Courier Sound Back in 2018, while creating sleeves for Graham Dunning‘s keg/Bulkhead release, Stuart Bowditch recorded the sounds of the Silhouette Cameo 3 plotter cutter and then offered it as basis for other artists to record a response. Now, if like me you have ever worked in an office and been surrounded by the rhythmic, mechanised sounds of copiers, printers, bursters, plotters and the like, you may have […]
Mr Olivetti
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Temporary Residence The recent collaboration between Date Palms‘ Marielle Jakobsons and Cali guitarist Chuck Johnson under the name Saariselka has yielded an album of exquisitely crafted and slow-moving beauty that employs steel guitar and the romantic thrum of Fender Rhodes to devastating effect.
(self-released) Meriheini Luoto‘s love for the forest and how the violin can be used to translate the mystery and wonder that it entails was used to excellent effect on 2017’s Metsänpeitto, which received much critical acclaim. Having been given the opportunity to perform it live, the idea was sown to produce a sequel and two years later, here it is.
Rockerill / Freaksville Josy And Pony have been gigging all across Europe since their first album dropped in 2017, and now they return with another fun-packed ride through the important matters of the day — but given their unique twist on ’60s French pop, ’90s indie and carefree hypnotic abandon. It is all topped off as ever with the mysteriously masked Josy’s winning French vocals, sometimes sultry, sometimes […]
Hubro Just looking at the cover of this album with Oyvind Skarbø and his musical friends and colleagues dressed as a school marching band gives you a vague idea of what to expect inside. They have quite serious looks on their faces, but the uniforms are a bit ill-fitting, as if they were borrowed and not taken too seriously. They are clutching various instruments that make them look […]
Cobblers Diagonal don’t trend to release albums in a rush, this being their third since 2008; but once they are in the studio, the ideas come pouring out. It has been seven years since The Second Mechanism and since that time, two original members, Alex Crispin and Daniel Pomlett have returned to the fold, the band once again becoming a six-piece. In the past few years, life has […]
Om Swagger There are some pretty eccentric ideas out there, certainly regarding music; but Ian Shirley, the editor of Record Collector, may well have come up with one of the wildest. Kraftwerk must be one of the most revered names in modern music history, and Ian has asked the internationally reputed Ebony Steel Band to interpret some of their better-known tracks in the joyful Caribbean style. I mean, […]
Thrill Jockey Thrill Jockey continue their venture into noise territory with the first release from Eye Flys. The band is named after a Melvins song and with their own track titles like “Crushing The Human Spirit” or “Weaponize” and with rather sinister cover art, you probably have a good idea of what this six-track EP contains.
Hubro Considering the island of Lanzarote is renowned for its sunshine and blue skies, this latest collaboration between Jo Berger Myhre and Ólafur Björn Ólafsson is filled with melancholy. Most of this has to do with Lanzarote being the last placed that Ólafur spent time with Johann Johannsson before he died early last year. Apparently, the two of them played a gig in a cave on the island, […]
Escape From Today / Dunque Paolo Spaccamonti has been a major player in the lively Italian avant-garde scene for the last ten years or so, collaborating with the likes of musicians Stefano Pilla, Mombu and Ramon Moro as well as Ben Chasny, Jim White and Jochen Arbeit. Not content with musicians, he also collaborates with photographers and video artists, so it is no surprise that his latest opus […]
Thrill Jockey Once again, Thrill Jockey are confounding expectations with the debut album from new soul wunderkind Sequoyah Murray. Hot on the heels of this year’s Penalties Of Love EP, the album finds Sequoyah crafting all sorts of .
Constellation It is hard to believe that Fly Pan Am have been away since 2006. Always Constellation‘s joker in the pack, their latest album carries on their rich tradition of genre-hopping, song sabotage and listener discomfort as if N’écoutez Pas were only yesterday.
Upset The Rhythm In their quest for world domination, Upset The Rhythm are going great guns with their release schedule. The latest two tasty treats to arrive are from opposite ends of the sonic spectrum and from both sides of the Atlantic.
(self-released) Brighton’s Emperors Of Ice Cream are a totally DIY band who, having worked their way through other local scene bands covering noise, improv and freak-folk type stuff, have settled on the Emperors for peddling an open-minded take on the kind of wonky indie scrawl at which the British were so good on the mid to late 1980s.
London 14 September 2019 After a tortuous journey through London and around the building site that is Hackney Wick at the moment, we find ourselves standing outside Studio 9294, one of the many curious venues that Baba Yaga’s Hut uses for its shows. Steel shuttered doors and a street art facade lead us into the concrete bunker that is serving the three bands tonight.
Trace Recordings Mark Beazley picks the Trace Recordings artistes with great care, and it is easy to see why they have chosen to release the first album from bass and voice duo Being. Not only does the bass couch the restless and emotive vocal in a dreamy gauze, but the overall sound draws the listener closer into the pervading melancholy.
Discus The two latest releases from Martin Archer‘s wonderful Discus label ply very different takes on the fluttering world of modern jazz.
Adaadat Gather round, kiddies. I hope you are sitting comfortably, because it is time for the second instalment of Story Teller‘s Lovecraftian travelogues. After the first instalment’s gory tale of love and lust between the aristocracy and plant life, I at least had some idea that it wouldn’t necessarily be the child-friendly story of the Marshall Cavendish variety. Once again, Bruce McClure has come up with something profoundly […]