It had to happen, even if only to be fair to those of us without lightning fast reflexes and supernatural senses regarding tracking down ultra limited, barely available cd-r's. Over the last 4 years or so, Machinefabriek, aka Rutger Zuydervelt, in addition to releasing several amazing 'proper' records, a cd, a 7" and maybe a few other things, has unleashed an impossible amount of self released ultra limited cd-r's, all in micro editions, 100 copies, 50 copies, some even less, and while we've done our very best to grab as many as we could of every single one, we missed a bunch! And of the ones we did get, they sold out in the blink of an eye. So here's your chance, a massive sprawling double disc collection, gathering up bits and pieces, the best tracks from an armload of releases, all sequenced and woven together, into what could very well have been actual Machinefabriek albums.
It's hard to tell exactly which cd-r's are included, and since only certain songs were selected, even those of you who nabbed every cd-r in sight, odds are there is plenty here that you haven't heard. Definitely lots of stuff we didn't recognize, and all of it, as we've come to expect, simply amazing. Long drawn out stretches of warm fuzzy ambience, muted glitchery, melancholy melodies, soft sweeping epics, wreathed in dense FX and thick swirls of shimmery whir and whirl. One of the masters of our new favorite sound, that sort of foggy buzzy dreamy drone thing we can't seem to get enough of. Fans obviously absolutely need this, and folks who were daunted by the limited nature of past releases, or just have a thing against cd-r's, this is the perfect introduction, a chance to hear what you've been missing.
And there -are- plenty of surprises. While both discs do flow beautifully, there are some strange sonic moments, the dreamy wheezy Eastern tinged post rock drift of "Oi Polloi", the ultra gristly and crackle infused glacial crawl of "Chinese Unpopular Song", the almost Merzbowian intensity of "Hieperdepiep", the THX-theme-stretched-into-gorgeous-metallic-drone of "Wintervacht", all seemingly strangely out of character for Zuydervelt, but in the bigger sonic picture that is Weleer, they sound perfect, all nestled comfortably amidst rich, thick sonic swells and smears. So great!
Another new Machinefabriek, this one a collaboration with American musician, Stephen Vitiello, and this is a record where the concept is so genius, the music would be hard pressed to live up to the expectations. For this collaboration, with Machinefabriek in the Netherlands and Vitiello in the US, instead of sending files back and forth as is typical with long distance projects, the duo came up with a clever idea. Each picked a handful of objects, and sent the objects to the other with instructions to use nothing but those objects to craft a piece of music. Which seems simple enough until you see the list of items: bells, book, tin foil, buttons, crackle box (?), thumb piano, field recordings, rocks, speakers, broken record and cassettes. Each of them created two songs on their own, and would team up for a final piece using another box, full of even less obviously musical items, which we'll discuss in a second.
First, the two Machinefabriek pieces, number one, using just bells and tin foil and buttons, Machinefabriek, aka Rutger Zuydervelt, managed to craft a piece not all that different than stuff he's done in the past, bells being the main sound it seems, sometimes recognizable, other times blurred into warm fuzzy tones, super minimal, by the end the tones seem to have blossomed, expanded, the notes deep and resonant, the bells a distant shimmer. For his second piece, Zuydervelt, using field recordings rocks and speakers, crafted a very Jewelled Antler sounding soundscape of staticky crackle, muted scrape, distant hum, all very rough and raw, but partway through they transform into something much more clinical and cold, the field recordings taking center stage, an intense buzz, almost felt more than heard, bits of high end squiggle, distant voices, all over a deep dark shimmering whir. Quite nice. Like a more musical Ryoji Ikeda during the second half.
The first of Vitiello's pieces, using just a crackle box whatever that is and a thumb piano, is all sine waves and dog whistle tones, crackle and buzz, clipped clicks and processed static, the thumb piano, only audible now and again way off in the background, a mournful almost melody, drifting in a field of glitch and crackle. Vitiello's second track, utilizing broken record and cassettes (seems like he got the easier part of the bargain, as most of his items were sound oriented or sound makers), is a gorgeously blurred and woozy field of electronically altered voices and snippets of music, bits of crackle and pop, skipping looped fragments, all smeared into what sounds like fractured short wave broadcasts, chunks of glitchy buzz, muted melodic whirs, strange effects, by now I think we can safely assume that the objects sent weren't the only items used, as there seems to be much processing and loads of effects. Still gorgeous and abstract, but would have been neat too to see what these two guys could have done without a computer and all those effects. But it's a good thing, they were allowed to use effects and computers and things, cuz not sure what the last track would sound like without em, considering the objects for the final track, the collaboration, are chocolate sprinkles, tape, egg cutter, rice and a plastic bag. Listening to it now, hard to believe even with all that technology at their disposal, that these guys could conjure up something so musical, but they did, and it's fantastic, deep resonant tones, disembodied voices, shimmering chimes, deep swells of low end, plenty of crinkle and crackle and static, but all very warm, and haunting, dark and mysterious and most surprising of all, melodic. Easily the prettiest song on the disc. But now matter how hard we listen, we just can't seem to hear the chocolate sprinkles...
This massive remix disc from AQ dronedrift fave Machinefabriek, is composed entirely of remixes of the out of print Stofstuk cd, the shortest Machinefabriek release but quite possibly our favorite. Originally released as a�little rectangular business card shaped 3" cd and clocking in at an impressive 5:31,�Stofstuk was recorded with only a singing bowl, a contact mic, a vinyl record and a laptop, and originally created as a private pressing, and is easily one of the most gorgeous slabs of shimmery minimalism we've ever heard. It was also crazy limited and went out of print in no time. Thankfully, since all of these remixes are based on that same track, it's included here for those of you who missed out. So before we get to the remixes, best to probably quickly describe the source. For�five glorious minutes, deeeeeeeep notes are loosed, lush and resonant, allowed to billow out like sonic ripples, every once in a while, some massive bass kicks in and washes over the listener like a huge slow motion wave, it's strangely transcendent, rich with intense emotion and sonic impact. Around these cavernous swells, various drawn out notes drift and shift, soft focus layers laid upon one another, gauzy and ephemeral, all hovering blissfully over a gorgeously muted field of barely there record crackle. Wow. Like a warm and dreamy Jeckian take on Raster-Noton, or some cosmic minimal meditation music. So totally beautiful. It almost seems a shame to remix something so nearly perfect to begin with, but thankfully, the majority of these mixes manage to subtly tweak the original, retaining much of the magic, while managing to imbue the revamped version with a bit of their own subtle style.�
If you loved the original version as much as us, this double disc is pretty much a no brainer. We complained in the first one about the 5 minute playing time, and how we just set the cd player on repeat and listened to it over and over and over, and that's almost what this is, but with each repeated play subtly and slightly altered (and a few dramatically different), but it's pretty tough to argue with 2+ hours of variations on Stofstuk. Plus check out the list of remixers: Alva Noto, Mitchell Akiyama, Xela, Svarte Greiner, Lesser, Freiband, Kim Cascone, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Luigi Archetti, Julien Neto, Pita, Adam Paccione, Henrik Rylander, Gert-jan Prins and loads more. As we mentioned, most of the versions are subtle variations, you might not even be able to tell the difference if you weren't paying close attention, but a few folks mix it up, Freiband adds a thick layer of caustic buzz and grind to the then barely audible original, Aaron Martin adds some glitch and microphone noise, Xela brings out the original's muted melodies and adds voices, Lesser adds a bit of grind and crunch, Henrik Rylander buries the original beneath layers of warm whirring fuzz, Julien Neto gives his version a soft focus, easy listening sheen and�Gert-Jan Prins transforms the tones of the original into gritty buzzing grinding low end and piercing sine wave tones, but these are the exceptions, and even though the above descriptions make it seem like those tracks must stick out like crazy, in the context of a massive double disc set, they sound just perfect, nestled as they are amongst song after song of whispery droney drift. So gorgeous.�
Packaged in a soft cottony pouches, housed in a folded cardstock jacket and a thick vinyl outer sleeve.�
Split singles are the perfect way to shove two bands together and see what happens. A successful split can go in either directions, two bands who have fuck all do to with each other, and do their own thing, or two bands who are together for a reason, best case scenario, because their sounds are in some way complimentary.
So consider this a best case scenario, two AQ faves, both masters of abstract drone and beautiful ambience, each given a side to do what they do, and it sounds like the two 'groups' worked off each others sounds. That's how great these two tracks sound together.
Machinefabriek goes way minimal, a super abstract, nearly static tone poem, each note stretched out into long barely pulsing streaks, rich luxuriant tones allowed to ring out and slowly subside, crystalline and gorgeously minimal, the lows deep and fluid, the highs soft and shimmery, a subtle sound that dissipates softly, as if it was designed to be a constant fade out from the very first note.
Black To Comm unfurl clouds of reverberating tones, thick billows of metallic shimmer, deftly (and VERY subtly) crafted into muted melodies, sounding like a louder, more dense reinterpretation of the Machinefabriek track. Chimes and bells, smeared into blurs of warm melodic drone, distant percussive twinkles, all wrapped up in BTC's gorgeous dreamlike sprawl.
Pressed on beautiful swirled grey vinyl, and packed with an original full color, hand painted collaged insert/cover, every one is different.
LIMITED TO ONLY 100 COPIES!!!! We got 20. Once these are gone we will NOT be able to get more...
Another entry in the who-can-release-more-records competition currently going on here at aQ. It's Machinefabriek versus Jasper TX, complicated by the fact that the two occasionally decide to make records together! Thankfully, it's a contest where everyone wins, especially those of us into gorgeous ambient dronemusic.
You couldn't ask for a better set up though. Two Fabrieks. Machinefabriek and pianist Leo Fabriek. We have to wonder if it was a coincidence and the two already new each other, or if Machinefabriek discovered this other Mr. Fabriek and tracked him down. Either way, the results are fantastic, and sounds like the two of them are very much of the same sonic mind.
The main sound source is of course Fabriek's piano, while Machine fabriek contributes guitar, banjo, effects and something called Povtronic. And we assume does all the mixing and processing. Dark doleful piano sprawled out over slow shifting whirls of processed low end. A constant slow pulse of rumble and whir, the piano a constant dark melody drifting dreamily. The background sound some sort of slowly moving nearly static sonic snapshot. The various elements moving subtly beneath the piano's slow crawl. The fourth track has little swirls of backwards guitars, some disembodied banjo twang, and ends up sounding like some back porch piano flecked ambient doom. While the final track features a gorgeous languid piano melody, drifting downstream on a buzzing sea of murk and hiss and whir, rumbling and shimmering, building in intensity until it's almost a machinelike grind, never deterring the resolute piano, plucking out note after note, letting them sink into the noisy abyss. So gorgeous.
We only wish there were more hours in the day, so we could spend some of them listening to this, and the growing stack of Machinefabriek cds we've been amassing.
Amazing packaging too. An elaborate folded origami style sleeve, not exactly sure how it's assembled, so haven't pulled it all the way apart to see what lurks inside, but it looks gorgeous. And there's a printed cardboard insert, with the liner notes, that slides into the side. Cool.
Angus MacLaurin (a piano-tuner and pipe-organ builder who lives in a log cabin in Maine), has been a member of various indie-rock ensembles that we're not super-familar with...but here he's all on his own, recording his "finely-tuned glasses" (wine glasses, judging from the indistinct photos) onto five different reel-to-reel machines, and then carefully splicing and mixing the tapes. A bit of theremin, kalimba and bass is added on two of the tracks as well. The results are varied and beautiful, a kind of ghost music. Gently haunting, chiming, ringing, glistening drones. Occasional backwards voices are heard, adding further to the ghostly effect... And I just noticed that one of the songs is called "Ghost Ship". Nice!
There has been something of an Angus MacLise revival going on in the past couple of years, stemming from the discovery of many archival Maclise recordings by Tony Conrad. In the '60s, MacLise had been a instrumental figure in the inception of LaMonte Young's Theatre of Eternal Music as well as the first incarnation of The Velvet Underground, before infamously departing after learning that they would get paid for a gig. Anyway, he thought VU was too structured. A creative wanderlust led him out of those pursuits, working with dozens of composers, poets, film-makers, artists, etc. and travelling all across the globe in pursuit of hermetic wisdoms and Buddhist teachings. "Astral Collapse" collects 6 tracks from the MacLise archives, offering a variety of instrumentation including organ, bongos, piano, autoharp, cembalum, bells, an Arp synthesizer, field recordings, voice, and plenty of effects. As heard on previous recordings, MacLise transforms everything into shimmering, intoxicated trances of amorphous sound. As talented as MacLise may have been as a poet, I can't say that the spoken word entries on "Astral Collapse" are all that successful; however, the haunting arpeggiated organ on "6th Face Of The Angel" and the dreamy, sonic shape-shifting of "Cloud Watching" more than make up for the incongruities of psychedelic drones topped with an earnest recitation of Buddhist mysticism.
"Brain Damage In Oklahoma City" is the second archival release on Siltbreeze of Angus MacLise's ecstatic drone minimalism. MacLise was the original percussionist for the Velvet Underground (before quitting after learning that they'd been PAID for a gig) and an active member of LaMonte Young's Dream Syndicate along with Tony Conrad and John Cale. While MacLise's sound definitely holds a similarity to the '60s minimalist giants around him, his sensitivity to texture separates him from his cohorts who were more interested in a strict adherence to concept. The highlight of this collection is the lengthy concert performed in New York as a benefit for the Oklahoma City Police Dept. Tony Conrad's liner notes (which appear to be some of his diary entries from 1968) aren't terribly clear as to the intent of the benefit - whether to pay for MacLise's legal fees from getting busted in Oklahoma for pot or because of general benevolence to the fraternal order of the police. I think the former is more likely. Regardless, this blows that recent Dream Syndicate release on Table of the Elements out of the water. Impressive tranced out drones (featuring Conrad playing "limp string") collide with the abstract rhythmic patterns from MacLise's barrel conga.
This most recent collection of work by Angus Maclise is culled from a collection of over 50 tapes discovered over 20 years ago and rescued from probable destruction. Maclise was instrumental in the formation of LaMonte Young's Theatre of Eternal Music as well as the first incarnation of The Velvet Underground, and continued to explore drone music, Eastern music and electronic tape music until his death in 1979. This two disc set features early electronic experiments, some epic ambient/drone pieces including performances from John Cale and Tony Conrad, and 2 recordings of Maclise reading his poetry, of which there are apparently very few recordings. While we are not much for spoken word around these parts, the two pieces here are actually quite nice. Maclise's poetry is strange and pretty wonderful and is delivered over a background of drone and hum and buzz. The rest of this collection includes the above mentioned short pieces for electronics, a bunch of short instrumental explorations and three 30 minute pieces of ambient clatter and ur-drone. Gorgeous and spacious, free and transcendental. Think No Neck Blues Band meets the Dead C meets Stockhausen. Great stuff!
MPEG Download: "Trance #2" [/audio/maclisetrance2.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Trance #2" [/audio/maclisetrance2.m3u]
The first pressing of this classic slab of modern minimalism sold out in a heartbeat, so we're guessing pressing number two will follow suit, and not surprising really, these archival recordings are fantastic. Rescued from obscurity by Gerard Malanga, this lp documents a handful of purely electronic recordings, a sound few knew MacLise had ever explored before, but listening to these now, has us wishing he had continued. The A side especially is a stunning sprawl of glimmering ambience, lo-fi, and full of ambient sounds, voices, room sound, chair scrapes and the like, but all of that is subsumed into the glorious field of shimmer MacLise conjures up. "Electronic Mix For 'Expanded Cinema'" does in fact live up to its title, the sound expansive and psychedelic, and yeah, very cinematic at points, sometimes devolving into wild little tangles are furious electronic squiggles, but just as often blossoming into something much more majestic and moving, long stretches of near silence too, at which point the ambient sounds seem to drift to the fore, as well as the sonic artifacts of the original medium, tape hiss and hum, but that hiss and hum only adds to the lush textures and constantly shifting sonic landscape. We'll admit that a lot of academic music and modern electronic minimalism can sometimes leave us cold, bleeps and scrapes and clicks, but the sounds here manage to feel lush and organic, the arrangements alive, the recordings raw and intimate, and definitely worth it for the A side alone.
But the B side is chock full of equally compelling stuff, murky expanses of drum driven (?) psychedelia, blurred, hazy ambience, looped and layered sounds, "Trance 1" especially is some sort of spaced out psychedelic jam, with Maclise joined by Tony Conrad and John Cale, with some of the other tracks moving back into purely electronic tonalism, the sounds gristly and in-the-red, flitting from pure tone phase to weird psych jam and back again.
Killer stuff. Here's hoping there's more lost gems like these still to be discovered...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Angus MacLise - poet and percussionist - was a key player in LaMonte Young's "Theatre of Eternal Music" which also spawned such artists as Tony Conrad and the Velvet Underground (which Angus a considerable amount of input in founding but quit upon learning they'd make money at a gig). "The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda" is comprised of lengthy pieces of looping psychedelic drones and hippy drum circle freakouts that were composed to accompany Ira Cohen and Jack Smith art films.
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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Angus MacLise was the original percussionist for the Velvet Underground (before quitting the band upon learning that they would be paid for a gig) and a member of the legendary trance / minimalist ensemble The Dream Syndicate with LaMonte Young, Tony Conrad, and John Cale. Recently his archival recordings have resurfaced as the Silbreeze collection "Invasion of the Thunderbolt Pagoda," this vinyl only collection from Counter Culture Chronicles, and the indefinitely postponed Dream Syndicate release (courtesy of Table of the Elements). Distrubing trance music that drifts endlessly with gritty hurdy-gurdy (?) drones and the constant pitter-patter of tablas and small hand drums. This eponymous collection features the long out of print "Trance" single from Fierce, "The Joyouse Lake" flexi disc which featured an excerpt from 1965's "Invasion of the Thunderbolt Pagoda," and the soundtrack to Ron Rice's 1964 film "Chumlum."
Just as it first appeared in the Boston Area around 1977, there are no song titles, contact info or any other identifying information accompanying this mysterious release, a reissue of a private press recording of serene but outsider-inflected new age classical composition. Like another similarly minded aQ fave, Moolah, the music presented on Mad Music Inc. is an oceanic mixture of echoed piano, harp and gong, in short sketches with one track adding percussion, some subtle bass groove and female spiritual cosmic jazz vocals (not quite the "cosmic disco" stated on Drag City's cover sticker, but still pretty cool!).
The primitive cover painting of two diametrically opposed naked women looks like it was inspired by Da Vinci's famous Vitruvian Man, with the women jumping out of their constrained environs. This seems like it would be an easy candidate for the Nurse With Wound list, especially with the back cover graphic of a chuckling Ming The Merciless type character with a tape machine implanted on the side of his head. Whatever it means, it must have been too elusive for even Stephen Stapleton, an obsessive authority on such obscurities. Regardless, for fans of weirdo new age, library records, and private press mysteries, this should be a nice sounding addition to your collection!
The liner notes to this reissue from a 1990 cassette boldly state that, "all sonds you hear on this cd originated from natural ambient sources. No electronic sound-sources were used." For those who would think that such a disclaimer would result in Maeror Tri's excursion into field recording and acoustic documentation, you would be wrong. All of the effects and heavy treatments that plant Ambient Dreams firmly within Maeror Tri's well established aesthetic of dark atmospheric drones and post-industrial bleakness are still present and accounted for. If anything, Ambient Dreams demonstrates that Maeror Tri (and their contemporary incarnation Troum) are all about their arsenal of effects units and their backmasking tape techniques; but they sure as hell know how to use them as effectively on Ambient Dreams as on any of their other records. As on all of their other albums, blurred masses of sound ground everything for Maeror Tri's droning productions whose amorphous structure fluctuates with a frigid liquidity. The half melodies, breathy fragments of sound, and rippled textures that break through the aforementioned dark ambience have all of the trappings of Maeror Tri's typical guitar strategies, rebuffing their claim that all of the work is of "natural ambient sources," unless of course those highly treated sounds found their way into a sampler and sequencer. Regardless, Ambient Dreams conjures the recurring image for Maeror Tri of blackened clouds of ash, dust, and soot suspended in desolated abandoned warehouse whose interior is sporadically pierced with dim shafts of light.
The material from the cassette releases of Maeror Tri have been trickling back into circulation over the years thanks to a nearly global campaign to keep these recordings into print. Maeror Tri should need no introduction from us by now, they being the German industrial-drone trio that enjoyed a vibrant existence from 1988 to 1996. In the best tradition of the DIY / mail-art / cassette-culture values, they eagerly recorded material for pretty much every request that came their way, with cassette releases and compilation tracks that barely saw much in the way of distribution during that time period, given the limited pressings. Ambiguitas was one of these cassette-only releases that was released in 1995 by the Lebensraum subsidiary of the French power-electronics / dark-ambient imprint Nuit Et Bruillard. It should be noted that the recordings are actually much earlier, dating back to 1991. This is a very bleak album even by the standards of Maeror Tri, who seem to be augmenting their thrumming drones with power-tool expressionism and nocturnal percussive clamor as heard on "Fusion Of Sementary Intelligence" which follows the guttural tape-noise chimney sweeping of the aptly named "Death Surrounds You". The latter half of the album shifts towards those achingly maudlin, long-form guitar drones that Maeror Tri's Stefan Knappe has mastered over the years, transitioning into those into a epochally cinematic form within Troum. Ambiguitas is fleshed out with two possibly unreleased tracks that date back to 1988, when the trio buttressed their ashen bellows with lugubrious synths and delay-pedal dub tricks.
This cd edition was reissued by Sergey of Five Elements Music / Exit In Grey on his new imprint Teta-Morphosis in an edition of 500 copies.
Originally released in 1997 on the now defunct Iris Light imprint out of England, Emotion Engramm was the final album from Maeror Tri - the haunting, post-industrial drone trio that was the precursor to the equally haunting, post-industrial drone DUO Troum. This record - more so than any of the other Maeror Tri albums - engaged the complex structures that Troum would later push through their interlocking, shadowy melodies and slow-motion, effects-heavy drone. At the same time, the concepts that went into Emotional Engramm are more closely related to the clinical psychological themes of the Maeror Tri albums Multiple Personality Disorder or Language Of Flames & Sound, as referenced by the titular engram (purposefully misspelled in the title), a Scientology term for a mental image embedded into the brain by any type of trauma - physical, emotional, psychic, or otherwise. Far from prescribing the teachings of Scientology, Maeror Tri uses that concept as a jumping off point in conjuring "resonance of control, impact, fortuity, the randomly instigated yet inedibly etched emotional memory: Kodak ghosts." It's easy to read particular passages within the frozen din of washed-out guitar noise, spectral melodies, tectonic bass rumblings, and metallic slashes of grim electronics as the seizures within the psyche that might get caught in an infinite loop for the inner-mind. Some of those images provide an emotional resonance that's deeply sad and full of despair, while others are enraged with a blackened hostility. As we mentioned, many of the ideas and strategies that went into this album continued to develop through Troum; but even so, this stands as one of the best albums that either Maeror Tri or Troum had produced.
It's been a very slow process, but the massive catalogue of cassette only releases from Maeror Tri appears to be making its way into the digital realm. Back in the early '90s, the Italian label Old Europa Cafe had released a very interesting tape series including two albums by this legendary German industrial drone outfit. It is a shame that in their recovery of these archival Maeror Tri recordings, OEC released the two cassettes as a double CD-R instead of giving them a proper CD release. No matter, it's still nice to see these recordings back in circulation. How long they'll be around is, of course, another matter. Hypnobasia (1992) is one of the noisiest manifestations of Maeror Tri, as trio of guitars spew volcanic slabs of distortion upon their signature low-end drone work and deep space ambience. Ultimate Time (1994) featured a bunch of tracks that had originally been commissioned for compilations, which for whatever reason never materialized. The flanging bass drones, metallic scraping, phased delay patterns, backwards masked screeches, and eerie crashing noises buried in digital reverb make for a much bleaker, more nightmarish version of the Krautrock antecedents in Popul Vuh and Kluster, but with ample references to Zoviet France and Lustmord thrown in the mix.
VERY LIMITED!! We only have a handful of these, and assuming we -can- get more it might take us a while.
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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Almost entirely overlooked by 'post-rock' journalists for their fascination with industrial culture, Maeror Tri (now disbanded though Stefan and Martin have continued as Troum) have nevertheless constructed some of the most beautiful and simultaneously terrifying drone rock, complete with delicate melancholic melodies sublimated beneath glacial guitar washes. These tracks were culled from the backing tapes Maeror Tri performed with on their last European tour. Opens up a can of whup-ass on Windy & Carl and Labradford. A pretty limited piece of vinyl from Soleilmoon.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
AQ favorite dronologists Maeror Tri dissolved in 1997 (with two thirds of the band reincarnating as Troum), but a handful of MT recordings have recently seen the light of day. "Hypnotikum II" is the second (and final) part of a series based on the tape loops used in a series of MT performances in 1996. Maeror Tri's dreamy oversaturation of drone-guitar noise is reminiscent of the old skool power electronics in which you can't tell if the melodic interludes are actual elements buried deep within the sound or hallucinated fragments. As with everything Stefan Knappe touches (either as MT/Troum or on his Drone 7" label), this is golden.
Here is the second pressing of Maeror Tri's 1996 album Language Of Flames And Sound, which has long been noted for the brain-shaped packaging (faithfully restored in the second edition) and also has the distinction as being Maeror Tri's noisiest recording. This German trio began in the early '90s as a bleak, Dark Ambient project that brought a simple, if elegant use of effects-driven melodies to post-industrial noisescapes proposed by the Hafler Trio, Lustmord, and Illusion of Safety. While there are plenty of drawn out periods of flanging drones, spectral hiss, and those evanescent melodies which have become the trademark for the post-Maeror Tri project Troum, Language Of Flames And Sound brutally slams down on the distortion boxes, turning these languid, pseudo-Goth drones into thickened buzzsaws of melodic guitar noise that's not all that far from where black metal has progressed in recent years. An album like this should also make Aidan Baker blush as so many of these sounds have been mirrored in Najda. Throughout these megawatt explosions of radioactive noise splattering the all-consuming, ever dark ambience, Maeror Tri set down grinding loops of mekanoid pulsations that get at the band's Industrial roots. It's nice to have this back in print, although it's pretty limited. So who knows how long this batch will last.
The two Meditamentum collections stood as the 'best of' Maeror Tri's offerings culled from their numerous cassettes released from 1989-1996 at the tail end of the first wave of cassette culture as we know it; and these collections had in fact gone through a couple of different reissue iterations themselves eventually getting released through the seminal dark ambient label Manifold, some fifteen years ago. Of course, those are long out of print; now the Polish label Zoharum has brought all of the material from those anthologies into this double-disc set, with much nicer packaging and artwork than any of the previous versions. But the strength is still in the sounds produced by Maeror Tri, whose Stefan Knappe and Martin Glitsch continued as Troum after Maeror Tri disbanded in 1996. Melody and rhythm soon became parts of Troum's droned-out vocabulary, but these musical aspects were far more fleeting in the work Maeror Tri, which hinged on an abstraction of grim noises that have more in common with the formation of cold planets out of comet dust, iron ore and ice than the instrumentation of guitars, bass, synths, flutes, accordions, etc. Here, it is the thrumming reverb of inhospitable galactic forms colliding in deep space, rippling through time and the cosmos as an existential shot of raw nihilism. As such, the recordings of Maeror Tri have much more of an industrially tinged, thousand-yard stare, which is fully on display on Meditamentum. The cassettes from which this collection was drawn include Peak Experience, Somnia Et Expergisci, Ambient Dreams, Sensuum Mendacia, Sublimal Forces, Allianz, Hypnobasia, Venenum, Beauty Of Sadness, Archaid States, Ultimate Time, and a handful of tape comps. Yes, a few of these cassettes have enjoyed reissues themselves; but this collection makes for one of the best bodies of work that Maeror Tri has ever produced.
This is the second Maeror Tri reissue to appear in the past month, perhaps signifying a flood of old material from the seminal German droned-out industrialists. Or maybe not. Regardless, Meditamentum I originally came out on the tiny Holonom label back in the mid-90s, collecting tracks from the huge catalogue of Maeror Tri's cassette-only releases dating back to 1989 (including tracks from Peak Experience, Somnia et Expergisci, Ambient Dreams, Sensuum MEndacia, Sublimal Forces, Allianz, Hypnobasia, and Venenum, if you must know). Limited to 500 copies, the first volume of Meditanentum quickly went out of print, only to be repressed (in a much nicer package with embroidered cloth sleeve) by Manifold. As a whole Meditamentum is a far more ambient, drifting collection than the black-hole isolationism found on the recent Singles collection released on EE Tapes; nevertheless, the trio still concentrates on their signature cold, grim soundfields of droning guitars, laced with backwards breathy echos and haunted extented vocalizations.
Multiple Personality Disorder was the first cd and first major release for the seminal post-industrial ensemble Maeror Tri; and yes, the album's title does allude to one line of psychological research into the delineation of (in this case) four personalities that often correspond with acute cases of multiple personality disorder. On one hand, this thematic application does make a parallel to the pseudo-diagnostic aesthetics promoted by SPK and Lustmord in the early '80s; but on the other, Maeror Tri's Stefan Knappe was studying psychology throughout university, and those ideas clearly impacted the way he approached music, smearing dark drones and ethereal melodies out of heavily processed guitars, bass, synths, and other instruments through Maeror Tri to provide an evocative, enveloping, atmospheric, and occasionally threatening form of dark ambience.
The four suites of the album include "The Administrator," "The Anaesthetizer", "The Revenger", and "The Protector," each seeking to encapsulate the metaphoric sounds of those aforementioned personality traits. Hence, the first seeks something of a balance that's neither too dark nor too warm in the shimmering guitar drones and backwards masked swells of monochromatism. The second piece is a opiating, druggy drone track, that has a serpentine, oozing quality in the densely stacked rumbles of low-end distortion and shadowy murk. "The Revenger" is a suitably menacing track of down-pitched vocal snarls and demonic growls that grate against a noisescaping drone backdrop. The finale is downright beautiful certainly looking forward to the post-Maeror Tri project Troum and their luminous, billowing drones sculpted with lilting melodies buried under tons of smeared reverb. Multiple Personality Disorder was always one of the best Maeror Tri albums, and one that succeeded through this conceptual framework (which would have caused lesser artists considerable trouble). The reissue does do away with the original Korm Plastics artwork, which wasn't anything really to write home about; so, if you don't have the original and are keen on anything dark and droning, pick this up!
Maeror Tri was a legendary German post-industrial band that forged a mighty sound of corrosive, post-Industrial dronescaping throughout the '90s before moving onto the equally impressive drone-based project Troum. Myein was one of the first CDs for Maeror Tri, originally released by ND Records and housed in an unusual, oversized triangular sleeve. Now that this has been reissued through Waystyx, Myein enjoys a slightly less cumbersome, but no less appealing matte black, die-cut sleeve with a gold envelope housing the disc. Myein opens with a black cauldron of swarming guitar drones that steadily increases the atmospheric pressures over the course of the opening track before cracking in a burst of seething noise. Maeror Tri follows this with one of their more melodic interluded, extending a melancholic descending chord progression into a haunted mantra. The final entry on Myein finds Maeror Tri at their most sprawling, amorphous, and shadowy with an undulating ocean of dark dark drones littered with flanging sounds. We can only hope that Myein is the first of many reissues from Maeror Tri's hard to find back catalogue. Excellent!
"Like a waterfall in your mind" reads a pithy text on the back of this reissue from the German industrial-drone iconoclasts Maeror Tri. It's very much a fitting descriptor to the sprawling, long-form bass-rumble that those three had developed as their signature sound during their prolific career from 1988 to 1996. Hypnotic, transfixing, ominous, sublime. Subliminal Forces was one of the many cassettes that had been released in a tiny edition at sometime during their career. The sub-underground imprint Tonspur put out the original cassette, doing so in 1993, which was a couple years after the recordings were completed. Suspended tones of flanging guitar noise and flecked electronics hang above inky black, gothic, shadowy, sepulchral, subterranean, and otherwise dark-as-fuck tones, lending to an post-apocalyptic imagery of flickering strands of Christmas lightbulbs that somehow managed to stay illumined while the remaining landscape is charred, bombed-out, deserted, and strewn only with rubble. After seven tracks of expressively desolate slabs of industrial drone, album's isolationist tendencies crack only slightly with the final track "Memento." Here, pools of synths and guitars ripple against each other's languid reverberations and spectral decay. Very lovely. Reports from the peanut gallery about the original tape's inconsistent sound seem to have addressed with the remastering of this album for the 2014 relaunch. As such, it's a necessary reissue on all fronts.
During the past couple of weeks, there has been a deluge of reissued material from the German ensemble Maeror Tri, whose exceptional, post-Industrial dronemusik straddles the current obsession with the doom-laden atmospherics of Corrupted, SUNN O))), Earth, etc. and the sublime impressionism of Jonathan Coleclough and Mirror. The Beauty Of Sadness was one of the last cassettes that Maeror Tri released before calling it quits in 1996; and as one might be able to discern from the title, this record finds Maeror Tri shifting their drones away from their heavy, menacing bleakness and toward a transcendent etherealism. Out of the churning wash of sound from their dynamic use of reverb, delay, and flange effects boxes, Maeror Tri push through honest to goodness songs of hypnotically repetitive guitar chords, melodies, and harmonies, making The Beauty Of Sadness come across like a rough-hewn but equally effective version of My Bloody Valentine's bleary eyed monotone found on Loveless. For those familiar with the recent work of Troum (whose members were two-thirds of Maeror Tri), The Beauty Of Sadness is an obvious precursor to thier marvellous first chapter in the Tjukurrpa trilogy.
Limited to 200 copies each wrapped in a slipcover that fits (almost too) snugly over the jewel case. There's a good chance we won't be able to get more and if you happen to concern yourself with the collectability / condition of your cd's, we would urge to take care when removing the jewel case from the slip cover.
Since their early beginnings, the German guitar-drone ensemble Maeror Tri had a love affair with the 7" single that extended into their formation of the now seminal Drone Records series of 7" only releases. From 1993 to 1998, the trio released five singles on a handful of labels, condensing their ground zero ambience, post-industrial shadows, and subharmonic detonations into eight minute chunks. Cleverly packaged in a seven inch cover, this compilation from EE Tapes features four of those five singles, including the Physis 7" for Fool's Paradise, the Mystagogus 7" for Noise Museum, and their two releases on Ant-Zen, Exorbitant and Pleroma. Saltatrix, which was the first single that Maeror Tri produced for Drone Records, is the one missing single from the compilation; and that's only because Drone is planning on re-pressing that single sometime in the future.
The Physis single opens the album with a post-Neubauten bashing of tribal rhythms upon heaps of scrap metal which gets an accompaniment of looping feedback, static, hiss, and ominous throbbings. While better known for their bleak ambience, both Maeror Tri and their later incarnation Troum explored primitive rhythms within the guitar excursions from time to time. Mystagogus and Exorbitant delve into subterranean murk with deep, all-consuming heavy drones steeped in a gravel throated menace, often heard in recent days from naysayers SUNNO))) and Corrupted. The album ends with some of the best pieces that Maeror Tri or Troum have ever done from the Pleroma 10" which happened to be released after MT had already disbanded in 1996. It's a cauldron of low-end misery that brims forth with an ominous riff whose melody sheers through the isolationist pall of secrecy. Absolutely stunning! Considering that only 524 of these things exist, they (like the rest of the Maeror Tri catalogue) won't last long.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Some of the earliest work from this amazingly prolific German drone band, "Venenum" was originally released back in 1991 as a cassette on AudioTapes and now sees a super limited digital release. At this early stage in Maeror Tri's existence, the overstaturation of guitar, keyboard, and occasional Teutonic vocalising held much more of a post-industrial ambience than the trancedent darkness of their later work. Lumbering melodies and bleak passages of raw sound filter through tons of icy effects. Really great stuff.
Very prolific, that Maeror Tri! This new Wheel double cd marks the third compendium of obscurities, compilation tracks, and unreleased material for this aQ-favorite drone-industrial outfit, following the two volumes of the Meditamentum series (originally released individually, but later collected onto a double disc set). Maeror Tri began back in 1988 and developed into one of the pioneering dark-ambient projects of the '90s before the project dissolved. Two of the members continued on as Troum, trekking along a similar trajectory for the heavy / bleary thrumm. The album is sequenced chronologically, with the title track of a DIY 4-track piece of echoplex saturation and sci-fi synths. This track of eerie synth pointillism and the next track from 1989 of monophonic plainsong chants cast through abandoned warehouse reverberation represent Maeror Tri's wanderings in the dark in search of their own vocabulary. By 1990, the flanging, shimmering gossamer guitars took root within the heavy pall of reverse-tape loop effects and dense bass-drones. The first disc marches through terminally obscure tracks (including one from a VHS tape that would be very interesting to watch, in order to see what Maeror Tri's visuals would have looked like!) from 1988-1994; and the second takes up the period from 1994-1996. On this latter half, the band abstracts the echo and shadow into slippery pools of despairing drone-melodies complemented with thunderous bass rumblings. There's a maudlin fragility to these guitar-laced melodies often stitched onto a far more desolate or tumultuous underbelly than heard on the first disc, as Maeror Tri become master impressionists in their compositions for sodden atmospheres, ironclad rigor, and grim industrial vibes. Hand-numbered Russian pressing, and as such, we have limited stock on hand.
Second solo record from Preston Nunez, whose 'day job' is playing in cosmic synth drone outfit Scantily Clad, whose three cd-r's were all big hits around here. A little while back Nunez sent us some copies of the debut record from his new group Guisher, which while bearing virtually no relation to Scantily Clad, still totally hit the spot, a head spinning bit of slice and dice audio collage weirdness, rhythmic and groovy and noisy and all over the sonic map. So we weren't entirely sure what to expect from this new project, Mafouka, which definitely has more in common with Guisher than with Scantily Clad, but where Guisher was a relentless sonic barrage, Mafouka sounds more measure and composed, at least a bit, it's still a bit of a barrage, 14 songs in a little under 20 minute, short bursts of hypnotic soundscaping. The opening track is all woozy and warped, a rhythms created from what sounds like a needle scratching across the surface of a record, not to mention some slowed down beats, looped female vocals, shimmery synths, it's like a super raw, primitive home brewed Portishead almost, that sort of washed out, late night vibe, then the next three tracks, all clocking in at well under a minute each, offer up brief snippets of sound, from a layered and looped but of easy listening, to some dialogue heavy, drum addled ambience, to a killer chunk of super distorted dirgey doom, again laced with bizarre samples, until finally another song that breaks the 2 minute mark, a synthy distorted creeper, the sound panning from speaker to speaker, laced with chopped up bits of drumming, layered voices, warm swirling melodic shimmer, which leads directly into another twisted, surprisingly melodic loopscape, from which unfurls the rest of the record, a sprawling selection of primitive sampledelia, equal parts Art Of Noise and Negativland, but all woven into something much more moodily musical, a glorious bit of home brewed 4-track alchemy that in some way plays out like a bedroom indie pop Endtroducing, albeit a bit more freaked out and fractured.
More super extravagant home mad packaging, this time, colored jewel cases with the art printed onto clear stickers which are affixed to the front, no tray, the 3" disc affixed to the inside of the trayless jewel case, over some photocopied artwork pasted into the bottom, which is also visible through the back of the jewel case, which has yet another clear sticker affixed to it. LIMITED TO 50 COPIES!!
Portable mp3 players and iTunes and all the digital music out there has definitely changed the way we listen to music. Many folks barely listen to whole albums anymore, instead making playlists, or setting their devices on shuffle, and while in some ways, that's a bummer, that the traditional concept of THE ALBUM, seems to be slowly fading from the collective consciousness, in other ways, it's actually gotten lots of folks to listen to music they've had forever, but had maybe forgotten all about, and shuffle is the best thing to happen to deep cuts EVER. How often does some track start playing, and you're forced to check and see who it is, and it ends up being some band you love, some record you love, but it's a track hidden away mid record. And the other thing we've noticed is how much you end up listening to records that are in your iTunes RIGHT AFTER one of your favorite records, there's that record you always listen to, which inevitably leads right into whatever comes next alphabetically, and bam, that next record is suddenly a new favorite too. Something similar happened at work, where one of the computers had an iTunes full of music, and there were certain records we listen to all the time, and like above, one of those records would play right into the next, and EVERY time, we would have to check and see what it was, and every time, it was a band called Magdalena Solis, so we checked the store, and the website, and we had never carried it. A mystery of sorts. Quickly solved when we discovered that it was sent to us by two awesome aQ customers, Wouter and Terje, thinking we'd like it, and boy did we, we LOVED it in fact, so much so that we tracked down the band, and then the label, and finally got actual copies for ourselves, and for YOU. And trust us, it was well worth the wait.
The sound of Magdalena Solis hovers somewhere between psychedelic space rock and kosmische krautdrone, which means it's pretty much EXACTLY what we love, hazy, washed out drifts of dense distorted wah wah guitars, swirling FX, Eastern melodies, hushed angelic female vox, minimal drums, most of the tracks, pulsing and drifting and shimmering, and when there are drums, it's more sort of a blissed out, percussion laced spacedronedrift, take "Seven Boys And Seven Girls" the drums a simple motorik pulse, the main melody looped and cyclical, the whole thing wrapped in effects-heavy swirls of distorted synth and psych guitar buzz, the sound building to a seriously blown out cacophony, only to settle right back down again, leading into the comparatively contemplative "Cities Crumbling Planets Growing", a sitar soaked stretched of billowy low end, and distant sci-fi squiggle, barely there guitars slowly build into something, thick and fierce and spaced out and dreamily distorted.
The whole record is a series of smoldering slow build space drone epics, heavily layered landscapes of swirling synths, wheezing organs, skittery percussion, lush warm sonic swells, all wreathed in thick swaths of serious psych guitar, the sound constantly shifting from tranquil and dreamlike, to blown out and druggy/droney and way tripped out, heady and hypnotic and easily some of the best kaleidoscopic kosmische space/drone/psych we've heard. Most definitely recommended for fans of White Hills, Grails, the Alps, Expo 70, Gnod, Carlton Melton, Bong, Lumerians, White Noise Sound, Spacemen 3 and other droney, druggy psychedelic drifters...
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, comes with a download code.
Elsewhere on this list we're reviewing the vinyl reissue of a long out off print cd-r featuring an AQ wet dream collaboration between Australia's Grey Daturas and Portland's (formerly SF's) Yellow Swans. Here we have a similar match up, but instead of those two bands butting heads in a dense noisy free for all, Maggoted is the secret rendezvous of just two like minded souls. Rob Mayson from the Grey Daturas and Pete Swanson of the Yellow Swans. You can almost picture the scene. Two guitarists, a bassist, drummer, keyboards, lots of noise, a big glorious ear splitting drone drenched racket, when Pete leans over and whispers in Rob's ear "Psst. You wanna go somewhere, umm, a little less crowded, you know, just you and me?" So the two secret off, and whip up their own private din. 30 minutes of droning grinding industrial free noise ambience, that ends up being as good as anything either one has done on their own.
There's definitely a like-minded approach to sound making shared by the Swans and the Daturas, obvious on their collaboration, and even more evident here when it's just one on one. Huge slabs of corrosive distorted whir, are separated by stretches of haunting tranquility, peppered with strange little sonar like tones, sort of industrial, a definite creeped out dark ambience, grinding and lumbering like Godflesh with all the metal removed, leaving nothing but a huge dense amorphous heaviness. By the end of the first 15 minute tracks, all the subtle dynamics and mysterious industrialism has been swallowed up completely by sheets of white noise and squalls of brutal hiss. The second 15 minute track follows a similar pattern. A dreamy muted drift, with boiling teapot high end skree way in the background, a moaning minimal drone right underneath, wavering and warbling below, with soft fluttering notes and lower register melodies drifting and swirling like whisps of black smoke. As the two meander darkly through this subtle sound world, a distant wave of white noise and damaged electronics threatens to overtake them, building into a frothing fury, before completely burying them in a thick swirl of cracked glitch and buzz and wild whipping streaks of grinding guitarnoise. Woah!
Packaged in a cool blue on black handscreened sleeve with photocopied insert.
LIMITED TO 150 COPIES, OF WHICH WE GOT ABOUT 40!!
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The saga of The Magic Carpathians, formed by Anna Nacher and Marek Stycznski and using a revolving cast of guest musicians continues to explore traditional Eastern and Central European folk, blended with an eerie psych-drone that never fails to be compelling and moving. This latest, putting tabla and bass center stage on many tracks, evokes both their regional and psychic influences, creating a deep, noisy atmospheric triumph.
The Polish avant-hippy experimental ethno-folk duo (got that?) the Magic Carpathians release their first domestic US disc, quickly following up their recent import-only "Denega" album (and coinciding with their first ever US tour, which featured an appearance
Vast celestial ventures, blinding cosmic rays, rhythmic inductions, psych jams from another planet! Well, not exactly another planet. Sun soaked Long Beach locals, Magic Lantern have generated quite the buzz over the last year or so after a steady output of limited cdr's and tapes.� We managed to catch one of their kraut-bliss live sets over the summer and we were really blown away. High Beams, their first vinyl release, is a finely crafted representation of Magic Lantern's sheer psychedelic power. Heavy blistering riffs swimming in a primordial ooze of spaced out organ, ripping solos, and luring drones.�By far the most solid and impressive recording we've heard from these dudes.�A fully engaging experience, High Beams maintains a nice balance between more intense, freak out, explosive-type jams and mellow, soft-daze meanderings. Pressed in an edition of 500 by the Not Not Fun family, this album is a must have for fans of anything cosmic! Trust us, you need this!
Another one we never got around to reviewing for some reason. A home brewed psychedelia, fusing Eastern melodies, psych folk shimmer, strange electronics, cinematic soundscapes and dense layered noisiness, using a crazy assortment of instruments, and not-exactly-instruments, including pump organ, voice, contact mics on faulty electrical lines, melodica, toys, iron balls rolling on wooden floors, accordion, cellophane, air cans, tape decks for the blind, guitar, shruti box and lots more. Twisted droney avant folk noise weirdness that is definitely right up our alley...
In the world of Magick Markers this release on the Gulcher label is perhaps most notable for being their first ever professionally manufactured compact disc. Yup, it's a fact! Up until now the band has had their music released on cassette tapes, cd-rs, and oh one vinyl lp on Ecstatic Peace (aka that label run by that fellow Thurston Moore). So, this is certainly a cause celebre for... someone. Musically, this very long-titled album is a disorderly heap of chunks and slabs of noisy guitar shambles that some folks might consider a distant relative of No Wave, but methinks that comparison would imply more compositional structure and form and organization than the Magick Markers have mustered here. File under: electric guitar dysentery. Note: although they've listed a whole slew of song titles ("Jung Knew Enough To Shut Up" is one of them), this is actually two 19+ minute long tracks (i.e, the individual songs aren't indexed).
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Praise the gods of Zeuhl. Here's the latest from French spiritual, operatic sci-fi prog jazz masters Magma! Fans over here should be doubly excited, because Magma are soon to embark on their first US tour in ages, including a date here in San Francisco in early April. In all likelihood, they'll be playing some material from this release, and it will fit right in with their classic '70s material. Magma's current lineup - with both young whizzes and old vets - is potent to say the least, we have no doubts that their shows will be amazing.
The symphonic onslaught of Slag Tanz is Magma at their usual over the top selves, a complex and conceptual 8-part piece (about 21 minutes total) full of insistent rhythms, heavy duty basslines, operatic exhortations, darkness and light. It's mostly sung in their made up language of Kobaian, of course, so we have no idea what it's "about" (even though the lyrics are printed in the booklet!) but it's clearly something serious, of course. We'd compare it with the likes of Japan's Ruins and Koenjihyakkei, if the influence wasn't in fact the other way around.
Cool all-black cover, with embossed logo and title. Digipack cd, or 180 gram vinyl with download code.
Given the look and sound of this short EP, Magnetic Stripper could be some terminally obscure DIY-industrial-synth project circa 1982, with the tinny drum machines, noisy blurts from various synths, and plenty of references to Absolute Body Control, Minimal Man, The Units, and Chris Carter's synth moments within Throbbing Gristle. But in fact, this is the work of San Francisco's James Ellis, currently working and performing today. There are four short pieces that would make for a great teaser for a forthcoming record, with the weird-science array of disjointed synth melodies and electro-static squiggling, all hanging upon skeletal drum machine pulses. The title track has more of a bedroom project New Wave feel with its motorik rhythms and percolated step sequencing. The other three tracks take more of an early SPK direction with all of the drum rhythms taking on a lumbering pace, minus the snarled noise and grizzy imagery. Both sides of the 7" end on locked grooves, and the single comes with a retro-looking button. Very cool.
Another backroom discovery, we got these more than a year ago, and somehow they never made it out on the floor. This trio of Australia underground vets have teamed up for some gorgeous sprawling free rock / free jazz weirdness. Warm and languid, abstract and pretty dreamy, taking guitars, vocals and drums, some feedback and processing, and even a bit of saxophone, into a weird blend of Necks like jazzy minimalism, and slow burning post rock ambience, like the Dirty Three covering the Dead C! All deep reverby guitars, sizzling cymbals, creaking bits of percussion, soft swirls of effects, very moody and fuzzy and ethereal. Some female vocals surface here and there, a soft torch songy croon over the smoldering post jazz skitter underneath, building to something a bit more abstract, a little more noisy, the cymbals still unleashing clouds of metallic shimmer, deep distant rumbles and whirs, some spidery guitars, and some woozy washed out ambience.
As the end draws near, the drone grows a bit more caustic, multiple layers of cymbals and soft feedback, and muted barely there low end, drift and swirl into a gorgeously hazy near static drone, rife with overtones and subtly shifting barely there melodies, and again, that skeletal guitar reaches up from the murk, grounding the free drift in something slightly more postrock, before closing off with a sub 2 minute outro, all angular Marc Ribot like guitar and breathless female vocals, haunting and quite pretty.
Think Necks, Bohren, Dirty Three, For Carnation, but a bit more avant and abstract, quite lovely...
Runar Magnusson hails from Iceland, although he is now living in Copenhagen where he has quietly been producing some of the oddest electronica to pass through the store. Certainly if you've been infected by the viral sounds of Fflint Central or the electro-absurditites of Stilluppsteypa, Magnusson's work is something to check out. That said, the album opens on unsteady grounds as fellow Icelander Asmundur Asmundsson warbles drunkenly through the words to Lou Reed's "Walk On The Wild Side," but as grim drones absorb the voice into the folds of grey vibrations, distant rumblings, and creepy electro-acoustic spasms, The Art Of Dying begins to live up to its name. An isolationist drift and shadow continues for a bit more than 35 minutes before Magnusson introduces a tumbling post-New Wave kaleidoscope of arpeggiated electronics that sounds like the dark sides of Fad Gadget and Heldon melded into a radioactive rhythmic cascade. After this incredible crescendo to the album, Asmundsson returns with another a capella clunker; for his finale, "We Are The World." Disturbing in more ways than one.
Perhaps the following situation may be a bit foreign to those of you who don't work in the music industry but we'd bet that some version of this happens to everybody now and again. Every once in a while, I (Jim) will meet somebody whose best friend is in a band or I'll re-acquaint with an old high-school or college pal who has recently discovered GarageBand; and inevitably the conversation sways to "Oh, you work at a record store? You should really check this record out! You'll love it." It's then that the misanthropist in me wishes I was wearing Andee's tUMULt t-shirt which elegantly proclaims, "I hate your band," as the music proffered inevitably falls between the twin pillars of musical mediocrity: Dave Matthews and Hootie & The Blowfish. Instead, there's usually a smile, a nod, and the non-critique, "oh, that sounds nice!" hoping the conversation will turn to other matters.
So when Ashis Mahapatra contacted me a while ago about his newfound love with digital synthesis, I was a bit nervous. Here's a genuinely great person who I hadn't been in touch with since college; fortunately, his record is FUCKING AWESOME, so I really didn't have to worry about dancing around the subject of a crappy record. Enough of that for a protracted introduction. Onto the meat of the record... Orange Of is an album that fans of Fennesz, Tim Hecker, and Keith Fullerton Whitman will drool over, densely packed with guitars blurred, fizzled, and refracted through the polygon abstractions of Max/MSP techniques. A beautiful shimmer of tapped guitar tones hovers above a thick pool of drone harmonics at the album's beginning, slipping and sliding through micro-glissandos before erupting in a dense Kevin Shield's explosion of narcotic distortion and tone-bending half-melodies. Mahapatra doesn't allow the computer to do too much of the talking for him, as he's certainly keen on grounding this album on the fundamentals of songwriting as swaying instrumental waltzes and elegant melodic phrases nestled in Mahapatra's vast oceans of post-shoegazing digitality. A highly recommended release from one code-slinging guitarist whose bound for great things.
