Cerca:shee la

Jan Anderzén and his partners celebrate the transcendental power of ecstatic music. Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa is the first Kemialliset Ystävät album in four years. It is the result of chance enhancing online collaboration methods, desire to get lost in the sound archives and the high art of meticulous editing. The album title is from visions of rivers running down from Heart of Darkness to the City of Joyful Noise. If contemporary music is a high speed train passing by then KY's music would be an orgy of light under a railway bridge.

A band member Lars Mattila experiences the music of Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa in spatial terms:

"There are worlds accessed only through our auditory system. I hear a Wunderkammer of freestanding sound objects. Rhythms like sequences of seemingly random stuff laid out on the forest floor: a pair of thrones, a Henry Moore sculpture, a watermelon, two thrones, a Moore sculpture, a melon... I trust the path to go on even if I can't see behind the hill. There's motion, wether it be drunk driving or super human rapid eye movement. The sheer amount of detail makes it impossible to take everything in at once. One's perception and shifting focus reshape the experience on each listen. I remember my visit to Cappella Palatina in Palermo where Normann architecture, Arabic arches and Byzantine dome form a harmonious whole. Various cultural and spiritual influences are recognized as equals. The sense of space also brings to mind the end scene of The Lawnmower Man when the dude is trying to escape the virtual world."

How do you breathe new life into a treasured, classic track? Answer: let Danny Krivit loose on it!

Who better to inaugurate our Mr Bongo Edit Series than one of the bosses of the art of the edit. More than just simple re-touches or loops to make the track easier to mix, Danny works his magic by employing all those years of studying and working with music as a remixer, producer and DJ. He has been honing his craft since the art form began and he seems to have a natural intuition for what works on the dancefloor.

When we asked Danny if he would be interested in reworking some tracks from Mr Bongo's back catalogue we knew the edits would be special, but Danny has outdone himself with these beauties, and arguably they are more than just edits.

By sheer chance, Danny had already worked on a rough personal mix of Sabu Martinez's 'Hotel Alyssa-Sousse, Tunisia’, a track taken from the treasured 'Afro Temple' album originally released in 1973. Danny just needed to freshen and tighten it up to a standard he was happy with, and the result is pure Latin fire.

The Belgian / Dutch orchestra leader Nico Gomez's 'Lupita' from 1971 is an undisputed banger, this underground Latin-crossover favourite has been causing mayhem on dancefloors for years. Here Danny takes it into another sphere adding extra drama and build-ups, adding and overlaying fresh percussion which sounds like it could have been taken from lost outtakes. Even those who may have heard 'Lupita' countless times, are sure to be impressed by the new lease of life that Danny has breathed into it.

2 huge tracks and 2 killer edits from a master of the craft.

"Bobby Dove is a gifted artist, and a brilliant new light on the songwriting scene - A time traveler, Bobby's songs meld genres with the touch of a master - I am a fan" – Mary Gauthier.Bobby Dove has built a following across Canada and beyond Born in Montreal, Quebec, Bobby has become known as one of the country's most dedicated troubadours, crooning live audiences with heart- worn originals, and paying tribute to the golden age of Country music. Along the road, Bobby has worked with a number of legendary players, and shared stages with artists such as Mary Gauthier, Richard Thompson, Irish Mythen, The Sadies and JD Mcpherson.

Bobby Dove's new album, Hopeless Romantic, offers eleven new
original Americana/Country songs on subjects such as unrequited love, being on the road, a haunted hotel and a hard-rocking pallbearer. Co-produced with Bazil Donovan (Blue Rodeo) and Tim Vesely (Rheostatics) at The Woodshed studio in Toronto,On, the record includes some of the finest in Canadian Country music including members of Blue Rodeo Jim Cuddy, Bazil Donovan and Jimmy Bowskill (The Sheepdogs, Blue Rodeo), and Burke Carroll (Kathleen Edwards).

The Dove is currently perched in western Manitoba, supporting the launch of Hopeless Romantic, as well as releasing The Bobby Dove Show, a virtual variety show, featuring Bobby's new songs, and interviews with renowned roots/Country singer- songwriters from across Canada. Sponsored by the Canada Council for the Arts, the show can be streamed on Bobby's social- media as well as on bobbydove.

"Dove can write rings around all but the very best of troubadours, telling stories in a compelling way…. This is very impressive indeed and I suggest you get Bobby Dove on your radar immediately." – Country Music People Magazine

Fünf Jahre nach der von 20 Buck Spin veröffentlichten Debüt-EP "Pulsing Dark Absorptions" erheben sich Daeva aus Philadelphia wie lodernde Flammen aus den höllischen Tiefen mit dem lange schwelenden ersten Album "Through Sheer Will And Black Magic...".

Ein feuriger Strudel aus frühem dämonischem Black Metal und zackigem Thrash Metal bildet die Grundlage des Albums, auf dem Daeva ihre Kunst wie glänzend geschmiedeten Stahl perfektioniert haben. Innerhalb dieses Wahnsinns setzt Gitarrist Steve Jansson die mit Maden übersäte Leiche des Death Metal und eine kräftige, tödliche Dosis reinen 80er-Jahre-Metal-Geistes frei. Die Reise durch dieses verbrannte Ödland wird durch die giftig-säurespritzenden Vocals des Sängers Edward Gonet geleitet.

Song für Song, Riff für Riff ist das von Arthur Rizk produzierte "Through Sheer Will And Black Magic" ein unersättlicher und unaufhaltsamer Wirbelwind aus außerweltlichen Genüssen und infernalischem Gemetzel. Wie in einem unerbittlichen Rausch stürmen Daeva die Tore des Himmels und unterwerfen die schwachen Schafen des Lichts in einem ultimativen Triumph der Hölle!

Fünf Jahre nach der von 20 Buck Spin veröffentlichten Debüt-EP "Pulsing Dark Absorptions" erheben sich Daeva aus Philadelphia wie lodernde Flammen aus den höllischen Tiefen mit dem lange schwelenden ersten Album "Through Sheer Will And Black Magic...".

Ein feuriger Strudel aus frühem dämonischem Black Metal und zackigem Thrash Metal bildet die Grundlage des Albums, auf dem Daeva ihre Kunst wie glänzend geschmiedeten Stahl perfektioniert haben. Innerhalb dieses Wahnsinns setzt Gitarrist Steve Jansson die mit Maden übersäte Leiche des Death Metal und eine kräftige, tödliche Dosis reinen 80er-Jahre-Metal-Geistes frei. Die Reise durch dieses verbrannte Ödland wird durch die giftig-säurespritzenden Vocals des Sängers Edward Gonet geleitet.

Song für Song, Riff für Riff ist das von Arthur Rizk produzierte "Through Sheer Will And Black Magic" ein unersättlicher und unaufhaltsamer Wirbelwind aus außerweltlichen Genüssen und infernalischem Gemetzel. Wie in einem unerbittlichen Rausch stürmen Daeva die Tore des Himmels und unterwerfen die schwachen Schafen des Lichts in einem ultimativen Triumph der Hölle!

"The anger and depression got to me, and I couldn't hold it in anymore
So, I got into a room with my demons and we just hit record," shares indie singersongwriter Leslie Mendelson. The resulting album, playfully titled, ' If You Can't
Say Anything Nice' ,' is viscerally themed, imaginatively arranged, cinematically
dynamic and textured, oozing raw elegance. " I deal with depression and anxiety,
and I've never really sang about it before. It also felt like what was going on with
society was also affecting me, in terms of gun violence, the opioid crisis, and the
all hatred in the news and media. It felt like it was time to speak out," Leslie
explains. Leslie has released two prior albums, including her Grammy Awardnominated debut, 'Swan Feathers,' one EP, and three singles. Her first album
exhibited a production sheen she opted to strip away on her sophomore album, '
Love & Murder.' Her latest, ' If You Can't Say Anything Nice ' ,' is a gutsy album that
splits the difference between her previous albums in terms of production, but
also features some garage- rock bluster. " The best time to make a rock n' roll
record is when you're broke and pissed off, " she says, with a good-natured laugh.
For the album, Leslie worked with longtime co-writer and guitarist Steve McEwan
who co-produced the album alongside bassist and engineer Lorenzo Wolff.

Hailing from Cincinnati, Ohio, Lincoln's music is equal parts pretentious and angsty. One day Sam Means (previously of The Format) tweeted a link to one of Lincoln’s Youtube covers, catching the attention of I Surrender Records. In a moment of sheer enthusiasm, the label couldn’t resist reaching out and signing him. Lincoln released his debut EP A Constant State of Ohio on I Surrender Records in early 2017. The single Saint Bernard is a TikTok smash having been used in over 100k user generated videos. The song went on to stream over 200,000,000 times between YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music.

“I think it’s a mistake to equate ‘perfection’ with flawlessness. To be human is to be perfectly flawed,” Johanna Warren observes while describing the joys of analog recording. Her new LP Lessons for Mutants was tracked live with a band to two inch tape—a revelatory new way of working for Warren. “Tape forces you to commit to a performance, eccentricities and all. The little glitches and anomalies that we’re tempted to ‘correct’ are often what make a thing magical.”

Lessons for Mutants is the prolific songwriter’s sixth solo LP and her second for Wax Nine/Carpark Records. The album’s running theme of metamorphosis (the title of the closing track, “Involvulus,” is Latin for “caterpillar”) reflects major changes in Warren’s personal life: after a decade of relentless touring, as the world was closing its borders, the American multi-instrumentalist unexpectedly found herself quarantining in rural Wales, where she’s now permanently homesteading.

Though tracking for the new album began in New York in 2018 in tandem with the sessions for 2020’s Chaotic Good, the majority of Lessons for Mutants was recorded in the UK surrounded by sheep, cows and a forager’s paradise of wild edible plants—a far cry from the urban jungle of LA that Warren had most recently called home. The body of work that emerged from this dramatic about-face is Warren’s most dynamic to date, shapeshifting seamlessly from searing punk screams to sparkly psych-folk soundscapes, from the bootleg ambivalence of Dylan’s Basement Tapes to cosmic stoner grooves reminiscent of Black Sabbath’s acoustic moments.

“Sometimes I can relate to myself/ I disassociate more than I’d like to, but what can you do?” Warren croons in “Tooth for a Tooth,” a wistful piano ballad that conjures the grainy romance of some smoke-filled 1940s jazz club. This kind of to-the-bone lyrical honesty has always been one of Warren’s strong suits, but these latest reflections are especially unflinching. Being forced to stop touring brought no shortage of self-examination for Warren, who quickly came to view her history on the road as an addiction from which she’s been detoxing. This sentiment dances through opening track “I’d Be Orange,” a drum-driven indie rock number replete with Beatles-esque male backing vocals: “Thirst for power, hunger for fame/ Always was a junkie for pain,” Warren confesses. This exploration of masochistic ambition and artistic martyrdom overflows into grunge anthem “Piscean Lover”: “It’s alright, we’re not ok/ We burn out not to fade away.”

“There’s this unspoken rule in modern music—modern life, really—that everything needs to be Auto-Tuned and ‘on the grid,’” Warren concludes. “This record is an act of resistance against that. There’s beauty and power in our aberrations, if we can embrace them.”

For most of us, life is a series of human interactions; some good, some bad, some happy, some sad. But what would life be without those peripheral characters who plant themselves into our worlds through the sheer force of their presence? Whether we speak to them or not, those vibrant contrasts to the everyday tide of ordinary people are a magical part of the human experience. Oddballs and misfits, flamboyant instigators or low-key game changers, we all clock them on our own hectic journeys, and they make the day a little brighter. Everyone has their favourite people.

Following the runaway success of their first one-shot single in 2020, Favourite People reconvene for a full-length of blues-tinged cuts stemming from sessions at Selva Studios in Brooklyn. The project’s roots predate the studio, from scattered jams and sweaty nights in New York nightspots to impromptu recordings on cruise ships, but the flashpoint of inspiration that truly set the album in motion was the arrival of a blonde 1960s Fender Telecaster. From there, the motley crew of sharp-shooting string slingers and sticks men set about crafting paeans to those striking souls who make the world a more colourful place.

The emphasis here is on the kind of forward-facing, electrically charged mix you felt (whether you realised it or not) hearing early Sabbath or Priest for the first time. With their undeniable bias towards vintage soul, Favourite People are far from heavy metal, but the same lineage of blues and by extension jazz informs the music, while the tonal crunch of that 70s era guides the sound. Feasting on tasteful overdrive and leaning on the unmistakable flavour of tape for much of the recording, the deal was sealed on this purposeful exercise in vibe thanks to the near-mythical texture of Guy Davie’s EMI Nigeria console at Electric Mastering.

Across the album there are mellow shades and bursts of good-time get-down exuberance, but the lead singles capture the essence of the band in no uncertain terms.

‘Promise Of Nibbles’ brings the Favourite People MO into sharp relief with a low-slung, hard swinging blues confection full of overheating organ and duelling guitars in pursuit of Southern-stewed boogie (im)perfection.

‘We’ll Be Late To The Party’ turns up the tempo and dials in the fuzz, striking an anthemic note which lands somewhere between urgent highway escapism and euphoric communal revelation.

‘Mass and Mustiness’ leans in on the funk dimension of the group’s sound with the sweetest licks and chops on that fabled telecaster backed up by an acutely angled beat and the slinkiest of b-lines.

These are but three of the vibrant vignettes laid down by this quietly unassuming collective of heads down jammers, loose groovers and vintage sound freaks –heavy grooving instrumentals pulled from their own moments of pure musical magic and captured on disc for your listening, dancing, living, loving pleasure.

Limited edition picture disc in full colour printed sleeve

Covered In Stars featuring members of Luna, Spacemen 3, Slowdive, Spectrum, Add N To (X), The Vacant Lots, Spiritualized, Slipstream and more.

This is a wonderfully colourful, beautiful fun and powerfully transcendent album by Fuxa, Featuring driving drum machines, gritty fuzz bitten guitars on The Sun Is Shining and Mary, 80's neon midnight post-punk disco grooves on Shadazz and perfectly blissed out floating in space vibes (Help Me Please and Cluster Fuxa). The synths shimmer and elevate, guitars attack and sparkle and the vocals deliver dark romanticism which evoke often David Cronenberg inspired fantasies such as photographs of car crashes, crushes on perfect strangers and unknown futures. 
 - Simon Scott (Slowdive)


Fuxa returns in 2022 with a new album  'Covered In Stars'
 
Eight new songs and several years in the making, of what can best be described as a full on sonic explosion. Mixing space-rock elements, krautrock rhythms, punchy beats and swirling electronic sweeps and beeps that would make for a perfect soundtrack for any warp speed travelling cosmonauts with phasers set to fun!!
 
For the past 25 years Fuxa front man Randall Nieman has no doubt been on a cosmic journey in sound and space. from his early beginnings a part of Detroit locals Windy and Carl as a guitarist/synth player, running and releasing close to 100 releases on his own label Mind Expansion, to later joining Sonic Boom's (Spacemen 3) group Spectrum for close to a decade. Performing the songs that Spacemen taught him touring across North America and Europe as well as recording and releasing several releases with Sonic under the Spectrum moniker. 
Randall has since worked with and released numerous amounts of material with the likes of Martin Rev (Suicide), The Telescopes and Dean and Britta (Luna) to name a few.
 
It is no surprise that Randall would once again build this new album with friends that he became close to over the years musically and there's certainly no shortage of indie royalty star power on this album
 
Produced by Randall Nieman, Richard Formby and Stefan Persson.
Mastered by Simon Scott (Slowdive)
This album features guest appearances from Britta Phillips and Dean Wareham (Luna), Ann Shenton (Add N to (X)), Mark Refoy and Jonny Mattock (Spiritualized, Slipstream), Roger Brogan (Spectrum/Dean Wareham), Jared Artaud (Vacant Lots) and more! Each adding an unmistakable and timeless element that Fuxa's core members have created. 
It would be hard not to notice the sheer aesthetic glory of this release as once again Randall has chosen the amazing James Marsh (most would remember him as the phenomenal artist responsible for all the Talk Talk albums over the years. His artwork is not only featured on the jacket but on both sides of the limited edition picture disc vinyl.
Covered in stars is a celebration of 25 years of music and friendships made along the way. 

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Fuxa! 

(Extended Reissue)

Double vinyl LP | Extended reissue
All tracks remastered from the original master tapes.

And here it is! For the first time ever, Zoo Folle in its full, extended glory.
This double LP contains both the soundtrack as released in 1974 (sides A and B) and previously unreleased gems (sides C and D).

Back in 2016 we put out the first official reissue of Zoo Folle. It sold out in a matter of months, leaving many vinyl collectors hungry for more. Quite serendipitously, the following year we found ourselves digging through Giuliano Sorgini's personal archives to prepare what would become Africa Oscura and stumbled upon a few mysterious reels that could be traced back to Zoo Folle. Imagine our joy when we realized that they contained the complete recording sessions of the original soundtrack, including unreleased material and never-before heard alternate versions! It was a no-brainer to start planning this extended reissue.

Already a phenomenon among collectors and experts, not only does Zoo Folle it keep winning more and more recognition, but, together with The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue and Under Pompelmo, it has established Sorgini as one of the great Italian composers of his generation.

And this is no coincidence. Zoo Folle is Sorgini's most committed and personal work. It reflects at once his beliefs as an animal rightist and his deep friendship with TV director and long-time collaborator Riccardo Fellini (brother of La Dolce Vita director Federico). It was Fellini himself who asked Sorgini to score his documentary on the living conditions of animals in zoos in Western metropolises (Rome, London and Paris in particular).

Originally broadcast by RAI in three primetime episodes, Fellini's exposé sharply contrasts the lives of caged animals with the freedom they experience in nature and wildlife reserves such as the Amboseli National Park in Kenya, Africa.

For his part, Sorgini offers perhaps his grandest score ever – a magnificent, multifaceted soundtrack that brings together a variety of instruments and the best musicians available at the time, from the lavish string orchestra recorded at the Fono Roma studios (a dream come true for someone who had not penetrated the inner circle of A-list composers like Morricone), to the angelic voice of Edda Dell'Orso, who conveys the sweetness and melancholy of the African sunset in Red, Old Skies.

Also performing on the soundtrack are exquisite soloists – all long-time friends of the composer. Nino Rapicavoli, for instance, whose flute adds a magical touch to the psycho-funk of Mad Town and the groove of Slaves, as well as Enzo Restuccia, whose afro-tribal percussions have made Ultima caccia a legendary track especially among lovers of Balearic grooves, and Enrico Ciacci, whose classical guitar soars beautifully over the nostalgic and poignant Chains. Not to mention the fact that Sorgini himself laid down the foundation tracks for the album in the small studio he had in the Prati neighbourhood in Rome, playing the piano, drums and several synthesizers.

So, what are you waiting for? Get your turntables ready for the full version of Amboseli (14 minutes of sheer bliss versus less than 6 in the original record) and for stunning, previously unreleased alternate versions of many other themes composed by Sorgini to celebrate the beauty of the savannah.

Nach der Veröffentlichung von "Acoustic Adventures -
Volume One", besteht der Großteil des zweiten Kapitels
aus schnelleren Stücken wie 'Black Sheep', dem
Allzeit-Live-Klassiker 'FullMoon' und 'Flag In The Ground'.
Aber SONATA ARCTICA wären nicht SONATA ARCTICA,
wenn sie auf Nummer sicher gehen würden: 'San
Sebastian' oder der Abschlusstrack 'Victoria's Secret'
schaffen es, ein völlig neues, erfrischendes Gefühl beim
Hörer zu verbreiten; ein Gefühl, das man natürlich am
besten vor einer Bühne erleben kann! Um diese
besondere Saga zu vollenden und endlich den
Startschuss für ihre nächste, mehrfach verschobene
"Acoustic Adventures"-Tour zu feiern, um die
Corona-geschüttelten finnischen und europäischen
Festland-Gemüter zu erheben. Aber erst einmal: Kommt
ins Wohnzimmer, lehnt euch zurück und folgt SONATA
ARCTICA auf ihrer abgespeckten, aber nicht minder
spannenden Reise in die Welt der akustischen Musik...!

After the release of "Acoustic Adventures - Volume One", most of the second chapter consists of faster tracks like 'Black Sheep', the all-time live classic 'FullMoon' and 'Flag In The Ground'. But SONATA ARCTICA wouldn't be SONATA ARCTICA if they played it safe: 'San Sebastian' or the closing track 'Victoria's Secret' manage to spread a completely new, refreshing feeling to the listener; a feeling that is best experienced in front of a stage, of course!
To complete this particular saga and finally celebrate the kick-off of their next, repeatedly postponed 'Acoustic Adventures' tour to uplift the Corona-shaken Finnish and European mainland minds. But first: come into the living room, sit back and follow SONATA ARCTICA on their stripped-down but no less exciting journey into the world of acoustic music...!

Master’s second album recorded by Scott Burns at Morrissound Studios! Classic 1990’s Death Metal! One of the problems with looking back on a musical genre from a perspective years or decades removed from the core of the movement itself is that subsequent developments tend to obscure both a genres origins and threads within a tradition that died out without offspring. As a result, interesting and deserving albums often get lost in the shuffle as reviewers reflect on those albums most “influential” upon later achievements. Death metal pioneers Master are among those who have been shortchanged as a result of that phenomenon, and their 1990 masterpiece “On the Seventh Day, God Created... Master” remains a fascinating exploration both of the genre’s roots and of spaces it might have occupied had different paths been taken. There are a couple of things that leap out immediately to even the casual listener. The first is the seeming primitivism of the music, with songs consisting of relatively brief, bludgeoning pieces driven by relentless rhythms, cyclic riffs and simple melodic hooks. The second is the realization that someone is playing some seriously insane, brilliantly constructed leads. In this case, that someone is Paul Masvidal, far exceeding anything he ever achieved with Cynic. Beneath the surface simplicity, lies a creative spirit that at once recalls the primal birth of death metal (which Master was both present for and very much a driving force behind) and points the way to what the genre might have become. Very apparent are the genre’s hardcore roots, Master here eschewing the Slayer-derived technical architecture that came to dominate most “modern” death metal in favor of structures that would not have been out of place on Discharge’s landmark “Hear Nothing See Nothing Say Nothing” release (there are even a few appearances of the infamous D-beat). Within the unrelenting storm of brutal repetition, the music’s core meaning is encoded, a sheer primal rage dripping from thunderous cycles of power chords and the open throated roar (again the hardcore influence) of vocalist and chief songwriter Paul Speckman.

The long-awaited full-length from Tommy and The Ohs: Mariposa Gold. Ohs’ mastermind Thomas Oliverio has worked alongside some of the biggest names in music today—but with Mariposa Gold, he takes a sharp turn into the psychedelic reaches of American roots music and the avant-garde. The result is a wild trip through a lavish soundscape, a California of fantasy and heartbreak, where genres and traditions bleed together in “the big surreal.” Guided by Oliverio’s fine-tuned sense of production and melody, Mariposa Gold is lush with arrangements that strive toward new and surprising dimensions. These songs sway like hummable country weepers sent through the looking glass, joining sheer virtuosity, worthy of the best session players, to a distinct experimental sensibility shaped by bluegrass, country, and psychedelia.

Riding the razor’s edge between bristling electroacoustic wizardry and the constrained structures and harmonic interplay of musical minimalism, »Immanent in Nervous Activity« is Die Schachtel’s new release from the creative partnership of Giovanni Di Domenico and Jim O’Rourke.

Comprising a single long-form work, divided into two movements that culminate as a second chapter to the duo’s 2015 LP, »Arco« - an album which endeavored, on visionary terms, after the potential of waiting and patience as means toward musical form - their latest adventure - recorded in Japan with further contributions by Eiko Ishibashi on flute and Tatsuhisa Yamamoto on snare - rolls at a glacial pace, deftly weaving tension into restrained sheets of tonality, texture, and harmonic dissonance that ripple with microscopic detail and a stunning sense of structure.

(Cargo Collective Title) RIYL: Barker, burger/ink, Andy Stott, Shackleton, Monolake, Jan Jelinek, Perila, Fax. 180gLP in 350gsm jacket + 190gsm inner + DL. CD in custom mini-gatefold paperboard jacket. T. Gowdy has kept up a productive albeit mostly virtual pace since the release of Therapy With Colour (his third full-length album and first for Constellation) which dropped just as things were locking down back in spring 2020: performances at numerous festivals including MUTEK Montréal, Node Festival and NEW NOW; audiovisual pieces exhibited at various European galleries and events; a track and video for Constellation’s Corona Borealis Longplay Singles Series; sound design for the documentary Atalaya by filmmaker Emma Roufs. Gowdy now returns with Miracles, his second full-length for Constellation, which draws on source materials originally performed in 2018 for an unreleased audio/visual project based around surveillance footage—a precursor to video1capped, monitor-based horizons that soon took on new meanings. Re-immersing himself in those recordings, Gowdy disassembles and deploys them as raw source material for new experiments with vactrols, noise gates and analog-to-digital triggering and aliasing, the original recordings juxtaposed anew amidst their successive textural and rhythmic treatments. Gowdy keeps this re-composition process stripped down, elemental and purposive, guided by an ascetic Aufhebung: synthesis as sublation—subjecting a temporal material/theme to analysis and transformation, reintegrating to form a whole that overcomes what it preserves without erasure, reshaping and intrinsically carrying its origins forward. Where Therapy With Colour was strictly and rigorously a set of stereo live performances, Miracles fuses iterative—though still spartan—layers of performance. “Therapy With Colour was about healing through self-hypnosis; Miracles is about forging a future with memory through subjection to trigger mechanisms” notes Gowdy. The result is a captivating collection of minimal IDM and oscillated electronics from the Montréal/Berlin producer, working primarily in a 120-140 BPM zone of tonal percussion and corrugated pulse. Gowdy’s sensibility and sound palette gets deeper and dirtier, summoning new pathways of alluvial flicker and abraded euphoria. As the album progresses, low-pass gate vactrols coalesce into a clear and vital theme, conveying immanence through woody timbres at times reminiscent of the Shinrin-yoku aesthetic (Japanese ‘forest bathing’), though always with a grainy transcendence rather than invoking any clean pure sheen. Gowdy consistently heats and heightens the presence of each component in the mix, balancing different elements in democratic compression/distortion, attaining an unornamental and earnest form of mantric-industrial majesty. Miracles is live, corporeal, activated electronic music of the highest caliber, deployed with monastic and meditative focus. Tracklist: 1 350J 2 Miracles 3 Déneigeuse 4 Transcend I 5 U4A 6 Vidisions 7 Clipse 8 Transcend II

'Abandon Your Friends' is From Autumn To Ashes' third album, originally released in 2005. The album - featuring the singles 'Sugar Wolf' an 'Where Do You Draw The Line' - was lauded by Kerrang Magazine, scoring the album 5/5 in their review at the time of it's original release. As part of Hassle Record's ongoing collaboration with Vagrant Records - in celebration of their 25th anniversary - this record is getting pressed to vinyl for the very first time. Record is pressed onto black vinyl, includes lyric sheet insert, and is packaged in a hand-numbered outer sleeve.

Musician and sound/video installation artist Steve Batespresents a solo ambient/noise album ofmelodic smear, radiostatic blur, panoramic noise clouds and dissolving tones. Made primarilyunder the self-imposed 'limitation' of a Casio SK-1, this is his first entirely solo full-length albumin almost a decade. All The Things That Happen showcases the more deliberate, intensive, noise-clustered side of Bates' wide-ranging sonic sensibilities and practices. An isolation record (like so many), itcombines an ineffable melancholy with claustrophobictension and simmering political rage.Powerfully composed from layers of glistening distortion-drenched melody, pulsing and droningoscillation, bursts of blown-out chords, sweeps of static and sheets of crackling hiss, Bates hasmade an impressively dynamic, ardent and iridescent noise album of real depth and underlyingdevastation."This was supposed to be an ambient record; quiet, minimal and sad. These tracks all startedoff that way but I kept reaching for more texture and noise. Somehow the noisier the record got,the less sad it was also. I was listening to, and loving, a lot of music by Andrew Chalk and I hadfinished a year-long run of listening to Eno's 1 and 4. I preferOn LandtoMusic for Airportsalthough I love both.On Landjust has a darkness and uncertainty that appeals to me. Addingmore noise also got me excited about ways this material could be played live even though italso felt like that could never happen again.In 2022, I opened for Godspeed You! BlackEmperor in Saskatoon to give it a try and waspleasantly pleased to hear it all live and loud."A fixture of Winnipeg's burgeoning punk and social justice community in the 80s-90s, Batesplayed in hardcore and indie rock bands (Pull My Daisy, Bulletproof Nothing) prior to foundingthe Send + Receivefestival in 1998. A crucial development in putting Winnipeg on the map foravant music and sound art, Bates helmed Send + Receive for seven years, then moved toTiohti:áke/Montréal, became Sound Coordinator at Hexagram (Concordia University), releasedsolowork on Oral and two albums with his Black Seas Ensemble on Dim Coast, and pursuedmyriad other ongoing audio research, installation and collaborative projects. Relocating toTreaty 6/Saskatoon the year before pandemic,All The Things That Happenis Bates' mostrecent purposive and purely 'recorded' work.Thanks for listening.

High Roller Records, reissue 2022, black vinyl, ltd 250, lyric sheet