Mev 40 is an essential listening experience. The four discs of this set bring together eight tracks from seven performances spanning 40 years of Musica Elettronica Viva’s activity, from 1967 through 2007. In 1966 musical ideas were flowering in America and Europe. As American expatriates living in Rome they were steeped in the classical New Music scenes happening on each side of the Atlantic, as well the heavy spell cast by Free Jazz. Musica Elettronica Viva was a new hybrid that blossomed out of that fecund sound pool. Within their songs can be heard a zeitgeist that not only spans the decades, but an inclusive and intuitive impulse whose periphery extends far beyond the group and deep into audio culture at large.
Give us an hour, we'll give you music to remember. This week we bring you an episode with brand new music from Softcult, Jim Rafferty, karen vogt, Ex-Easter Island Head, Jon Collin, James Devane, Garth Erasmus, Gary Wilson, and K. Freund, plus some music from the archives from Goldblum, Rachel Goswell, Roy Montgomery. Rubber ducks and a live duck photo from Matthew in the UK. Get involved: subscribe, review, rate, share with your friends, send images!
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A reissue of a legendary private press Brazilian psych record, this disc represents a welcome document of this too rarely heard classic. With a mellow fusing of psych, folk and plain great songwriting, the album provides a number of instantly memorable sides with subtle and pleasing idiosyncrasies keeping them afloat.
Since establishing their own small-run label to release their work, the duo behind Sutcliffe Jugend and Bodychoke have become extremely prolific, releasing multiple projects this year alone. While to some this could seem excessive and overindulgent, each release from Kevin Tomkins and Paul Taylor (as well as joint releases) have taken entirely different directions. These two releases are both vastly different: Loss is mostly just vocals and guitar (recorded over the span of two days), while Vocal Sound Collage is exactly what the title indicates.
Along with the likes of label mates (and fellow Chicagoans) Locrian, The Golden Sores have taken a modernized approach to drone, away from the traditional academia of La Monte Young and the like, but also diverging from the metal leanings of Sunn O))) into its own realm of ambience and electronic sensibilities.
Between his roles as both filmmaker and Fonal Records head, Sami Sanpakkila has somehow managed to find time to produce this, his fifth album of solo material under the Es moniker. Citing Pekka Streng's "Kesamaa" as its impetus makes sense considering the immediately nostalgic summer feel of the record, though Es' eyes are set on a much more distant and ethereal horizon than Streng's song-based structures.
Cocteau Twins founder and indie guitar demi-god Robin Guthrie has always been both reliable and respectable (musically, anyway), but seldom surprising. The pleasant and elegant dreampop instrumentals of Angel Falls do not waver from this trend. However, they don't indicate any declining quality in his singular soundscape wizardry either.
Helen Scarsdale founder, sound installation artist, and mega-collaborator extraordinaire Jim Haynes claims that his work involves the process of rusting. More specifically, the sounds he makes connote the suffocating grip of decay and the passage of time. On Sever Haynes marries that focus to the creation of dystopian worlds and crippled environments, creating a convincing and uncomfortable environment of his own as he proceeds.
This decidedly un-Nadja release is a stunning surprise by a pair of artists that I thought I had completely figured out. This single-sided LP by Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff nods more to Angelo Badalamenti than to the usual avant rock gods. Gone are the waves of crushing riffs and in their place is some well placed suspense and elegant, soundtrack-like motifs.
The latest instalment in Blast First Petit's ongoing 10" series in honor of Alan Vega’s 70th birthday sees Greg Anderson and Stephen O’Malley team up with Pan Sonic’s Mika Vainio for a killer Suicide cover. Also included is a rare outing by Head of David’s Stephen Burroughs and a new live track by Alan Vega himself.
This album is yet another fine testament to the French composer’s genius; these pieces have bucketloads of creativity and depth to them despite being shelved for well over 20 years. Composed between 1982 and 1984, the first piece showcases Ferrari’s interest in tape collage work and sampling whereas the second piece is one of his less than traditional compositions for a traditional ensemble.
