7"
A ludicrously rare outing from Jah Rej and the Jah Works crew appearing on vinyl for the
first time.
.*Dating from 1989, `Carrion Bird' has only previously surfaced on the cassette-only various artists set `One Foundation' released on the Jah Works label.
*A deep meditative instrumental (apart from a hint of Donette Forte's voice drifting into the mix) dropping on a moody head-nodding mid-paced rhythm.
*Backed with `John Crow' a retrained dub mix by Rej from Channel One UK studio.
Music and Poetry of the Kesh is the documentation of an invented Pacific Coast peoples from a far distant time, and the soundtrack of famed science fiction author, Ursula K. Le Guin's Always Coming Home In the novel, the story of Stone Telling, a young woman of the Kesh, is woven within a larger anthropological folklore and fantasy. The ways of the Kesh were originally presented in 1985 as a five hundred plus page book accompanied with illustrations of instruments and tools, maps, a glossary of terms, recipes, poems, an alphabet (Le Guin's conlang, so she could write non-English lyrics), and with early editions, a cassette of field recordings' and indigenous song. Le Guin wanted to hear the people she'd imagined, she embarked on an elaborate process with her friend Todd Barton to invoke their spirit and tradition.
For Music and Poetry of the Kesh, the words and lyrics are attributed to Le Guin as composed by Barton, an Oregon-based musician, composer and Buchla synthesist (the two worked together previously on public radio projects). But the cassette notes credit the sounds and voices to the world of the Kesh, making origins ambiguous. For instance, The River Song' description reads, The prominent rhythm instrument is the doubure binga, a set of nine brass bowls struck with cloth-covered wooden mallets, here played by Ready.' According to writer and long-time friend of LeGuin, Moe Bowstern (who pens the liners for the Freedom To Spend edition of Kesh), Barton built and then taught himself to play several instruments of Le Guin's design, among them the seven-foot horn known to the Kesh as the Houmbúta and the Wéosai Medoud Teyahi bone flute.' Barton's crafting of original instruments lends an other-worldly texture to the recordings of the Kesh, not unlike fellow builders Bobby Brown and Lonnie Holley. Bowstern notes, Other musician / makers have crafted their own Kesh instruments after encountering the earlier cassette recordings that accompanied some editions of the book.' Both Barton and Le Guin are sensitive to the sovereignty of indigenous Californians and were careful not to trample the traditions of the Tolowa people who lived in the valley long before the Kesh. You research deeply, and then you bring your own voice to the table,' said Barton. Within the Kesh culture, the numbers four and five shape the lives, society and rituals. Barton composed loosely around these numbers, patiently listening to the land of Napa Valley for signs and audio signals from the natural elements. Todd incorporated ambient sounds of the creek by Le Guin's house and a campfire they built together. The songs of Kesh are joyful, soothing and meditative, while the instrumental works drift far past the imaginary lands. Heron Dance' is an uplifting first track, featuring a Wéosai Medoud Teyahi (made from a deer or lamb thigh bone with a cattail reed) and the great Houmbúta (used for theatre and ceremony). A Music of the Eighth House' sends gossamer waves of the faintest sounds to float on the wind.' Like the languages invented in the vocal work of Anna Homler, Meredith Monk, and Elizabeth Fraser, the Kesh songs and poems play with the shape of voice.
The Music and Poetry of the Kesh cassette was meant to accompany and enhance the experience of reading Always Coming Home. Presented in this edition as a long-playing album, where only traces of the book linger (the jacket offers some of Le Guin's illustration, and a letterpressed bookmark featuring the the narrative modes of western civilization and the Kesh valley is included), the music alone breaking the silence of what might be. It can transport—offering a landscape for imagining a future homecoming. One in which we are balanced, peaceful, and tend to the earth and its creatures. A line from the Sun Dance poem reminds us, We are nothing much without one another.' Freedom To Spend gives new life to the recordings of the Kesh people in the first ever vinyl edition of Music and Poetry of the Kesh, out on LP, and digital formats on March 23, 2018. The LP will include a deluxe spot printed jacket with illustrations from Always Coming Home, a facsimile of the original lyric sheet, liner notes by Moe Bowstern, multi-format digital download code and a limited edition bookmark letter pressed by Stumptown Printers in Portland, OR.
This past Monday, January 22, Ursula passed from this realm to another leaving a life spent building and exploring other worlds while challenging social concepts of the real word she inhabited.
Freedom To Spend had been working under Ursula's enthusiastic endorsement and with Todd Barton, her musical collaborator on Kesh, to give the music that accompanied her 1985 epoch a new life. With the Le Guin family's encouragement to move forward with our planned release, we are humbled to play this small role in sharing Ursula's work.
As Pete Swanson, one third of Freedom To Spend, stated, Ursula's legacy is her work which transformed the world, and this is another piece of the universe that her imagination birthed becoming real.' Listen to A Teaching Poem / Heron Dance' below.
For his third album for Far Out Recordings, London based multi-instrumentalist and one of Europe's finest saxophonists Sean Khan ventures to Rio de Janeiro to collaborate with iconic Brazilian polymath Hermeto Pascoal. Taking its title from the escaped slave settlement 'Palmares' in the Northeast of Brazil during the 1600s, Palmares Fantasy is Khan's utopian jazz message for the world, and features Azymuth drummer Ivan 'Mamao' Conti, bassist Paulo Russo, guitarist Jim Mullen, and guest vocals from Brazilian chanteuse Sabrina Malheiros, and Cinematic Orchestra frontwoman Heidi Vogel.
Like Hermeto Pascoal, Sean Khan is a self-taught musician. Never able to afford his original dream of studying at Berklee, and having been turned away from Guildhall School of Music for being 'too raw', he became disillusioned with what he saw as the exclusivity, elitism and dangerous institutionalisation of the jazz world. Yet Sean's love for music and the drive to create never faltered.
Hermeto Pascoal, the man Miles Davis once dubbed the most impressive musician in the world', is a similarly independent artist. A true maverick whose ingenuity and freedom from conventional restraints is so great that he has essentially conceived his own musical language, made him the dream collaboration for Sean.
Aspiring to inclusivity and equality also informs the message in Khan's music. Inspired by the 17th Century settlement of Palmares in Brazil's Alagoas region, which was free from the Portuguese crown's murderous exploitation of South America for a century, Khan notes his fascination with the fact that while majoritively made up of escaped African slaves, many deserter conquistadors also joined the settlement.
Hearing the deep-grooving title track with this history in mind, the listener is transported to a futuristic musical eden, with Mamao's insatiable 10/8 rhythm back-boning Hermeto's wild improvised vocals, rhodes and whistles, while Sean's harmonically brilliant sax and flute add more layers of moody, characterful expression. 'Moment of Collapse' is Sean's poetic study on the uncertainties of modern day western civilisation, delicately presented by the gorgeous vocals of Heidi Vogel and drenched in lugubrious strings and Alice Coltrane-esque harp. The two covers on the album are of Hermeto's own 'Montreux' (on which Hermeto plays solos on a teapot and a pint of water), and an uplifting soulful jazz-funk take on Milton Nascimento & Lo Borges MPB classic 'Tudo Que Voce Podia Ser' featuring the vocals of pioneering nu-bossa voice Sabrina Malheiros.
The recording sessions for the album were part of an intensive and hugely productive eight-week excursion to South America for Far Out boss Joe Davis in the summer of 2016, which also saw the sessions for Azymuth's Fênix and a forthcoming album from Uruguayan fusion legend Hugo Fattoruso.
Fantastic' Gilles Peterson
Loving this!' Opolopo
Thank you!' Sassy J
Proper! Great track.' Colin Dale
this is great!' Yannick Elverfeld (RBMA / Needs Records)
I've enjoyed Sean Khan's earlier releases, but this really seems like he's grown into his fairly considerable talent.' Mark Sampson (Songlines)
His last album was his best so far, but I think this one may be even better.' Laurence Pragnell (Soul Brother Records)
dope!!!' Kyri (R2 Records)
this is great - really cool vibe!' Sam Redmore
wonderful track - can't wait to hear the lp.' Simon Harrison (Basic Soul Radio)
This is very tasty indeed.' Gavin Boyd (Soul Has No Tempo)
Stunning!!!' Mark Milz (Further In Fusion)
Oi Oi' Samuel Lloyd (Balamii Radio)
PRESS / ONLINE
VINYL FACTORY (UK) News (Anton Spice) 09/03/18 online
SOUNDS & COLOURS (UK) News (Gabriel Gahan) 09/03/18 online
THE WIRE (UK) Review confirmed (Joseph Stanard) print
EVENING STANDARD (UK) Review confirmed (Jane Cornwell) print + online
ECHOES MAGAZINE (UK) Review confirmed (Laurence Pragnell) print
LIBERATION (FR) Feature confirmed (Jacques Denis) print + online
MUSIC IS MY SANCTUARY (CA) Premiere confirmed (Mike Jones) online
JAZZ MAGAZINE (FR) Review confirmed (Frederic Goaty) print
SHINDIG! (UK) Review confirmed (Grahame Bent) print
MUSICA MACONDO (UK) Premiere confirmed (Tim Garcia) online
RAWCKUS MAGAZINE (USA) News (Randy Radic) online
KIND OF JAZZ (UK) Review confirmed (Fernando Rose) online
TONART MAGAZINE (DE) Review confirmed (Michael Moehring) print
WORLD MUSIC NETWORK (USA) Review confirmed (Raul Da Gama) online
BADD PRESS BLOG (USA) Review confirmed (Kevin Press) online
ORKESTER JOURNALEN (DK) Review confirmed (Patrik Sandberg) print
LIVE
WORLDWIDE FM (UK) Sean Khan live session confirmed (Gilles Peterson)
RADIO
BBC RADIO 6 (UK) Gilles Peterson - Palmares Fantasy (24/02/18) link
OTHER
BRITISH AIRWAYS On board BA flights (June 2018)
A thrilling 9-song set, Murmurations is as perfectly pitched for headphones as it is for clubs, named after giant cloud formations of starlings and themed around the stunning emergent behaviors that appear within them. To mirror these movements in the sonic landscape and visuals of Murmurations, SMD's James Ford and Jas Shaw collaborated with the celebrated Hackney-based vocal collective The Deep Throat Choir, as well as creative directors Kazim Rashid of ENDLESSLOVESHOW (Aphex Twin, Flying Lotus, Hudson Mohawk) and Carri Munden.
Finding time in between Ford's work as a producer and Jas' club gigging last year, the duo arranged a session in Shaw's countryside studio. Via an introduction from a friend of Ford's wife, The Deep Throat Choir's director Luisa Gerstein and SMD began swapping some production and melodic ideas. They decided to bring the whole East London-based choir into the studio to experiment, and the results were intense. Jas says, 'Listening to them moving their voices around a tone, altering the timbre, making chords, was like working with an incredible new synthesiser.' Rashid and Munden explore related ideas centered on kinetic energy and communal movement throughout the visuals of Murmurations. Rashid says of the collaboration, 'We were both having discussions around the purity of collective human experience and how transcendental this can be. Techno and the dance-floor is one of the last true expressions of this euphoria.'
From the beat-less introduction 'Boids' onwards you can hear uncanny patterns and sounds rising up from the sea of voices -- not traditional chords or harmonies, but complex interference patterns that play tricks on the mind and merge perfectly with SMD's distinctive synth tonalities and instinctive dancefloor nous. At times you might hear hints of Bulgarian choral music, or Cocteau Twins, or avant-garde composers like Iannis Xenakis or Pauline Oliveiros - but really, thanks to the creative freedom of SMD's working methods, it is a sound completely of its own, something all too rare in an age of retro and reference.
Ford and Shaw still have the same love of pure sound, human harmonies and electronic possibilities that they did when they first met at university, and it's clear that their career path has allowed them to nurture this love and express it as vividly as ever before.
Ryuji Takeuchi provides Instruments Of Discipline with an EP of noisy, hypnotic tracks, ranging from giddy, stomping, left-field techno to melancholic ambience; the EP's title 'One's Sentiment' provides a thoughtful angle to this at times cacophonous collection, for while they are bristling with noise there is something contemplative about the pieces, expressed in a way that suggests more than one thought trying to take life at the same moment, Ryuji finds space for conflicting voices both spatially and in terms of mood, the first three tracks, 'Ambivalence', 'Sadness' & 'Sorrow' crawl with competing elements, synth lines drool over and meld with throbbing kick patterns, anxiety & excitement are tightly wound in focus as tracks build and develop, leaving the listener to navigate these abstract planes, intoxicated; while the final track 'Regret' is a compelling piece of noisy, ambient minimalism that allows for an austere pause after the eruption of the initial works. It becomes evident that Ryuji's journey as a producer, through periods of hard-techno, deep-minimalism and the more abrasive ventures on HueHelix, has created a powerful and nuanced voice that is fully on display in 'One's Sentiment'.
Ryuji Takeuchi - Artist Bio
Ryuji Takeuchi (Local Sound Network / LSN, HueHelix) was born in Osaka, in the late 90s, he moved to the United States where he discovered Techno, House and Electro Music, influencing his desire to produce & DJ. His first wave of releases on LK Records, Arms, Mastertraxx, FK Records, SWR, Innervate, I.CNTRL, Impact Mechanics, Silent Steps, GSR & Brood Audio to name a few, were straight-up, hard techno,
In 2011, Ryuji started his own imprint, 'Local Sound Network / LSN', a platform for a new generation of both Japanese & global electronic music & later on, in collaboration with Tomohiko Sagae, Go Hiyama & Kazuya Kawakami, the label, 'HueHelix / HHX', developing further the voice of Japanese techno & experimental electronics, with a focus on distorted, industrial sounds.
In 2012, Ryuji launched the 'Local Sound Network Digital Solutions / LSNDS' series born from a desire to both discover and introduce a wider range of electronic music to the world.
Ryuji Takeuchi provides us with an EP of noisy, hypnotic tracks, ranging from giddy, stomping, left-field techno to melancholic ambience; the EP's title 'One's Sentiment' provides a thoughtful angle to this at times cacophonous collection, for while they are bristling with noise there is something contemplative about the pieces, expressed in a way that suggests more than one thought trying to take life at the same moment, Ryuji seems to find space for conflicting voices both spatially and in terms of mood, the first three tracks, 'Ambivalence', 'Sadness' & 'Sorrow' seem to crawl with competing elements, synth lines drool over and meld with throbbing kick patterns, anxiety & excitement are tightly wound in focus as tracks build and develop, leaving the listener to navigate these abstract planes, intoxicated; while the final track 'Regret' is a compelling piece of noisy, ambient minimalism that allows for a pause after the . It is testament to Ryuji's journey as a producer through periods of hard-techno, electronic minimalism
2x12"
An artist as versatile as Alex Krüger is a rare find these days, not only did he release numerous EP's and albums as Tigerskin or Korsakow since the mid 90s, he's also been on the forefront of the 'Dub Techno' movement since 1999 with outings on classic labels such as 'Raum...Musik", 'Force Tracks' and '3B/ United States of Mars". Now ten years after his last album on 'Opossum Recordings' Alex is back with this well crafted genre bending full length 'Caves & Cages". From deep techno cuts through rippling ambient excursions to funky reggae infused live jams with Haushausen this work is yet another milestone in the creative bubble Alex lives in (i.e. his studio). A predominantly analogue producer, Alex recorded most sounds for 'Caves & Cages' on his modular synths and vintage gear at Organic Domain during 2017 and early 2018. Throughout the album tension ebbs and flows effortlessly via syncopated subs, analogue improvisation, subtle chord stabs and sustained swells interspersed with textured field and home recordings. The ambient opener 'Intra' sets the tone for the album. Rich with alien atmospheres, distant soundscapes, out of reach voices and licks of live instruments dug up from numerous recordings dating back as far as 30 years, even before Alex started his electronic journey. The sojourn ventures deeper from there. Subaquatic dub techno is the mood on 'King's Cave", 'Helix' and 'In Air' only surfacing ever so slightly for moments of clarity where shimmering tops and glistening synth lines shed some light on the steady grooves. The tracks 'Future History' and 'Transition State CIV' border on deep house territory.
Fresh on Francis Harris' Kingdoms imprint comes Adamo Golán's seven track LP, 'Exile And The New'. Golán is the alter ego of British-German artist Laurens A. Schmidt, who has been pursuing a more club-focused techno project, while developing an ever deeper fascination with experimental music, ambient and film scores. Drawing influence from his adopted homes Berlin and currently London, the 26-year-old has been uncompromisingly trying to develop his own musical voice.
'Exile And The New' expresses this ongoing pursuit and, being the first full-length and first ever release by Adamo Golán, marks the start of his most personal project to-date. Stretching over seven tracks, it touches upon a diverse set of sceneries, moods, and emotions whilst a distinctive sound design gives the work a subtle framework and guiding thread.
'Fis' starts the proceedings, introducing drones and field recordings and enveloping the listener in Golán's distinct sound world. 'Just Friends' merges distant snapshots of disembodied vocals with granular sound design and a sense of both space and creeping claustrophobia simultaneously. It's an approach the young producer has mastered - 'Replica' maintains an ambience of the deeply personal and a wider, hazy focus, realised via exquisite melodic fragments against a backdrop of pads and chiming electronics. Title track 'Exile And The New' unfolds around another cinematic world scored via a single stringed instrument, static interference and oceans of space. 'Lie to Me' brings a piano refrain to the fore, wrapped in luscious ambience and more fragments of a conversation heard through the rain. 'Then Rely On Me' slowly develops out of a haunting atmosphere and finds an uneasy but strangely beautiful flow, before 'The Hungry Years' closes out the album as it started - floating in space.
The 26-year-old artist sees the album as a journey that should captivate but never impose itself on the listener. It´s a gracious and neighborly invitation to dive in, get lost and explore its facets and peculiarities
Criminal' is a confessional work. Through the stark lens of shame and guilt that has followed Luis Vasquez since a violent childhood growing up within the humming ambient sprawl of 80s Mojave Desert, here he documents the gut-wrenching sound of going to war with himself. Battling with his own sanity, self-hatred, insecurity, self-entitlement and grappling with the risk of these things transforming him into a person he despises, Vasquez has laid his feelings bare with this: his confession and most self-reflective work to date. Guilt is my biggest demon and has been following me since childhood. Everything I do strengthens the narrative that I am guilty' Vasquez reflects. The concept of 'Criminal' is a desperate attempt to find relief by both confessing to my wrongdoings and by blaming others for their wrongdoings that have affected me.' 'Criminal' marks a striking and important chapter in his self-exploration, both artistically and emotionally. As a young musician living in Oakland, Vasquez began to try and process the narrative of his difficult upbringing veiled through musical exploration. Taking krautrock's motorik beats and Post-Punk deconstructions and honing them into a hushed percussive incantation, The Soft Moon's self-titled debut album took shape. The album was released in late 2010 by Captured Tracks and was praised by critics and emulated by contemporaries. In 2012 the apocalyptic conceptual work of 'Zeros' emerged, shortly followed by Vasquez moving to Venice, Italy in 2013, acting as a catalyst for 2014's release, 'Deeper'. While previous albums were primarily instrumental records, where Vasquez's voice was diffused amidst the music as another instrument, 'Deeper' marked the beginning of a new musical direction where vocals and lyrics became something more than a mere presence. 'Deeper' was a descent into the womb of childhood trauma, anxiety and fear, and although Vasquez survived this dark exploration of himself, he did not return alone. Working once more with Maurizio Baggio, who produced 'Deeper', at La Distilleria in Bassano Del Grappa, Italy, 'Criminal' sees Vasquez further explore putting his lyrics at the forefront and letting his raw emotions flow. The album is Vasquez's way of holding himself accountable and seeking redemption for the abuse he inflicts on himself and others, and acknowledges roots in the abuse which, inflicted upon him as a child, broke him.
Haiku's Raw Waxes label is delighted to welcome the famously unconventional Stanislav Tolkachev with a new track EP of experimental techno and IDM sounds. Entitled Champions' Breakfast and with brilliant artwork from German Benedikt Rugar, the releases features six cuts, one of which is a previously digital-only track landing here on vinyl for the very first time.
Haiku has long been a fan of Ukrainian Tolkachev having previously collaborated on a remix for the label, while Tolkachev has also released on Haiku's other label Inkblots. This new EP is one that not only shows off the label's willingness to take risks and put out diverse and interesting electronic music, but also one that proves Tolkachev is a truly unique artist with his own musical voice. He has been that way for more than a decade now, and has put out three long players as well as countless EPs that get heavy support from the tastemakers of the day. This latest offering contains his take on the essentialness of groove, enriched by his use of atonality, dissonance and acid-not-acid textures, all in a minimal style.
The deep 'Shady' kicks things off with spangled synth lines and eerie pads off in the distance. It's a lonely and insular piece with kinked rhythms that keep you locked. The excellent 'The Main Thing Is To Survive' is then less constrained, with kicks that rock back and forth as off kilter synth lines warp and wrap around each other in mind melting and tripped out fashion. Switching up the mood with ease, 'Fuck This Guy' is a dark and musty passage of humid ambient techno with static electricity buzzing about over smeared pads that are filled with menace, then the curious 'Hair In My Mouth' is about blurting, busted frequencies, loose and scattered drums and glassy melodies. It's a mangled and mashed up track that sounds like little else. 'Negative Space' is horror soundtrack techno with urgent, driving drums and nervy sound design that keeps you on edge, and closer 'Self Destruction' is built on broken, bristling beats. A rhythm slowly emerges from the haze and it is one that is physical and restless and sure to make a big impact in the club.
This is a varied and vital EP that oozes essential electronic invention.
Vibraphone Records continues to deepen its contemporary repertoire by inviting Andrew Soul into the fold with a vocal contribution from house music legend Robert Owens. "Slipping Into Darkness" is a beautifully rendered deep house gem with expressive piano work, rubbery bass synth tones, but in some ways the minimalism of Vincent Floyd's remix gives Owens' vocals a chance to take centre stage. "As You Are" is a crooked, broken beat exploration on the fringes of deep house, and Owens' voice sounds resplendent in the more experimental surroundings before Nick Anthony Simoncino comes on board with a 90s flavoured, darkside remix of the highest order.
On 30thMarch, Wah Wah 45s will release ORANGE WHIP, the new album by their latest signing, Honeyfeet. The outfit, who have received praise from the likes of The Guardian, have also set festivals alight up and down the country with their unique melange of sounds.
For the last couple of years the Honeyfeet (who name from a line in the Blues Brothers film) have been a conduit for the ideas and expressions of an exotic mixture of Manchester based musicians. This genre-defying band incorporate styles including jazz, folk and hip hop into their music. Someone once called it Folk-Hop and Barrelhouse-pop, and that's just vague enough to make sense.
The band are fronted by Ríoghnach Connolly - also known for her work with Real World artists Afro Celt Sound System and The Breath - "a remarkable singer and flautist who...can ease from Irish traditional influences to soul" (The Guardian). The line up is completed by Rik Warren (vocals/harmonica), Gus Fairbairn (tenor sax), Biff Roxby (trombone/vocals), Ellis Davies (guitar), Lorien Edwards (bass guitar), John Ellis (keyboards) and David Schlechtriemen (drums).
ORANGE WHIP finds the band at their most incredibly diverse. Opening with recent single Sinner (received radio play from the likes of 6 Music and BBC Manchester), which showcases Ríoghnach's extraordinary agile and emotive voice, the album moves with dizzying swagger on songs covering a wide range of subjects. Quickball tells the story of being so infatuated with someone you want to eat them, while Whatever You Do addresses the fear-mongering of the press over folk-hop and oom-pah, and Demons deals with love and redemption on a blast of harmonica-driven country, sung by Rik Warren.
Rik also takes lead vocal on a re-working of Robert Johnson's Love in Vain, a song showing Honeyfeet's more reflective side, his Skip James-esque drawl bringing an eerie quality to the lyrics about a doomed relationship. The band reshape the progression too, swinging the tune slowly and creating a little underground blues club in the midst of the recording.
Elsewhere the band go all New Orleanian on Colonel Hathi's Trunk Juice, a sinister tale inspired by trombonist Biff Roxby's horn riff recalling one of the elephants of The Jungle Book. Further showcasing their virtuosity, on one of the album's best moments - especially the nuanced vocal performance by Ríoghnach, who was raised on Irish folk - on Hunt and Gather the band do their own take on prog-folk, with a flute and cello melody running alongside a brass counterpoint.
Ríoghnach turns in another incredible vocal on the album's final track - future single Meet Me On The Corner. With a pounding beat, it is one of the album's main highlights. Guitar and brass propels Ríoghnach to sing lyrics that could be straight out of the playground, but suggest something deeper, possibly mystical even, in it's demands for a dalliance on the street. It closes the album on a high note, for a band who have that rare ability to distil all their disparate influences, while always sounding like their unique selves.
ORANGE WHIP heralds the sound of a remarkable band going overground.
Cover with laser-cutting and printed inner sleeve, ltd. to 500 copies, incl. mp3A Score for Darling is both the sound track for the Danish film "Darling" (2017) as well as a collection of outakes from it. Raúl Pastor Medall (Rauelsson) and Erik K Skodvin (Svarte Greiner & 1/2 of Deaf Center) were paired together to work on the accompanying music after the director, Birgitte Stærmose wanted to try a new direction. Both together and individually they have created a highly affecting collection of pieces to a film that is not afraid of pushing the emotional content to the max, centered around the story of a dancer on the rollercoster ride of her life. This is also the first time either of them have made a full lenght sound track, making it their debut on the big screen.The music and instrumentation heard on the album is brimming with dynamics and diversity, featuring violin by Christoph Berg, cello by Anne Müller as well as a mass of other sounds like church organs, synths, guitar amp violation, electro-acoustics, piano and more, all layered together into 15 beautiful and devastating fragments of mood. The final piece of the album "Breathe" - featuring Otto A Totland on piano and Katinka Fogh Vindelev (We like We) on voice - can be seen as their own lamenting end title to a longer period of work with this album, finally finished.
This is the first album of Borusiade, in which she takes her music to a new level, finding her very own expression, that is making us first shiver then sweat, then chill and finally melt.
Cómeme starts 2018 by proving again to be a safe haven and a sanctuary for sensitive plants and unique characters devoted to music - just like Miruna Boruzescu aka Borusiade - from Bucharest - who conquered the radio stations of our parallel worlds and utopian desire. 'Dream catcher' was the name of the show, and 'Jeopardy', a nocturnal EP, her first release on vinyl.
Now, after adventurous travels through night clubs, theatres, windy cities, snowy fields and merciless deserts her desires and imagination have manifested themselves in her very first album, carrying the intriguing title: 'A Body'
The record sleeve features the back of her head, making us wonder what she sees, on the other side. Her visions unfold through 8 pieces of music that follow a dreamlike narrative of associations and transformations. Somber synthetic atmospheres, sparse and spatial rhythmical arrangements, strangely seductive melodies and lysergic ally pulsating bass lines lead us away from a dystopian present towards a sensorial experience we long to repeat as soon as it's over.
'A Body' is a deeply poetic work in which again and again you will hear Borusiade's voice, sometimes dissolving and recreating meanings in mantra-like repetitions, sometimes layering itself to pagan choirs of smooth ecstasy. Then again you will also hear that voice close to you, singing, sharing an experience or a thought. It is always soft, effortless and unpretentious, but always strong, clear and precise, like the voice that speaks to you in an altered state of consciousness. It seems to come from the same person that is holding your hand, when everything else seems to fade into uncertainty while wandering through strange times and places...
Starting with the song CLUSTER the effect is kicking in, we sink into the universe of the album through this throbbing ambience that seems populated by a reverberated ant colony that broke into a synthesizer. The introduction of this album is a complex emotional soundscape that is followed by a song: BREATHE, which sounds like a classic you never heard. With its catchy melancholia, it creates a déjà vu like strange familiarity of the unknown - a memory from the future. And though our minds were just twisting and turning in an overflow of information, we suddenly leave our bodies and observe ourselves breathe.
Other tracks, like DORMANT are more focused on the narration of the body and its state. Words, describing it in many ways, softly and incessantly repeated, are mixed deeply into the soundscapes of a track that features a bass drum so soft it could be a heartbeat. Foggy moments like these dissolve in a track like AN ACUARIAN FEELING, which is queer synthesizer love, shifting in shape and momentum, a ray of light that pushes itself through the nightly atmosphere that was preceding these moments, a similar landscape in different times - a choir enters, cheerful drums, climbing and descending melodies and rhythms of hope. Just like the utopian vision in the title track A BODY, that stands at the end of this journey, which in itself just opens another new horizon.
Some gigs are simply meant to be out there - even if they take decades to actually make it into our hands. This is without doubt one of those concerts, recorded at the Philips Halle, D sselsdorf on the 28th March 1979
during the Live Herald Tour. Includes the only known live recording of Talking to the Sun' Released following the AIM-nominated deluxe box set from Hillage, 'Searching for the Spark', this new 'Dusselsdorf' double CD showcases the Steve Hillage Band's prowess with excellent sound quality - a quality so high that you'll forget that it's a live recording until the applause. This is a band at the height of its powers, with Steve in great voice throughout, and most obviously utterly
enjoying themselves. The vibe is completely infectious and doesn't let up throughout the entire gig. Featuring Steve's own adventurous compositions and covers of Beatles and Donovan classics, all are approached with a joie-de-vivre and high sensibility. The trademark heady combination of vibrant psychedelic rock interwoven with an irresistible full blooded groove, interspersed with the smoothest of deepspace synth/guitar trips gathers all before it in a tsunami of up-lifting music.
With the benefit of hindsight, Steve's musical trajectory from the creative space riffs of Gong to the trance and techno of System 7 is made instantly clear. This version of 'Dusseldorf' will be released as a double CD presented in
mediabook packaging complete with a 24-page booklet and 3LP gatefold pressed on to 180g heavyweight vinyl.
Belgium's favourite underground house DJ Red D celebrates the 10 year anniversary of his We Play House Recordings label with 6 vinyl samplers containing new tracks and some very wanted gems from the catalogue. Artists featured are San Soda, Fabrice Lig, FCL (featuring Lady Linn), Kiani & His Legion, krewcial, Reggie Dokes, Raoul Lambert & Nacho Marco, Art Of Tones and many more. Voices Near The Hypocentre
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About We Play House Recordings
We Play House Recordings - WPH - is the work of Belgian DJ & producer Red D. Started 10 years ago to release the music of his friend san Soda, the label had (and has) the aim to release house music in all its shapes and forms. WPH's house ethics date back to the days where house was just a name for music that was played in clubs. There is no such thing as tech house, no such thing as deep house or minimal, there is simply (house) music, good or bad.
We Play House Recordings is lovingly led by Red D (real name Bart Van Neste), one of Belgium's leading underground music figures. Be it in his role as DJ, A&R, promoter, music panel host or general nitelife instigator, Red D does things with passion, humor and a healthy dose of keeping-both-feet-firmly-on-the-ground...with a twist...
WPH was started in 2007, so it takes no math genius to know that in 2017 the label is celebrating its 10 years anniversary. Running from the spring till winter 2017 this anniversary will be celebrated with special vinyl releases, a triple CD, a digital compilation, a Spotify playlist and a series of label nights all over Belgium and beyond. True to form the compilation will have WPH classics but also a BIG bunch of new material from core artists of the label like Locked Groove, San Soda, Kiani & His Legion, Fabrice Lig and many more.
Dedicated to giving newcomers an honest platform to showcase their talents, this run of compilations is to be comprised of crystalline electronic music, spanning out across various forms. The inaugural offering sees Villanova and Time team up to reshape La CHICA's Oasis with brushstrokes of subtle melancholy, TEHO fuse contemporary Deep House with UKG and YEUZ' pair of idiosyncratic compositions, for the modern dance floor. Label founder, Agoria, ventures South of one hundred and ten beats per minute on his remix of Embers, cloaking Stefan Smith's original in humility and innocence. A FEW WORDS FROM THE ARTISTS ... about their tracks Oasis: 'The original track brings us a very unique vibe, the work of the analog textures implement perfectly the unique voice of La CHICA ...as soon as I listen to it I was hooked to make a remix that would keep the same feeling .. but adding the energy and dynamic to make it floor friendly.' Embers: 'Other than Music, Stefan's only other Passion in life is reading Samuel Beckett. Whilst reading his radio play Embers he got a call from Nicolas Becker asking him to contribute some work to a project. He set about composing this track with Becketts words reverberating around his head. This track somehow made it into the hands of Becketts friend/collaborator Agoria and here we are.
An ethereal, unresolved presence fading into the stereo field, Hilja breathes into life with a haunted synth line and self-sampling vocal hook that instantly creates an enchanted space. Hilja is the debut album by Glasgow-based musician Maria Rossi aka Cucina Povera. Named after a style of southern Italian traditional cooking associated with precarity and making-do, a philosophy of simplicity and stoicism that applies perfectly to the spare but beautiful music Rossi experiments with. Hilja's marriage of minimal synth, field recordings and the hymnal dexterity of Rossi's vocal performances creates a new language, sometimes literally, to be spoken in some mythological Fourth World we've yet to create.
Originally from Finland, Rossi brings an acute sense of space, surroundings, and practicality to her working practice, with each composition often relying on a limited sound palette to create deeply affecting messages which transcend language. Cucina Povera's power is to communicate purely, often down to the solo-choir nature of Rossi's multi-layered voice, an achingly beautiful instrument which has seems to have an innate spirituality in its grain. The tension between the means and the end is at the heart of Cucina Povera, the invocation of a kind of secular spirituality at times using nothing but Rossi's voice. Indeed there's almost a Dogme-like purity to the arrangements: Elektra is a soothing song based around the lapping waves of Rossi's wordless backing vocals and a simple field recording of stones knocked together. Kehoitus is completely a cappella, a haunted fairytale told in glossolalia, evoking a quasi-religious experience with very little.
For music often minimal and simple there's a boldness that belies Hilja's status as a debut. Rossi allows each word, each sound and rhythm to exist in its own space, finding its own relationship with its surroundings. Mesikämmenen Veisu is perhaps the most ecclesiastical sounding composition here, burbling water trickles below a virtuoso vocal, with incredible arrangements in several registers undulating above. A meditation to relieve hunger and restriction, it's a perfect summing up of Hilja, a music ambient but completely earthed, finding enchantment in what you have to hand, the realism of magic, the magic of realism.
First Press limited to 300 with hand-screened sleeves.
The current resurgence of jazz in all its' forms has certainly been impossible to ignore in recent times - from the chart-bound, mainstream crooning of Gregory Porter, to the left field 'jazz not jazz' soundscapes of Kamasi Washington, Moses Boyd, Nubya Garcia and Snarky Puppy proves this is a worldwide phenomenon. One artist who has been been ploughing this furrow in the southern hemisphere for longer than most is Lance Ferguson. As the driving force behind The Bamboos, Cookin' On 3 Burners, Lanu, and the Black Feeling series, these are the varied and versatile projects on which he has built an enviable reputation.
Menagerie 'They Shall Inherit' saw the light of day in 2012 (Tru Thoughts Records) and established the fact that jazz of the contemporary type could reach back to it's essential roots and present itself, refreshed and vital for a contemporary audience.
Lance himself explains: "The Arrow Of Time' draws its inspiration conceptually from the themes of space exploration, human evolution and the future of humankind. It's pretty big stuff to be underpinning an album of modal Jazz tunes - but the main message is one of hope, and I hope that comes across in the music"
Late 2017 saw the 2 track album sampler 'Evolution/Arrow Of Time' create a genuine buzz of anticipation, being playlisted on Jazz FM, and also supported by Jamie Cullum (BBC Radio 2) and both Don Letts & Gilles Peterson on their BBC 6 Music shows - having as it does the spirit of deep jazz, but combining an accessible sound that reached way beyond the usual jazz hungry audience - due in one part to Evolution's immensely catchy hooks, with the voice of Fallon Williams focusing the listeners attention on the philosophical themes Lance highlighted above. Now the album, laid out in its' entirety can be experienced, attempting to encapsulate the music with the written word feels like a somewhat futile exercise, so it is best to consider Lance Fergusons' final thoughts about its inspiration, influences and ongoing appeal.
"The sound of record labels like Strata East, Tribe and Black Jazz has been a massive influence on Menagerie. To me that sound is timeless, exciting and just as vibrant as a musical format in 2018 - and the proof is that we're hearing more and more young musicians embracing it"
Just as magnified record grooves reveal dust constellations and lunar landscapes, so too does Godblesscomputers' third album. 'Solchi' is a deep search into previous moments in Lorenzo Nada's lifetime, influenced by the presence and power of music. His process began with the recovery of some old cassettes, mixtapes nearly forgotten, audio recording of voices from his childhood, and lots of dusty jazz, soul, and hip-hop records. As the starting point of this travel merge with its end, past and present combine to form GBC's current sound. Warm electronic production rooted by grooving bass lines form the core of a kaleidoscope of sixteen tracks, colored by synthesizers, guitar echoes, scratches, samples, fading voices and kalimba. The album is a collection of sixteen stories, sixteen soundscapes; each of them GBC's tribute to the path taken thus far, an homage to his love for music. The recording and studio work took place over a year, with the adding and subtracting of many elements.
KUF create emotion-laden dialogues across layers of time and dimensions of sound. Voices recorded in private are chopped up and brought out center-stage to sing with beats hammered out right here and now. Glowing synths push forward. Basslines rise to grab the melodic role of a track while a vowel is truncated and locked into a grid, driving the rhythm. Voices move within the frame of a sample, performed by hands pushing keys, guided by the ear, immersed in a trio session's deep flow... A vortex of quirky hands, responsive ears and glowing circuits. Since Thomas A. Edison first recorded the human voice in 1877, the recording arts have changed music forever. Musicians have explored the endless possibilities of bouncing their input onto layers of tape, off the walls of an echo chamber or the circuitry of electronic helpers - technology that modulates, spatializes, shifts, divides or multiplies the work of human hands and mouths. An era of sampling offered a cubistic analysis of the recorded past and DJs took dancers onto intricately fractured time travels. This is the historic foundation that KUF keep probing. Just like the sampler and the DJ before them, they found new ways to re-allocate where machine and man stand when making music together. Most importantly, they turn the resulting friction into sparkling bursts of energy. 'Universe' digs deeper into the android vocal chords. The album offers sweeping melodies, different beats and persistent bass. Immerse in the intimacy of the voices, probably recorded in trains, backstage areas and at late night private parties during Berlin Lichtenberg warehouse rehearsals. By striking the keys, KUF squeeze out and serve up all
