumcorps and Aaron Spectre.
"Death Sentence" is another killer, a loping skull caving beat, clipped and distorted, over a noisy backdrop, and wrapped in some seriously cinematic ambience, the sound shifting constantly from dark and thick and layered to spare and skeletal to twisted and noise drenched. "Rorschach" too, with its strange melody constructed from processed vocals, and looped stutter beat, and wild swirling percussion, not to mention more thick bass, and one of those drops that would kill on the dancefloor if any DJ had the balls to spin something this heavy, and then finally there's "Dead", the 8+ minute closer, that starts out all blissed out and ambient, before transforming into a wildly tangled drum and bass squall, buried beneath a gauze of hazy shoegaze drift and buzzing metallic churn, the drums and production shifting constantly, a dizzyingly, insanely programmed psychedelic dubbed out junglenoise blowout. Totally ruling, some of the darkest heaviest electronica we've heard.
Check out the two releases we recently got from the local electronic duo known as Submodern. The first is their full length debut titled Object Oriented Mood Management and the follow-up is this six-song ep called Inner Mission. Submodern craftily construct their tracks from nice bloopy bleepy sequenced synth sounds atop dancefloor-primed programmed beats and basslines. The former are perfect for getting all tripped out to, and the latter keep things groovin' along at an easy-goin' pace.
This EP definitely shows some developments from the duo's debut. Its highlight track is definitely the third one, the moodily atmosphered "Stuck". Despite its title, it's anything but stuck! There's more layers, more textures and generally much more IDM-y action goin' on. The next track "Lurp" continues on that shadowy path. Can't wait to hear where they go from here.
Check out the two releases we recently got from the local electronic duo known as Submodern. One is an ep called Inner Mission and the other is this, their full length debut titled Object Oriented Mood Management. Submodern craftily construct their tracks from nice bloopy bleepy sequenced synth sounds atop dancefloor-primed programmed beats and basslines. The former are perfect for getting all tripped out to, and the latter keep things groovin' along at an easy-goin' pace. The most kinetic of the ten tracks is the eighth "Minimal Angst". A nice little kick amid the mostly chill atmospheres.
Why look it's a 20th cent. new music/electronica classic.
Collection of recordings spanning American electronic composer Morton Subotnick's career. It includes a remastered version of Touch, originally released in 1969 (his third commercially released composition) and created on the Buchla synthesizer and a four track. Also included is "A Sky of Cloudless Sulfur" (1978) also created using the Buchla, and a new piece entitled "Gestures"
Have to say, we haven't always been too keen on some of the contemporary acts on the Soul Jazz label. What with all the amazing reissues and vintage compilations, the newer bands often pale in comparison. But on the last couple of Soul Jazz singles comps, the tracks by British duo Subway have always caught our attention. And now we have this full length (their first for the Soul Jazz label) and it has barely left our cd player (or turntable, for some of us)! The opener "Persuasion" is a stunner, marrying cosmic Baleria with Seefeel like dub house. Krautrock influences are on full display from Kraftwerk to Cluster (obvious with a track called "Harmonia"), but with a warm edge that feels authentic rather than a pastiche of styles. And it's not all just geared for the dancefloor, with thoughtful meditative soundscapes and propulsive Moroder-esque themes offering the perfect cooling off music for hot summer nights! Recommended.
This is the silliest sounding (and looking) cd we've gotten in a long time. So much so that we spontaneously blurted out new words to describe it... like "twinkee booobles shplicka poing-poing"! Dunno quite what that means -- won't find it in a dictionary -- but it sure fits this Belgian fellow Laurent Baudoux's music. To boot, all the lyrics are befuddlingly sung in Japanese by MC Illreme! Yes, some folks might describe the tracks as being old video-gamey sounding, but there's more loopy-bloopy layers and jagged rhythmic outcrops going on that Super Mario would prolly have a hard time negotiating... but not us! Fans of Atom Heart (any one of his numerous personas) and Aavikko might experience particular breathless glee in Orchestre Philharmonok. More fun than a barrel of balloon-a-gram toting monkeys.
One of six new tapes from the always awesome Holodeck label out of Austin, Texas features a new release by Texas psych-heavies, Sungod. We raved about them awhile back for their debut release, Crash Galactic, now sadly out of print. On Contakt, these cosmic explorers are setting foot on a new and strange alien landscape, starting with a More-era Pink Floyd desert soundtrack vibe before breaking out with full kraut-inflected heaviness of lysergic guitar washes and pummeling poly-rhythmic momentum. A heady mix of gaseous electronics and acid guitar shred is nicely tempered by Blade Runner-like ambient passages of forlorn piano and slow burn synth-scapes. The final track, "Third Reichel" brings in layered acoustic guitar treatments in sequenced repetitions that evolves into full deep space rock take off. Limited!
