MUSIC

When I started my record label Broken Flag in 1982, one of the people I really wanted to work with was Maurizio Bianchi. His album “Symphony for a Genocide” was such a haunting, evocative record that I needed to get in contact with the man who made it. We made contact and remained regularly writing letters to each other, mine in my unintelligible scrawl, his in his red ink on photocopy paper. He was massively prolific and I soon became a distributor for his fantastic early albums like “Regel”, “Mectpyo Bacterium”, “Mörder Unter Uns/Neuro Habitat”, “Menses”, “Endometrio”, “Carcinosi”, “Das Testament” and “Armaghedon”, albums I still love to this day. He kindly contributed tracks to Broken Flag compilations as well. Releasing an album by him was always going to be high on my list of priorities and when he agreed I was overjoyed. He said he wanted a colour cover and I was running the label on a shoestring budget but I wanted him to be happy so I agreed. He sent me two polaroid photographs which we had blown up to cover size and are the pictures on the front and back cover that you see today. He wanted to release records as Maurizio Bianchi in the future rather than just as M.B and asked for the name on the cover to read “M.B. = Maurizio Bianchi”. Although the record has the catalogue number BFV3, it was actually the second vinyl record I put out because once I heard it, I didn’t want to wait for the first Ramleh album (BFV2) to be ready. I had been slightly apprehensive about what the record would sound like because just before he sent it, he told me that he had become a Jehovah’s Witness and seemed to be going through a very happy life-changing experience. He was in a relationship with the “T.D.” of the second side track “T.D. 56”, so I thought maybe the music would be too light sounding or upbeat and when I heard it, it certainly wasn’t what I was expecting but it was stunningly beautiful but still with some of the sadder, ominous melodies I loved so much. My fears were unfounded. It was a classic. Still one of my favourites to this day. I’m very proud of it. I get a co-production and co-direction credit on the sleeve but in reality all I did was provide the money and arrange for the record to go into production. I had no influence on the music itself or the cover pictures. Maurizio has made so many records that it’s easy to get lost knowing where to start but I think this album is a good entry point and is one of his very best along with “Mörder Unter Uns”, “Regel”, “Menses” or “Symphony for a Genocide”, although you can’t go too far wrong with any of his wonderful music. As I sit here listening to it again it takes me back to 38 years ago when I first heard it and knew that I was going to be lucky enough to release a classic for the ages. Just 500 vinyl records exist from that original Broken Flag release. They are out there somewhere except for the one I have right here which will be with me until I die. It’s great that it’s coming out on vinyl again and I hope if you’re hearing it for the first time you adore it like I do. “To all the redeemed people”. (Gary Mundy, August 2021) When in the cold spring of 1983, I set about decomposing these elegiac synthetic - concrete suites, my decadent vision of life was taking a brighter turn, and in fact the atmospheres that pervade the whole work, enriched by the emotional notes of a keyboard of violins, reflect my thirst for visceral eternity. The title therefore, “The Plain Truth”, follows my research directed towards the infinity of the human soul, one step away from spiritual truth, for the benefit of the loyal supporters of the plain electro-neuronal sound. (M.B., August 2021)

Violinist, composer and filmmaker Tony Conrad started his career in New York in the early 1960s. As a member of the Theater of Eternal Music (a.k.a. the Dream Syndicate) alongside John Cale, La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela and Angus MacLise, he participated in now-legendary and often legendarily loud drone performances with many pieces having no beginning and no end. During a fateful trip to Germany in 1972, Conrad met with avant-rock visionaries Faust and made the very first record to bear his name. Outside The Dream Syndicate, originally released in Europe only in 1973, is a stunning debut. Two side-long tracks―“The Side Of Man And Womankind” and “The Side Of The Machine”―show just how far Conrad had moved beyond his minimalist peers. Werner Diermaier’s repetitive drum beat and Jean-Hervé Peron’s stripped-down bassline conjure a tense, ascetic groove, while Conrad’s seamless violin, initially so controlled, reveals a surprising adaptability. The music shifts almost on a subliminal level, pushing and pulling to the drone’s internal pulse. It is hard to imagine Conrad’s trajectory from downtown Manhattan to a farmhouse in the German countryside that ultimately resulted in Outside The Dream Syndicate, yet no other record captures―so completely and instantly―the intersection of avant-garde and rock forms. Outside The Dream Syndicate remains ahead of and bracingly outside of its time. This first-time vinyl reissue and long out-of-print CD release have been carefully been carefully mastered from the original master tapes and include liner notes by musician Jim O’Rourke and author Branden W. Joseph.

Originally released on CD by Cramps Records in 1989, this is a work by Walter Marchetti (1931-), a central figure in the Italian conceptual art group ZAJ, also known as Europe's Fluxus, and a master of the avant-garde in Italy.This is a masterpiece with a melody that seems to be based on a certain mysticism, floating in the water in perfect stillness, and is highly recommended for those who like Morton Feldman.

A reissue of Antibarbarus, issued as a compact disc in 1998, was the first edition Walter Marchetti released on Alga Marghen. The Antibarbarus cycle of five pieces makes use of original tapes coming from the same recording sessions that originated some of Marchetti's major musical works realized in the '80s, collected in his two CDs: 1989's Vandalia (NMN 076-4CD/NMN 083-5LP) and 1984's Per La Sete Dell'orecchio (NMN 083-3LP). This former series of works presented some homogeneous and untouched sound sources in the "concrete" status of their inner - and necessarily chaotic - level of entropy. Nevertheless this operative and only in appearance "neutral" premise introduces an implicit mimetic transposition. This link between the "iconic" threshold of the acoustical material and its transposition literally deconstructs the prerogatives and the ideological categories of music composition. In Antibarbarus, the temporal continuum restores the mimesis of the phenomenal regression of musical time, crystallized in a framed-length which gets estranged from subjective domain. But the transfiguration of sound sources now deliberately intends to de-signify the analytical prerogatives of hearing. The sensorial perception is in such a way inhibited from an immediate comprehension of the acoustic reality so reproduced: canis reversus ad vomitum suum. In the late 1950s, Marchetti was able both to formalize a more critical aim towards the established lingua franca and absolutist ideology of musical avant-gardism and to expand the sense of artistic praxis, in line with an ethical and subtly political evaluation of aesthetic experience. Marchetti was inspired by Cage's poetics of indeterminacy and subsequently created, through a close and indissoluble association with Juan Hidalgo and José Luis Castillejo, an original and de-ritualized form of action-music which led in 1964 to the birth of ZAJ group. Marchetti's work relays, in its procedural level, upon a resolute de-functioning of the musical codes and impose this act as a reversed mimesis of the methodological statute of music composing. Namely, not a "degré zero de l'écriture", but its "reversal"; not a "denial of style", but "style of denial". In this perspective, Walter Marchetti's oeuvre condenses one of the rare examples of aesthetic radicalism consciously extended to music poetics. Comes in full color gatefold sleeve; Includes printed inner sleeves (with photos of "Musica da camera n. 182", London, Raven Row, 1989/2011 and "Music in secca", Milano, Fondazione Mudima, 2003); Liner notes by Gabriele Bonomo in English and Italian.

Building upon a standing commitment to the work of artists who worked in international obscurity under the shadow of 1960s and '70s fascist Spain, Alga Marghen returns with "El Artilugio”, a never before issued body of work by Manuel Calvo. Bridging the contexts of installation, sound art, sound poetry, and experimental music / noise, its stunning two sides - issued in a limited edition of 200 copies on vinyl, housed in a gatefold sleeve with an accompanying large format 8-page booklet with in-depth liner notes by musicologist Gabriele Bonomo - open a visionary creative universe, too long hidden by the history's weight. Edition of 200 in gatefold sleeve, also includes a large format 8-page booklet. ** Over their decades of activity, the Italian imprint, Alga Marghen, has illuminated a near countless number of historical artefacts at the juncture of visual art, experimental music and avant-garde deployments of language, helping to radically reshape our understanding of 20th Century creative practice. Embedded within their ever-growing discography lies a small window, via releases by Zaj members Walter Marchetti, José Luis Castillejo and Juan Hidalgo, into the avant-garde happening occurring in Spain during the '60s and '70s, while the country lay under the final decades of fascist rule. Now, Alga opens access to this radical world with El Artilugio, a stunning LP of previously unavailable sonic art by multidisciplinary artist, Manuel Calvo, created in 1966. Creatively thrilling and existing outside the larger historical vision of experimental practice occourring in Europe during that decade, its stunning sounds are issued on vinyl in a gatefold sleeve, accompanied by a large format 8-page booklet with in-depth liner notes by musicologist Gabriele Bonomo, in an edition of 200 copies. As important as world-premiere releases come. Born in 1934, during the 1950s and '60s Manuel Calvo emerged as a forerunner and a protagonist of geometric abstract painting in Spain, working against the odds attempting freely expression within the context of fascist rule in Spain that had taken hold during the early years of his life. During his early career, he was closely aligned with groups like Equipo 57 and Grupo Parpallo, artists who were active around Valencia and held strong connections to the rest of Europe, developing the principles of an analytical art in opposition to the main currents of informal art and lyrical abstraction. This restless questioning increased to more radical tendencies in his work, a period spent in Paris and then Brazil, before returning to Spain in 1966 where he fell into contact with artists like Juan Hidalgo and Walter Marchetti, who had founded the Zaj group in Madrid in 1964, and begun creating some of the most subversive means of aesthetic communication encountered during that period. Calvo’s new phase of radicalism, embarked upon between 1966 and 1967, centered around the transformation of his studio into a laboratory where he could hold a permanent exhibition of his works, opening it to the public with no temporal limits, in the hope to reverse the standing perceptions of what an exhibition was. Within this space, Calvo created El artilugio, a participatory installation where the effects of light variations were randomly activated through simple buttons by the audience, opening the potential for open structures of unlimited possibilities for random variation. In addition to this, through a process similar to that applied to the light, Calvo introduced a reel-to-reel recording machine and a pre-recorded magnetic tape as a sonic element, recording the parasitic noises of an old electric engine that were then introduced into the installation via the reel-to-reel. It is this sound component of the installation that makes up Alga Marghen’s incredible LP, El artilugio, opening long overdue access to this singular creative world. El artilugio comprise two side long tracks. The first encounters the brilliant, randomized sonic universe that accompanied the installation of the same name, appearing somewhere between sound collage - split and juxtaposed by the participant’s push-button activated manipulation - and a microscopic journey across the surface and generative possibilities of the machine whose sounds it captures, rattling, clicking, scratching, droning, and buzzing as it goes, before fading out in a glissando after nearly half an hour. As a fascinating juxtaposition, the second side of El artilugio features the performance of an Austrian soprano singer reading out phonems, alliterations of single words, tongue twisters, and texts in different languages, repeated obsessively into states of abstraction that offers a stunning counterpoint to other forms of sound poetry being created during this period across the globe. Issued in a vinyl edition of 200 copies, in a gatefold sleeve that also includes a large format 8-page booklet, with El artilugio Alga Marghen has offered yet another triumphant window into the incredible world of singular artists working against the odds within fascist Spain, expanding their long-standing commitment to illuminating under-celebrated artefacts from the 20th Century, and changing history as they go. Absolutely incredible, and a must for any fan of sound art, sound poetry, and experimental music at large.

Crucial set feat. Sly Dunbar, Robbie Shakespeare, Aston Barett, Winston Wright, Sly Morris, J. Francisque and Skully "Zoot" Simms.

Another gem from the extensive Flipper Music catalog, more precisely from their Flower sublabel, "Dreams For Sax" is possibly one of the most stand-out productions from their studio ensemble Gruppo Sound, this time around featuring saxophonist Paolo Russo with keyboardists Stefano Galante and Vittorio Quattrini. First released in 1987, the songs recorded for "Dreams For Sax" are a beautiful melange of easy-listening electronic and jazzy vibes, from mellow tunes such as "Dawning" and "First Class" to some killer floor-filling italo disco bangers such as "Walking On Air" and "Dance Power". A groovy Italian library banger from the 80's now available on vinyl for the first time since its original release as a limited edition of 500 copies.

Essential jazz album among the influences of the future-jazz quartet Sleep Walker by trombonist Hiroshi Suzuki. “Variation” is a joint project including the legendary jazz drummer Masahiko Togashi featurig pianist Yuji Ohno, saxophonist Jun Suzuki and trumpeter Tetsuo Fushimi.

Belonging to a series of geographical-themed albums that draw upon numerous indigenous traditions from across the globe, like the previous releases in Dialogo’s Piero Umiliani Legacy Series - Continente Nero and Africa - Polinesia, issued by Piero Umiliani’s own Omicron imprint in 1975, highlights the composer’s travels and his striking ability to mirror these physical movements through sound, activating a seemingly unstoppable realm of creative freedom and exploration for composer and musician alike. Rooted in a foundation of rich percussion, soft tribalism, and exotic suggestion, Polinesia renders an abstract mirage of white beaches kissed by the ocean via its colorful cocktail of sonority, dancing blissfully across the album’s 15 songs, and covering a startlingly amount of creative territory as it goes. From the loungy kitsch of its opening tracks, or the overwhelmingly beautiful vocal melodies of Sotto le Palme, to the percussive minimalism of Canoe, Erbe Magiche, Danza Magica - each calling to mind Moondog at his best, with a bit of Midori Takada thrown in - and the dense ambiences of Pellegrinaggio, the composer takes us deep into an imagined realm, moving freely across its geographies and drenching the ears in its sounds. Beautiful and striking from the first turn to the last, Umiliani’s Polinesia fleshes out the world we began to explore with Dialogo’s reissues of Continente Nero and Africa, adding breezy sounds to the mix and plenty of dynamism across its length. Never before reissued on any format, with original copies commanding top dollar on the secondary market, Dialogo’s fully authorised vinyl reissue of Polinesia is a stunning thing to behold. Also available on CD, the album was remastered from the original analogue master tapes.

One of the great unsung saxophone hero's: Harold Vick worked as a sideman with Hammond Legends Jack McDuff, Jimmy McGriff, Big John Patton, and Larry Young. He played on and off with Walter Bishop, Jr. and also worked with Philly Joe Jones, Howard McGhee, Donald Byrd and Ray Charles and appeared with Dizzy Gillespie, King Curtis, and from 1970 to 1974 with Aretha Franklin. He played in Jack DeJohnette's jazz-rock band Compost from 1971 to 1973,recording with them in 1972 which is about the same time as this recording and that is probably the reason it is under the pseudonym of "Sir Edward". Add to that an absolutely top notch band, including bassist Wilbur "Bad" Bascomb, Jumma Santos on percussion and the mellow vibes of Omar Clay and this is a must have soulful jazz outing. The music is a funky mix of some of the big Soul tunes of the day, with versions of Donny Hathaway and The Stylistics and a nod to the CTI stylings of the day with a get down version of "People Make The World Go R...

Heavy 180g black vinyl + free digital (Bandcamp exclusive) Expanded Edition w/ 4 bonus tracks, japanese obi, a 72 photography collage of the many people who inspired this music and liner notes by composer Neil Ollivierra aka The Detroit Escalator Company. Sirio Ultra Black debossed sleeve 400gsm Half Speed Mastering Sublime and perfectly produced cutting-edge ambient techno masterpiece made in 1996 by unsung Detroit hero Neil Ollivierra, an album as underrated as it is essential. 25 years after its original release on UK label Ferox Records, Soundtrack [313] still provides a deeply futuristic aesthetic experience, warm and emotional electronics, along with glistening melody lines that create a peaceful, relaxed environment. This album possesses a formidable aptitude to always instill its listeners with a life-affirming feeling of serenity. A true timeless and unique classic that exists within its own genre and which still pushes the envelope of electronic music that transcends the club experience. This expanded release includes 4 bonus tracks (6 tracks on CD / digital), a liner note by the artist, and valuable photographic footage from his personal archives. This reissue has been mastered from original files by Sidney Claire Meyer at Emil Berliner (former Deutsche Grammophon studios in Berlin), using the half speed mastering process, and pressed on heavy vinyl at 45rpm. 25th anniversary audiophile edition. For fans of Detroit Techno, Global Communications, Black Dog, Manuel Goettsching, Tangerine Dream, Susumu Yokota, und Klaus Schulze.

Arthur's epic minimalist orchestral composition conducted by the late Julius Eastman 

Stunningly beautiful, mercurial and moving. 

The transcendental, ephemeral sound scape originally intended for theatrical performance. First release in 1983 on Chatham Square.

Rare recordings of beat/cut-up writers and artists William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin. Comprises the complete recording of Burroughs reading live in Liverpool in 1982, plus performances by Gysin of a selection of his permutated poems, as well as home recordings made by the pair in Paris in 1970. All recordings are taken from original tapes in The British Library collection. 180 gram vinyl.

For over 50 years, Kan Mikami has stood as a master of the Japanese blues and outsider folk. His unmistakable, powerfully evocative voice and surrealistic poetry reveal a gritty, transgressive life on the margins shot through with evocations of sex and violence, religion and romance. Released in 1991, I¡Çm the Only One Around was Mikami's first album with Tokyo's legendary P.S.F. Records and heralded an artistic renaissance. It marked the beginning of an incredibly productive and wildly creative era for Mikami that extends to the present day. This opening salvo presents the essential core of Mikami¡Çs music; With nothing but his voice and a stripped down electric guitar the album is a powerful, effortlessly emotional statement filled with moments of both brutal passion and gentle revelation. It is unrestrained, direct, brutally honest. It embodies Mikami¡Çs philosophy: ¡ÈIf you¡Çre going to make music, stake your life on it - it¡Çs worth it. Making music is an intensely human act.¡É In the newly translated notes to the album, Hiroyuki Itsuki, one of Japan¡Çs most renowned writers perhaps put it best: ¡ÈWhat erupts here is all the fury and grief of Jōmon Man (the prehistoric people of the Japanese archipelago), lobbed into the middle of a 1990s city. Kan Mikami is unchanging, yet definitely in motion. He advances not forwards, but backwards. Not a retreat, rather he consciously progresses backwards. At the final destination for his full-steam astern poésie lies a massive, gaping black hole, exuding a dazzling, black light. This is the image evoked by the world of Kan Mikami that you can hear on this album.¡É Mikami would go on to release 15 solo albums with P.S.F. as well as numerous collaborative efforts with other giants of the Japanese underground including Motoharu Yoshizawa, Masayoshi Urabe and Keiji Haino, with whom, along with Toshiaki Ishizuka he formed the group Vajra. Black Editions is honored to present the first ever vinyl edition of Kan Mikami¡Çs ¡ÈI¡Çm the Only One Around¡É featuring lyrics translated by Drew Stroud and newly translated notes by Alan Cummings. Remastered and cut to vinyl at Elysian Masters Los Angeles, pressed by RTI, packaged in heavy Stoughton tip-on jackets with insert featuring textured paper, gold foil stamping and metallic inks.

Lovely Music present a reissue of Robert Ashley's Automatic Writing, originally released as an LP by Lovely Music in 1979. Over the course of Robert Ashley's career his preoccupation with language and the voice took many forms. He became known in his librettos as a wonderful, funny, moving writer. But with Automatic Writing he examines language at a very "primitive" level -- the human impulse make sounds to express his inner state, whether it be regret, embarrassment, fear, or happiness -- even though there is no one else to listen. Talking to oneself.

Personnel: Voices - Robert Ashley and Mimi Johnson; Electronics and Polymoog - Robert Ashley; Words: Robert Ashley; Translation: Monsa Norberg; Silhouette: William Farley. The switching circuit was designed and built by Paul DeMarinis. Recorded, produced, and mixed by Robert Ashley at the Center for Contemporary Music, Mills College (Oakland), the American Cultural Center (Paris), and Mastertone Recording Studios (New York). This reissue was remastered and cut, from the original reel-to-reel tape, by Scott Hull, Masterdisk (New York). Manufactured at Record Technology Inc/RTI (California). 180 gram vinyl; Stoughton Old Style sleeve. Includes an insert with a transcription of the words, and the Automatic Writing notes Ashley wrote for Lovely's 1996 CD (that included "Purposeful Lady Slow Afternoon" and "She Was A Visitor").

"On Automatic Writing, Robert Ashley composes under the influence of his 'involuntary speech.' (In his liner notes, Ashley revealed that he suffered from 'a mild form of Tourette's.') The piece starts quietly, with scraps of Ashley's mild, tremulous voice arranged next to more fluid French translations and barely-there touches of Moog. After Ashley's phrases lengthen enough to encompass sense-making phrases, a bass-register groove briefly appears, vanishes, then returns. Few pieces so quiet have proven as captivating; many that intend to be equally startling can't capture Ashley's range of surprises." --Seth Colter Walls, from Pitchfork's "Fifty Best Ambient Albums of All Time"

Post-minimalist American composer Rafael Anton Irisarri makes his Umor Rex debut with bold new album, The Shameless Years. Inspired by a troubled socio-political climate, buried melodies punch their way through a bleak cover of noisy drones, periodically veering into some of Irisarri’s most eerily pertinent music to date. LP limited edition of 700 copies pressed on red colored vinyl, includes a post card with original artwork and free download coupon.
One of Rafael Anton Irisarri’s most thematically and sonically cohesive records to date The Shameless Years came together in a relatively short burst of creativity starting at the end of 2016. Rediscovering some relatively older tools – namely Native Instruments’ Reaktor, Absynth, and Kontakt software – Irisarri combined them with his collection of guitars, pedals, amps, and analogue processing gear, turning his Black Knoll Studio north of NYC into a powerful writing tool. Completed quickly by Irisarri’s standards, let alone during a period of social upheaval in American society, the record faces down several key personal themes. The title, suggests Irisarri, could in fact be seen as a reflection of the era of shamelessness we’re currently living in; a time of fake news and alternative facts.

Two tracks were completely remotely between Irisarri in New York and Umor Rex veteran Siavash Amini from his home in Tehran, Iran. This music came together at the peak of all the anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant rhetoric happening in the USA, not to mention the banning of Iranians from entering the country, explains Irisarri. The diptych with Amini, ‘Karma Krama’ and ‘The Faithless’, seems bathed in additional waves of sorrow and dread. The wash of symphonic stormclouds of synth drones and processed notes on the latter gradually appears and disappears over the course of thirteen mournful minutes.

‘Rh Negative’ marches gigantic guitars through towering valleys of scarred ambient noise dealing with Irisarri’s own heritage, many of his ancestors having come to America to escape poverty and oppression. The refusal of modern America to extend similar sanctuary to refugees escaping turmoil weighs heavily on the composer. Elsewhere an emotional onslaught of notes buried in mounds of greyscale noise on ‘Sky Burial’ aims to deal with Irisarri’s very own mortality – something he was recently confronted with following health scares, an accident, and a near-death experience in 2016. Pushing 40 as this album was being made, the composer is constantly aware that he’s already outlived his own father, who died at the age of 32. Facing down both intolerance and the void, the epic soundscapes of The Shameless Years are a vast cry of emotion from Irisarri. The clock is ticking – gotta make the most out of it while you still can.

For the next release we head to Barbados and 1985 for the first official reissue of ‘Exit’ by Fire Flight. The best reissues succinctly capture a moment in time and this album provides a snapshot of Island life in the Caribbean region of the America’s in the middle of the 1980’s. The LP encompasses new wave, funk and early house rhythms with a backbone of calypso. The idea for Fire Flight started with Carl “Beaver” Henderson, a musician, arranger and producer who initially provided back up band services for the Royal Bank of Trinidad & Tobago’s annual staff Calypso competition. In 1981 the idea quickly evolved into the 15 piece band that was Fire Flight who took Trinidad and Tobago’s performance spaces and annual carnival by storm with their electrifying life performances. The band also travelled to Toronto, Montreal and New York for their annual carnivals. In 1984 the band entered the now defunct Coral Sound Studios in Barbados to record their debut album. The driving force behind the LP was the band’s main songwriter Francis Escayg’s desire to explore alternative avenues of recognition for the band and to perform and thrive in the carnival off season. Highlights from the LP include the slow new wave funk of ‘Best Shot’ & ‘White Horse’, the melting pot of calypso, zouk and reggae influences on ‘Hard Life’ & ‘Mornin Lovin’ and the tropical proto house of ‘Wantin U’ that was a highlight of the Fire Flight live show. The LP is pressed on heavyweight 180 Gram Vinyl with new full sleeve artwork from Bradley Pinkerton.

Unusually even for an out-there progressive jazz musician, Sun Ra came from Saturn which gave him a completely unique take on this round place we call Earth. The Antique Blacks was his 1974-era album which has been out of print since 1978. It's rather more sprightly than some of his more abstract work with free-form noise, poetry readings and sax solo-ing all competing for space. Truly an originator.

Originally released in 2008 on CD and in a very limited vinyl edition, "The Malady Of Elegance" by Goldmund aka Keith Kenniff finally gets its long-deserved vinyl re-release, featuring a new artwork and remastered audio by Taylor Deupree. Taking cues from 'Corduroy Road' Keith Kenniff (aka Helios) again restricts himself to the piano in conjuring up his humble soundscapes and again we are pulled into a deep, meditative and filmic world as the notes glide to a slow, pensive meter. Keith's precedent release was the challenging 'Two Point Discrimination' EP, released on the Western Vinyl label as part of their portrait series, but where that record was a collection of haunting experiments in form and sound, 'The Malady of Elegance' sees us back into the warming, homespun territory of 'Corduroy Road'. That's not to say these compositions are upbeat, far from it in fact, but there are lines to be drawn to folk music, and while Keith no longer draws on the American Civil War as a primary influence there is still the sense that the ghosts of old America haunt the keys. On top of these references we see Keith tripping somewhat fittingly into a flickering filmic world somewhat in line with his taste in European film. There is a delicate narrative on show throughout the record from the opening hopefulness of Image-Autumn-Womb through the melancholy of Now to the sensitive romance of the album's closer Evelyn. Listening to the record almost creates its own cinematic accompaniment in the minds eye, and this is simply a testament to Keith's incredible talents as a composer. Fans of Erik Satie, Sylvain Chauveau and Hauschka need look no further, 'The Malady of Elegance' is a deeply personal meditation which you cannot help but get lost inside.

deeper and deeper: studio mule excavates another treasure from japan’s rich modern music history. this time spiritual leaning rhythms that come from none other then eitet-su hayashi, one of japan’s most renown taiko drummers, a percussive instrument that is deeply rooted in the mythology of japanese folklore.

with “kaze no shisha”, studio mule reissues a crucial album of his long-spanning career, that started in 1971, when hayashi joined the globally famed ondekoza group. the so called “demon drum group“ established the taiko drumming to a global audience and intensively toured around the globe between 1975 and 1981 - the year the group split.

shortly after, hayashi and some like-minded spirits formed kodo, a new drum troupe with hayashi as lead drummer. after their first live performances he left the ensemble again in order to launch his solo career, whose first output marked “kaze no shisha”, released in 1983 on the japanese subsidiary of the us record company victor.

the album’s six compositions feature hayashi on taiko drum and other percussion, famed japanese composer midori takada on marimba, cymbal and bells, shuichi chino on synthesizer, chi soungja on the traditional korean zither gayageum and the korean janggu drum as well as the singers kamur and tenko, also known as the honeymoons.

all songs have been written by eitetsu hayashi and been recorded between july and august 1983 at sunrise studio and victor aoyama studio in tokyo. it must have been an intensive time. a time, in which hayashi transformed the drumbeat of his heart into a variety sounds, melodies and rhythms, without losing the melancholic, yet demanding kaito air.

the record’s a-side starts rough and traditional with “kintonun”, a tune in which hayashi bangs the taiko stormy while charmingly dancing with chi soungja’s korean janggu drum performance. a propulsive start that slides into “cosmos” – a slow glooming melancholic trance-folk-spiritual tranquilizer, featuring hayashi playing the piano and koto, while chi soungja weeps ghostly on his gayageum zither.

a perfectly built folk drama, deeply charged with musical infinity. its followed by “kalavinka”, an industrial leaning composition, that lifts off with metal tones and meditative chanting, only to melt into a mesmerizing melodic marimba crescendo, played by midori takada. again, the myths of ancient japanese music kisses modern minimal realms and nothing seems to refer to the pure percussive genre hayashi is famed for.

the b-side opener “kaze no shisha” presents a slow growing performance by hayashi on the japanese zither koto. his nervous play transforms into a synth drone played by shuichi chino, that slowly makes space for hayashi’s tribal taiko drumming that again disappears in another wave of koto string notes.

the follow up “bakuon” launches with a supersonic transport sound and operatic singing by the honeymoons, that amalgamates with hayashi’s feverish performance on his main instrument, the taiko. every now and then strange synth sounds and disparate voices open the short composition, that abruptly ends after 2 minutes and 30 seconds. the final of “kaze no shisha” is reconciliatory.

on “seiten” hayashi creates a conversation between the taiko and mokugyo, also known as the buddhist wooden fish. they turn into some kind of call and response talk, always leaving enough space between the rhythms and tones to create a deeply spiritual psychic sphere.

an utterly captivating, keen to experiment album, full of japanese music mysticism, surprising non-linear shock-waves, repetitive minimal structures and frenziedly drumming, who in interaction introduce a less popular side of one of japan’s most prolific drum poets.

Faitiche presents a new album by Andrew Pekler: Sounds From Phantom Islands brings together ten tracks created over the last three years for the interactive website Phantom Islands - A Sonic Atlas. With his 2016 album Tristes Tropiques, Pekler created a highly unique cosmos of ethnographic sound speculations. Sounds From Phantom Islands continues and simultaneously expands this concept: finely elaborated chordal motifs float like fog over fictional maritime landscapes. A masterpiece of contemporary Exotica.

Phantom islands are islands that appeared on historical maps but never actually existed. The status of these artefacts of European colonial expansion from the 15th to the 19th century oscillates between cartographic fact and maritime fiction. Sounds From Phantom Islands interprets and presents these imaginations as a quasi-ethnographic catalog of music and synthetic field recordings. The pieces on this album are based on recordings made for Phantom Islands - A Sonic Atlas, an online interactive map developed with cultural anthropologist Stefanie Kiwi Menrath.

Originally released in 2006, Eingya by Helios aka Keith Kenniff returns in a new 2021 edition vinyl re-release, remastered by Taylor Deupree.

Beginning the album on a high with the pastoral beauty of "Bless This Morning Year," Kenniff showcases of what he does best: heartbreaking guitar and piano melodies punctuated by crumbling beats and backed by the most atmospheric synthesizer sounds this side of Eno's Apollo. The appetizing "Halving the Compass" blends subtle field recording with the kind of piano melodies so beautiful they could be compared to Virginia Astley or Harold Budd. This is followed by the album's clear highlight, "Dragonfly Across an Ancient Sky." It's an unsurpassable folk guitar piece with a decomposing percussive background and the sort of melodies that would turn evil tyrants into weeping babies. An album that could appeal as easily to fans of Nick Drake as to fans of Boards of Canada or even early AIR, this truly has something for everyone.

Raised in rural Pennsylvania, Kenniff put out Helios's 2004 debut album, Unomia, while studying percussion at Boston's Berklee College of Music. Since then, he's released six more albums as Helios, in addition to collaborating with his wife Hollie Kenniff in the shoegaze-inspired pop duo Mint Julep and composing music for films and archival use.

"A protracted sunset of an album guaranteed to see you through the longest days of summer and into the twilight of the autumn." - The Wire "A soundtrack of molasses-sweet, midsummer sunset melancholy and pastoral mellifluence." - Tinymixtapes
 

“This heat are one of those bands that (as a person wanting to be in a band) I aspired to be like. Not to sound like them or rip them off in anyway, but just be one of those bands that you hear and you know instantly, that your listening to This Heat and none else. They’re a band that set their own rules and did it without ever sounding pretentious or like they were trying too hard. The first record i had by them was This Heat but I thought it was amazing that i could be into them for some years and keep discovering other EPs or songs by them like Health and Efficiency that still felt completely fresh and still do. - Dave Porter (Avey Tare, Animal Collective)

Ted Curson (1935-2012), a renowned jazz trumpeter from Philadelphia, has performed with many legends including Cecil Taylor and Charles Mingus. His masterpiece leader work released in 1971 from Futura Records, a legendary French avant jazz and free music label, has been officially reissued! This album was recorded at Europasonor Studio on June 18, 1971 during a visit to Paris, and features Georges Arvanitas (piano), Jacky Samson (double bass), and Charles Saudrais (drums). A gem of an album that transcends the boundaries of classical, modal jazz, fusion and free jazz.