Twittering Machines

Another lazy post but I didn’t want this one to get brushed under the rug.

From the website:

“Three albums by Randy Burns were originally released on the ESP-Disk label during the late sixties. The first of which called Of Love and War came out in 1966 and was somewhat your typical mid-sixties solo folk debut album, straight out of the Greenwich Village scene. It contained a few self-composed tunes but mostly ‘borrowed’ songs from fellow folksters. Accompanied only by his acoustic guitar and occasional 12-string backing, Randy laid down a set that inspired his own writing. The third album called Songs For an Uncertain Lady was released in 1970 and already leaned much more towards Randy’s rock style in the early 70’s, when he moved on to the Mercury label. However still folky, as a whole it was much more straightforward and outgoing than the music described yet.

Now, in retrospective categorized as acid- or lonerfolk, ever an effort of a self-composed album in the folkrock genre of the time is Evening of the Magician, from 1968. Randy has a clear and warm, very distinctive voice, especially beautiful when backed up by himself on two songs. In regards to the ‘acidfolk’ point of view his poetic lyrics may be considered slightly psychedelic. However his words unsophisticated are often used and placed oddly, therefore making the meaning of the song not instantly obvious. From a ‘lonerfolk’ perspective, the music is quite introvert due to a woolly home recording sound. Now backed up by a small band, Randy’s music really is folkrock in the very essence of the term, or even how it should be. He’d constructed compositions that are and can only be carried out on (acoustic) guitar, the core melodies being within the suggestive chords, underlined by electric solo guitar and bass, and occasional drums, organ, piano, and flute. The album only consists of the most gentle and musically interesting songs.

It has been a challenge to provide the best of sound quality for the vinyl reissue. The original vinyl was of poor quality, the original tapes were worse. Furthermore, the recordings appeared to have been panned dominantly to one channel making it sound completely out of balance. But, with the latest technology the album could be fully restored to the way it should sound. The audiophile will find a centered stereo image and smooth continuity of tonal beauty.

Randy recently picked up the guitar and started writing again. Apart from his often ESP-Disk related cult status, he is a very much respected member of the US folk community. Now, his current followers are introduced to probably his most essential of music history, as collectors are offered a true gem in the best quality ever.”

Looks like another great reissue from Enabling Works.  Remember they have already delivered two very fine Loren Connors reissues.  I’m sure we will all enjoy the “centered stereo image and smooth continuity of tonal beauty.”

Due September of this year.  A sample here.  You can also hear Connors sound bites for those not familiar.  However, this is very unlikely with ML at the helm!

I’ll cut to the chase; this LP is freakin’ awesome!

Feeling lazy, I borrowed this from the previously mentioned Volcanic Tongue:

“Fantastic almost-Fushitsusha scale amplifier worship from Evan Caminiti of Barn Owl. Over the space of the last few years Barn Owl have evolved from a group that dealt primarily in slow-mo feedback architectures to a pair of heads with enough vision to marry Charalambides-style E-Bow gravities with orchestral/early music settings, black 70s metal, Savage Resurrection-style twin guitars and classic weightless Japanese psych. Here Caminiti combines Bay Area tectonics – the sounds of horns in the fog, the feel of SF ballroom era Trips festivals – with lucid six-string devotionals that move from soaring arcs of feedback damaged melodies to the kind of fragile portraiture in sound of Loren Connors circa Hells Kitchen Park. The atmosphere has the same choral/devotional air of the more orchestral Fushitsusha work – especially aspects of the Tokuma releases – combining achingly simple single note solos with endless waves of black electricity, but it’s all cut with a classic parched/desert feel that draws on inherited traditions of blues as much as imported avant axe. This is a major solo guitar side and one that sits happily alongside your favourite solo six-string testaments. If you dig Haino, Rallizes, Loren Connors etc you won’t be disappointed. Highly recommended!”

So there you have it.

Forgot how totally, absolutely brilliant this record is. For this outing, Leyland Kirby, under the Caretaker moniker, has joined Philip Jeck and William Basinski as a master in the art of soupy opacity.

This LP is all about distance, decay and a bygone era.  Kirby doesn’t declare intent, merely hints at it through this aural fog.  And this is what is so great, this record does improve with subsequent listens; it’s density reveals itself differently every time the needle is dropped.  Ambient music of a sort,  just not the wallpaper variety; this record demands (commands?) your attention.

Sadly long out of print according to the internet.  However, there is good news; a new Caretaker LP is on the horizon.  Also a nice way to introduce a new site (to me anyway) called Zen Effects.

This one proved irresistible. Limited to 300 copies for the whole wide world.

Already shipping.  Available here.

This from Wonderfulsound this morning;

“John Stammers releases his debut LP on Wonderfulsound.  As well as all the usual formats we have lovingly spent time mastering this recording straight from the master tapes to the vinyl lathe.  This is a process that does not happen much these days with vinyl but it was the way it always use to be, because it sounds better.

Available in Hand Screen printed sleeve & numbered.  We can not stress enough how beautiful this release is and how wonderful it sounds.”

I took a chance on this one after and intriguing review in the latest Wire (the one with Richard Skelton on the cover; more on him later).

I stole this image from Nathan’s MySpace page as I couldn’t find a useable image of the LP I bought; I’ve decided to call it ‘banjo decay’.  Here’s a bit from the press release.

Hailing from Baltimore, USA. Nathan Bell has recorded with more than a dozen bands in the last decade. Most known for playing bass in the legendary Lungfish from 1996 to 2003, he has also worked with P.W. Long, Mighty Flashlight, and Television Hill, an earlier version of Arbouretum and the mighty Human Bell. He plays cyclic banjo music – sometimes delayed – sometimes bowed creating medative hymns for the soul. 8 tracks that flow like an abstract sound poem with Nathan’s hypnotic banjo mantras wound around percussion, bass, trumpet viola and cello.

PS.  Buy the Skelton LP; his stuff is amazing!

My love of all things ECM is no secret, so this one is a special treat. A new ECM title on vinyl!

Mathias Eick
Skala

Mathias Eick’s intensely melodic trumpet occupies the centre-stage in this album of self-penned tunes which will appeal to an audience beyond “jazz”. Against the powerful backdrops offered by his sleek, modern band, driven by two drummers, he delivers richly lyrical soliloquies.

That from ECM HQ; here’s the line up.

Mathias Eick trumpet
Andreas Ulvo piano
Audun Erlien electric bass
Torstein Lofthus drums
Gard Nilssen drums
Morten Qvenild keyboards
Tore Brunborg tenor saxophone
Sidsel Walstad harp

It is my civic duty to alert all to this new LP. Limited to 250 copies and available from Derek himself.

Derek Monypeny
Don’t Bring Me Down, Bruce

Here’s a little more:

“I’ve never been one of those armchair sound-travelers myself. Say the words “world music” and it immediately conjures up a specific, neutron-bomb-worthy scenario in my mind, involving a jester’s hat, a farmer’s market, and a pan-pipe enema. So it’s strange that I find myself drawn to this LP of all-instrumental solo oud recordings by Derek Monypeny, the first-ever release on his new Raheem label.

It’s doubly surprising that I care at all about this thing given Monypeny’s credentials. Apparently he is a former member of the bands Oaxacan and Sir Richard Bishop’s Freak Of Araby Ensemble (whoever that is – I guarantee you they’re no Lothar And The Hand People). And get this – in 2009 he put out a solo double cassette on the Weird Forest label. The last time I had a got-damn cassette tape in my hand, it said “Billy Idol” on it and I was throwing it across the room at my little sister. Anyway – this guy seems to be the exact model of “underground” buffoon who spends all his mom’s money on effects pedals for his hella weird jams (of course they’re “jams,” and “rad” ones at that) – and yet he’s made something genuinely intriguing here.

Side 1 consists of six very stark, intimate composed pieces. Almost as if Jandek took a trip to Mississippi via Istanbul and Calcutta, but had somebody help him get tuned up first. Real loner atmosphere here, authentic ache, no steel drums in sight.

Side 2 is made up of two long, tranced-out hunks of what the late Mr. Vliet once dubbed “psychedelic Bromo-Seltzer.” The last song, “Sobek” is an ecstatic 12-minute-plus undersea raga with crazed percussion, everything run through a severe phase-wah wringer that will scatter seeds and stems all over your study.

To sum up: This is one of those out-of-nowhere, higher-minded head scratchers that everybody loves. I salute Mr. Monypeny, and hope that Jeff Lynne lends him that spaceship from the Out Of The Blue tour sooner rather than later.”

A little bit more with music.

Just got back from Listen with this little gem tucked under my arm. I also bought a cd; that’s ok, right?  Now back at work and intent on wasting company time and resources, I thought a little mindless surfing would be in order. Heading right on over to Soundways, I discovered this soon to be released LP.

Aqui Los Bravos!
The Best of Michi Sarmiento y su Combo Bravo 1967 – 77

How cool is this guy!

This one should be a beauty; out in about a month.

More info here.   A video or two here.

His last LP on Humming Conch was one of the lovelier records of ’09.

Thought I better let everyone know about this one.

“SMM: Context is the first release in Ghostly International’s new yearly compilation series of evocative, exploratory music. In 2004, Ghostly International introduced SMM, an unknown acronym used to evaporate the already-unspooling musical boundaries between classical minimalism, electronic and drone composition, film soundtracks, and fragile imaginary landscapes. SMM: Context features a hand-picked selection of some of the world’s finest musicians from Poland, Germany, Denmark, Norway, North America and the UK who traffic in SMM’s slow-moving, texture-focused compositions, simple in instrumentation, but infinitely complex in execution.”

Artists include Leyland Kirby, The Fun Years (who had this quite brilliant LP last year), and Svarte Greiner.

Due March 1, 2011. More info here.

This struck me as pretty interesting, “Groups of music fans sit in front of a vinyl turntable, with the best speakers they can afford, dim the lights and listen to a classic album all the way through.”

Read more here.

Brilliant!  Monkeyhaus done UK-style?

This one caught my eye.

“Arguably the best solo guitar record in the past few years. 10/10 ” (Foxy Digitalis)

“Quietly captures the sound of a man simply playing a guitar extremely well, with little ostentation or outside artifice” (Brainwashed)

“A record that deserves to be treasured and soaked in over the years purely on its own aesthetic merits, regardless of external trends”. (Stereo Sanctity)

“The magnificent solo guitar playing of Dean McPhee is beautifully documented on “Brown Bear”…the ideal way to relax into a chilled evening with those you love”. (Terrascope
Online)

Should be pretty good I figure.

Available here .

I can’t wait for this one ….

From Boomkat, “*Limited double vinyl edition – comes with a download code redeemable directly from the label* Juv is the Norwegian duo of Are Mokkelbost and Marius von der Fehr. Miasmah present what is effectively their debut release, some 14 years after it was initially conceived. Between 1996 and 1998 the solemnly attuned duo created a dark metal variant with strong traces of bleak ambient and experimental doom, following a strict methodology within limited means. Sampler-derived minimalism, guitar abstraction and field recordings were key ingredients, slowly coalescing in the confines of their bedroom studio. Unfortunately, due to disagreements, work on the album abruptly stopped. Only two years ago Are Mokkelbost started compiling the album and rediscovered hours of music, rescued from tapes in a suitcase. Think Sunn O))) stuck with Svarte Greiner, Deathprod and Thomas Koner in a freezing log cabin in the Norwegian wilderness, and you’re almost there.”

Juv in happier times?  Happier because 14 years ago they had absolutely no idea what a download code was/is!

Pepe Wismeer is not a person but a duo from the Champagne-Ardennes region of France and have been making their own unique brand of music since 1999. “The music on this LP moves with patient strides, sometimes swelling to sudden crescendos, accompanied by electronic scrapes and coughs. A slightly damaged, spare, chamber folk-psych, whose distant cousins can be found in the darkly tender moments infused in early Psychic TV / Current 93 / Coil, or in the atmospheric postures of Antony & the Johnsons” (description borrowed from Beta-lactam Ring).

The music is mainly structured around piano and voice accompanied by electric- acoustic guitar, 5-string bass, concrete sounds, samples, oud, sitar, metallophone … and maybe some sheep & birds & water & glass. All music recorded on analogue equipment to add warmth and handcraft to the icy atmospheres. This is a vinyl LP in a 1-off pressing of just 100 copies.

Equation Records

Now for the cool part. “This record was pressed on standard 140g vinyl using a new process called a “Father Press” – which eliminates the need of a “Mother” plate BUT means you cannot press any more than 100 copies or so. The only way to re-press is to cut another master. So this is a unique item!
Sound quality is superb.”

How’s that for audio fool geekery?

Keeping with the theme of new and noteworthy, check this one out.

Here’s the link for a taster, http://cstrecords.com/cst075/ .  Available Feb. 22.