"Gelb" is an unreleased 1974 album produced by the iconoclastic electronic musician Conrad Schnitzler, who sought to demystify the academic strangle hold on electronic music in reducing all of the avant garde techniques and ideas into a simple interplay of tonal color. Often realized as overlapping electronic patterns, cyclical rhythms, and synthetic swooshes, Schnitzler's early '70s compositions appear now as the prototypes of a lot of modern day electronica, especially IDM, ambient, and techno. "Gelb" does sound a little dated, due to the less than perfect recording conditions and the limited palette of electronic sounds, but the sweeping, space-age surfaces of Schnitzler's electronic tones and jittery drum machine arpeggiations are as good as anything he released during that time. Vinyl only.
The last of the five 'color' releases is the Green one. The original LP consisted of two very long, elegantly minimal environmental pieces. "Der Reise Und Seine Frau" from 1976 features an endlessly wandering synth solo, meandering over a very distorted & churning drum machine loop without much development for 32 minutes. The synth patch is a very modest one, but pretty enough: Schnitzler for Mother. There's a lot more going on in 1980's "Bis Die Blaue Blume Bluht": interlocking, circular melodies looping endlessly over a percolating Wurlitzer rhythm for 20 minutes. A very tropical mood: imagine Kraftwerk's "Ananas Symphonie" without the Hawaiian slide guitar left looping for the night and you're halfway there. The original vinyl encouraged playback at both 33 and 45 rpm, so unsurprisingly the 14 minute bonus track is "Bis Die Blaue Blume Bluht / 45" -- although, surprisingly, the piece isn't simply pitched up, it's digitally time compressed to a faster tempo without actually changing its pitch, so you basically get a 35 minute version of the piece that picks up the pace about halfway through. Grun might seem a bit modest compared to the untamed worlds of Schwartz and Rot, but I have to admit that this pleasantly relentless album won me over by the end. (guest review by AQ pal Jon "Wobbly" Leidecker)
First, before we get into the review, we should mention that this double lp is housed in an oversized French paper hand silk-screened jacket. While it's a beautiful package, the combination of its oversized shape and the delicacy of the material means it's prone to damage in shipping, and of course all the copies we have received arrived a bit bent up. The label has no replacement covers so this is all we're going to get. We've taken a couple dollars off the price to compensate a bit, but those who are more fastidious about the shape of their vinyl sleeves, might want to steer clear of this, as we won't be able to replace them. Sorry about that!
But WOW!, this is a beautiful double lp live set from 1972 by the late experimental kosmiche composer, Conrad Schnitzler. Salvaged from decaying tapes of a performance for an art exhibition, the sounds on this are like a multifaceted sci-fi ballet. The coordination of individual electronic sounds operating in harmonic tandem of each other showcases a brilliant array of synthesis and restraint, while at the same time emanating a warm centrally vibrant core. For some reason in some of our minds we always have this impression that Conrad Schnitzler was the most abstract and cold of the German musicians of this period, but lately with each new reissue that becomes available, that impression is proven wrong time and time again. This is a gorgeous set, as essential as any of his key recordings from this era. And as usual, crazy limited, ONLY 1000 COPIES and at this point almost gone so act fast!
Here's an unexpected set of reissues: vinyl versions of two classic krautrock albums by electronica pioneer Conrad Schnitzler. They're legit, done from master tapes we're told.
"Rot" (Red) was Con's amazing 1973 solo debut. Intense science-fictional bleep-drone, with ironic titles like (side one) "Meditation" and even "Krautrock" (side two). It's totally dark (but a little silly too). The Plate Lunch cd reissue of this we used to stock is now out of print, so that makes this new LP version even more essential. Of course, this vinyl reissue is pressed on red wax, in a red sleeve.
Ten thousand cheers to Captain Trip Records for reissuing all five of Conrad Schnitzler's Color Albums. Originally available only in private pressings, and only sporadically available since then, this cycle included his first solo albums and his first forays into purely electronic music. Before these, Schnitzler had already been a founding member of Tangerine Dream and Kluster (who renamed themselves Cluster after Schnitzler's departure).
His first 'solo' album, Schwartz, is technically the third Kluster album, a trio improvisation by Schnitzler, Moebius and Roedelius -- and was actually reissued as such on cd in the '90s as Eruption. Similar in sound to the first two albums, we hear a variety of traditional instruments (cellos, drums, guitars, organs) played in the most rudimentary manner possible, treating them as raw sources that are then filtered, delayed, and otherwise processed into a bizarre and barely recognizable cavern of pure sound. There actually aren't any synthesizers on this record -- the sounds are all vaguely acoustic in nature, though transformed into something very alien. Whereas their first two albums were commissioned by a Church on the condition that the records also contain strangely religious spoken word texts, this album is purely instrumental -- but more than that, they just get much further out this time -- this is the best of their three records. Though not as compositionally refined as the astonishing Cluster '71 that Moebius and Roedelius would go on to create with Conny Plank, this gains points for audibly being a live performance. A very ahead of its time one at that -- bands are beginning to sound like these records again now, 35 years later -- if you've been spending quality time with Yellow Swans and Skaters cdr-rs recently, you will definitely dig this record from out of their mind Germans playing in a basement 35 years ago, and hitting the source.
This new edition adds a four minute soundcheck from a different trio -- Schnitzler, Freudigmann & Seidel. Otherwise it's identical to the 1997 CD reissue. (guest review by AQ pal Jon "Wobbly" Leidecker)
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
NOW ALSO ON VINYL!
The history behind this particular Conrad Schnitzler track is a little vague. Supposedly, Zug is also known as the "Red Cassette" which the German electronic pioneer self-released in 1973 (some say 1974). M=Minimal recently reissued a collection of Zug remixes, a couple of which had already appeared on vinyl before; but now the excellent remixes from Ricardo Villalobos and Max Loderbauer get now appear on vinyl. Schnitzler's history has been well mapped here at aQuarius, so we'll merely mention his inspired involvement in Tangerine Dream and Kluster. Villalobos & Loderbauer recently wowed us with their abstract recontextualization of ECM chamber jazz. On the first remix here they adopt more of a motorik / minimalist techno vibe that fits with the taut rhythms that Schniztler embedded into that old tape; and the second spins Schnitzler's dystopian synth drones into a clattering decentered piece more reminiscent of the New Zealand outsider Omit (who really would make for a stellar artist for M=Minimal to reissue!). Download card included!
So often you might read about an album we carry here at Aquarius that sounds as if it were recorded in a bunker, a tomb, a sewer, a cave, a warehouse, or some other nasty, gritty space whose nastiness and grittiness seeps into the recording itself. As much as we would like for each of those times we make such allusions to be true, it's actually quite rare that musicians would record an album in such a location. Conrad Schnitzler and Wolfgang Seidel have done just that, as they brought a bunch of synthesizers down to an abandoned cellar at the Tempelhof Airport in Berlin to record this excellent set of Kosmische electronic blorp. Schnitzler, of course, is a Krautrock legend having worked with the earliest incarnations of Tangerine Dream and the first sessions in Kluster (before the K became a C), and moving on to producing some of the finest examples of claustrophobic proto-electronica from the Krautrock era (e.g. Con and Ballet Statique). Seidel had worked with Schnitzler in the aforementioned Kluster as well as Eruption way back in the day, with sporadic collaborations throughout the past couple of decades. It's impossible to tell who's doing what on this recording of oblique electronic mashings that are equally psychedelic and claustrophobic. Warbling structures of algorithmically complex patterns get torn apart with thrumming electronic noises, weird semi-melodic clunkery, and mad-scientist erratic behaviors. Consequenz 010B is a full 65 minutes in length, but it's limited to 250 copies of which we have limited stock.
We were so saddened by the recent passing of krautrock legend Conrad Schnitzler, a one-time member of both Tangerine Dream and Kluster, who then went on to create one of THEE most incredible bodies of solo work of perhaps any of the krautrockers. This record is not so much a proper Schnitzler record, as it is a strange sort of collaboration. It seems that Schnitzler was forever recording sounds from his many electronic synthesizers, creating an expansive music library, from which all of these sounds were taken. Borngraber and Struver, who run the M=Minimal label, were afforded the opportunity to go through Schnitzler's library, and create a series of new compositions, and Con-Struct is the result.
It's difficult to suss out how much of this is pure Schnitzler, and how much of it is Borngraber & Struver, but really it hardly matters, much of this definitely sounds like a Schnitzler record, the krautrock vibe is big, but there's also definitely a sort of minimal techno vibe, the record opens with a gorgeous stretch of deep buzzing pulses and percolating rhythms, the mood haunting and slightly sinister, all laced with swirls of electronics and thick swells of rumbling whir, before giving way to the following track, which has more of a Kompakt vibe to it. But even here, that minimal techno rhythm is wreathed in swirls of dark layered thrum, and mournful minor key melodies, the sound trancelike and cyclical, which is how most of the record plays out, each track essentially a simple looped arrangement, the core sound and rhythm repeated for the length of the track, while the various elements shift gradually, and all around it various sounds swirl and shimmer. Our only complaint really is that all of the tracks could have been stretched WAY out, and turned into epics even more trancey and hypnotic.
But overall, the mood is surprisingly dark and haunting, the occasional almost house-y rhythm or skittery groove, does little to take away from the record's darkly cast sonic shadows, the swirling low end, the rumbling drones, the thick bassy buzz, the melancholy melodies, it's pretty much the perfect slab of dark minimal rhythmic krautdrone mesmer.
San Francisco guitarist Schott (Junk Genius, T.J. Kirk, etc.) with his first solo record, released by John Zorn's Tzadik label as part of their "Radical Jewish Culture" series. Features Trevor Dunn of Mr. Bungle by the way.
We've long been a fan of Encomiast, never tiring of his gorgeous drone explorations, so when we discovered that the man behind Encomiast also had a black metal band, it seemed like a no brainer, and indeed, the music of Schrei Aus Stein manages to fuse Encomiast's deep rumbling drone music, with a strangely washed out and hypnotic midtempo buzz drenched black metal, this is not blazing riffy thrashing black metal, no this is a murky sprawling blackened oozing blackness, the riffs super distorted to the point of almost becoming drones themselves, the vocals are buried in the mix, the drums are simple and skeletal, the buzz and black infused with haunting melodies, the songs heaving and lumbering, the overall sound very Burzumic, but also weirdly poppy and melodic, not glaringly so, but within the swirling black mass of sound, melodies creep out only to disappear again, a few of the tracks sound almost gothic, with a bit of a cold wave vibe, definitely some Joy Divisiony low end going on in the background.
Another song starts out all high end Sunroof! style ur-drone, only to splinter into a loping depressive black metal pound, while another is all slow building and doomy, a little post rocky, with soaring riffs and simple motorik drumming, and the final track is all slow motion SUNNO))) dirge, which quickly gives way to something much more melodic and pretty, a sort of shoegazey soft doom, that slowly builds to a wall of blurred noise, only to finally explode in a frenzy of blasting flute flecked proggy black metal tangle, eventually blissing out into yet more shoegazey dreaminess, before fading into streaks of effected flute.
Housed in a DVD case, with photocopied insert, and LIMITED TO 200 COPIES!!
Wow! We are so excited that this has been put back into print. Klaus Schulze has an extremely extensive back catalog, and sometimes it can feel a bit overwhelming as to how to navigate it and where you should begin. With Irrlicht once again available we say that answer becomes a little easier. This was his very first solo album which he recorded in 1972 shortly after he left his stint drumming for legendary Krautrockers Ash Ra Tempel (he was also was the drummer in the earliest and maybe greatest incarnation of Tangerine Dream.) After stepping away from the drum-kit Schulze found where he really was most comfortable, and that was behind his elaborate setup of keyboards. With the advent of the Moog, and his mastery of the organ, Schulze was interested in making a new kind of music. Electronic music that was oozing with atmosphere, tension and sensuality. When Schulze was making this record he was heavily under the influence of Musique Concrete along with some other things we are sure! He had a damaged amplifier at the time which would break out into internal feedback when he turned up its volume control. He also went to a large classical orchestra in Berlin where we was allowed to attend a rehearsal that he recorded and then played backwards throughout Irrlicht. For an artists who would go one to make so many more records this still stands as one of, if not his greatest (even though it actually pre-dates his adoption of the Moog synth as instrument of choice!). Along with Cluster, Eno and Kraftwerk, Schulze stands as one of the fathers of electronic music as we know it. What's also so amazing about this record is how you could imagine so many of our favorite black metal bands hearing this and it seeping its way into the more moody/damaged elements of their records. The eerie ambiance of many Burzum and Striborg records can be heard in the totally intense undertones of Irrlicht. Thanks in part to many of the limitations that he was facing back then, there is an eerie and majestic presence to this album. Sometimes beat up organs, messed up amplifiers, and youthful enthusiasm stand the test of time. Especially when the person behind the controls had this amazing knack for creating eerie, haunting otherworldly sounds.
This reissue comes in a nice digipack with liner notes in both German and English, some in the form of an interview with KS himself. And, there's a 24 minute long bonus track called "Dungeon"! It's not necessarily from the Irrlicht sessions, in fact no-one seems to know exactly when or where it's from (other than somwhere in Europe, early '70s), but it's agreed that it's more early Klaus Schulze dronework that needs to be heard...
Blonk does Schwitters! So perfect. The Dada vocal babble classic as interpreted by the amazing Dutch sound poet/performer.
We won't go into too much detail with these as we only got a tiny handful of each. Latest batch of ultra limited lathe cuts from New Zealand label CMR. Each one packaged in a super striking, simple cardstock jacket, most with printed inner sleeves, Limited to 60 copies, of which we got the remaining stock. Once these are gone, they are gone forever.
Sci Hi is another NZ outfit we had never heard of, but we are really digging this. Exclusively upper register exploration, a trilling squeaking keening world of video game sounds and simulated bird calls, dense clouds of high end flutter, reverb and delay wrapped around bursts of beeps and tiny squiggles of sound. Distorted and convoluted, tangled and confusional, but still kinda nice to listen to. This lathe cut 7" comes with a full length cd-r containing 10 tracks, another 40+ minute excursion into Sci Hi's strange high end soundworld.
The aptly-named Scorch Trio is back with another blast of electric guitar fueled n' frenzied Nordic free improv on the Rune Grammofon label. If you liked their previous 3 or 4 discs on Rune G, or the recent Box album featuring Scorch Trio guitarist Raul Bjorkenheim, you're probably eager to grapple with Brolt! Likewise if you're into similar sorts of "dangerous jazz" from, say, Nels Cline's various bands. Yeah, it IS jazz, but with plenty of sharp electric edges and dense drum-battery. While jazz vet Bjorkenheim's six string scorchin' deserves top billing (and he also cranks the electric viola da gimbri), the other 2/3rds of this power trio make plenty of noise too: Ingebrigt Haker Flaten (electric bass, electronics) and Paal Nilssen-Love (drums & percussion), both of whom also play in "garage-jazz" freakout combo The Thing with saxophonist Mats Gustafsson.
Track one gets into skonky-rhythmic territory that recalls the spazz-prog of Japan's Tatsuya Yoshida before it's over, while the next one delves into more atmospheric, textural zones a la Supersilent. And so it goes, the whole album chock full of skree-filled soundscapes veering from the moody to energetic.
Mick Harris has been operating his dub-electronica project Scorn for over 15 years now, with his first forays being released through Earache and later through the industrial minded Hymen Records. Throughout his career, his goal has been devastation through dub, taking plenty of cues from contemporary contexts, whether that be the Pathological label from the early '90s (e.g. Terminal Cheesecake, Ice, God, etc.) with their post-Public Image Limited heaviness, or from the Illbient dark-dark-dark hip-hop of Spectre and the Wordsound crew, or as is the case on this album, the dubstep of Kode 9 and Burial. A threatening, malcontent atmosphere has always been at the heart of Harris' work, even if you were to go back to his early days in Napalm Death; yeah, you'll find that here creeping around the modulated sub-bass riffs that wow & flutter in most every dubstep track. The tracks themselves are nowhere nearly as memorable as anything that the aforementioned Kode 9 or Burial have concocted; but Harris does have a knack for keeping things dark. And if the dark, the dubby, and the devastating is what you are after, look no further.
NOW ON VINYL!
Another manic blast of freaked out 8-bit jams from this curiously monickered purveyor of blown out video game gabber. The sound of Scotch Egg is a bit hard to describe, the closest we can get is, maybe imagine being in an arcade, playing your favorite eighties video game, when inexplicably, lightning strikes the arcade, and the electricity surges through the wiring and right into the video game you're playing, suddenly, the machine freaks out, shooting sparks, the characters on the screen transform into weird shapes and start doing unspeakable things, and the sounds, oh the sounds, that music you grew up with, the soothing lullaby of primitive computer melodies, gone totally haywire, exploding into squalls of utter 8-bit chaos, the rhythms fast and furious tangled and chaotic, flurries of tones, melodies become gnarled and dizzying.
You know that part in Galaga where the mother ship comes down and captures one of your men so you can shoot id down later and have a dual shooter? The sound it makes when it sends out its green and blue tractor beam? Now imagine that sound stretched into a whole song, with the dude from Hella going apeshit on the drums in the background. That perfectly describes one of the songs here. Some of the other tracks sound like the Boredoms if they were transported back to the eighties and tapped to do music for Dig Dug and Mr. Do. Or maybe imagine Venetian Snares, zapped Tron style and beamed into a video game, and these are his desperate musical cries for help. Sound wacked? Well, it is, WAY wacked.
The sounds are all over the map, many you'll recognize as being purloined from some of your favorite video games, but here, they're just tiny parts of a ear pummeling barrage of sound, from Melt Banana style video game grind, to weirdly intense 8-bit drones, all the 'death' music from video games stretched out into actual songs, There are some real drums here and there, some guitar, some fucked up vocals, some tracks even sound like damaged video game free jazz, while others sound like creepy computer math rock, but for the most part it's just frenzied electronic gabber video game lo-fi 8-bit freak out dancefloor destroying mayhem and we LOVE it. Be sure and stick around for the final track, a weird looped groove assembled from what sounds like a tape recorded video game, all lo fi and muddy, but here looped and assembled into some druggy repetitive almost krautrocky drone jam.
We rarely carry toys, not cuz we don't all love toys, but we already have our hands full with just music. But every once in a while, a toy comes along that speaks directly to music nerds like us. And you presumably. And the folks at PressPop in Japan definitely seem to have our number!
Way back in 2005, they released a Bob Moog action figure, wearing a sportcoat, red bowtie and glasses, finger extended to depress a key on his trusty analog Mini-Moog synthesizer. As we proclaimed back then, the perfect gift for "AQ vintage-synthesizer-lovin', action-figure-collectin' shoppers", and we were right, those Moog dolls flew out of here like you wouldn't believe. So here we are 3 years later, and just in time for Christmas, it's time for the second in PressPop's series of electronic music innovators, this time none other than Raymond Scott!
By now, Raymond Scott should need no introduction, if you need to know more, do a search on the aQ site and read all about this electronic music pioneer,, his life, his music, and his legacy. Needless to say, like Moog, with out Scott, a whole lot of your favorite bands would sound a whole lot different. Not to mention the fact that he's responsible for some of our favorite cartoon music ever.
Anyway, if you're like us, your music room or computer or wherever it is that you spend all your music listening time, deserves to be blessed by Saint Scott, his visage overlooking you sanctuary, as he reaches out to add his own synthesizer buzz to whatever it is you're listening to. The body is the same as Mr. Moog's, so he's got the same magic finger outstretched, but Mr. Scott is dressed in a natty grey suit (with a Raymond Scott 100 year anniversary silkscreened on the back) with a black tie, accompanied by his keyboard of choice, the Clavivox, which he invented and patented in 1956 (and which featured a sub assembly constructed by a young Bob Moog who would design the first Moog synthesizer a decade later!). The doll and the keyboard are housed in an eye popping full color box designed by Mr. Archer Prewitt (of the Sea & Cake), and the back of the box features a killer illustration of another Scott invention, the Electronium, a keyboardless automatic composition and performance machine!
And as if that weren't enough, also included is a cd, with more killer Archer Prewitt artwork, which includes: "Powerhouse", probably Scott's most famous bit of cartoon music, a track from Scott's Soothing Sounds For Baby, his collection of electronic music for infants, really beautiful and strange, alien and hypnotic, and coolest of all, three archival tracks of Scott talking about and then demonstrating his various inventions, the Clavivox, the Electronium and the Rhythm Modulator. Holy Cow!!!
As with the Moog doll (now long gone), these are indeed super limited, and a little pricey with overseas shipping, but have a read, a look, a listen, so worth it, the perfect gift for the synthesizer nerd or music obsessive in your life, or heck, buy it for your own geek self, we did!
(Counts as 3 items for shipping purposes, not one or two, as per our usual 'box set rule'.)
Simon Scott produced one of the best records of 2009 with Navigare, an album whose shoegaze dronemusic was dotted with radioluminescent dream-pop numbers. It was hardly a surprise to us when we learned that he was the drummer of Slowdive way back when. Since then, Scott has produced a single for Immune and a collaboration with Jasper TX, both equally fantastic. For his second proper record, Scott makes a slight detour; but one that is well suited to everything else that's been released by the hauntologically leaning Miasmah records. The album opens with a languid series of smoke and mirror abstractions flickering above a nocturnal jazz rhythm that gives way to a Caretaker-esque melody of disembodied historicism amidst subterranean clatter and eerie scrapings. A walking bassline follows this as the only constant to the next track "Betty" whose distant cacophonous guitars slide into audibility through a dense fog of reverb, with a trip along the drumkit taking one tempestuous fill before succumbing to Scott's omnivorous reverb, sounding not all that far from Supersilent at their grooviest and some of those bleached Crescent instrumentals, if anybody remembers that Bristol outfit. With the breathtaking "Radiances," Scott relives his shoegaze past with a song directly out of the Slowdive playbook: a halo of guitar ambience brightens a classic Brit-pop maudlin rhythm section, where the droning slipperiness of the guitar is perfectly countered by the easy pace of the bassline. It really does sound like "Albatross" off of the Blue Day album by Slowdive, and we mean that as quite a high complement. Scott reprises this dream-pop sensibility on the equally deft "Drilla," with electro-static crackling and plenty of ephemeral drone-guitar work to fill in the blanks.
Ah, Miasmah! After the likes of Elegi, Jacazek, and Kreng, we're pretty much automatically interested in any new release on Norway's Miasmah label. Like this one. Add in some bits of trivia, like that Scott was once the drummer for shoegazers Slowdive, and that this disc features a guest cameo from another Miasmah artist we love, Jasper TX, and we're already pretty intrigued. We also weren't at all surprised, but certainly pleased, by the gentle swells of ambient sonics that seep sleepily from the speakers when one hits play. The first two tracks, "Introduction Of Cambridge" and "Under Crumbling Skies", are blissfully replete with quiet hum and shimmering textures, forming into and out of drifting diaphanous melodies, blurry and melancholic. Some sparse, slowed down drum skitter adds a touch of Bohren to the proceedings in the first track, while the second employs a glorious chorus of angelic drones, that graces one's ears again and again throughout the disc.
Then, suddenly upping the volume, the third track "Flood Inn" seemingly enters into a subterranean realm full of soft fuzzy distortion. Quasi-industrially rhythmic, with a distant tolling bell heard amidst the crackle, this is ambience of the heavier (but not harsh) variety, almost like something from a Nadja or Jesu album.
Having given warning of a more sinister side, the disc continues on, with seven tracks more, being a beautiful blend of dreaminess, drone and distortion. There are almost pop songs hidden here, with buried rhythms and barely-there vocals (in one instance contributed by 12K's Sanae Yamasaki, aka Moskitoo), electronic treatments rendering the sound sources (guitar, sitar, violin, cello, flute, field recordings, voice, ???) all one lush, hushed, beautifully bleary, gorgeous warm bath of song-like drone...
It's a moodier, shoegazier take on Pop Ambient perhaps, certainly something that fans of Tim Hecker, Fennesz, Final, Jasper TX, and of course those other Miasmah wonders should check out!
Yay! More from the UK dronester with two first names, who was once upon a time the drummer for shoegazers Slowdive, but only really recently came to our attention via his full-length for the Miasmah label last year, entitled Navigare. We loved, loved, loved that record, as we do most things Miasmah, and compared it to everything from Nadja to Jesu to Jasper TX to Tim Hecker... Now Scott is back with a four-song mini-lp follow-up for the Immune imprint, a vinyl-only 12" that comes with an mp3 download coupon. It's 24 minutes or so of of shimmering, shifting, sometimes sombre, dense drone bliss. Consisting of calm crackle, haunting hum, and buried melody, these abstract soundscapes are immersive, Pop Ambient drift that's physical, yet soothing. Originally begun during the Navigare sessions, but completed later, we're told, these tracks certainly share much in common with Navigare in terms of mood and method (they're apparently, though not that obviously, constructed from digitally processed acoustic instruments, and field recordings, among other sound sources). Mysterious though they may be, we're somehow not surprised when we're further told that certain of Scott's inspirations for these songs include a bout of tinnitus he once suffered, and the sad fate of an alcoholic submariner relative of his.
We wish we had the language - the poetry - to say more about this, to really put into words what this sounds like, but maybe that's not necessary anyway. Those of you appreciative of music like this, addicted to music like this, hopefully already have an inkling that this is for you from what we've already said (or what you've already heard), to which we'll only add our typical, but meaningful, "Nice".
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The Scratch Orchestra was formed in 1968 around the Fluxus inspired conceptual trio of Cornelius Cardew, Howard Skempton, and Michael Parsons. Utilitizing "uncontrolled variables", the Scratch Orchestra (which swelled in size to enormous 432 member ensemble during a performance at the Royal Albert Hall in which the orchestra literally wrecked one of Tchaikovsky's piano concertos) created situations where it wasn't neccessary for the performers to know how to play the instruments, know the score, or have any much of an idea of the piece beyond a general concept. Stella Cardew, Brian Eno, Lou Gare, David Jackman, Dave Smith, Michael Nyman, Tom Phillips, Eddie Prevost, Keith Rowe, and John Tilbury are just some of the members who have performed in The Scratch Orchestra. This piece was the first public performance for The Scratch Orchestra (whose membership at the time is uncredited). Erratic crashes of junk, free-jazz saxophone skronk, and multiple turntables cranking out beat up waltzes and polkas. Quirky conceptual brilliance.
What do you get when you cross one part Nadja and one part Bloody Panda? Well, pretty much what you might expect, a collection of sprawling epic doomic dirgescapes, that slip from spaced out and psychedelic to blackened and buzz drenched, blissed out and ethereal one second, suffocating and crushing the next, most often in the same song.
"Crepuscular" begins all spidery guitars and distant atmospheric shimmer, but it's not long before that Nadja style metalgaze creep blots out the sun, resulting in a sort of washed out, grinding slo-mo dirge that really does sound quite Nadja like, which shouldn't be surprising as both members of Nadja show up here, resulting in something more like Nadja with an extra guitarist, which we're not complaining about AT ALL. It's a gorgeously thick and corrosive and fantastically heady avant metal drift, drum machine driven, give it a sort of Godflesh vibe, but way more blissed out, droney and trancey and totally hypnotic, the sort of dreamdirge heaviness that's so easy to get lost in. That heaviness does get dialed back for a brief spell midsong, during which the trio weave a lust shimmerscape of glistening effects and deem rumbling swells, only to work their way back to an even more blown out dirge.
The title track finds the core Scythling duo of Aidan Baker and Josh Rothernberger joined by vocalist Rebecca Fasanello and Michael Tambouro on hammered dulcimer, which had us expecting something darkly delicate, which the opening few minutes are, but Fasanello's vocals are a demonic shriek, that in places transforms into a witchy croon, and the dulcimer, we were expecting some sort of Botanist like percussive shimmer, but instead, they seem to just add to the general din, adding streaks of metallic shimmer, but for the most part, it's a gloriously slow moving cloud of blackened dirgery, the drums skittery and abstract, a droned out blurscape that manages to sound both grim and black, and spaced out and psychedelic simultaneously.
The final track "Gloaming" introduces another guest vocalist, as well as someone credited with "violet ray", the track starting out haunting and minimal, weird disembodied melodies over distant pianos, all smeared into a hazy abstract drift, a crumbling low end drone gradually surfacing underneath, underpinning what sound more like the Caretaker or Tim Hecker, eventually that low end splinters into a cloud of caustic crumbling heaviness, but the track remains a drifty amorphous crawl, moaning foghorn like melodies, shimmery guitar buzz and tinkling melodies eventually fight back the onslaught, the track unwinding to its end as some sort of blackened chamber music, the doomic creep wreathed in clouds of abstract metallic shimmer.
Band names are tough. Coming up with the right one, one that captures the sound, the idea, the meaning of the music you're making. Some start out stupid, Flaming Lips? But soon becomes so inseparable from the music, that the name virtually becomes the music. Some are so weird, they can't help but be brilliant, Fuck I'm Dead, Bathtub Shitter, and a whole host of others come to mind.
When we first hear Pelican way back when, and were listening to the record, the name just didn't comput, it wasn't heavy or intense, it was just, a bird, but now we're sort of used to it, so Pelican does actually sound sort of intense, like the music. SO maybe the same thing will happen to Seagull, this one man band who's responsible for this here super limited one sided single. Weren't sure what to expect with a name like Seagull, the cover is appropriately black and white and cryptic, the name huge in a killer, almost unreadable olde English font....
Well, no matter what we were expecting from Seagull, it wasn't this, although we were pleasantly surprised. If one can use the word 'pleasant' to describe a disc of grinding growling low end and crumbling hissy noise. But for some of us, yeah, we can use the word pleasant. Although dirge-y and droney and gristly might all work a bit better. A single track, monochromatic and subtly shifting, strangely hypnotic but harsh in a not entirely harsh way. The sound is tough to describe, it sounds a bit like the run off of a record, when the needle slips onto the label and skids to the center of the turntable, a little like that, but mixed with the sounds of a roaring fire, industrial machinery, shifting tectonic plates, grinding glaciers, distant avalanches, or those weirdly fuzzed out spaces between stations on the radio, all sort of woven into one throbbing thick crumble, a garbled muted black noise, but the more you listen, the more melodies and strange textures reveal themselves, hidden rhythms, layers of sound overlapping and shifting slightly. this is definitely 'noise', but some strange almost 'soft' sort of noise...
We have no idea how Campbell Kneale, overlord of the mighty Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label, finds time to keep discovering so much amazing, unheard music. He plays in loads of bands, Black Boned Angel, Birchville Cat Motel, he plays shows, makes record after record after record, goes on tour, has a family, kids, maybe even a real job. It's a wonder he can even run a label at all. Especially one where most of the discs are hand made and assembled. We don't want to jinx it. Not sure what we would do if there was no Celebrate Psi Phenomenon. Miss out on a whole lot of kick ass music that's for sure. We've discovered so many amazing groups, lots of all time AQ faves too: Birchville Cat Motel obviously, Dialing In, 1/3 Octave Band, Peter Wright, Lugosi, Seht, MHFS, Black Boned Angel, Ming, Mrtyu, With Throats As Fine As Needles, Ming, Mirag and more.
And we can now add Seaworthy to the list. This Australian combo sound just like their name would lead you to believe. Serrata is a blissful oceanic exploration, a swoonsome soundscape of distant drones and shimmering sonic surf, lapping waves of sound causing the listener to gently rock back and forth, like floating on your back in a clear tranquil ocean, delicate clouds drifting far above, your body at one with the rolling swells beneath. So serene and peaceful, soft focused and meditative, a dreamy droning meditation on the deep blue sea, a sonic sending off, eyes closed as you drift toward the horizon. Wow.
A thoroughly anomymous proposition located somewhere in Los Angeles, Secam Kino mines the suitably obscure corners of industrial culture and synth-punk nihilism, picking over the choicer bits from such non-household names as Happiest Tapes On Earth, Trance Port Tapes, Cause & Effect, or any jackbooted label promoting dourly industrial electronics circa 1985. The templates for this sound were generated by the likes of SPK and TG, although many of the bands on those labels (and by extention, Secam Kino) have dropped any overtones to a rock/pop structure. No lyrics, no melodies. Just rhythm, noise, disease, and abjection. The tracks can roar with the fluttering wow of varispeed tapedecks lurching toward oblivion with densely packed tricklings from subterranean catacombs, and others lace simple drum-machine through cable-buzzed dischord, horror-score step sequences, and found tape dialogue of a psychosexual nature. The whole thing has the feel of the paranoiac tension of a nuclear command outpost devoid of inter-personnel communication and fraught with military prescribed amphetamines and sleepless delirium. While it sounds very little like Thought Broadcast, Secam Kino taps into a similar fetishization of a very particular sound long since lost to the annals of history. Super limited pressing with silkscreened covers and spray painted cassette shells, as with all of the Chondritic Sound tapes.
An unusual and utterly unhinged black metal album from two of the members of Norway's Neetzach (whose debut cd we reviewed a couple lists ago), Vrangsinn and Dirge Rep. They call Secht "a musical piece of pure insanity". We'd agree, though some might take exception to the "musical" part. They go on to say that it was "composed under Satanic and Narcotic influence" which we do believe. Seriously though, this is certainly a cult concept: it's all one 37 minute track, starting off with drizzling rain-sounds and melancholic acoustic guitar, developing a disturbing, droning atmosphere with baby-like black metal mewlings before unleashing a full-on electric guitar and drums assault, building ever-heavier and more frenzied, with angular breakdowns and an overall extremely maniacal vibe. About twenty four minutes in, it returns to hissing ambience, a creeped-out chill-out in the forest before a final dose of chattering distortion ends the album. File with Abruptum, Mistigo Varggoth Darkestra, Caacrinolas, Rakhim, and whatever other semi-improvised, soundscapey, single-tracked, non-standard black metal you can think of...
And making this even more crazed and cult, since the Secht duo are such scenesters they were able to enlist such friends/fiends as Gaahl (Gorgoroth), Nattefrost (Carpathian Forest), and Nocturno Culto (Darkthrone) amongst others to provide additional screams n' sounds!
It's pretty impossible to not be intrigued by a record that features the legend: "This music was created with the pure power of the guitar drone." Especially when those words prove to be absolutely true.
The record begins with nearly 15 minutes of abstract drift, a wash of delicate low end flutter, soft swells of oceanic drone, ultra minimal and gorgeously languid, the opening track a barely there whisper of sound. So gentle and soothing. Track two introduces that previously mentioned 'pure power' with a coruscating dronescape all keening crumbling distortion, moaning steel strings, a dense reverberation of coruscating grind and scrape, all smeared into a surprisingly melodic sea of blown out buzz.
The final track is over half the record, clocking in at nearly half an hour, and revisits the dark tranquility of the opening track, a stark landscape of drifting bell like tones, distant streaks of muted feedback, slow motion pulses of warm low end, and stretched out partial melodies. A gorgeous bit of night sky glimmer, that toward the very end introduces some abstract distorted guitars, a slow motion wash of rumbling buzz that shifts and shimmers, a huge swaying mass of grizzled guitar growl that gradually fades into nothing...
Essential listening for fans of the drone guitar, especially Fear Falls Burning, Troum, Taiga Remains and the like...
Latest in Gears Of Sand's series of super limited, hand assembled live discs, each documenting a single performance, the first was from the always prolific aQ fave Aidan Baker (of Nadja), this one from the curiously named Seconds In Formaldehyde, whose last disc, a favorite around here, bore the legend "This music was created with the pure power of the guitar drone", and while for that disc, those words could not have been truer, for this latest one, SiF explore a world much more soft and melodic, still generating sounds exclusively with electric guitar, but here the sounds are ethereal, tranquil, the edges soft and rounded, notes and chords waver and shimmer, the guitars soaked in reverb and delay, and processed into long blurred streaks of sound, minor key melodies drift and everything is hushed and underwater. The opener is 20 minutes of almost New Age style bliss, total bottom of the sea, sun dappled sonic glimmer, looped and mesmerizing and subtly dramatic. Cinematic and expansive, yet hushed and intimate. Absolute crystal vibration bliss.
The other two track are similarly dreamy, but offer up much more varied texture, the second getting a bit raw and intense with an almost Nadja style climax, which quickly gives way to more glistening harmonic drift, while the closer, offers up some effects drenched atonal melodies, almost like underwater whale songs, laid over a deep warm shimmering swell, the result, a surprisingly dramatic bit of soft focus, deep listening ambience.
So gorgeous. Not as 'heavy' as the other SiF disc, but still might appeal to fans of the guitardrone, a la Fear Falls Burning, Aidan Baker, Troum as well as folks into pure late night dreamdronebliss. Packaged in a thick, silkscreened, cardstock origami style fold over sleeve. LIMITED TO ONLY 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, we got about a quarter of those, so be quick...
After releasing over a dozen tapes and 7"s, Violent Narcissus is the latest release from Jeffery Witscher, the man behind Secret Abuse, and it's a sizzling heap of buzzing electronics and blown out radiance. Heavy, damaged Iowa city drone scapes. We didn't think it was even possible, but Secret Abuse manages to conjure the perfect dose of harsh bliss. Densely layered walls of fuzz and sizzle that boil over hushed melodies, the lp is equal parts gorgeous and abrasive. Unlike past releases we've heard that don't veer too far from the harsh noise territory, Violent Narcissus adds a bit more to the formula. With some decipherable guitar passages and lush drones buried in blown-out goodness, the album is pleasantly abrasive. Talk about aural cleansing! Highly abusive. Highly recommended.
Let's state right from the outset that Trey Spruance's musical entity known as Secret Chiefs 3 is simply impossible to nail down and describe. Words really do not do SC3 justice, especially in the case of their latest work -- sprawling in scope, intricate in detail and majestically presented -- but we will make a valiant attempt here. Indeed, adjectives such as magical, mysterious and mind-blowing do apply, however they barely scratch the surface. We'd say 'spectacular' but the folks at Tzadik already beat us to the punch by using it on the cd's obi blurb. On Xaphan they've joined forces with their comrade John Zorn, performing eleven passages from his epic work, Masada Book Two. The eleven players embrace, attack, caress and devour the compositions with an otherworldly zeal. They come together as a single inimitable force, at once seeming absolutely unhinged and utterly in control. The threads of the SC3 aural tapestries are always densely knotted and woven with ace musicianship and from a myriad of disparate styles and inspirations delving into spy thriller soundtracks, exotica, metal, surf, esoteric knowledge and so much more. So it is on Xaphan, and the formidable outcomes may seem impervious to some and electrifyingly listenable to others. Breathtaking.
This is the first release on Casual Acid Tea, a new label run by Matthew Clark, the drummer for Premonition 13 (Wino from St Vitus and the Obsessed's new band), and this strangely titled record finds Clark teaming up with Colin Langenus of USAisamonster, which already seems like a strange combination, but when you realize that this group was created to cover tracks from those great Secret Museum Of Mankind compilations of historic early ethnographic field recordings, it somehow seems even stranger.
But once you get an earful, it stops sounding so strange after all. In the tradition of groups like the Sun City Girls, this Secret Museum Of Kind Men tackles two tracks, one from Greece and one from Japan, and channels the spirit of the original, while imbuing it with all the modern musical history that informs their playing, and the results are pretty fantastic.
The A side is a version of "Kaike Ena Sholio" by A. Kostis, and is a gorgeous, slithery slab of buzzing minor key gypsy folk, the spidery guitars matched perfectly by wordless female vox, the drums driving and propulsive, those guitars splintering into slashes of psychedelic skree, and near the end, dense clouds of tangled freakout, the track droney and heavy and hypnotic, and it ends way too soon after just over three minutes. Not hard to imagine it sprawling into a heady expanse of droned out psychedelic raga.
The B side is a reinterpretation of "Ise-No-Umi" by the Imperial Household Orchestra, and is much more restrained than the A side, crooned vocals over fast picked raga like guitar buzz, a simple skeletal rhythm, and then about a minute in, the songs blossoms into something a bit more epic, the drums more driving, the guitars soaring, the vocals soaring alongside, slowly building to a final squall of dirgey pound and psychedelic swirl.
So awesome. Way recommended for fans of Sun City Girls, Siamese Temple Ball, Neung Phak, Dengue Fever, Sublime Frequencies and of course all the Secret Museum Of Mankind collections.
This is the second in the Secret Museum Of Kind Men series, in which a modern band reinterprets songs from those classic Secret Museum Of Mankind compilations of early ethnographic field recordings. Released on a label run by the drummer of Premonition 13 (Wino from St. Vitus and the Obsessed's new band!), it's hard to tell if this second single is by a whole different band, it's credited to an outfit called Ramble Tamble, and does have a bit of a different vibe, but for all we know, it's the same guys just trying something different. Either way, if you loved the first one, you're gonna dig this too, and if you missed out on that one, don't blow it again, cuz this stuff is incredible. Fans of Six Organs and the Sun City Girls' Torch Of the Mystics record, this is right up your alley.
The A side is a woozy prog workout, all slithery synths and soaring strings and shuffling percussion, equal parts gypsy folk, weird synth prog and tripped out heavy psych. Exotic and mesmerizing, it's a hypnotic heady sonic sprawl culminating in a final wild freakout of tangled melodies and warped progged out bluegrass breakdown. The B side is super groove and almost Klezmer sounding, with FX drenched piano, sawed Devil-Went-Down-To-Georgia fiddles and clouds of swirling shimmer, the bluegrass vibe is still pretty present, in fact, it sounds a bit like bluegrass traditionalist Black Twig Pickers after they dosed on a particularly virulent strain of L.S.D.
Like the first volume, WAY recommended. Comes in a super swank, silkscreened metallic blue inked sleeve, with a photocopied insert.
It's been a while since we've heard from this Canadian outfit, purveyors of minimal kraut-drone drift and abstract psychedelic ambience. We Described their sound as being a bit like "Flying Saucer Attack collaborating with Andrew Chalk", which still most definitely applies, we'd also probably compare them to The Caretaker and maybe even Tim Hecker, the two tracks here longform sprawls of slowmotion chordal swells, and washed out faded dreamscapery, the sounds a hazy, crystalline shimmer, the A side drifting blissfully along, through clouds of prismatic thrum, before settling into something a bit darker, the sounds muted and woozy, buried melodies drifting lazily beneath warbly loops and barely there reverbed percussion, a minimal abstract dub, that's more a buried field of crackles and hushed pulsations that a proper rhythm, the sound slowly transforming into something sun dappled and lovely, the second half of the song playing out like some lost bit of chamber music, slowly spinning on an old Victrola, laced with strange bits of percussion, and draped in a gauzey haze. The B side is even more washed out and abstract, a dark, brooding new age drift, all slow shifting slabs of low end rumble, and moaning distant melodies, the first few minutes almost sounding like some record being played bask super slowly, but then the sound explodes into an epic, majestic drone, moving and emotional, roiling minor key melodies just below the surface, imbuing the static sound with a dark emotional heft, all before the sound seems to loop in on itself, building a final stretch of looped tension, and woozy layered mesmer.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!!!
One of our favorite pastimes here at aQ is stumbling across those uncovered gems that may have otherwise remained hidden in internet obscurity. Vancouver, Canada's Secret Pyramid is the perfect example of one of these hidden gems, a humbly packaged cd-r that turned out to blow our freakin' minds. Apparently this guy is one half of Solars, another killer Vancouver psychedelic drone outfit whose tapes have sold-out of here like hotcakes. Picture those same smeared melodies washed away in fuzz, growing drones giving way to sedated vocal murmurs, strummed acoustic guitar embellished with cosmic layers of shimmering delay, all meticulously composed into something that resembles Flying Saucer Attack collaborating with Andrew Chalk.�
"Ghosts of the Sun / Oceans" opens with swirling washes of gently strummed acoustic guitar, layers of howling feedback and cosmic buzz weave themselves in and out of muffled vocal reflections, soft whispers in the dead of night that give way to deep buzzing dark ambiance. Creepy drones hover above the cavern floors like grey mist, distant feedback swells echoing like flutes or distant birds, all building up to a gorgeous fuzz drenched climax that unfolds like a warm jet stream arching across a dim coastal horizon. "Milk & Honey" begins with a deep, dooooomy wash that builds into an entrancing buzz, creepy and hushed FSA style vocals lurch in again, this time reminding us of a contemplative, more droney Suicide. Finally "Permanence" calmly lifts off with a beautifully whirling sound wall, something similar to the cryptic tones of Kevin Drumm's Imperial Horizon, but Secret Pyramid come off as less industrial, and offers up something more mystical, serene and ephemeral. Needless to say, we were really impressed by this debut release and can not recommend it more. "Ghosts" is criminally limited to an edition of 50, so act fast if you'd like to get your hands on one of these hand-assembled cd-r gems!�
Movements Of Night is the first lp (as far as we know) from these Canadian drone drifters, whose past releases (two tapes and a cd-r) we raved about in the past. As much as we loved those, this new one, released on the venerable Students Of Decay label, manages to take their sound even further. From the opening couple minutes, we were totally smitten - the sound a lush, swirling, psychedelic morass, of lush layered textures, of keening, heartwrenching melodies, buried beneath gristly fields of soft focus static, under which, a meditative pulse throbs hypnotically, so cinematic and majestic, haunting and stirring, it's the kind of part most bands spend half a record, or at least most of one long song building up to, but these guys start out, with this dense, cathartic soundscape, which really sets the tone for the whole record, aligning them sonically with Philip Jeck, William Basinski, Tim Hecker, Stars Of The Lid, a sort of darkened psychedelic take on Pop Ambience, a looped dreamscape of heady, hypnotic, blissed out dronemusic, that is so mesmerizing, it has us wishing it would never end.
And while we were prepared to explain that nothing else on the record manages to reach the same sort of sonic and emotional peak, it's actually somehow, not at all true. The next track, in fact, seems to effortlessly conjure up another deep, emotional soundworld, all slow shifting minor key swells, softly reverbed melodies, washed out strings, and lysergic chordal drift, the sound building and building, before slipping right back into a muted field of drifts and swells. And so it goes. Every track, a dark, moody, brooding, cinematic gem, some ultra minimal and abstract, wispy fields of lowercase sound, others bold and strident, emotional and expressive, some almost symphonic, majestic and epic in scope, bordering on psychedelic noise, others hushed and whispery, barely there, brief blurred smears of sonic color, but every single second, of every track on Movements Of Night, is stunning, moving, and utterly breathtaking.
Includes a download code!
Record number two from these Canadian krautdrone drifters, featuring one half of aQ faves psychedelic dronerockers Solars. We raved about SP's first release, a super limited (and now out of print) cd-r called Ghosts, describing it as sounding like "Flying Saucer Attack collaborating with Andrew Chalk" which still pretty much applies. Right out of the gate, SP launch into some thick heady dronemusic, blustery swells of heavily layered buzz, warm washes of blurry chordal bliss, that grows thicker and louder as the track progresses, easing into full on Nadja metalgaze territory, sans the propulsion, instead this dreamlike heaviness is allowed to drift and shimmer.
The label mentions Popol Vuh, and in spirit we can hear the comparison, but these guys (or this guy) are more about deep, heavy dronemusic, building layer upon layer, and letting the overtones and the shifting sonic colorations lend movement to these otherwise near static sprawls. There are rhythms, but you have to dig deep, they've buried way down in the mix, more a distant pulse, or a strangely textural shuffle, but when the rhythm locks in, like on "Still Return", it changes the feel completely, even the melodies seem to coalesce into dark abstract pop, the vibe way more shimmery and shoegazey, but just as kosmische and blissed out as the rest of the record. The rest of the record in this case playing out as a series of dronepsych drifts, slipping from warm, washed out, muted pop ambient blur, to softly strummed folky dirge, to thick blown out psychedelic squall, to lush gauzy dronescape, and finally to a hazy bit of choral thrum, laced with buried melody, and blurred into a fantastically blissed out smear of dreamy druggy drift.
Gorgeous stuff, and probably crazy limited like the cd-r, so you know what that means...
Movements Of Night, from these Canadian krautdrone drifters, was already an AQ Record Of The Week in its original vinyl incarnation when it came out last year. Now it's been issued on cd, in a specially priced two cd set with ANOTHER great Secret Pyramid album, The Silent March, that we'd previously reviewed back when it was but a cassette release, now long out of print (that one's also now been issued on vinyl, separately, by SoD, and can be found elsewhere on this list). So, this double disc is a great deal for all you cd types!! Here are our reviews of the two halves of this release, first, The Silent March:
We raved about Secret Pyramid's first release, a super limited (and now out of print) cd-r called Ghosts, describing it as sounding like "Flying Saucer Attack collaborating with Andrew Chalk" which still pretty much applies. Right out of the gate, SP launch into some thick heady dronemusic, blustery swells of heavily layered buzz, warm washes of blurry chordal bliss, that grows thicker and louder as the track progresses, easing into full on Nadja metalgaze territory, sans the propulsion, instead this dreamlike heaviness is allowed to drift and shimmer.
The label mentions Popol Vuh, and in spirit we can hear the comparison, but these guys (or this guy) are more about deep, heavy dronemusic, building layer upon layer, and letting the overtones and the shifting sonic colorations lend movement to these otherwise near static sprawls. There are rhythms, but you have to dig deep, they've buried way down in the mix, more a distant pulse, or a strangely textural shuffle, but when the rhythm locks in, like on "Still Return", it changes the feel completely, even the melodies seem to coalesce into dark abstract pop, the vibe way more shimmery and shoegazey, but just as kosmische and blissed out as the rest of the record. The rest of the record in this case playing out as a series of dronepsych drifts, slipping from warm, washed out, muted pop ambient blur, to softly strummed folky dirge, to thick blown out psychedelic squall, to lush gauzy dronescape, and finally to a hazy bit of choral thrum, laced with buried melody, and blurred into a fantastically blissed out smear of dreamy druggy drift.
Then, Movements Of Night: As much as we loved Secret Pyramid's prior releases, this new one, released on the venerable Students Of Decay label, manages to take their sound even further. From the opening couple minutes, we were totally smitten - the sound a lush, swirling, psychedelic morass, of lush layered textures, of keening, heartwrenching melodies, buried beneath gristly fields of soft focus static, under which, a meditative pulse throbs hypnotically, so cinematic and majestic, haunting and stirring, it's the kind of part most bands spend half a record, or at least most of one long song building up to, but these guys start out, with this dense, cathartic soundscape, which really sets the tone for the whole record, aligning them sonically with Philip Jeck, William Basinski, Tim Hecker, Stars Of The Lid, a sort of darkened psychedelic take on Pop Ambience, a looped dreamscape of heady, hypnotic, blissed out dronemusic, that is so mesmerizing, it has us wishing it would never end.
And while we were prepared to explain that nothing else on the record manages to reach the same sort of sonic and emotional peak, it's actually somehow, not at all true. The next track, in fact, seems to effortlessly conjure up another deep, emotional soundworld, all slow shifting minor key swells, softly reverbed melodies, washed out strings, and lysergic chordal drift, the sound building and building, before slipping right back into a muted field of drifts and swells. And so it goes. Every track, a dark, moody, brooding, cinematic gem, some ultra minimal and abstract, wispy fields of lowercase sound, others bold and strident, emotional and expressive, some almost symphonic, majestic and epic in scope, bordering on psychedelic noise, others hushed and whispery, barely there, brief blurred smears of sonic color, but every single second, of every track on Movements Of Night, is stunning, moving, and utterly breathtaking.
Seen Through is the duo of Pseudoarcana head honcho Antony Milton and one half of the group Empty Mirror, whose now out of print cd-r we reviewed and raved about a while ago. Dreamy spaced out guitar scrapes and slides. Lots of plink and twang, creak and moan. Hazy melodies stretched out in fields of tape hiss and amp buzz with a wild burst of good old NZ noise rock guitar squall right at the end!
MPEG Download: "Insect Darkens" [/audio/seenthroughinsect.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Insect Darkens" [/audio/seenthroughinsect.m3u]
Year Zero was 2004 for Gerritt Wittmer and Pete Swanson, when these two titans of West Coast noise joined forces under the banner Seers for a smattering of performances and one hell of a studio session. Somebody had offered to release those studio tracks; but as can happen in the world of independent music, the label in question quietly dissolved. Ten years later with Wittmer transitioning into a method-acting debauched balladeer for his Names outfit (whilst continuing his challengingly obtuse vocal-driven sound & noise work) and Swanson departing the Yellow Swans for greener pastures as a globetrotting solo artist from a base in Portland, Oregon (where else?). The sizzlingly white-hot frequencies from the Wittmer-Swanson axis seem to originate from modular synth exploration, feedback immolation, and the volatile jitters of floorcore pedal abuse with the resultant electricity always staring at the precipice of aural violence. We might have mentioned this before, but the Bay Area noise community (think Joe Colley, Scott Arford, Michael Gendreau, R.H.Y. Yau, Antimatter, etc.) seems to tightrope the arenas of noise, electro-acoustics, theory, transgressiveness, transcendence, etc. Wittmer's solo work has often veered into this camp, and he seems to be pulling the psychedelic psychosis of Swanson's aesthetic closer to his on Seers. On the studio recordings, the blistering tones and drones are softened (slightly) through the echoing phasing salve of delay patterns at the beginning of the album; but by the last track, the pure lazerbeam frequencies caused our collective tinnitus to ring loudly with heads cocked alongside Nipper, the RCA / Victor dog.
The second disc in this set is printed up as a cd-r, which is baffling since the studio recordings were professionally replicated as a proper cd. It is a live session, clocking in around 20 minutes in length following what Swanson and Wittmer produced in the studio with seering upper register frequencies and innard-massaging rumblings. A damn shame it too so long for this to come out. Better late than never, that's for sure!
Obscure reissues like this really make our day. This disc brings to light German brothers Eckhart und Wolf-J.'s experiments in instrumental electronic music circa 1971-73, a la early Kraftwerk, Kluster, Conrad Schnitzler, and the Silver Apples... Short, freeky pieces done with home-built synths in some Dusseldorf basement. Give me weirdo D.I.Y. krautrock electronics like this over the output of today's laptop dorks any day!
Another classic slab of dark dreamy drone from Stephen Clover aka Seht. The title definitely hints at what you'll find on this here disc: a slow moving glacial drone, icy and crystalline, throbbing and reverberating, shifting and swirling, barely there but somehow totally and gorgeously suffocating. Lush layers of sound, piled atop one another, as we watch each layer slowly merge with the one beneath it, sonic tendrils surreptitiously exploring the layers around it, until all the layers are inexorably linked, a slowly squirming intertangled mass, dreamy and hypnotic, but haunting and foreboding as well. The second track threw us for a loop though, when a seemingly out of place shuffling drum beat kicked in, all dubbed out and effected, which at first seemed totally distracting, but quickly drew us in with its propulsive throb, and the whole thing quickly becomes some sort of gorgeously alien krautrock. Really cool.
Another mysterious outfit on Celebrate PSi Phenomenon, who we've come to love, if not know entirely. How could we? Each record is a huge expanse of mysterious sound. A barely there sonic travelogue, a slow motion trip through a foggy and murky underbelly. As if somehow we figured out how to sneak behind all of the records ever made. Hidden behind the grand facades of commercial radio and punk rock rebellion and experimental noodling, is a vast expanse of concrete hallways that seem to go on into infinity, in every direction, even down. Tiny sounds echo through the halls forever, making it impossible to discern when the original was made, ten minutes ago? Ten years? A thousand? A dark and creepy seemingly endless glacial drift, the hum of machinery can be heard, just barely, through the thousands of feet that separate these deserted halls from the surface. The distant chirping of some tiny underground insect sometimes intrudes on the shimmering stillness, but just as soon drifts away, leaving ghostlike traces of sounds, and far away impressions of melodies that once were.
