Derek Rogers – Peripetia (A Beard of Snails, 2012)

Derek Rogers
Peripetia
CDr A Beard of Snails Records ABOS3-090 (Denmark, 2012)

01. A Method, or a Process
02. Change Is Inevitable
03. Piano Lessons
04. Thoroughly Revealed
05. Ethion
06. The World’s Turned Upside Down
07. Forward Thinking

All tracks recorded/engineered by DR in november 2011 in Los Angeles, CA.

New immersive works from recent L.A. transplant Derek Rogers – a name you’ll most likely recognize. From mellow synth and/or guitar drift, to edgy cascades, over understated minimalist melodicism augmented by environmental recordings et al., mood and feeling are central here. One of the finest headphone-appropriate albums I’ve laid ears (and head) to recently, yes! Housed in 14x14cm envelopes with individually « drip painted » cover bits – each one unique.
(A Beard of Snails)

Si ce blog est moins dynamique qu’au bon vieux temps, certaines choses ne changent pas, comme par exemple mon attachement à la micro-structure A Beard of Snails. Illustration avec cet album.

Lee Perry – The Compiler Vol.1 (Rectangle, 2001)

Lee Perry
The Compiler Vol.1
CD Rectangle International Ltd. Rec-CC2VOL1 (UK, 2001)

01. Army Dub
02. Flames of the Dragon
03. Django Shoots First
04. Wind up Doll
05. Run Around Dub
06. Supersonic Man
07. Grumbling
08. Judgement Day
09. Enter the Dragon
10. Clint Eastwood Rides Again
11. King Tubby Dub
12. Every Knee Sall Blow
13. Iron Claw

Knowledgeable fans of Lee « Scratch » Perry will smell something funny about this one as soon as they look at the track listing and the questionable licensing information on the back. Four of these tracks were previously collected on the highly dubious compilation News Flash, while « Supersonic Man » appears to have been lifted from the Heartbeat album Lord God Muzick. « Grumbling » is actually a Junior Byles song entitled « Mumbling and Grumbling, » « Judgement Day » and « Enter the Dragon » were previously issued on currently impossible-to-find Justice League albums (and thus constitute something of a public service here), and « King Tubby Dub » and « Every Knee Shall Bow » sound suspiciously unlike Perry productions at all; in fact, they sound very much like Bunny Lee productions. (This would not be the first time that one Lee’s work had been substituted for the other and released under the Upsetters’ name.) Provenance and legalities aside, how is the music? Well, it’s great, of course, if maniacally uneven. « Django Shoots First » is one of the most famous and enduring rhythms ever recorded by the Upsetters, and Junior Byles is at the top of his considerable powers on « Mumbling & Grumbling. » The computer rhythms on « Supersonic Man » are a bit jarring in this context, and « Enter the Dragon » is a goofy foray into kung fu movie kitsch. Does the album hang together? Absolutely not. Is it lots of fun anyway? You bet. (Rick Anderson)

On a déjà vu des compilations plus rigoureuses que celle-ci, on a aussi déjà vu des labels plus rigoureux que Rectangle, mais on ne va pas bouder notre plaisir pour autant. Dois-je vraiment préciser qu’aucun volume 2 n’a jamais suivi?

Dan Warburton – Life in the Greenhouse (Appel Music, 2008)

Dan Warburton
Life in the Greenhouse
CDr Appel Music 01 (France, 2008)

01. Life in the Greenhouse

Dan Warburton : violin
Recorded on march 3rd, 2007 by Christophe Le Dantec at the Palais de Tokyo, Paris

Music for Plants was an installation by Berkeley-born artist Peter Coffin which formed part of an exhibition curated by Anthony Huberman at the Palais de Tokyo, Paris, in February and March 2007. Several musicians, including Noël Akchoté, Hervé Boghossian, Pierre-Yves Macé, Jean-François Pauvros and myself, were invited to play a solo set in Coffin’s greenhouse, to entertain visitors to the gallery and amuse the plants. To the best of my knowledge, no scientific studies were carried out in the aftermath of the exhibition to see exactly what effect the music had on them (the plants, I mean). I’d be curious to learn of the existence of any strange deformities that might result from overexposure to difficult new music, as I’ve often wondered what lasting damage I’m doing to myself. Perhaps you could do some fieldwork of your own by setting up a CD player in your greenhouse and putting this disc on repeat play for a few months. But be careful. Remember The Day Of The Triffids. (Dan Warburton)

Warburton’s release is for solo violin and was recorded inside a green house which was set up as part of an installation by Peter Coffin. He invited various musicians to plat inside the greenhouse ‘to entertain the visitors of the gallery and amuse the plants’, which is a great idea, but who knows if plants like music? Maybe to find that out, Warburton suggests on the cover of the release, the release should be taken into a greenhouse and the effects could be scientifically tested on the plants. I can’t do it, as I have no plants. At forty-four minutes and forty-four second this is quite a long album for a single solo improvisation on one instrument, even when Warburton has all the right skills needed to play such an instrument. He moves up and down the strings, hits them, strikes them, plucks them. In terms of new improvisation – the instruments as an object – he doesn’t do much, the violin here sounds as a violin and nothing else. Perhaps the conventional character of the improvisation is something I have some trouble with and I could have easily settled for a release that lasted twenty-two minutes and twenty-two seconds. (Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly)

Au Palais de Tokyo, à l’intérieur d’une installation de Peter Coffin dans laquelle auront aussi été invités à se produire Jean-François Pauvros, Pierre-Yves Macé ou encore Noël Akchoté, Dan Warburton s’emparait en 2007 de son violon et improvisait avec, en tête, l’idée de distraire les plantes.
Life in the Green House, enregistrement de cet étrange concert, pose aujourd’hui la question de l’importance de la situation ou de l’environnement dans la raison d’être de ce type d’exercice musical : sur disque, Warburton passe de pizzicatos minuscules en mouvements d’un archet dérouté, joue des pauses et des relances non sans ironie, caresse un instant une mélodie ou décide de buter sur une note frêle, impose enfin une diphonie déstabilisante ou porte de légers coups à son instrument. Ici et là, quelques passages convaincants ; ailleurs, moins de truculence. Dissocié de l’installation, il manquerait donc un je-ne-sais-quoi à l’enregistrement. (Le Son du Grisli)

C’est l’heure de notre mise à jour hebdomadaire (ou semestrielle) avec cet album initialement sorti sur un micro-label aujourd’hui disparu, depuis épuisé à peu près partout (même si certains mail-orders ont peut-être encore une copie dans leurs tiroirs), et qui se retrouve aujourd’hui sur un blog que personne ne visite (confidentialité quand tu nous tiens). Une musique sans doute un poil trop stressante pour vos plantes vertes ou votre animal de compagnie.

www.paristransatlantic.com/warburton/

Jeff Gburek – Impatience (Nothing Out There, 2010)

Jeff Gburek
Impatience
CDr Nothing Out There n.o.t.#17 (France, 05-2010)

01. 3:51
02. 15:33
03. 11:33
04. 4:34
05. 0:50
06. (with Tetuzi Akiyama) 9:09

Limited edition of 99 copies.
5 solo acoustic guitar tracks and one featuring Tetuzi Akiyama.
Includes special packaging with exclusive ink drawings by Jeff Gburek.

It has already been released, on May 15th, Jeff Gburek’s, « Impatience », a sequence of semi-improvised guitar pieces (recorded in Berlin 2007-2008), plus one track recorded live with Tetuzi Akiyama (recorded live at Radio Afera studios, Poznan, Poland). And it’s about time!
Long ago mixed and ready to go, I had other releases of my electro-acoustic projects – most notably Red Rose for the Sinking Ship on Triple Bath, Virtuous Circles on Absurd and the most recent Remote Provinces on Aural Terrains – all of which seemed to take precedence. The tracks for Impatience were recorded in my former Berlin flat on Gniesenaustrasse 69 on the 6th floor in the appalling quiet of early summer and coincided roughly with a series of solo acoustic concerts I had been playing around town that year. The title refers rather to the central track, number 2, with its protracted breathing spaces which I assumed would tax the patience of some listeners but which had been growing essential in my playing process. The sense of time without sound creating a new situation for a value in sound is essential for understanding « impatience » as a work not simply for the guitar but as an existential consequence of living through the sound of playing and not-playing. The CD as a whole therefore draws upon the unexpected in several ways: some of the pieces can be taken as tradtional articulations of the guitar without any preparations and at first glance not at all conceptualized. The work, upon closer listening, unfolds from the space-time of a reflective folkmusic and gradually opens into wider articulations of space and what I call « outside-time » – wherein there is no longer any pressure to sound or not to sound. Strange what happens inside the outsidetime: the songs themselves become pieces of memory drifting. There is no will to hold them together and yet they do just that revealing the power of the ear close inside the brain putting together the puzzle of fragments: songs seem like interrupted improvisations and improvisations seem like composed songs. But in every case, the listener finds his or her own paths and openings between them, the wind of the mind moving them as much the wind out of mind.
The final track with Tetuzi Akiyama was recorded in September 2008 in Radio Afera Studios in Poznan and while Tetuzi is playing steel-string wooden guitar, myself on prepared slideguitar, tapes and objects. This track previews a full length cd by the two musicians now being mastered. This track on Impatience will be the second time I and Tetuzi appear on cd together, following our concert cd Live at Kule, Berlin, 2005 on Herbal Records.
The CD is hand-made by Constantin Dubois (and his N.O.T. Label, based in France), a collaborative design, using several ink-drawings that I created here in Poznan rather recently.
(Jeff Gburek)

FR Celui-là, ça fait un moment que je voulais le poster, mais j’attendais qu’il soit sold-out au label. Et mine de rien, il en faut du temps pour écouler 99 copies. Mériterait amplement une réédition vinyle.
ENG Stunning acoustic guitar pieces, now sold out at source.

www.canardsauvage.com/not.html
www.futurevessel.com/orphansound/

v/a – Ear:View (Own Records, 2002)

Various Artists
Ear:View
CDr Own Records ownzine#002 (Luxembourg, 2002)

01. Man – Daniel
02. Sug[r]cane – St(ee)ll Believe
03. Belmondo – You Shine on
04. Paso Doble – Esteba
05. Circle Around the Zero – Mevlana
06. Yellow6 – The Final Piece (Part One)
07. L’Ego – Social Addict

FR Voici l’heure de notre mise à jour plus ou moins hebdomadaire avec cette très confidentielle compilation-fanzine de l’excellente maison luxembourgeoise Own Records. On notera que la ligne éditoriale du label était déjà bien affirmée à l’époque.
ENG Time for our weekly update with this pretty obscure compilation from Luxembourg on Own Records. A promising micro-label in 2002, turned into a great label today.

www.ownrecords.com

Eugene Carchesio – Trances (Rhizome, 2008)

Eugene Carchesio
Trances
CDr Rhizome rhcd19 (Australia, 2008)

01. Trances (1)
02. Trances (2)
03. Trances (3)
04. Trances (4)
05. Trances (5)
06. Trances (6)
07. Trances (7)
08. Trances (8)
09. Trances (9)
10. Trances (10)
11. Trances (11)

Eugene Carchesio : synthesizer, drum machine

Carchesio, star turn of The Lost Domain, punk ingénue in G55 and long-time collaborator with Leighton Craig, unleashes one of his most fantastically boggling sets. Those looking for DNE’s post-Coxhill jazz whimsy will be pleasantly surprised by Trances’ pure, opaque and yet slyly playful rendering of modern minimal electronics, not one-hundred miles from the renowned Raster-Noton cabal (Alva Noto, Frank Bretschneider, etc.).
(Rhizome)

Minimal, grid-oriented “acid” from composer Eugene ‘The Lost Domain’ Carchesio. Sounds not unlike a Mille Plateaux / Sähko release ca. 1998, or the more linear exploits of synth-pulse compatriots Nerve Net Noise.
(Mimaroglu)

Un titre programmatique pour un album qui séduira les amateurs de CoH et autres vieilleries à la Raster-Noton (s’ils passent par ici).

http://www.mimaroglumusicsales.com/artists/the+lost+domain.html
http://www.suttongallery.com.au/artists/artistprofile.php?id=9

Elali – Ayaye (Bleu Caraïbes, 1991)

Elali
Ayaye
CD Bleu Caraïbes 82807-2 (France, 1991)

01. Ayaye (Lokua Kanza)
02. Troublé (Zao / Lokua Kanza)
03. Tu m’a déçue (Lokua Kanza)
04. Napona yo (Lokua Kanza)
05. Nasi nabali (Lokua Kanza)
06. Kueyou (Elali / Lokua Kanza)
07. La ballade à Juju (Elali / Lokua Kanza)

Its Pascal Lokua Kanza mentor who has produced and arranged several albums which include Zao (« Confused »). She sings in Lingala that Guéré (Ivorian language).
Elle a pour mentor Pascal Lokua Kanza qui lui a produit et arrangé plusieurs albums où on retrouve Zao (« Troublé »). Elle chante aussi bien en lingala qu’en guéré (langue ivoirienne).
(Afrison)

Deux posts en huit mois, et maintenant deux posts en dix minutes. Infichu de trouver d’autres informations que ces quelques lignes sur cette souriante demoiselle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txEAsHme8kc

Enfer Boreal – Untitled (La Station Radar, 2010)

Enfer Boreal
Untitled
CDr3′ La Station Radar fake tape serie #16 (France, 2010)

01. Untitled

Enfer Boreal from France.
Previous releases on Housecraft, Ruralfaune, Stunned and Tape Drift.
Ambient soundscapes – drones.
(La Station Radar)

FR Enfer Boreal en mode amniotique exploratoire (quelques longueurs, donc, si vous préférez). Et tant pis pour les impatients qui avaient déjà retiré ce blog de leur liste de favoris, si j’étais mort je l’aurais dit.
ENG Edition of 50 copies, sold out at source and not on Bandcamp so far… (And you shouldn’t have removed this blog from your bookmarks…)

http://www.lastationradar.com
http://www.myspace.com/enferboreal

A.M. – Orla (Ikuisuus, 2006)

A.M.
Orla
CD Ikuisuus IKU-005 (Finland, 2006)

01. As The Rain Comes Down
02. Sky Voltage (Reeds)
03. Ribcsraper
04. Some Dreams Must
05. Chamber Lull

All sounds sourced from Orla reed organ (except background cars and rain…). Recorded and processed 2003-2006.

One day in early 2004 I arrived home to find the biggest parcel I had ever received sitting on my doorstep, it was crudely wrapped and covered in stamps. I was amazed that anyone would POST something like this through the regular mail system.
I brought it inside and cut away the packaging. To my astonishment I found that it contained a large old ‘Orla’ chord organ and a letter from Marcel Bear (Empirical) saying that he had noted my recent enthusiasm for organ tones (see also With Throats As Fine As Needles and Sunken…).
He had found this one at a garage sale and thought that I might like it. My interest in organs had been at least in part inspired by my reading about Charlemagne Palestine and his concept of the « Golden Music ». His idea of a stream of sound that may facilitate an ecstatic bliss of religious intensity has been hugely influential to me (in much the same way as Haino’s ‘sound of the universe’…).
I decided pretty much straight away that I would record an album using this organ as the predominant sound source (the only other sound sources are the field recordings of rain on the 1st track and scaffolding pipes on the 2nd).
As the recordings progressed from the straight ahead drone of the 1st track I stripped away more and more unnecessary components of the machine until on the last track I was bowing and plucking the spring pegs of the keys. One of my favourite sounds was that of the fan motor itself. (Anthony Milton)

A.M is Antony Milton, once again stripping back to just his initials for a noise/sound based record.
The concept for this album is a pretty simple one, Milton received an Orla chord organ (an instrument that pretty much begs to be used for drones) as a present from a friend and decided to use it as the primary source material for this album. You might be tempted to think Antony has gone and sabotaged himself by chaining himself to such an instrument for an entire album but, through some skilful recording and processing, he has produced a wonderfully dynamic drone album.
‘Sky Voltage (reeds)’ features a bass throb that seemed to wanna tear apart my shitty bedside stereo the first time I played it. When played at high volume this record is really quite forceful. Its drones are too soaring and insistent not to capture your full attention. Like Morton Feldman’s Rothko Chapel, this is sound that leaves no corner of the room unfilled with sound.
‘Some Dreams Must’ offers a momentary lull in the ecstatic organ action, opening with the sound of what seems to be the organ’s fan belt. It then moves into some piercing whirring notes played on the Orla’s higher register. The track swells into something that is kinda like a piece by Growing, but played by one guy with an organ.
The record ends with ‘Chamber Lull’, a lovely closer featuring plucking of the organ’s springs. It offers a slow return to the world after total sound immersion that has gone before.
Cue this album up back to back with Tony Conrad’s « Joan of Arc » to really take a journey inside that eternal sound. (Cola Nitida, Foxy Digitalis)

Antony Milton ici aux prises avec un orgue. Il aurait pu faire la même chose avec une guitare, mais le résultat n’aurait pas tout à fait eu le même souffle. Et un bel objet si vous arrivez à mettre la main dessus (c’est sold out au label).

http://www.myspace.com/antonymilton
http://www.ikuisuus.net

The Faraday Trippers – The Airbust Suite (Seagrass, 2009)

The Faraday Trippers Symphonette Society
The Airburst Suite
CDr Seagrass Recordings No. 1 (USA, 2009)

01. Adagio Furioso
02 Andante Misterioso
03. Largo Molto Agitato

Performed live, direct to digital, April 29, 2009.
Pat-Trip Dyspenzer, theremin (left)
Michael Scholtz, theremin (right)

An Edgar Allan Potpourri of Eldritch Foul Imaginings. (Gordon Charlton, Beat Frequency)
Totally rippin’! (Phil French, Stunned Records)
The Trippers RULE the etherwaves! (MV & EE )

FR Premier post de l’année, et retour des Faraday Trippers avec leur premier album. Un duo de theremin à écouter très fort encore une fois (même pas peur).
ENG First post of the year, with more theremin duo from the Faraday Trippers. Play loud.

http://www.myspace.com/faradaytrippers
http://www.myspace.com/seagrassrecordings