|
|
|
|
viewing 1 To 17 of 17 items
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 023LP
|
oracle and audioMER. announce the release of Reading The City with music by oracle, Laszlo Umbreit, and Mira Sanders. In 2019, oracle invited artist Mira Sanders to interact with their practice through her writing. Due to the corona crisis, their shared working time couldn't happen in the planned way: "The writing project was originally planned as an exchange while travelling together one week on the Buratinas boat, navigating on the canals and rivers starting from Brussels. Due to the sanitary conditions with the Covid-19, the trip together could not be realized or at least was complicated. Instead of seeing the situation as an obstacle, I saw it as an opportunity to travel with them from afar. Me, living outside the city and them, inside. My question was 'how, through their voices echoing with the urban spaces, will I imagine the city's everyday life?' Because one of the things that oracle's practice does is to offer ways to perceive and encounter the city and its inhabitants. For the texts I was inspired by the recordings oracle sent me every day during one week. Besides that, the book Invisible Cities written by Italo Calvino gave me a way of structuring my imagination." Following this artistic exchange and during a collaboration with sound artist Laszlo Umbreit, the idea of the record Reading The City was born. The existing recordings and the written sci-fi episodes by Mira Sanders functioned as a source of inspiration for the electronic sound composition "Places", infiltrated by the original voices and city soundscapes. The recordings of the texts "From Afar" reflect oracle's playful and spontaneous way of interacting with their given environment. "From Afar" is an invitation for the reader to immerse in the city while being in movement. Each track on this side has its own identity or color, often in relation to what Mira's text evoked, but this also happened in an empirical way, by trial-and-error. "Places" is a composition in movement, following the idea of interaction with imaginary cities but regularly coming back to a presence of the workshop's raw documentary sound. While being a carefully edited piece, it tries to keep a certain sense of immediacy and improvisation through semi-random dropping of heterogeneous sound materials in the timeline. The arc drawn by the journey through different "places" is an interpretation of what can happen inside (and outside) when experiencing the oracle practice.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 022LP
|
Argos and audioMER announce the release of Seemingly Still, with music by Laszlo Umbreit, Sirah Foighel Brutmann, and Eitan Efrat featuring the Ramirez Brothers. The cover artwork contains details of Miroir Seb Fragile!, a 16mm film by Sirah Foighel Brutmann and Eitan Efrat, made in memory of cinematographer Sébastien Koeppel (1971-2013). The track "Miroir Séb Fragile!" is played live by the Tel-Aviv based group The Ramirez Brothers. Uzi Sefi and KitKit Rarmirez who have developed a cult following in the Tel Aviv music scene, are recorded here in an improvised two-day recording session in Beursschouwburg, Brussels. Starting from a stereo recording of a 16mm film projector showing the film Miroir Seb Fragile! Laszlo Umbreit created the track "Seemingly Still", at times sounding like a shamanistic ritual. Sirah Foighel Brutmann and Eitan Efrat (both 1983 in Tel Aviv) have been working in collaboration for several years and are creating works in the audiovisual field. Sirah and Eitan's practice focuses on the performative aspects of the moving image. In their work they aim to mark the spatial and durational potentialities of reading of images -- moving or still; the relations between spectatorship and history; the temporality of narratives and memory and the material surfaces of image production. The collaboration between Laszlo, Eitan and Sirah have been developing since 2008, in their first film project collaboration Printed Matter. Eitan and Laszlo also have an instrumental drums-electronics duo called Rhh. Laszlo Umbreit (1986) is a Belgian sound designer and musician based in Brussels. Laszlo's work is anchored in sound research yet usually dialogues with the moving image, whether as present or absent. His musical practice mixes improvisation on electronic instruments, field recordings and a long meticulous editing and mixing process of sonic materials.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 018LP
|
audioMER. announce the release of a new LP; Make Visible The Ghosts with music by Aki Onda and artwork by Paul Clipson. This album is the follow-up of Aki Onda's Cinemage project Lost City -- with Loren Connors and Alan Licht -- released on audioMER. in 2015 (AUDIOMER 013LP). On Make Visible The Ghosts, New York-based musician Aki Onda composed the soundtrack for the images of the San Francisco experimental filmmaker Paul Clipson, who suddenly passed away on February 3, 2018. In 2009, Clipson and Onda met at the Amsterdam Schiphol Airport for the first time and shared a ride to the International Film Festival Rotterdam, where they presented audio-visual works in the same bill. Since then, the two artists -- known for their highly personal approach with Super 8, 16mm, cassette Walkman, and radio -- maintained a close friendship over the next nine years. Their works deal with memory, time, space, and those reflections, and they had a lot to share. Onda and Clipson completed their collaboration work Make Visible The Ghosts -- a combination of vinyl LP of Onda's music and large-size collage artwork by Clipson -- a few months before Clipson's departure from life. The work is composed of the materials they used for their performance in New York in 2012 and developed over the three years from 2015 to 2017. Onda notes: "The loss of Paul has left a huge hole in our mind including his friends and collaborators. Paul is no longer here, and this is a chance to remember him and his images that extended and expanded our perception of how the world can be seen and heard."
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 016LP
|
On The Spectrum Does, New York avant-rock musicians Che Chen and Robbie Lee create three earthy and slow-moving pieces, informed as much by various global folk traditions as they are by 20th century composition and improvisation. Their "anything goes" approach to improvising leads to a sonic document that sounds raw, intense, and freshly exciting. A wild and shambolic brew that sounds like nothing else. Che Chen is musician and visual artist currently best known for his work with percussionist Rick Brown as 75 Dollar Bill. In the mid-2000s, he formed this duo with composer and producer Robbie Lee, who at the time played with people like Baby Dee and Neil Hagerty. Their most concentrated period of activity is bookended by a first LP they self-released in 2008 called Begin, And Continue! and this record, The Spectrum Does, which contains music recorded several years later. On The Spectrum Does, both tackle a range of unconventional instruments like bass recorders, Renaissance clarinet, glissando flute, tarogato, electrified violin, ultraslow recorders, and custom modified tape machines. While their first LP documented their earliest, mostly acoustic improvisations, The Spectrum Does captures Che and Robbie after five or so years of meeting two or three times a week and multiple tours around the country (a couple of times as a part of Jozef van Wissem's band Heresy Of The Free Spirit). By now what was pulsing out of their little overdriven tube amps was even more electrified and warped. Sounds of unknown origin seem to bubble up to the surface, met by completely unique approaches to wind and string instruments. Much boundary pushing improvised music gets described as "outer limits" but on The Spectrum Does, it seems much more right to say they explore the "inner limits". It is deep listening music, but not minimalist; complex but not virtuosic. Dissonances intermingle with folk harmonies and rhythms. As with all of the music this duo made together, there's a sort of shambolic-shamanic sensibility to it, but without a motive or explicit purpose. To be filed close to Tony Conrad, Henry Flynt, Pelt, and The Dead C. Personnel: Robbie Lee - flute, tarogato, melodica, great bass recorder, electronics, percussion; Che Chen - violin, harmonium, bass recorder, tape machine, electronics, percussion. Cover painting by Che Chen; Typography by Jeroen Wille. Recorded and mixed by Robbie Lee; Mastered by Jack Allett. Edition of 300.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 017LP
|
With The Object Isn't There, UK guitar player and producer Jack Allett has made a deeply personal masterpiece based around cyclical guitar parts and electronic percussion. Playing like a half-remembered fever dream with an aesthetic that is ragged, hypnotic, and spacey, its two side-long pieces touch on minimalism, kraut-infused dub, and euphoric dancefloor optimism. As comfortable being played after Manuel Göttsching's album E2-E4 (MGART 424CD) as right before a Terekke lo-fi house anthem, it is laced with the melancholy of an early morning post-rave comedown. Yet for all the references and name-checking, it's a record that is hard to compare to anything else, past or present. This record is about - insofar as instrumental music need be about anything - hallucinations. The title The Object Isn't There serves as a concise definition, derived from the quote "A hallucination is a strictly sensational form of consciousness, as good and true a sensation as if there were a real object there. The object happens to be not there, that is all." (William James, The Principles Of Psychology, 1890) Having experienced constant tinnitus -- a form of auditory hallucination -- for the last 13 years, Jack has long questioned the distinction of something experienced as being either there or not-there. Even if, strictly speaking, a hallucination is something that's not there, if the reality of how it affects day-to-day existence is undeniable then to any extent that matters, it is there. But The Object Isn't There is no tale of woe, nor simply a response to this one condition, and tinnitus need not be considered only as distressing or distracting. Allett sees it merely as one example of many things in life that cross this uncertain terrain. Allett explains: "There are obvious parallels here with the notion of active listening. There is room for emotion too, particularly an overwhelming, all-consuming emotion. Essentially the music here is concerned with being overwhelmed by a sensation, never really being sure to what extent you are conjuring it up yourself, to what extent it exists independently of you, but ultimately deciding that it doesn't much matter; the sensation itself was undeniable." The Object Isn't There was written, recorded, and mixed in Camberwell and Camden, London, UK (2012-2016). Artwork by Graham Lambkin; Design by Jeroen Wille. Mastered by Jack Allett. Edition of 300.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
CD
|
|
AUDIOMER 019CD
|
The world of Mireille Capelle is one of music and theater. She has performed as a singer in numerous European opera houses, under the artistic direction of the foremost stage directors and conductors. Mireille Capelle is singing professor at the Ghent School of Arts and member of the artistic board of HERMESensemble. She has a particular affinity with contemporary music and art, characterized by many encounters with the most important contemporary composers. Do'un is an "architecture sonore" ("sonic architecture") composed for the exhibition INTUITION (2017) curated by Axel Vervoordt and Daniela Ferretti in Venice. Mireilles sound scapings are electronic sculptures to be performed as a live format. Do'un was presented as a live installation by Mireille Capelle and HERMESensemble with visual artist Angel Vergara at Palazzo Fortuny in May 2017. Inspiration for Do'un comes from the philosophy of the Greek philosopher Democritus and his ideas about cosmology and the void. Do'un is a one-hour piece characterized by rich sonic layers embedded in a drone-y atmosphere. A very intuitive piece. Mireille Capelle in her words about the piece: "Even though when I talk about it, I find that intuition is closer to mind than instinct, the sound architecture Do'un, created for Intuition, seems to prove the opposite. This piece is very sensory. . . . Sound needs the sensitivity of the physical body to receive intuitive auditory information. As if listening to the invisible is really a human act, a human need. Something that is within us and that we inevitably seek, either consciously or unconsciously. The rhythm that is often used for the communication of ancient peoples with the invisible universe, and that goes against our rationality, is present in the installation." Mireille Capelle appeared in various films and plays, as in an impressive number of operatic roles -- including Wagnerian parts such as Eva and Kundry, or Salome and Der Komponist (Richard Straus) and a slew of French characters. In parallel she developed a large concert repertoire including main sacred and secular works from early baroque to contemporary music. She manages to combine most intimate singing as a classical recitalist and opera singer with pioneering all-round "performances" as a vocalist, composer, and soundscaper. Furthermore she is linked to the HERMESensemble as a member of the artistic committee and performer. Design by Jeroen Wille. Mastered by Jack Allett. Three-panel digipak.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 014LP
|
Kunlun is but one of the many aliases of French artist Max P., who's known to the world as the man behind percussion-driven psychedelia projects like High Wolf and Black Zone Myth Chant. Since 2009 he has released LPs through Not Not Fun, Holy Mountain, Editions Gravats, and Leaving Records. With Time Remaining Unknown, he serves up a dish of eccentric library/new age music gone wrong. The LP is based on improvisations recorded in the summer of 2011, marking Kunlun's first steps in analog synthesis with a very simple set up. Some of those improvisations were also featured on a 2012 Winged Sun tape called Kunlun III. The A-side offers five tracks that explore a sort of heavily layered chamber acid, diving into low frequencies and gravelly bass synthesizer with weirdly disorienting, fluctuating time signatures. Side B is one long trippy maelstrom of seismic submarine bass hypnotism with deep, eroding noise bursts blasting through. As a whole it makes for a dark and claustrophobic piece of psychedelia that will delight fans of Hieroglyphic Being, Bernard Fièvre, Ron Morelli, or Low Jack. Artwork by Belgian artist Lore Vanelslande.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
DVD/BOOK
|
|
AUDIOMER 015DVD
|
Limited hand-numbered edition of 300. NTSC region-free DVD with 60-page paperback book (290mm x 220mm). Ground is an audiovisual performance in which Dewi de Vree and Jeroen Uyttendaele use graphite drawings as a control interface for several electronic instruments, thus rendering the acoustic tactile. Fascinated by ways of rematerializing an increasingly dematerialized and idealized world, they produce work that can be seen as an attempt to approach electronic music in a more intuitive, engaging manner. Using graphite, a material that conducts electricity and is used in everyday variable resistors, they compose drawings that figure as the interface that controls the volume, pitch, and amplitude of the piece. As the drawn lines stretch, intersect, or encounter foreign conductive elements -- such as the hand -- the sound is either modulated or becomes warped. The result is a performance that blends senses together or juxtaposes them, as it creates tension between the unpredictable, aleatory qualities of the graphite and the order of lines that the performers impose upon it, forming the rudimentary score of the piece. The Ground book collects 51 of these graphite drawings, presented with text by Hicham Khalidi, and is accompanied by DVD containing a video recording of Ground performed live by the artists at Studio Loos in The Hague, Netherlands, in July 2014. Jeroen Uyttendaele (born 1981) is an artist interested in sound as a sculptural element and in its relation to light, space, time, and the audience. This manifests as the development of audiovisual instruments, installations, and sound compositions. His works often exploit basic properties of technology, such as conductivity, as tools for expression. Dewi de Vree (born 1983) is a multimedia artist based in The Hague who deals with the sensual experience of physical experiments. Building upon her background in the visual arts and her fascination with the interaction between man and machine, she makes translation machines, sound interfaces, performances, and installations. Examples of her work include works based on the physicality of electricity, electrochemistry, thermodynamics, and electromagnetism. She is involved in the Villa K experimental music venue in The Hague, the Instrument Inventors Initiative (iii), and Proefjeslab, an interactive science show for children created with Arno Verweij. Ground is a co-production of iii and audioMER. made possible by the support of the Creative Industries Fund NL. Camera operated by Takeuchi Toshi. Sound by Matteo Marangoni. Edited by Matteo Marangoni and Jeroen Uyttendaele.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 013LP
|
"The images were shot in New York between 2001 and 2002. It was during the time when we were still in shock from 9.11. The stars and stripes suddenly became visible everywhere in the city. Soon after, the invasion of Afghanistan started. Everybody was living under an indefinable fear -- not knowing what would happen in the future" --Aki Onda. Lost City started as a series of photographs shot by visual artist and composer Aki Onda in New York right after September 11, 2001. A decisively introspective response to a major world event, his pictures were devoid of direct references, but documented his immediate surroundings, focusing on how what happened resonated on a personal micro-level. Since 2005, Onda has been presenting this series as slide projections, which function as a visual score for improvisation, and performing with NYC avant-garde musicians Loren Connors and Alan Licht. The two improvisations on this LP were recorded at Anthology Film Archives in NYC in 2007. Lost City contains the vinyl, a folded 20 x 30 inch poster with the complete photograph series, and an A4 risoprinted booklet containing the accompanying text written by NYC-based curator/writer Niels van Tomme. The record's A-side is a duo piece between Connors and Licht that consists of wandering, buzzing guitar drones with occasional noisy eruptions. It highlights the almost twin-like connection between the longtime collaborators, with telepathic intersecting guitar lines and a sense of unease seeping through. The B-side is Connors's lyrical, atmospheric solo performance, equally sparse and spacious. Limited to 350 copies.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 012LP
|
The Tenses is a duo comprised of Ju Suk Reet Meate and Jackie Oblivia, two veterans of the weirdo art collective that is known as the Los Angeles Free Music Society. They also form the core of legendary experimental juggernaut Smegma. The LAFMS have been a singular force in DIY culture ever since the early '70s and encapsulated an endless string of projects and bands that married a sort of proto-punk with trashy guitars, avant-garde music, tape manipulations, free jazz, improv, and absurd vocalizations into a hyper-original and singular form of music. They're seen by many as the originators of noise music, and have been an immense influence on bands like Sun City Girls, Merzbow, Wolf Eyes, No Neck Blues Band, etc. The Tenses is one of the latest vessels for Ju Suk and Jackie to explore the outer realms of sound and space. Compared to the mothership that is Smegma, it is a more compact and intimate project where turntables, tape collages, distorted surf guitar and coronet are used to create elaborate, haunted atmospheres. After releases on Harbinger Sound and their own Pigface Records, The Tenses now add another chapter to their history with Howard, their LP on Belgian imprint audioMER. Howard is a mind-expanding tour de force that scrambles spoken-word deconstructions and spontaneous freak-outs into a musical non-sequitur; a strange and disorienting trip. Loops of voices from long-lost instruction movies, shortwave radio dramas that get overrun with sirens, various non-instrumental sounds, and a bewildering stretch of Link Wray-like guitar riffs; Howard is a record that oozes paranoia, the perfect soundtrack for making explosives in your basement. Comes in a limited edition of 300 copies with artwork by Wouter Vandevoorde and design by Wouter Vanhaelemeesch and Jeroen Wille.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 011LP
|
Rome-based producer Egisto Sopor has been turning heads with a steady stream of most excellent releases. A CD-R on Legowelt's Strange Life Records, a tape on 100 % Silk, a double LP on Planet Mu and an ever-growing series of jams that are put on Soundcloud or on his Youtube channel. All of which offer atmospheric, acid-tinged techno laced with idiosyncratic touches. He has thus developed quite a cult-following among lovers of lo-fi electronic music who eagerly await his next grainy video, that feel like lost transmissions from an early '90s MTV broadcast. Polysick doesn't get out much and keeps a low profile which adds to his rather enigmatic standing. With his new LP Daydream, Egisto has created the perfect soundtrack to a midnight trip through darkened cityscapes. Starting out like a confused jam session, it slowly takes off and twists into uncanny shapes, conjuring up images of a futuristic nightlife that plays out under neon lights, with a feeling of dread constantly lurking in the shadows. This is techno that tells a tale; a storyboard that comes pushing through in muffled flashes. A chase scene through deserted back alleys, executed while hunter and prey are both in a half-awake state, stuck in an infinite loop. And when the ambient synth twirls unravel and a 4/4 pulse kicks in and tears through the dreamy state of consciousness, it never signals a reassuring release of tension. You might dance to it, but not without anxiously looking over your shoulder. 180 gram vinyl limited to 500 copies.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 010LP
|
The person behind Urpf Lanze is Belgian visual artist Wouter Vanhaelemeesch, who is mainly known for his large-scale ink drawings that offer a hermetic blend of weirdo characters, medieval iconography and surrealist decors. His artwork started gaining some attention a few years ago when renowned avant-garde lutenist Jozef Van Wissem started using Vanhaelemeesch's work to decorate many sleeves of his recorded output, including his collaborations with filmmaker Jim Jarmusch, noise legends Smegma, free-folk band United Bible Studies and fingerpicker James Blackshaw. Next to doing exhibitions in places like Tokyo, New York and Paris, his drawings appear regularly in zines and underground publications all over the world. He also runs the audioMER label together with designer Jeroen Wille and has provided artwork for records by Jack Rose, Robbie Basho, Mauro Antonio Pawlowski, Cian Nugent, Graveyards, Second Family Band and many others. Urpf Lanze is the moniker of his rather unorthodox solo guitar project, under which he has been playing for several years now. With an acoustic guitar that lays flat on his lap, tuned to unwieldy scales, he brutalizes the instrument in an oddly musical way. As if this wasn't enough, he lays down some vocal work that goes from ventriloquist-like whines and mumbles to deep and guttural grunts. The result is a rather unhinged and demented music. Imagine the rawness of Bill Orcutt, the more frightening sides of Loren Mazzacane Connors and the absurd stylings of Wilburn Burchette all wrapped into a Lovecraftian sonic nightmare. Procession of Talking Mirrors is his first full-length solo album. Recorded live on a 4-track tape recorder, these six tracks offer a mixture of Japanese folk music, free psych, scratchy Delta-blues recordings, damaged lo-fi and aggressively percussive fingerpicking. While some tracks may carry a more melancholy tone, others seem closer to acoustic death metal than any kind of folk music. However you may describe it, it is most definitely not a record for the faint of heart.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 005LP
|
2009 release. In collaboration with Croxhapox Gallery, AudioMER. presents Sachiko's first all-drone vinyl release. Heavy-weight vinyl and paste-on sleeve with artwork created by Johan De Wilde. Stellar vocals and drones: three pieces of hypnotic, gliding delight. "The first side is a completely mesmerizing stone. Accompanied by Rinji Fukuoka (Overhang Party) on voice and cello, Sachiko sounds as if she is gargling planets as she levitates wordless vocals through a slowly shifting bible-black background of orchestral drone and eternal music strings generated by vortices of cello and viola and hovering electronics. Can't think of anything that so beautifully combines the vision of the original Dream Syndicate with the aesthetics of dark Japanese psychedelia. On the flip there are two tracks, both of which extend the time-blurring effects of the first side into new zones of heavenly tonefloat, with Sachiko's high vocal style dissolving in butterflies of F/X while electronics hiss and spit and intergalactic shortwave travels through endless space. Easily the best record she has made to date, a mesmeric slice of higher-minded drone narcosis and a classic Japanese underground side. Highly recommended." -- David Keenan, Volcanic Tongue.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 009LP
|
2011 release. Whiteout is a weather condition in which visibility and contrast are severely reduced. The horizon disappears completely and there are no reference points at all, leaving one with a distorted orientation. These same characteristics could be applied to the sound of the musical brainchild of Lin Culbertson and Tom Surgal. In the past White Out have been heralded for the way they entirely reinvent themselves to accommodate the creative personalities of their many prestigious collaborators, including Thurston Moore, Nels Cline, Jim O'Rourke, William Winant, and many others. Recorded over an extended period of time in an undisclosed midtown Manhattan location high above the city streets, Asphalt and Delay marks the first time in White Out's recorded history that Culbertson and Surgal have devoted an entire album to duo improvisations. Each of the five compositions captures a different hue of the spectrum of sound in White Out's sonic universe. Asphalt and Delay puts White Out in a whole new light, unfettered by any external influences they burn super nova bright. The artwork for this LP is provided by Belgian photographer Yoko Tack.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 007LP
|
2010 release. "Le Piano Demécanisé is the result of Frederik Croene's urge to sabotage the piano, to destroy the nostalgic relation between player and instrument, making obsolete acquired techniques, finding himself unable to play repertoire, thus freeing himself and the object." -- Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly 757. Frederik Croene performs his music on a "dismantled" piano, which, if I believe the cover of this record, looks like a drum set. It seems to me that much of the music is played in an improvised manner, but perhaps with classical training in mind. Also, again, I am not sure but it could very well be that Croene takes his inspiration from Zen. Sometimes, like in "Gonflammation," the piano actually sounds like a piano, which is odd if it has been dismantled, but in "Postludium 'pour le piano,'" Croene allows external piano sounds into his music. Overall the music has a very contemplative and percussive nature. Either with hands, sticks, or bows, he gently approaches the piano and works on it, very much like a composer, an explorer, and an improviser. Croene explores the possibilities in a careful way, almost like a scientist, and let's the results speak for themselves. Hard to place on the scale composition versus improvisation, but throughout very nice.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
LP
|
|
AUDIOMER 002LP
|
2008 release. Mauro Antonio Pawlowski is best known for playing skronky guitar riffs in various Belgian bands such as Deus, Othin Spake, Evil Superstars, Club Moral, and countless other projects. On his own he is notorious for being an unpredictable master of puppets who simultaneously oozes freshly demented nursery rhymes and weird avant rock from his trousers. Untertanz is a collection of live performances that capture his free jazz take on madman rock 'n' roll. Think Ciccone Youth era Sonic Youth, Bruce Haack, The Residents, Jandek, and Derek Bailey. Ranging from abstract spooky blues to musique concrète made for stampeding schoolgirls to wonky dances of death, this album captures Pawlowski at his most alchemic and complete.
|
|
|
Artist |
Title |
Format |
Label |
Catalog # |
|
|
3CD
|
|
AUDIOMER 006CD
|
Review in Vital Weekly 757 by Frans de Waard: "Obviously I can't review this 3CD by the for-me-unknown Mireille Capelle. Let me explain. Each CD has one piece of music, but to play the complete piece you will have to play two CDs on four speakers at the same time. Such elaborate set up is not allowed here in the Vital HQ building, but I understand that each can also be heard individually. Phew, that's a relief. From the extensive booklet I gather Capelle, who has a training in classical music, in singing, as well as appearing in various films and she composes her 'sonic architectures' with natural elements and these three (two?) works are part of that. It all sounds very Zen-inspired, both the music and the written aspect of this. I'm not sure how her compositional techniques work, but on 'Naga' I think she uses mainly laptop and perhaps some sort of Max/msp patch in a very tranquil way. A bit like Christophe Charles on his Ritornell CD. On 'Anello,' the sound sources seem to be more of an acoustic nature, but also treated with the aid of the computer. It has, like 'Naga', a fine open sense of open space. 'Sunyata' is on the other hand a very closed work. It takes a long time before one hears anything at all, and it slowly turns out to be a work for flute and cello. Each of the three pieces has an entirely different length, so I'm not sure what the idea is when you are playing these together, but I could very well imagine that playing all three at the same time might bring further enlightenment."
|
|
|
|