My Brutal Life, by The Black Dog
30 Monday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental, Noise
in30 Monday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental, Noise
in26 Thursday Oct 2023
In the early days of MEGO prior to it’s transformation into Editions MEGO a most unexpected release appeared amongst the radical roster. Out of all the twisted hard drive activity from PITA, General Magic, Farmers Manual etc appeared a very different kind of release. One made from a computer, but one with a softer atmosphere, cloud-like in sonic shape and even containing discernible melodies (!). This was the debut release from Japanese artist Tujiko Noriko which not only launched her career to a larger audience but opened the doors of Editions Mego to a broader range of experimental musical forms.
Noriko’s particular synthesis of electronic abstraction, melody, voice and atmosphere has few peers as sound gently circles her mystical words morphing into a succession of emotive aural experiments framed as songs.
Noriko’s evolution since her debut Mego release has seen further solo works alongside collaborations as well as a shift into cinema, both acting and as director.
On Crépuscule one can hear the influence the film medium has had on her music as visual insignia are invoked in the evocative audio at hand. Instrumental interludes further conjure a film landscape alongside the titles which also reiterate the cinematic form.
This is synthetic music with a deep human presence. The mind of a human captured wandering the fantastic realms of the internal sphere is exquisitely rendered through machines which usually prompt one to disfigure such humanistic tendencies. The warmth, serenity and dream-like environment that Noriko conjures from her tools is what makes her such a unique and outstanding artist and Crépuscule is an epic testament to these powers.
The title Crépuscule perfectly encapsulates the somnambulant nature of the music where the nocturnal shifts evoke a broad sense of calm. Crépuscule I features a selection of shorter ‘songs’ whilst Crépuscule II allows more room for these songs / moods to breathe with only three songs running at broader longer duration. Crépuscule allows the listener to view the world through Noriko’s eyes. With her cunning ability to humanise machines a world of calm wonder is allowed to take focus in the frame.
Music, words, vocals and mixing by Tujiko Noriko
Recorded at Vic Studio and at home
Words on track 11 by Joji Koyama
Support vocals and voice: Vito & Len Baute Tsujiko
Euphonium: Kana Kotera
Saxophone: Kazuya Kato
Album editing, arranging and artwork by Joji Koyama
Typeface by Dinamo
Mastered by Stephan Mathieu@Schwebung
22 Sunday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental
inSmooth & slow . . .with regular digital “bumps” . . . to be featured on an upcoming 2024 podcast.
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9⁰ (4) GIOVANNI LAMI October 2023 To celebrate its 15th anniversary, 901 Editions launches a virtual residency program, inviting artists to share their creative process during the time span of a month. They have no pressure on any side and are really free to do whatever they want. We encourage them to focus on a specific theme/concept or methodology of their choice, as well as to follow their own spontaneity. We believe that uncertainty and hesitation are part of the creative process and have their own value. Life is a process, we learn by doing. The pieces will be uploaded irregularly on a dedicated Bandcamp page, only when artists are willing to do so. Just for the residency period, we offer the work as “free / name your price”. We called the residency program 9⁰, playing with the numbers 9, 0, and 1: any number to the power of 0 is always 1. •••
GIOVANNI LAMI. Sound artist and musician who has worked within soundscape and sound-ecology boundaries since 2009/10. Lami immerses himself in the phenomenon of magnetism with unrestrained curiosity and regularly wrestles surprising insights out of it. In our current era of hyperspecialization, he can truly be called a universal scholar, his qualifications range from photography and visual arts to a PhD in food technology all the way to a wide range of professional experience, including as a UNESCO employee in Ethiopia. All this has sharpened his analytical view, which he has focussed for some time now on the potential of sound. His research is related to the study of resonant surfaces in the field, degradation processes and the limit/interferences of each device used to record or reproduce sound.
In 2016, with Enrico Malatesta and Glauco Salvo, he founded MU, an independent association devoted to sound experiences, acting as a listening platform to develop and bring fresh and smart workshops, listening sessions, gigs and conferences. In 2022, he joined MAGMA, developing the Elementi series and other events in his area. In 2023 with Carolina Martines, he founded Manticora Editions, an ongoing project which is a mixtape label and a shell of different sound proposals in progress, created together or individually by the two artists.
He released from several labels like Dinzu Artefacts, Archive Officielle, Ftarri, Kohlhaas, Consumer Waste, Crónica and others. From 2014 he played in venues like DalVerme, Cafe OTO, Macao, Standards, Confine Aperto, Spectrum, Cafe Kino, Cave 12, Spettro, Tempo Reale, MART, OOR, Klappfon, Area Sismica, Teatro Fondamenta Nuove, KNOT Gallery, and festivals like Storüng, Ravenna Festival, NODE, Transmissions, Path, Detritus, Santarcangelo Festival, La Digestion, A L’Arme!, Angelica, Lost. You cannot find him on social media, just take a look at his website or his Bandcamp. Or drop him an email.
www.giovannilami.com
19 Thursday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental, Minimal
inVerdant Machine is Ryan Potts’ latest album as Aquarelle since 2017’s Leave Corners, and it showcases his interest in using a narrow set of tools to create a wider soundscape than in the past. With a focus on fewer tools but longer duration, Potts has created two side-long pieces that utilize the full length of the vinyl format to play with perception and expectation.
The album marks a departure from Potts’ previous work, as he stripped back his approach and did away with his standby instrument, the guitar. “For the first time in many years I mostly just played with the machines and electronics in my basement with no real thought of what the material would become”
The pieces, having more room to breathe, sound like quintessential Aquarelle layers of layers but present as both lighter and much heavier or at least more dynamic than ever before. The edges are being explored. “The whole album is quite layered because I can’t help myself, but it’s really just sine waves, simple string loops, and feedback (from many different sources — electronics, tube amps, mixers, digital generators, baby monitors).”
Unquestionably this is the most minimal and outright “noisy” album in the Aquarelle discography. It is also the most assured and methodical. A slow deep breath through a thousand wires.
Released May 26, 2023
14 Saturday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental, Minimal, Noise, Tech/Glitch
in‘X’
| Phonography / Glitch / Experimental Ambient / Minimal Techno | 79:44
I like what Elon Musk has done regarding the revamping of the Twitter platform . . . now “X“.
That appreciation has given rise to this: a slightly hazier, bumpier & noisier ambient atmosphere . . . constructed purposely with four double artist entries so as to achieve a predetermined, vertical/synergistic sound (along with temporal/tonal compositional, cross-referenced flux).
Crafted in late August (after returning from vacation), I’ve been listening to this (quality control!) during my early morning trail runs: there are no “perfect” mixes . . . but this is as close as we’ve ever gotten to mix perfection!
Pairs well with 2020’s u r b a n & White Noise Room.
Deepest respect to Steve Roden (1964 – 2023)
Stream/Download via Hear.This:
01 00:00 Remixing the World – Port de Mourepiane, Marseilles
02 01:28 Taylor Deupree – November (gourd kalimba), excerpt
03 04:04 Steve Roden – Usonian Poem (excerpt)
04 06:23 Taylor Deupree – May (coconut & teak ladle, wooden speaker), excerpt
05 09:23 Solo Andata – Ember
06 14:35 Youga – Mereka Ada
07 20:29 Arovane – Sicht
08 23:18 Erik Levander – In I Stunden
09 28:18 Eudscher – DB612
10 37:44 Ebauche – Umbilical Transfer
11 42:04 Youga – Sisa-Sisa
12 48:29 Dronal – Broad Sided
13 52:26 Solo Andata – Arc
14 58:06 Erik K. Skodvin – Black & Bronze
15 61:35 Erik Levander – Här Tystnar Träden
16 70:25 John von Seggern – Traces
17 73:59 David Torn – Someday Find a Waltz
14 Saturday Oct 2023
Posted by gabulmer | Filed under Ambient, Art, Electronica, Ether-Jazz, Experimental, Jazz Fusion, Minimal, Mixing, Noise, Tech/Glitch
14 Saturday Oct 2023
Posted Ether-Jazz, Experimental, Jazz Fusion
inTom Jackson – clarinet
Neil Metcalfe – flute
Benedict Taylor – viola
Daniel Thompson – acoustic guitar
More exquisite, improvised, jazz-ish din from A New Wave of Jazz. Yum!
12 Thursday Oct 2023
Posted Uncategorized
in“Materia Breve” is composed of residues. Fragments of field recordings; still images of small landscapes, enlarged to show their grain. The simple gesture of gathering what remains, stirring the embers.
THE NAME’S ALLUREMENT, by LUCA LANFREDI
You said «Let’s go», and the wind is
this breath that erases without haste.
A sharp movement of lives,
the trembling that welcomes those who breathe.
Hands are a gesture; the presence
just a nod.
The gash is transparency:
leaning on the edge of thoughts.
The house is open to prayer, open to
the tense movement between your chest and rest.
«We have this, nothing else»: we said,
we have the mouth of departed thirst.
I need time to recoil me
in the long-lasting breach between things.
The asphalt carries the loads and the questions,
as our perpetual plea of days.
The night is an unfinished act;
laughter, a crackling fire.
Silence is disclosed through your lively blows,
which are eyes, tongue, a pair of summer shoes,
which are your words like «Darkness
doesn’t scare me», or «I’m hungry, I’m always hungry».
Always.
Like a conversation with a cloud,
or the invitation of the months nearby the bed.
A rarefied coldness, a tight time.
Every universe has its own language.
Every universe has the voices that you seek for.
«Possessing is a game switched on», you said,
staring at the places embroidered on the water.
The signs bear the recognition.
The graphite ring, the grateful bread,
the pages lightly brushed with a touch.
«You are lucky», you said before leaving,
«Farewell», you said, «Farewell is but a breath
in speech».
I didn’t look for you, I didn’t find you anymore,
in the maelstrom of light under the stage.
All the words just behind,
And now you’re happy, they said. Peace
is already in history enshrined.
In the rustle of overlapping footsteps
the stirring of grass and leaves.
Every universe has the voices that you find in it.
Every universe is a music score.
10 Tuesday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Experimental, Minimal
inTen years ago, Warren Kroll, as Forrest, recorded “Beyond the Withered Hills” (i, absentee 2014) – a mesmerizing ambient album of windswept drones and drifts, capturing the essence of a sonic journey through vast and boundless landscapes. The passage of time did not fade its allure, but instead, an audacious remixing endeavor by Joseph Minadeo unleashed its true transformative potential. Like uncovering an underwater relic lost in the depths of the sea, this reimagined creation has birthed a submersive, aquatic melancholic alternate piece. Each reimagined track now resonates with a echoed piano, bringing the listener into a surreally submerged realm.
released September 8, 2023
Layout : Chris Bigg (LP) / Siori Kitajima (CD)
Mastering : James Plotkin
Additional Pianos & Guitar : Corey Farrow & Michael Tolan
08 Sunday Oct 2023
Posted Ambient, Electronica, Minimal
inVery smooth, soothing & enticing . . .
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“Prologue” marks the starting point of a new collaboration project by Markus Guentner and Joachim Spieth, who will present their first album “Overlay” in November 2023.
Released September 1, 2023
All tracks written and produced by Markus Guentner and Joachim Spieth
In pursuit of excellence
Digressions & musings on Ambient, Electronica, Mixing & the Ether
Jazz is the Teacher - Funk is the Preacher
lead from the front
Christian inspiration and encouragement to give a jolt of caffeine to your soul.
We started and we will finish