Kranky The latest Loscil release stems from an intriguing proposition; have a twenty-two-piece orchestra play a three-minute composition, press it onto acetate and sample the end result after a little abuse, and use that as the basis for ten long drifting pieces. In general, Clara is a sedate album, initially evoking the slow ebb and flow of waves on an empty beach, but a sea that over millennia […]
Yearly archives: 2021
167 posts
Glacial Movements John Sellekaers‘s latest series of drone sculptures are the sort of journey in which you can just close your eyes and allow them to transport you. The drones are deep and resonant, but with other lighter textures skirting the edges, pushing you off balance just a little. The ebb and flow is at times slow and rhythmic with pulses scattered, the rising and falling bringing to mind […]
Tenor-Vossa I suppose it is fair to say that what set Breathless apart from their contemporaries was the extraordinary voice of Dominic Appleton; it somehow managed to encapsulate a desolate longing, but never really strayed into melancholy. It was a voice that understood loneliness and did its best to rise above it. Having said that, the band managed to surround that voice with some of the most widespread […]
Jazzland The artwork for Maridalen‘s first album, photographs of beautiful but brooding Scandinavian vistas sit well with the pastoral gentleness of the music contained within. The three players — Anders Hefre on sax and clarinet; Jonas Kilmork Vemøy on trumpet and sparse percussion; and Andreas Rødland Haga on double bass — convened in the nineteenth century mission house of Maridalen Kirke and somehow the vibe of this old […]
Rocket The nouveau mediaevalism of the first track on Easy To Build, Hard To Destroy, “Elka” is a choice gem plucked for those early hippy daze where I first mentally hitched a ride on the Gnod train from the back of a dusty Trowbridge barn. A trickle of curling consciousness, leaking naturally into the latch key languid incessants of “Inner Z”, full of sweeping Moog and dazzling silver, […]
Broken Folk The duo of Clair le Couteur and Carli Jefferson brings a much-needed sense of drama and intrigue to the world of folk and their love of the history of song and its function as a staple for our way of life is perfectly presented in Lunatraktors‘ second full-length album, The Missing Star. Taking , they weave sad and strident tales of humanity’s undoing and also its […]
Play Loud! What a pleasure this LP is, a refreshing skew of anarchic jazz / freestyle surgery and falling downstairs momentums. There’s a manic urgency that makes AIDS Delikat one of my favourites of the Tapetopia series so far. Recorded at the end of 1984, Christmas market sounds intersperse the action. The ping(ed) recoil of air-gun darts mingling with festive barrel organs, weaving between the goods, the fruit […]
arkLIVE There is something about the amount and variety of found voices that Invictus Hi-Fi uses here that sets a really mysterious and far-reaching mood on The Market Deities. Past and present voices of economists, sociologists, thinkers and robots abound, putting forth simple ideas or complex thoughts that feel as if there is some kind of multi-dimensional and rather esoteric conference taking place upon which some tasteful and […]
Crammed Discs Not only are Crammed Discs intent on a reissue series for their Made To Measure imprint, but there are still artists recording and releasing material in the series which they feel fits the criteria of artistic adventure. Although releases have been few and far between this millennium with the likes of Tuxedomoon (and various offshoots) plus Jozef van Wissem, Crammed are still searching for and securing […]
Rocket This has a weird energy, a smokey commune bonfiring prog, hippy trippiness and the more esoteric end of the musical spectrum. A flamboyant mirage angeling the experimental itch of the Ya Ho Wha 13, King Crimson and Comus (and a hell of a lot more). The Holy Family‘s head architect David J Smith has gathered together a host of like-minded travellers, including The Utopia Strong’s Kavus Torabi, […]
Crammed Discs In Crammed Discs‘s ongoing reactivation of their Made To Measure series, the reissue part continues with prodigious French composer Hector Zazou‘s extraordinary travelogue suite Geographies. Comprising nine pieces taking in all manner of styles and using a fine array of instrumentation and voices, it takes the listener on a journey through French provinces, the outer reaches of the Francophone nations and the wild countryside, all held […]
Thrill Jockey It is interesting that in the time between the release of 2020’s Summerlong and this year’s Earth Trip, there has been no new music from either Wooden Shjips or Moon Duo, giving the impression that the ease of recording the solo stuff as Rose City Band and the inherent themes of travel and escape are what is fuelling Ripley Johnson‘s creativity currently. Earth Trip follows on to […]
Constellation T Griffin‘s soundtrack for the rather fascinating-sounding film about the life and work of Mexican architect Luis Barragan covers a lot of ground across the thirteen intricate pieces that The Proposal comprises. Using a band that comprises drummer Jim White and Matan Roberts amongst others, he has produced a thought-provoking and diverse suite that takes in smokey jazz, found sounds and drones, but manages to imbue a […]
Warp It is not before time that Warp has chosen to compile the work that Seefeel produced for them. For me, Seefeel are one of the most important and overlooked bands of the nineties, managing to skirt around a number of genres without stepping directly into them, blazing a trail for a lot of artists who wanted to merge the burgeoning IDM sound with a guitar-based aesthetic.
Blindblindblind I’m not overly familiar with Le Days’ output, but I’m really liking the stark majestics Daniel Hedin is conjuring up on We Are Nowhere, a double album of emotional outpourings buried in roomy reflection and shoaling silver. As you all know, I love a bit of musical introspection, and this provides a plentiful platter to all that is broken or bent out of shape.
Empty Birdcage The array of percussive instruments in the photograph on Steve Noble‘s Solo release shows the stripped-down aesthetic that he is working towards; a snare, some gongs, various cymbals and some sort of boards. The sounds that appear within are about as far from the busy funk workouts of Rip, Rig and Panic as it is possible to travel in the intervening years, with the forty-minute piece […]
Thrill Jockey Everyone’s favourite collaborating drummer Kid Millions has found a kind of solace in the arms of Mouse On Mars‘s arch experimentalist Jan St Werner. Perhaps solace isn’t quite the right word, as these glitchy, dusty scuffles are not particularly relaxing; but somehow have found an odd momentum. Recorded back in 2016/2017 for a handful of people and then tinkered with and added to in the intervening […]
Discus Martin Archer must have been busy over lockdown. Not only was he keeping an eye on the running of Discus, but he had time to be involved in a multitude of collaborative releases, two of which have dropped almost simultaneously and show two very different sides to his not inconsiderable capabilities.