04 November 2012

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Albums and Singles

The Legendary Pink Dots are back with their highly anticipated new album.

Chemical Playschool is a concept in which more then ever an indulgence in extended ballads and psychedelic improvisations allows Edward Ka-Spel's voice to engage us with his unique brand of storytelling, and the use of synthesizers brings to mind vintage space rock adapted for the modern age.

The album opens with the beautifully epic "Immaculate Conception" where Ka-Spel transports us into a world of stars and planets surrounded by voices and distant echos. In "The Opium Den Parts 1-3" we find a melancholy piece with classic LPD folk essence, arriving then at the ritual tribal ballad "Ranting and Raving."

Chemical Playschool is able to surpass all of our expectations for a band always able to surprise as they lead us through their peculiar dream world. A truly inspired release representing one of the most beautiful concepts created by this eclectic and mythic band.

More information here.

04 November 2012

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Albums and Singles

The Part Time Punks Radio Sessions 12" by HTRK and Tropic of Cancer holds six sublime songs of desire.

Comparable to a fly-on-a-wall Peel Sessions, the critically acclaimed Part Time Punks radio show is the sound of the LA underground, run by local icon Michael Stock.

The limited split captures both bands live at the radio headquarters during HTRK's first 2011 tour of the USA, accompanied by comrades in minimalism and melancholia, Tropic of Cancer.

Flipping this vinyl sounds like two sides of the same cursed coin, and mirrors a high school dance playing an endless lustful waltz. BPMs bumped down to a psychic stalk. It's a broken and beautiful memento.

More information here.

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

This is a simple, yet effective deconstruction of electronic dance music. With Senni's love of house and techno music clearly on display, he strips the clichés of the genre down to their barest essentials, showcasing an intentionally repetitive series of almost fragmented tracks. While at times the repetition can become a bit too tedious, overall the results are quite unique.

Editions Mego

The album is made up of real time live recordings via MIDI with no overdubbing after the fact, using only a single synthesizer as the instrumentation.Interestingly, Senni sticks to the more melodic, rather than the rhythmic building blocks of dance music, which are usually the focus of the genre.There is nary a 909 kick drum to be heard, and a standard beat only appears on two of the five tracks, albeit heavily buried amidst the synths.

Instead, the focus is on tight synth arpeggio leads: the traditional build-up component for most tracks, isolated and repeated without ever reaching the expected climax.The descending pulses of "Xmonsterx" stick with an occasionally numbing amount of repetition, but eventually the key range becomes spread out further, and the pacing is slowly tweaked and modified into something noticeably different."Windows of Vunerability" follows a similar tact, but adds in a simple, snappy rhythm to pair with the melody.There is a slight, but perceptional variation on the beat until its conclusion, where things get all stuttering and inconsistent.

Lorenzo Senni mixes it up a little more on "Makebelieve" and "Digital ‚àû Tzunami." The former emphasizes rhythm more than melody, with chaotic, but structured loops that possess a digitally ragged, eight bit quality to them at times.On "Digital Tzunami," Senni matches a squeaky synth sequence with a buried lower-end thump, offsetting the higher pitched sounds quite nicely.

There are definitely times where the intensive, intentional repetition of Quantum Jelly begins to get a little much, especially on the 13 minute "Xmonsterx."At these times the balance between conceptual and enjoyable starts to shift in the wrong direction for my tastes.However, the shorter, more diverse pieces on the second side of the record go a long way in keeping things fresh, isolating and freezing in time the moments of electronic music we all know, but never consider solely on their own.

samples:

• Xmonsterx
• Makebelieve
• Digital ‚àû Tzunami

 

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

On these two live performances, this duo (that previously performed together as Overhang Party) serves up two slow, drifting pieces that hover into minimalist and dissonant spaces, but never stopping or becoming stagnant, weaving together strings and electronics into a mixture that is surprisingly complex and rich for live recordings.

Musik Atlach

The title piece, recorded last year in Tokyo, emphasizes Fukuoka's cello and violin at first, conjuring a slow, but distinct and deliberate beauty that, even as it builds in complexity, remains tastefully understated.Sachiko's electronics eventually fortify it into a denser, bassier tone before opening it up into a more dissonant, noisy space.It never goes too far into harshness, however, and soon reduces back to a sparse, rhythmic throb to close the track.

The second, "Prayer of a Fool 2011," recorded in Paris, emphasizes the electronic end of the duo’s sound more, mixing rising and falling synth layers with blurry, out of focus voices.Rather than the slow, drifting propulsion of the other performance, this one has a distinctly sad, melodic quality to it.Monastic vocals only add to the overall somber feeling, but it soon evolves into a more dissonant world of guttural noise and sci-fi squelches.The closing moments lean more into solemn loops and shortwave radio static.

Were it not for the applause at the end of the second piece, I would have had no idea that it was a live performance as it has all of the complexity and structure of a studio work.While there is a lugubrious craw to both tracks, it is completely fitting, and never does it drag too slow, it instead emphasizes the restrained, ascetic mood.√°TOMO‚àë is an atmospheric suite of acoustic and electronic sound that manages to both satisfy the worlds of drone and more dissonant noise.

samples:

• √°TOMO‚àë
• Prayer of a Fool 2011 (Excerpt 1)
• Prayer of a Fool 2011 (Excerpt 2)

 

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

Releasing an entire album consisting of only percussion is never an easy task, but Krakowiak proves that he can stand toe to toe with any of the more established artists in the field, mangling his drums into sounds that more often than not only have a ghost of a resemblance to what I had expected. At times pensive, other times aggressive, there is not a dull moment to be heard on Moulins.

Bocian Records

"Crowds Skating, Nathan Philips Square" melds percussion into a purely metallic monstrosity.Scrapes and grinds pile atop one another like the sounds of a collapsing sheet metal factory, and often feel like the more aggressive moments of early Organum stretched out for an entire track.Tomasz Krakowiak attempts a more traditional noise sound with "Approaching Miller's Creek," by a reverberated blast that sounds like the inside of a metal tube rolling down a steep hill, made even harsher with some late appearing shrill outbursts.

Pieces like "February, Stream in High Park" and "Moulins" might be a bit less aggressive, but no less obtuse than the others."February, Stream in High Park" is a jumbled, mechanical like clattering that sounds more like a large idling engine rather than any traditional musical instrument.The title track is more just a collage of deep, bassy rumbles that, knowing its percussion I can hear the resemblance, but if I did not know, I would not have made that assumption.

Krakowiak also works in a healthy dose of subtlety, keeping things fresh and diverse."Never Ending Wait for Train to Pass, Six Nations Reserve, Ontario" begins with a loud crash, but the bulk of the work simply captures the sustained hum and vibration, sustaining it into an understated, rather beautiful piece of sparse drone."Waiting For Train, Six Nations Reserve, Ontario" is only metallic ringing, mixing in what sounds like some digital signal processing.It is not necessarily a relaxing piece, but it does end the disc on a more open ended, spacious note.

The pacing and variety of Moulins is what makes it such a strong album. Tomasz Krakowiak hits that perfect point between sonic transformation and over-processing, mixing the percussion sounds into different beasts entirely, but all the while still retaining some vestiges of their source.While the song titles may seem more indicative of a field recording work, it feels more like an audio journey, with Tomasz recreating the sounds and sights of his travels using just a drum kit. This is no small feat considering how well he does at achieving that goal.

samples:

• February, Stream in High Park
• Crowds Skating, Nathan Philips Square
• Waiting for Train, Six Nations Reserve, Ontario

 

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

Quarter Turns Over A Living Line is the debut album by Raime.

It follows the duo's self-titled 2010 EP and two subsequent 12" singles, If Anywhere was here we would know where we are and Hennail.

Moving away from the sample-based strategies that characterized their early work, Joe Andrews and Tom Halstead have looked increasingly to live instrumentation for their first full-length, mounting intensive recording sessions for percussion, guitar and strings before painstakingly piecing the album together at their home studio. The gothic and industrial signifiers in their music remain, but more submerged and oblique than ever - no more pronounced as influences than jungle's rhythmic dynamism and doom metal's oppressive weight, or aspects of techno, modern composition and dub.

The 7-track album is due to be released on November 19 on 2x12", CD and digital formats. The cover art is derived from an original photograph by William Oliver, produced in collaboration with Raime and featuring dancer Rosie Terry.

More information here.

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

While I still have some minor misgivings about its execution, Nadja have certainly found a way to make their latest release a noteworthy and meaningful event: they have made a rock album (at least, as much of a rock album as could be expected from them).  That is something of a quixotic move, as songwriting and singing are not exactly the duo's greatest talents, but the inspired addition of Jesus Lizard drummer Mac McNeilly definitely makes Nadja's signature doomgaze aesthetic a lot more punchy and immediately gratifying.  It is a marriage that will probably yield some truly wonderful results somewhere further down the line, but Dagdrøm is more of a promising, oft-successful experiment than a revelation or total creative rebirth.

Broken Spine

Nadja is a bit of an unusual case for me, as I genuinely enjoy the niche that they have have staked out for themselves (generally slow-motion avalanches of heavily distorted guitars), but find the sheer volume of their output both baffling and exasperating.  By my count, Nadja currently have over 18 releases, most of which are variations on a pretty narrow theme.  That makes it quite difficult for a casual fan like myself to muster any enthusiasm for a typical new album, which is why a bold divergence like Dagdrøm was almost a necessity at this point.

In most respects, Nadja's transition to a more conventional "doom metal band" sound is a huge success.  McNeilly's drumming, for example, is quite an invigorating, dynamic, and potent addition.  Rather than playing at a doom-y crawl or attempting to dazzle me with virtuosic fills, Mac instead opts for the punkier "bash-and-bludgeon" approach, which proves to be the perfect counterbalance to Baker and Buckareff's wall of sludge.  That is not hyperbole, as I cannot imagine these songs working if the drums were less blunt and visceral.  Besides that, the album is strewn with great grooves, crushing walls of distortion, and squalling crescendos.  All of that pleases me.

Unfortunately, lots of great parts does quite not equal a great album in the case of Dagdrøm (though it certainly comes very, very close).  Nadja's biggest stumbling block is probably the buried/whispered/mumbled vocals: it almost seems like Baker's mindset was "Songs need to have singing, I guess.  Hand me a microphone, I'll add some now."  That is not to say that the vocals are bad—they are not.  However, they do feel completely inconsequential and add nothing to the songs.

Another issue is that the songs are perhaps a bit overlong.  I have no problem with their more ambient-minded work stretching out for 20 minutes or more, but a one- or two-riff "song" definitely overstays its welcome a bit when it exceeds ten minutes.  I also feel that this new direction sacrifices some of the band's distinctiveness, but the staggering density of passages like the outro of "Falling Out of Your Head" are still pretty uniquely Nadja-esque.  I suppose that is less of a flaw than an interesting artistic choice, as these songs tend to build towards sounding like Nadja (albeit an atypically ferocious version) rather than sounding instantly recognizable as such.

I feel like I am probably over-thinking and over-critiquing this effort a bit, but I cannot help it–it comes so exasperatingly close to being absolutely crushing.  In fact, despite its flaws, it is probably the single most essential Nadja record around: longtime fans will definitely want to hear Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff rip shit up (it is easy to imagine parts of "Space Time and Absense" whipping a mosh pit into a frenzy), while this is probably the most instantly likable window into Nadja's world that a curious listener could hope to find.  Sure, it is not quite the Nadja sound, but there are more than enough glimpses of it to lure new fans towards their more experimental, long-form work.  As a result, Dagdrøm presents a very unusual situation: it is not the band's best work, but it is an unqualified success in all other regards (direction, appeal, choice of drummer, and general bad-assness).

Samples:

• Falling Out of Your Head
• Dagdr√∏m
• Space Time and Absense

 

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

This latest release captures the ever-prolific Shiflet in one his more "ambient" moods, offering a more conventionally musical and slightly less-scary window into his work than his recent, more epic Sufferers/Merciless diptych on Type.  Naturally, some of Mike's noisier and weirder impulses still make their (welcome) appearances, but these nine relatively short pieces balance his harsher textural themes with an unexpectedly varied palette of sublime shimmers, woozy guitars, and some very wrong-sounding violin.  This definitely ranks as one of Mike's most inspired release to date (and possibly his best).

Under the Spire

Mike Shiflet has found a pretty wonderful and unique way to make drone music, insomuch as he has basically figured out how to make harsh noise seem warm and listenable.  At the risk of sounding like I am gushing, it is a rather marvelous and difficult feat to pull off.  He does not do it with every song on The Choir, The Army, but such pieces certainly dominate the album and give it its character.  The trick sounds rather simple, as he essentially just combines quavering synths with a seething bed of grinding, hissing noise.  The execution is the tough part, however, and Mike nails it perfectly on pieces like "1917," "Zahlentheorie," and "Omnicron Serenade."

Impressively, each of those pieces sounds radically different from the others.  Also, many of the album's other pieces sound even more radically different, yet the album somehow feels thematically coherent and flowing.  It is also endlessly listenable, owing to its unusual and conspicuous absence of melodies or chord changes.  The secret seems to lie in the hyper-minimalism of the music, as these pieces rarely contain anything more than a single note or chord, nor is there any straightforward melodic or harmonic development.  This album is almost entirely textural and the textures are dense, vibrant, and unpredictable enough to seem fresh and visceral every time I listen.  In fact, some songs dispense with any musical component altogether, like the roaring chaos of "Attrition," which sounds like a bulldozer driving through a factory that is on fire (which is a compliment, obviously).

Shiflet allows the pendulum to swing entirely the other way near the end of the album, however, as "Inching" is all shimmering synths and languorous, blurred guitars.  Then the album's brief closer, "Yonder," continues that theme of melodicism, but perverts it into something truly disturbed and disquieting–it sounds like someone playing a mournful, out-of-tune violin along with an insistent, warbling, and discordant tape loop of a guitar while the apocalypse rages outside the window.  I am not sure if it is the album's best, most inventive piece or not, but I do know that nothing could have followed it.

I am truly surprised by how much I love this album, as I did not expect Shiflet to be this absorbing and powerful with such short songs, nor did I expect these nine pieces to cohere into such a beautifully constructed and sequenced suite.  I also did not expect it to be so ingeniously varied, seamlessly combining fragile beauty, cosmic horror, and howling entropy into a twisted fun house of an album that exceeded my expectations in every way.  This is sound art at its absolute best.

• Zahlentheorie
• Attrition
• Yonder

 

 

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

Cankun's music is an exercise in stretching pop hooks to their logical extreme. They push back against standard compositional forms by forcing a rigid, dutiful recurrence on their melodies, layering them with more and more complex loops in the style of electronic music until they reach a kind of psychedelic apex.

Constellation Tatsu

Idle is a record of anticipatory bliss, full of shimmering guitars, echoing drum machines, and ambient harmonics pulsating throughout. Peaceful chords and whirring resonant drones pervade each song with increasingly beautiful effect, but they never actually seem to go anywhere. To some, this might seem like the work of a group trapped in the initial stages of writing a summer pop anthem. But Cankun's music touches on a different nerve than standard verse-chorus-verse payoff. Their songs are focused on capturing a single, perfect moment through guitars and drums, then recreating that moment ceaselessly until nothing else can be done with it. The music chooses to remain stationary, but it stills feels as if, by listening to it, you are going somewhere, moving in some direction. There are obvious similarities to krautrock or early psychedelia, mainly in the sense that Cankun wants to achieve more with less.

Cankun break up the eight minute "Sneakers" in half, with two similarly structured guitar loops and cascading waves of synthesizer coloring each part in gradually more intense ways. On "Where's Zion?," they introduce vocals in the song's second half, repeating a single indecipherable mantra over and over as it slowly becomes more yelling than singing. On "I Know You Love To Dance," they apply lo-fi distortion to a persistent strum of guitars and metallic percussion, which blurs into a haze of noise before fading away. The closing song, "Water Alps," features drums in the forefront, where they collide playfully over what sounds like a passing train.

Each piece is distinctly crafted as if to designate a certain space, or a place in time. In fact, taken as a single document, the six songs on Idle might appear to be a set of six photographs, exactly detailing the events of a day in the form of specific points plucked from its hours. A persistent theme of hazy, filtered pop and repetition is omnipresent, but the constant reinforcing of that theme—of recurring memories and the bliss of lingering in them—makes the album more cohesive than monotonous. Cankun has built small but pleasant glimpse into another world.

samples:

• Sneakers
• Water Alps

28 October 2012

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Albums and Singles

Jeff Carey makes cathartic, head clearing bursts of noise, bereft of any kind of real context. This is the latest in a number of releases from the electronic composer, who employs re-purposed game pads and other devices to create a mixture of arresting high pitched catalytic noise and digitally manipulated drones.

Jeff Carey Foundation

Carey controls his sound–completely improvised and recorded with few adjustments, as far as I can tell–by means of circuit bent equipment, managing filters and unexplainable sources of random noise with idiosyncratic spontaneity on a joystick. From a very limited palette he manages to assemble a wide, apparently limitless range of textures and atmospheres. Especially notable is his grasp of dynamics and buildup, which is what sets this release aside, lending just the slightest sense of humanity to what is otherwise cold, completely computerized noise.

The opening "Lag" is an assault by a singular statement–a constant burning shriek that sounds like hundreds of cracking bones and power tools being used incorrectly. "Struct" pops in and out of silence with permutations of a few static oscillations, while "Fold" burns ominously, with microscopic pops and clicks whirring above a distant eerie hum. The most variety comes from "Thresh," where Jeff commits eight minutes to discovering the whole range of sounds possible from his equipment. I can't help but be entranced by it even after repeat listens.

I feel a bizarre sense of reassurance from Carey's noiser moments, which are cathartic in their brute strength and sheer single-mindedness. However, I feel like some of the record suffers from not experimenting with contrasts more. His best moments, such as "Thresh," offer an endless universe of different sounds and effects, from the malevolent to the subtly sublime. Even in the unrelenting "Chop," the frequent use of ominous silence empowers the aggressive blasts of harsh noise, lending them a climactic intensity.

On much of the album, especially the latter half, Jeff Carey focuses more on a few specific high pitched buzzing sounds which resembled swarms of insects flying back and forth and dangerously close. They were interesting at first listen, but with Jeff's music there's a capacity for any number of impossible shapes and contours, so I was a little underwhelmed (and honestly surprised) that he produced the same sound more than once. Still, a good majority of the album is delightfully unpredictable, so I'm just nitpicking. It might be familiar territory, but Carey's music continues to find a niche by remaining confusingly, vibrantly fresh.

sample:

• Excerpts from "Interrupt/Decay"