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viewing 1 To 25 of 56 items
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DIGI 068LP
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Sean Byrne's Bugskull project returned in 2009 after a long hiatus with the Digitalis-released Communication. A few years later they released the acoustic curveball, Strange Mountain, on legendary Inland Empire label, Shrimper. Digitalis is very happy that the proper follow-up to Communication has landed on the Digitalis shores again. Collapsed View is a whimsical summer excursion through jaded forests and crystalline tides. On the plucked acoustic opener, "Heaven/California," you're gently dropped into Byrne's hazy lair. The repetitive main dirge moves like molasses until you're appropriately comatose. It's a dizzying beginning that settles nicely into the bass crunch of "Olde Growth." Forward movement in the form of a canned ramshackle beat underlines the drawn-out leads that appear to float in a puff of smoke. "Icarus Rising" steals the show with its jet propulsion bass line and psych-infused guitar leads. It's an intoxicating combination that gets better with repeated listens. Byrne breaks out all the stops on Collapsed View, mutating gamelan-esque electronics into an ocean-side romp on "Druids." Hypnotic guitar swells wrap around the piece, elevating it onto a different plane. It begins the second side, which, compared to the A-side, is a meditative ambient affair. Saxophone lamentations punctuate the title-track, drawing a circle around a star-filled night in the middle of nowhere.
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DIGI 065LP
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Paco Sala have come a long way since the dusty beats of their debut, Ro-Me-Ro (DIGI 043LP). The duo of Antony Harrison and the re-christened Birch (formerly Leyli) dissected and reassembled their sound during the two years Put Your Hands on Me was written and recorded. This album, their second, runs deeper and is far more collaborative in all aspects. Put Your Hands on Me is steeped in violence, sometimes subtle and sometimes overt. Scars left from a brutal past play victim to the minor-chord synth swells and complex rhythms. In between whispers, Birch howls with a vengeance. Her voice provides a counterweight to Harrison's gunshot-fed beats and glowing synths. Each hushed tone or whispered lyric is bathed in smoky neon hues, lost in a binge-fuelled haze. Album opener "Impossible Places" melts disparate influences from contemporary R&B to '80s no wave into a cathartic reverie while the cryptic melodies of "Jonny Silverhands" soundtrack a dystopian future. Birch's voice is soft and sultry against the sharp synths and rhythms of "The ACO," acting as a barrier between the perpetrator and a sea of bubbling rage. There's a scattered diversity to Put Your Hands on Me, yet it never loses its cohesive thread. It's a massive album, meticulously assembled and masterfully engineered. Paco Sala aren't fucking around any longer. Mastered by John Tejada and cut to vinyl at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 067EP
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Ricardo Donoso brings his triptych of releases to a close with this remix EP, bringing in five diverse artists to pick tracks for re-working. Yves De Mey offers a nerve-wracking, midnight-black take on "The Sphinx," which slowly builds through layers of skittering synths, while Recondite brings "Diagonal Environment" straight to the floor with a driving 4/4 that adds a solid backbone to proceedings. Paul Jebanasam presents a dark and winding "Affirmation" remix, complete with intricate compositional elements and blasting cinematics, while John Tejada offers a club-ready version of "The Redeemer" before Andreas Tilliander's TM404 provides an acid-soaked take on "Open Drawer, Full of Masks."
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DIGI 063LP
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Following on from a couple of strong releases as part of his Lumisokea duo for Opal Tapes, Koenraad Ecker returns with his most intriguing release to date, the first Digitalis release for 2014. Straddling the line between analog electronics, darkened ambience and slow techno, Koenraad Ecker recalls the colossal drone-noise of Mika Vainio and the sharpened bass frequencies of Joachim Nordwall, albeit shot-from-the-hip in a manner befitting his connection with Opal Tapes. Fourteen-minute opener "Oran" is sprawling and resolute, spread across two parts that display Ecker's compositional chops through an impressive mix of blacked-out electronics and horror-filled cello passages. Inside long, drawn out sequences, Ecker avoids repetition and beats down a tonal path where the structure of each piece is dynamic yet cohesive. Sparse beats end up in a death spiral, competing with Ecker's cello and bleak electronics that fill the empty spaces. Like the slow burn of a lit fuse, "One-Eye" crawls through layers of decay before exploding midway through into incalculable chaos. Square waves blot out difficult melodies only to suddenly disappear like a corroded hallucination while white noise builds from short crackles into cavernous rhythms.
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DIGI 066LP
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Over the past year as Peder Mannerfelt has shed the skin of The Subliminal Kid, we've only had small samples to taste of his new brand of musical sorcery. Lines Describing Circles changes all of that. Ten tracks deep, this is not so much an album as it is a declaration. From the opening, harrowing crackle of "Collapsion," Mannerfelt's intent is to crush the listener into a perfect metal cube. Lines Describing Circles displays the sound of a man fully in control of his machines. Throughout the album, though, there are respites: the title-track settles into a hypnotic groove while a simple, infectious melody repeat into darkness, while "In Place of Once Was" has a melody lurking, too, but it's constantly overwhelmed by sub-bass nihilism. "Gulo Gulo Caesitas" is the pinnacle of the firestorm: cacophonous beats pummel you into submission while feedback and seemingly endless layers of aural mayhem pour down like sonic acid rain. As the computerized voice repeats "barren" over and over on "Evening Redness in the West," there is no horizon left to long for. Peder Mannerfelt's transformation complete, he is off to find new trails to blaze as the melancholic pads of "Rotterdam Anagram" are obscured by distorted filth. Mastered and cut by Stefan Betke. 500 copies only, comes in a spot gloss sleeve.
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12"
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DIGI 062LP
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The second part in a two-part 12" treatise that together will be entitled As Iron Sharpens Iron, One Verse Sharpens Another. Ricardo Donoso completes his latest trance mission for Digitalis with One Verse Sharpens Another. Four tracks of serpentine arpeggios, rolling bass pulses, and stealthy, soaring synth chords that simulate cybersex in anti-G, from the X-Files atmospheres and alien seduction of "The Redeemer," to the pilo-erect triggers and tense pizzicato strings of "Open Drawer, Full of Masks" and over to the sublime, supple bass roll and gentle ambient caress of "Child Primitive" and the mind-weaving Belgian trance bliss of "Master Game (Shape to Come)."
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DIGI 061LP
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The first part in a two-part 12" treatise that together will be entitled As Iron Sharpens Iron, One Verse Sharpens Another. Over the past five years, Ricardo Donoso has sharpened his vision and craft into a diamond point. Opener "Affirmation" references Assimilating the Shadow (DIGI 046CD/LP) while still pulling the listener deeper into the darkened pyramid that Iron/Verse occupies. Bleeding into "The Sphinx," the focus is further dialed in. As the geometry that's graced the covers of each album has become more acute, so has the music contained therein. "Diagonal Environment" features a relentless pummeling of heady bass sequences and subtle leads while the "The Old Straight Track" mixes elements of blackened dub and burnt-out goa into something new and addictive.
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DIGI 053LP
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Between 2003 and 2012 James Ginzburg masterminded the release of hundreds of records on the various imprints of his Bristol, UK-based label house Multiverse Music, including Tectonic, Subtext, and Kapsize, overseeing the second renaissance of bass music in Bristol. It's unsurprising that such a hyperactive spirit would begin to find the strictures of dance music creatively stifling. Focusing on his Subtext label, Multiverse's most cerebral outpost, he became occupied by two projects -- Emptyset, with the curator Paul Purgas, a brutalist exploration of the outer limits of modern composition via the reduction of industrial techno to a pummeling, sensory assault, and something at quite the opposite end of the musical spectrum: a solo acoustic folk record. Dance music has always been the sound of the city, thus it's no surprise that his journey into traditional songwriting saw him wandering into the countryside. Faint Wild Light lies in the bucolic tradition of Simon & Garfunkel, Nick Drake and Crosby, Stills & Nash, but this is not a work of journeyman nostalgia; the wandering has a genuinely fevered tone, a desperation to be totally lost in some potential inner arcadia, isolated from a computerized production process. Equally it's no minimal Pink Moon; it sounds more like a '60s folk troubadour produced by a contemporary hip-hop impresario, which in some ways it is. The finger-picked guitars are carried along by a monumental sound-wall of analog synths, pianos, and strings, while the legacy of his Ginz guise is evident in the intricacies of the percussion arrangements. Rhythms are conjured from found sounds, clicks, taps, tape hiss; a drum kit fashioned from the sonic scraps on the cutting room floor. Ginzburg's particular fondness for the short stories of Cortázar and novels of Nabokov is evidenced by the narrative structure of the songs; vignettes without beginnings, middles and ends, meditations on golden days misremembered, modified visions of half-imagined pasts, all delivered with a hallucinatory, celebratory fervor.
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DIGI 054LP
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Opal Tapes figurehead Stephen Bishop has pushed a lot of boundaries with his label and his own music under the Basic House moniker since bursting onto the scene a few years back. The label in particular carved out a deep niche early on and its momentum seemingly can't be stopped. Caim in Bird Form originally appeared as a very limited cassette on Digitalis earlier in 2013 and now finds its proper home on wax. Basic House is never static, always burrowing toward the center of the earth but missing by a few degrees. "Caim in Bird Form" is gritty, while stilted beats crawl on "I Found You," leaving tonal wreckage in its wake. Bishop ups the ante with the bleak futurism of "64 Bummer" -- synths float skyward blacking out the sun underneath a veil of heavy bass making for one of the album's best moments, along with the caustic sonics of the title-track. And then, just when the darkness gets out of hand, the circus comes to town in the form of "Ultra-Misted" to massage your ears. Features gorgeous artwork by Savwo, cut to vinyl at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 055LP
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Calling someone "ahead of his/her time" is straight out of Music Marketing 101 and is a claim that rarely holds much merit. On occasion, though, it's a phrase that is entirely appropriate and accurate. Joel Brindefalk was as integral a part of Sweden's premiere off-kilter dance label, Börft, as anyone outside its founders, Jan Svensson (FRAK, etc), Birre Isgren (FRAK, etc), and, eventually, Joachim Nordwall (Skull Defekts, etc). While Brindefalk's work under monikers such as Contemporary Punk Unit (CPU), Egglady, and others showcased his skill and range as a producer, it was always Ü that impressed most. In 1992, still just a teenager, he was, in fact, very much ahead of his time. Great Dose of Monotonous Techno was released on cassette to little fanfare and festered in obscurity for years. As Börft and Digitalis formed a collaborative partnership in 2010, reissuing this album became a top priority. Recently, as the worlds of noise and techno have again begun to merge, Brindefalk's early experiments sound almost prophetic with their relentless repetition, formless shape, acid tingers, and simple, pounding rhythms. Great Dose of Monotonous Techno is the perfect title for this record. It contains music whose impact is felt through its crushing loops and gloomy melodies. Ü might make people dance, but does so begrudgingly. There is an undercurrent of angst flowing throughout Great Dose, adding another edge to an album already cut with razors. Sadly, Brindefalk passed away in February of 2013 as this reissue was finally coming to fruition. He leaves a serious void in Swedish underground electronic music, but his legacy will only continue to grow. Remastered from the original tapes by Brindefalk friend and pupil Andreas Tilliander at Repeatle. Cut to vinyl by Helmut Erler at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Original artwork and layout by Christian Carlsson modified for vinyl by Brad Rose.
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DIGI 051LP
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Resident Los Angeles android, [PHYSICS] unveils his debut LP Spectramorphic Iridescence for the Digitalis label. Glazed electronics and polymorphic beats run through wetware enhancements left behind by future civilizations. Even with the neuron-popping hooks from opener "Anodyne Dream" or the crystalline "Isosceles Trapezoid" acting like sandman for your brain, there's a dark undercurrent running throughout Spectramorphic Iridescence. Death-march rhythms snake through "Emerald Forest," adding an extra sinister layer to all the cryptic stabs. As it bleeds deftly into "The Keep," it's the ghost trapped in the machine, tortured into obsolescence. [PHYSICS] continues pounding the electricity, waiting for the last voice to drown beneath the bloated, cybernetic waves. Moments of sonic ecstasy filter in when they can, though, finding heavy tranquility cycles with "Realization" and album closer, "Ultimate L." Its over-the-top, sugary synthetics laced with all aural opiates you need. "Ultimate L," especially, achieves maximal catharsis through countless layers of slowly-evolving tones. [PHYSICS] have crafted an album steeped in cyberpunk lore, complete with neon death rays and jacked-in viruses. Spectramorphic Iridescence weaves a singular narrative through thoughtful sequencing and impressive songwriting. Before the end it manages to sing its dystopian hymns like a mythic artificial intelligence finally freed from its VR prison. Cut to vinyl by Lupo at Dubplates + Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 052LP
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Jim Donadio's debut Psychedelic Black album as Prostitutes came out in 2012 and ended up on many year-end lists, fitting in somewhere between the post-noise abrasive techno of Pete Swanson, Container, Nate Young, etc., the roughened post-punk hues of Powell and the more precision-built constructions of the Raster-Noton label. Donadio's follow-up, Crushed Interior, arrives via Digitalis and picks up where he last left us, taking us through to the next, blackened layer of re-formulated techno templates. Opener "Coming Down Here with Human Needs" lifts slowly but eventually gets sucked down a filtered rabbit-hole before crashing out the other side on top of minimal, crushing rhythms, while "Dial Tone Degradation" pummels you into submission with a no-holds-barred assembly of industrial machinery pounding out massive rhythms that build in intensity until there's no room for the growling bass lines to maneuver. Where Prostitutes really excels, though, is in Donadio's ability to know when to pull it back and let the listener breathe for a minute. The middle duo of "Through Their Hungry Lips" and "Spiders in My Eyelids" sound like the leftovers of a strip-mining operation. The former bounces cryptically with only the vaguest hint of a beat while the latter would be meditative if it wasn't so dense, that sense of unease permeating through to the end of this excellent album.
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DIGI 050LP
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Leven Signs' Hemp Is Here came and went in 1985, as both a cassette release (Unlikely Records) and vinyl release (Cordelia) in the blink of an eye. The duo of Peter Karkut and Maggie Turner managed to craft one of the strangest, most affecting albums of new wave experimentalism of the era, but due to the album's impossible-to-find status, it's been largely forgotten and continuously overlooked ever since. A chance encounter with the cassette version of Hemp Is Here led Brad Rose of Digitalis on an internet scavenger hunt before tracking Karkut down. Through the years he has continued developing his various artistic pursuits, recently having his short film Sunflower Supermodel shown at the London Short Film Festival. Turner's path is a bit foggier, though her collaboration with Karkut continues. But what is it about Hemp Is Here that makes it such a special record? At times it feels like a modern, electronic take on gamelan music with crashing rhythms and modal melodies corrupted via bewildering sonic processes. Karkut layers organ sequences over and over, constructing songs that have more in common tonally with music you'd hear in gothic cathedrals than any sort of school of electronic music. Think of a more diverse, Eastern-tinged Flaming Tunes and you might be getting close. On the surface, Karkut's complex compositions seem at odds with Turner's often-detached, stunning vocals, but it's the dichotomy of those two disparate elements that latch on and don't let go. All new artwork by Pete Karkut. Remastered from the original tapes by James Plotkin, cut at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 049LP
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Following a duo of LPs for Dekorder, Dan Hayhurst (audio) and Reuben Sutherland (visuals) recorded Slime Code for Patten's Kaleidoscope label which originally issued a version on cassette tape in 2012. This music was performed live to eight-track tape from which a digital edit was compiled and from that came this exclusive vinyl version. Visually and sonically, disorientation and imperfection play a major role. From the bewildering and complex cover art straight down to the insanity of its scope, Slime Code's impact starts from the second you get the record in your hands and doesn't end until the broken tribal blasts and cybernetic electronics close down the show. Submerged blips act like aural drips falling into a rapidly-flowing river of tropical bounce until dissolving into squalls of synthetic noise. The music operates as a highly visual level across two extended pieces consuming disfigured bleeps and herky jerky post-techno rhythms sounding like Sun Ra meets Ekoplekz in a conical flask of liquid mescaline, all spun through a centrifuge at Daphne Oram's home lab. Yet far from being an abstract mush of sonics, their logic dictates a strong sense of linearity that's almost reflective of the dancefloor, to an extent much like Diamond Catalog, and somehow also of the lilting metallic timbres associated with Konono No. 1, or Harmonious Thelonious and The Durian Brothers 12"s on Diskant. The intangible magic of their sound lies in the way their grooves dissolve and reassemble at will, performing almost impossible segues between seemingly insoluble sounds and rhythms in spiraling vortices of frothy geometric convolution made to immerse and stimulate your pineal gland to joyfully lysergic effect. Cut to vinyl by Lupo at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 044LP
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Kansas City's Brandon Knocke has quietly been making a name for himself as a producer and composer the last few years. Beyond his solo work as Discoverer, he fronts the enigmatic Parts Of Speech as well as the newly-formed, incredibly promising duo, Svamps, with Kianna Alarid Cameron of Tilly & The Wall. Knocke is a glutton when it comes to his electronic concoctions, but on Tunnels, we hear him at his most bare. Discover's second full-length, Tunnels, could be considered a concept album of sorts. What's immediately apparent about the album is the attention to detail in the composition. From the opening chords of "Circular Motherboard" through the laid-back catharsis of "Personal Clone," Knocke is prepared to take listeners on a cinematic ride through white, sterile hallways and feminized technology. The low-end thump of standout "Blood Lab" drags you through antiseptic, holographic imagery designed to distract from the disconnect between reality and an imaginary utopia. "Lesbian Software" embraces the desolation of a technologically-driven existence with heavily-vocoded vocals paired exquisitely with emotionally-charged synth leads. Diametrically opposed but combined in absolute harmony, Knocke is absolutely on top of his game here. It is music that infects you like a nano-virus, simultaneously destroying what you know but rebuilding it as something better and more pure. As the album comes to a close, Discoverer has come to grips with this controlled and stilted future that hovers in the distant future. But in that acceptance is a realization that our human essence cannot be entirely vanquished. In the playful bass lines of "Materialize" and triumphant assertion of "Personal Clone" that close out the album, Knocke lets you know that even in the starkest future is the chance to further evolve.
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DIGI 047LP
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While husband and wife duo Brad Rose and Eden Hemming might be best-known for more "challenging" sounds, they managed to rack up accolades for their first foray into pop with the Mechanical Gardens (TYPE 073CD) album released by the Type label back in 2010. Nightrunners is Altar Eagle's second full-length together and pushes the duo's woozy pop sound into a flickering neon haze. The soft-focus beauty of Eden's voice is now placed center stage, and the industrial pop productions are as dreamy as they've ever been. Whether through the whimsical dub-influenced opener "Carousel Ocean" or cold-wave shakes of album highlight "Runaways," the duo have an authenticity that is impossible to place, and a singular quality to their music. As they saunter from electrified shoegaze notes to darker sounds, each track seems intrinsically linked to the next, imbuing Nightrunners with a narrative that brings to mind classic 4AD -- from the jagged pop of This Mortal Coil to the outsider dub-pop of Colourbox. These are songs dragged kicking and screaming through a thicket of microchips and frozen pizza. Just lie back and enjoy the ride. Original art and design by Radek Drutis, the guy responsible for all those ace Madlib sleeves. Mastered by James Plotkin and cut to vinyl at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Vinyl edition of 500 copies.
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DIGI 045LP
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SeekersInternational comes from the mysterious Transmolecular collective, heavily-informed by sound-system culture and sounding like classic material from Rhythm & Sound, Kit Clayton, Disrupt, Actress, Pole and Andy Stott. The album was written and compiled during the darkest hours: dubbed-out rhythms echo from smoldering speakers, looped to infinity like a message to the heavens. It's the driving force behind this music that sings in its distinct, confused voice while wondering where it all went wrong and how to dig out of that barren hole. Fledgling beats are built through repetition and embrace; they are the beginning of the end and deliverance from the bottom. I hesitate to call this music spiritual, but it's hard to deny the purified feeling that SKRS leaves you with. This is music that will fill not just physical spaces, but also all the crevices within. It's been mastered and assembled in such a way as to maximize its impact and to underline that The Call from Below is the sound of home. Mastered by The Stunt Man at Suite Sound Labs and cut to vinyl by Lupo at Dubplates + Mastering, Berlin. Cover illustration by Mysteryforms.
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DIGI 042LP
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Portland, Oregon duo, The Slaves, only have a handful of releases under their belt so far, but it doesn't mean they haven't left their mark. Operating in the void somewhere between shoegaze and doom, this is music that is stretched to its breaking point and epic in the true sense of the word. Barbara Kinzle and Birch Cooper know how to fit within each other's movements, piling on in all the right places and knowing when to pull back. Spirits of the Sun shows their singular focus at its peak. These four dark and lush dreamscapes stretch their claws, dig in, and never let go. The Slaves have no qualms about who or what they are. The formula is simple: guitar, synth, voice. Kinzle's synth-work is where the backbone begins, but Cooper's caustic guitar raids are always lurking, waiting for the perfect moment to disrupt the harmonic elegance. It's these layers of smeared guitar chords and synth notes that add so much depth to each piece. It feels like you're being swallowed by a sonic abyss and it's only Kinzle's narcotic, sublimely towering vocals that save you in the end. Throughout Spirits of the Sun, there is a dichotomy pulling in opposite directions. The Slaves create music that is simultaneously beautiful and grotesque. There's a twisted, dark side that is consistently being overshadowed by sounds that are overwhelming and majestic. Each aspect pushes and pulls, but the beauty and the symmetry win out in the end. By the time the album closes with the soaring "Born Into Light," it is statuesque and firmly entrenched in the deepest reaches of your psyche. Spirits of the Sun is a force and The Slaves will guide you toward your own oblivion. Mastered by Brad Rose and cut to vinyl at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Artwork by Birch Cooper. Limited edition of 500 copies.
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DIGI 041LP
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Pat Murano's Decimus project has been all over the map in the past few years, undertaking a massive effort to put out a series of 12 albums in accordance with the zodiac of Decimus Magnus Ausonius. Previous to this, Murano was perhaps best-known as one of the founding members of No Neck Blues Band, K-Salvatore, and Malkuth, but it is with Decimus that the full story finally unfolds. With 11, Murano is going schizo and taking you down a hellish aural rabbit hole, deep into the abyss. Digitalis is not exaggerating when they say this might be the weirdest record they have ever put out. 11 opens with layers of looped, rusty-sounding strings mashed together with slowed down, death-rattle vocals. With buried crunch rhythms peeking out from the morass, the whole effect is like wandering through a funeral procession through a post-apocalyptic metropolis. Everything moves rapidly until it doesn't. Murano slows things to a crawl, pushing the demonic howl under a pane of glass. Blown-out minimal beats emerge to carry the bones along, but it feels like the worst is inevitable and there's no place to go but down. And that's when Murano pulls the rug out from beneath. Solemn guitar chords are plucked like feathers, mourning the loss of the sun but never losing faith entirely. Of course, that's just a tease because just as abruptly as it appears, the section is destroyed and replaced by sharp synth stabs and manipulated tribal death marches. Everything has a crunch to it. 11 sounds like an album that was found in a sandy tomb. It's simultaneously ancient and still looking forward. The whole album is so disorienting and disfigured that it's oddly beautiful. The thing about this installment in the Decimus saga is how much of a story it tells. Murano deftly jumps from one chapter to another, throwing so many ideas and styles into the cauldron and spitting out something that flows like magic. This is the soundtrack for modern times, in all its ugly glory. Cut to vinyl at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Artwork by Tiny Little Hammers.
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DIGI 040LP
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In 1982, a small Canadian record label specializing mostly in classical music released Heliograms. This was the first record by Canadian composer and video artist Jean Piché, and it was also one of the first albums to feature music produced almost entirely with digital synthesizers. But, due to an unfortunate turn of events, the label went bankrupt as soon as Heliograms was released, therefore relegating this essential piece of electronic music to obscurity. Jean Piché recorded Heliograms between the years 1977-1980 during his time at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, BC. The music on the LP consists of works for computer, digital synthesis and acoustic instruments, and most of it was composed using the POD Interactive Compositional System that Barry Truax had developed at SFU. The four compositions that make up Heliograms are often dense, harmonically-rich pieces that slowly evolve through time. There is a strong use of tonality throughout which characterizes Piché's work during this period. It echoes a fascination with the music of Terry Riley, Steve Reich, and Lou Harrison, placing it firmly in a minimalist approach to electronic music, alongside the contemporary work of American composer Laurie Spiegel, then working at Bell Labs. The initial sounds that would end up constituting the bulk of "Ange," the first piece on the LP, were created on the Systems Concepts Digital Synthesizer, also known as the Samson Box, during a residency at Stanford University, California, in the CCRMA facilities. The Samson Box was a powerful machine and the first of its kind. It was designed to synthesize complex musical events in real time using FM synthesis. As soon as Piché returned to SFU, he mixed all the tracks in a traditional analog studio and then proceeded to record the voice of Joanna Anonychuk, as well as his own voice, carefully blending these with the sounds generated with the Samson Box. The result is a striking oceanic drone of microtonal frequency waves shifting in and out of focus. Remastered by James Plotkin from the original tapes and cut to vinyl by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
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DIGI 034CD
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Jürgen Müller was a self-taught amateur musician who, while studying oceanic science at the University of Kiel, purchased some electronic instruments and set up a mobile studio on his house boat, docked along the town of Heikendorf, on the North Sea. He held a life-long fascination with the ocean, the expansive and endless inner-space of the deep, where he felt many ecological miracles had yet to be discovered, and which kindled a love for the unknown. This love of all things nautical started early in his youth and eventually led him to study the oceanic sciences. For one week in 1979, Jürgen took up with a film crew on a mission to document some sea-water toxicity testing that was being performed by a couple of notable biologists, only a few kilometers offshore. At the end of the expedition, he decided that he would make music to capture the strange feeling conjured by these experiences. Utilizing only a handful of barely-remembered childhood piano lessons, Jürgen set about creating his marine-influenced vignettes with some electronic instruments he had gathered through friends, as well as borrowing some new equipment from a local school's music department. As a general music lover, earlier in the '70s he had taken note of several avant-garde electronic composers who he felt simultaneously captured a purity of sound and sense of wonder that was lacking in other music. He dreamt of fusing this ideal with the synthetic recreations of nature. In a sense, one could say he stumbled onto an early "new age" aesthetic through pure ignorance and coincidence. Mixing relaxing ambient tones and spooky, otherworldly sounds, he came up with a unique approach. After filling several reels of home recordings, he held ambitions of becoming a film composer. He decided to start his own publishing company, Neue Wissenschaft, and hoped to compose albums to sell as production music to various film companies for use in documentaries and television programs. As he was simultaneously hard at work on his studies to finish school, he had to work on his music in short intervals, and often had to put it aside altogether. As a result, it took several years for him to actually realize his sole full-length recording, Science of the Sea, the sessions for which began in late 1981, before finishing a year later. Less than 100 copies were pressed, and few of them were even sent out to potential clients. Most copies were eventually given to friends and family. Jürgen's musical gamble never quite paid off as he had hoped, and without any outside interest or connections in the music world, he soon abandoned any dreams of a musical existence and instead chose to further his oceanographic career. Remastered from the original tapes by Brad Rose.
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DIGI 043LP
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Paco Sala first came to fruition sometime in 2011 as producer Antony Harrison began developing a totally different side to his usual musical explorations as Konntinent. Following up a debut cassette, Radial Sundown, that introduced Paco Sala as a new solo vehicle for Harrison's love of hip-hop, Italo-disco, & synth-infused pop music, Harrison joined forces with vocalist Leyli -- and everything changed. Leyli's voice became the perfect vehicle for Harrison's squashed productions, adding an elegance and airiness to his dark, introspective tropes. This is most evident on the show-stopper, "Spiral" -- Leyli's vocal is divine, streaming skyward as it twists into endless, delicate shapes, with a hypnotic beat and Tropicália-infused loops acting as the perfect backdrop. Leyli slowly takes over the album's first single, "Gifts Of The Bloom," with layer-upon-layer of wordless murmurs. Along with B-side opener, "Tre's Future First," they show off Paco Sala's Italo influence with stunted beats and catchy, yet minimal synths. It's the vocals, though, that continually push Ro-Me-Ro to another level. Ro-Me-Ro is as striking a debut as any on the esteemed Digitalis label over the last few years, tapping into that emotional, sparkling intersection where followers of Nite Jewel, Chromatics, Not Not Fun and Julee Cruise will find much comfort. Original art by Marie-Pascale Hardy. Mastered by Brad Rose and cut to vinyl by Rashad Becker at Dubplates + Mastering, Berlin. Limited to 500 copies only.
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DIGI 039LP
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FRAK has been around for 25 years now. They have been the talisman of Sweden's inimitable Börft label since its inception. Over the course of dozens of tapes, 12"s, and full-lengths, this group has known no real boundaries. It is alien music in every sense of the word. Even if each track offers something different to the narrative, the album keeps a connective tissue running throughout. After 25 years, FRAK is showing no signs of age. Muzika Electronic is a mix of skewed dance music paired with heavy doses of modular synthesizer exploration and bizarro pop. It's all brand-new, recorded specifically for Digitalis. FRAK is constantly skirting the line between minimal dance music and noise music, often finding new and innovative spaces to occupy and exploit. Album opener "Voyage No. 1" embodies this to perfection. Slow-moving rhythms provide the backbone while looping, crusty synths spin around, spiked with dizzying, high-pitched melodies. It seems odd at first, but as an introduction to what is contained within the sonic walls of Muzika Electronic, it starts this journey off right. It flows into the deceptively catchy "Tristesse Dance" like magic. You will find yourself hooked on the cyclical bassline within a few bars. FRAK's pop sensibilities are most on display, though, with the New Order-tinged "Pulse-Crack." Wide-eyed leads mesh into the pulsating bass undercurrents, riding a blissed-out electronic wave into outer space. It is absolutely hypnotizing. The robotic vocals of "Varje Dag" and "In Order To Create" swim in a sci-fi glow. This is music that is wrestling with itself, never sure if it is searching for the future of dance music or looking back to its past. That dichotomy, though, is what drives Muzika Electronic into so many great and unexpected realms. Cut to vinyl (LOUD) by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Art by Tiny Little Hammers. Limited to 500 copies only.
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DIGI 038LP
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Perispirit is the duo of Ricardo Donoso and Luke Moldof and they have been haunting the Northeast of the United States for a couple of years now. After a slew of releases on Prurient's Hospital Productions label and Ricardo's own Semata Productions, Spiritual Church Movement has Perispirit taking an unexpected turn as they unleash their most cohesive and accomplished work to date. Spiritual Church Movement is the sound of two worlds colliding and forming something entirely new in the aftermath. In this case, digital and analog systems are turned against each other. Moldof's analog source material was blitzed and manipulated while Donoso worked his sorcery via digital matrix, showing that both approaches can win the prize. Squalid sonic debris spill out and melt together with beats that are barely there and melodic shrapnel to create this weirdly compelling, utterly disjointed composition. And if you thought Moldof and Donoso were concerned about expectations, Spiritual Church Movement is proof it was the last thing on their minds. Synthesizers are mauled by digital processes, battered down to bare bones, turning passages of melody into disease-stricken organisms paired with fractured, plodding rhythms, at times sounding like Autechre attempting to make a noise record: it's well and truly fucked. The expertise with which everything is constructed, though, is what makes these pieces excel. Everything is where it should be and the combination is almost religious in its attention to detail. But before the duo gets too close to the sun, everything is burned to the ground and the process starts over. Just when you think you have it figured it out, Spiritual Church Movement is off on another disfigured tangent. Over the course of these two sprawling sides, the cult of Perispirit is born. Ricardo Donoso and Luke Moldof carry with them the conviction that anything is possible and nothing is out of bounds. Spiritual Church Movement is their manifesto. Mastered by Brad Rose and cut to vinyl at Dubplates + Mastering, Berlin. Limited to 500 copies only.
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DIGI 035LP
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Grant Evans, who is also of Quiet Evenings alongside his wife Rachel (aka Motion Sickness Of Time Travel) and co-curator of the Hooker Vision label, is the brains behind Nova Scotian Arms. Throughout numerous releases, he has shown a consistent ability to keep listeners guessing as he explores endless sonic territories. With Cult Spectrum, Evans is drowning himself in a hazy aural sea. Like much of his work, there is a very distinct mood on Cult Spectrum. This is funereal music that is stretched to the breaking point -- distant echoes are buried underground in a delicate mix of sounds that are as cosmic as they are organic. This duality is at play straight-off with the masterful opener, "Gathering/Composition." Soaring in crystal skies on beds of hiss, each strained note from Evans' Rhodes piano emerges from the murk like an anchor keeping the song and the mood forlorn. Tape-loops and radio interference deliciously muddy the waters on the 16+ minute "Emulsion," combining all those and more into a cacophonous stew. Acoustic guitars circle around in a swirling synthetic drain -- each wave emerging in stages as Evans shows considerable compositional skill in the way the piece is put together. With "Overcast (1st Delay)" comes a melancholic, skyward glance, taking shape through tonal dichotomies. This is the sound of dissonance sculpted and shaped into something far greater than the sum of its parts, leaving its mark long after the final, ghostly seconds of "Hearse Overdub (Decomposition)" fade away. Evans is digging a tunnel, heading straight for the sun. Mastered by Lawrence English and cut to vinyl at Dubplates and Mastering, Berlin. Limited to 500 copies only.
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