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2LP
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LUMB 036LP
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$45.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 12/20/2024
Steven Wilson is no stranger to composing music that appears to counter everything else before it in his catalogue. Bass Communion, his long running solo electronic project, is no exception to this perverse streak that apparently likes to turn all expectations upside down. The Itself of Itself, Bass Communion's first album for 12 years, skillfully pays testament to this. Long established as a purveyor of mostly atmospheric or ambient textures, the seven cuts that represent The Itself of Itself take detours from this approach in order draw as much from musique concrete, noise music, abstract electronics and uneasy listening. Whilst still rippled with the same shades of light and dark that can be found throughout all of Bass Communion's work, The Itself of Itself reveals a fascination with analogue sounds and, more importantly perhaps, "unwanted" analogue artefacts like tape hiss, wow and flutter, static noise, and sonic break-up, taking the music into a space at once different yet familiar. On the title track, a mellotron flute rusts and collapses in on itself in a way that renders it the very antithesis of the one deployed on "Strawberry Fields Forever." Everything adds up to a dynamic listening experience where unease, dread and comparatively claustrophobic torrents of sound make (un)natural bedfellows to moments of enchantment and serenity. Above all, The Itself of Itself sees Steven Wilson cutting his teeth on an album that's at once cinematic and moody whilst proving him to be a master in electronic music craftsmanship. It's an album that might surprise some of those who have thus far been paying attention to his work as Bass Communion, but setting out to please everyone was never part of his raison d'etre. The Itself of Itself catches Bass Communion spreading its weatherbeaten wings to embrace new strategies and a strong desire to journey elsewhere. Arriving in a wonderful Carl Glover designed deluxe cover also comprising a 24pp. booklet of his photographs and an obi strip, this version of The Itself of Itself arrives on Lumberton Trading Company as a double LP pressed in an initial run of 1000 copies.
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CD
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LUMB 036CD
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Steven Wilson is no stranger to composing music that appears to counter everything else before it in his catalogue. Bass Communion, his long running solo electronic project, is no exception to this perverse streak that apparently likes to turn all expectations upside down. The Itself of Itself, Bass Communion's first album for 12 years, skillfully pays testament to this. Long established as a purveyor of mostly atmospheric or ambient textures, the seven cuts that represent The Itself of Itself take detours from this approach in order draw as much from musique concrete, noise music, abstract electronics and uneasy listening. Whilst still rippled with the same shades of light and dark that can be found throughout all of Bass Communion's work, The Itself of Itself reveals a fascination with analogue sounds and, more importantly perhaps, "unwanted" analogue artefacts like tape hiss, wow and flutter, static noise, and sonic break-up, taking the music into a space at once different yet familiar. "Apparition 3" presents a stark nod to Wilson's established command of shifting textures steeped in penumbral gauze, while "Bruise" is akin to a space probe adrift and headed towards a white dwarf as all communication is reduced to a disturbing and indecipherable crackle. Meanwhile on the title track, a mellotron flute rusts and collapses in on itself in a way that renders it the very antithesis of the one deployed on "Strawberry Fields Forever." Everything adds up to a dynamic listening experience where unease, dread and comparatively claustrophobic torrents of sound make (un)natural bedfellows to moments of enchantment and serenity. Above all, The Itself of Itself sees Steven Wilson cutting his teeth on an album that's at once cinematic and moody whilst proving him to be a master in electronic music craftsmanship. It's an album that might surprise some of those who have thus far been paying attention to his work as Bass Communion, but setting out to please everyone was never part of his raison 'etre. The Itself of Itself catches Bass Communion spreading its weatherbeaten wings to embrace new strategies and a strong desire to journey elsewhere. Arriving in a wonderful Carl Glover designed deluxe cover and featuring a 24-page booklet of his photographs and an obi strip, The Itself of Itself arrives on Lumberton Trading Company as a CD pressed in an initial run of 1000 copies.
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2LP
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HIART 009LP
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RSD 2018 release. Hidden Art Recordings present a reissue of the debut Bass Communion album as a double-LP for the first time. Steven John Wilson, aka Bass Communion, on the record: "The first Bass Communion album was originally released in April 1998 by Third Stone, the same label later reissuing it under their Hidden Art Recordings imprint. It was compiled from musical experiments made during a period spanning 1994-97, all of which might loosely be termed ambient. Later on I would spend a lot more time on Bass Communion, often refining structures, processing, and sound combinations over a period of months, but at this point I was making each piece of music within only a few hours and rarely revisiting them afterwards. Several DAT tapes with filled in this way, while CDRs of various track listings were made and passed on to friends, record labels, and anyone that I thought might be receptive to the music. When the chance eventually came to release the first official CD, I listened back to the several hours of material I had accumulated by then and selected what I felt were the highlights to make a five-track disc lasting just over an hour. In retrospect it's the long version of 'Drugged' that makes the album worthwhile for me. The other pieces are perhaps less successful, but I learned something from all of them. One thing the album has in common with later Bass Communion music is that hardly any electronic sources are used, the pieces are mostly derived from processing 'real' instruments such as guitar, saxophone, piano, organ, percussion... etc. 'No News Is Good News' was recorded in 2000 in collaboration with virtuoso oud player Naseer Shamma, and originally used a background music for Grant Wakefield's audio documentary album The Fire This Time, issued in 2002. As such it dates from a few years after the rest of BC1, but as it's the only other title to have been issued on Hidden Art, it's been included here as a bonus track." Comes on 180 gram vinyl and in a gatefold sleeve. Remastered and with exclusive liner notes by Steven Wilson. Includes a bonus track not on the CD version and brand-new artwork. Edition of 1000 -- last copies.
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CD
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IMPREC 193CD
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2009 repress. "Molotov and Haze is packaged in a deluxe, tip-on style heavy-duty gatefold jacket with the CD slipped into a Japanese inner bag. Design by Carl Glover. Bass Communion is a project dedicated to Steven Wilson's recordings in an ambient, drone, and/or electronic vein. Most of the pieces are experiments in texture made from processing recordings of real instruments and field recordings. The atmosphere of the music has tended towards the dark and melancholic, but expressed with an almost zen-like beauty. More recently, Wilson has also started working with a guitar and laptop configuration -- the first material in this style is contained on this album."
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CD/DVD_AUDIO
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SOL 155CD
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"The new Bass Communion album Loss is not about the violent moment of loss, but its aftermath. The crushing melancholia, the endless questions of 'what if?' and 'why?', as well as the concepts of regret, missed opportunity, or a feeling or moment in time that can never be recaptured. But even in the midst of this gloomy scene, hope and light are born, for loss is never total. Memory lingers, a residue of evidence is left behind, and life goes on. Steven Wilson, the man behind Bass Communion, says 'For me, the album is an extension of the previous release, Ghosts on Magnetic Tape, which relates to Electronic Voice Phenomena, or the idea that the dead can still communicate with the living world through recorded media. In order to try to capture this feeling I wanted the music to leave a spectral, ghostly impression, and to have an organic decaying quality, like something trying to break through from another world. To this end my musical sources were mainly 78 rpm records, a vibraphone and an upright piano. No synths or electronics were used, only organic sources or instrumentation that has been around for at least the last century.' Although best known for his rock band Porcupine Tree and his production and mixing work for artists as diverse as Opeth and Yoko Ono, Steven Wilson sees Bass Communion as his personal labor of love. In Bass Communion we hear not only the music nearest to his heart, but the music closest to what he himself listens to: 'In freeing myself from thinking in terms of melody or rhythm, and focusing purely on the texture and inherent qualities of pure sound, I believe the music achieves a purity of intent and spirit, as a means to express some of my innermost feelings, such as loss, at a much deeper level.' Following a limited edition vinyl release, Loss is being issued in unlimited digital glory, as a two disc set consisting of a high resolution 5.1 surround sound DVD-Audio disc and a standard stereo CD."
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