воскресенье, 22 апреля 2012 г.

Mike Shiflet / Joe Panzner - Recollect / Reconstruct Cassette - Rubber city noise

Mike Shiflet / Joe Panzner - Recollect / Reconstruct Cassette


Taken aback. You wake up from greasy confusing dreams. You come out from an surreal world and ...surprise. Nothing changed. The same surreal world around you. The same confusing things around you. What is reality?
Heavy noisy drones stab and fondle at the same time until you can not tell the difference. Choppy vibes irritate and soothe until you can not tell the difference. You should get used. Really. There's no difference.
Buy the cassette from Rubber city noise.

воскресенье, 15 апреля 2012 г.

DDb Interview Series (1013) - Justin Wright (Expo'70/Sonic meditations)

Many thanks to Justin for his time!


1. Well, obviously for those who know your project this question is aimless. However, why ‘Expo’70’? And how did it start?

I wanted to work on more organic music and needed a platform to showcase that. At the time I was in a band, which was really great, I had many more ideas flowing through my veins and needing a way to execute them, this is what become Expo '70.


2. Your project name has a special design that, if I am not mistaken rarely changes. Am I right? Or is it just an optical illusion? Do you feel a certain aura hovering about every record you make (because I do)?

I'd say each record has it's own aura and mysticism in place. I try not to create the album twice, one may think it's going to be the same at first listen, but it reaches further into it's own design.


3. Tell a bit about the local community? What stuff can you recommend for checking out? What gigs you’ve attended lately were exceptional? 

The last show I went to was Acid Mothers Temple, it was part of a local music festival, mostly indie rock stuff. I also played with Woodsman and Dustin Wong, that was an exceptional show. The local community is very sparse for good experimental music, most are just bar bands. There are a handful of great groups here though like Umberto, Snuff Jazz, Vor Onus, Carnal Torpor, Monta at Odds, Goodwillies, Shawn Hanson, Plante, Sounding the Deep, Christopher McFall, Scammers...everyone sounds very different and unique from one another.


4. Since the improvisation is the base of your music, how would you describe the difference between what you feel while playing live and while recording? Do these schemes somehow affect the improvisation approach or technique?

While playing live I have to keep in mind it's for an hour straight, not much room for error. Recording, I can do as much experimentation as I need to get where I am going. Live setting and recording I try to put myself mentally in the same place so the music will flow the same.


5. You run your own label ‘Sonic Meditations’. What was that that pushed you to put out your first release?

I think it was having a lot of great local music with no platform and a way for me to re-release my music on different formats. It has since grown into handpicked music I feel needs to be heard or feel I want my personal stamp on it.

6. You’ve recently released a cassette by one of my favorite artists James R. Moore (Cloudland Ballroom) and it’s truly amazing! How do you decide what to release? Do you receive lots of demos or you rather work with your friends or those who you know?

James and I have been talking for a few years now. I was really impressed with his Black Mountain Transmitter release, "Theory & Practice". So I decided to have him do an album for me. It's a really great release, I think he did an outstanding job on it. I do get many demos, but I try to hand pick things that I search out, it's very rare I will release something someone sends to me blindly.


7. Next question I will ask to every person in DDb interview series. What have changed in independent music world with the developing and spreading of the Web?

Well, there are less independent shops, more web-based shops, so I don't really have a place in my town to go shop for the music I like. I have to drive about an hour away or just order online. Now, anyone can be heard making music from their bedroom, which isn't always a good thing. I think stores are more competitive and don't take too many risks these days. You can pretty much hear any music on the web now, so for new bands that's great for getting listeners outside of their region.
Any positive improvements? Any negative repercussions?

It's saturated, I'm surprised sometimes how popular Expo '70 still is with so many other great artists out there, but also glad since there are so many new comers to the genre of music I am associated with.



8. Tell about your relationship with vinyl collecting. Do you collect anything?

Well, I used to collect way more than I do now, I used to buy just about everything on vinyl I could afford, but having been down and out in the past, I have sold over half my collection. Now it's only records I feel deserve to be owned by my, my very favorite records or ones that are more affordable. I also get lots on tour from other bands and also with trading.

9. What about your day work? Does it affect your ideas in music? How does it correlate with your music life?

I guess it does, more so that now I'd say. I have too much free time now and think I have more structure it would give way to producing more music.

10. Please share your future plans? What are you working on? And what’s next?

I am making plans now for a European tour with Ancient Ocean, we will head over seas mid September for the tour. I have an album coming out on Blackest Rainbow and Ancient Ocean and I will have a split LP for the tour. I have also been working with a 3 piece band version of Expo '70 and we have a side of an LP coming out on Record Store Day and will be recording early May for a release on Essence music.


Femminielli – Sprezzatura Cassette - Robert and Leopold

Femminielli – Sprezzatura Cassette


Hey pal. Here's a healthy dollop of seducing voices and beats. Flee of the office chair and lets meet at 7pm at the barroom. I will order four beers but then we will drink only champaign. Bring your girlfriend, sure! There will be a fucking awesome opportunity to dance. But beers and champaign first... OK. See you. Oh! One more thing. It's raining. And the rain is violet. Strange, ha?
Released by Robert and Leopold.

Ewphoria - Ewphoria Cassette - Already dead tapes 2012

Ewphoria - Ewphoria Cassette


Second offering from Mario Gonzalez released by Already dead tapes.
This is the music of fear. Perfect soundtrack for disaster movies like The Road... However it does not depicts. On the contrary it digs in minds and thoughts and reveals the bodiless monsters. What we see is the endless battle between a man and his disgusting desires.
Lucid, harsh and as always well-crafted. Buy from Already dead tapes.

воскресенье, 8 апреля 2012 г.

sashash ulz ~ maenads Cassette - sicsic tapes, 2012

sashash ulz - maenads Cassette


Calm winter day. People move slowly. Everything is slow and half-asleep. Buildings and streets change their shapes. Coffee gets cold immediately. One can not catch anyone's look. No familiar faces. No familiar directions. There's no memory. This is a music for total estrangement.
Released by Sicsic Tapes.

воскресенье, 1 апреля 2012 г.

Imperfect Masters “This Humanly Mess: Music of El Cerrito for Clarinet and Boot, Vol. #23″ Cassette - Full of Nothing

Imperfect Masters “This Humanly Mess: Music of El Cerrito for Clarinet and Boot, Vol. #23″ Cassette


Many thanks to Ivan and Anya for this amazing tape. It has become a good friend of mine for a few hard days in the past. This record can be nominated for the most multifarious tape prize. And the koolest thing is that the artists manage to keep the definite line, not stepping over the edge where most improve composers find themselves speaking to the gods of Math and playing in Angry birds with devil. Nope. Robert Horton and Dan Plonsey keep and keep their line. A good line leading to the throne of the Beauty Goddess. Another koolest thing is that so many different styles and directions are mixed and delivered during the improvisation set. Clarinet and hand-made string instrument called “boot” open up beautiful world which is not real but which is almost real... Very honest record.
Must have. Buy from Full of Nothing.

DDb Interview Series (1012) - Felicia Atkinson


1.
As a musician you are mostly known either as Felicia Atkinson or Je suis le petit chevalier. Please tell about the originals of both projects and the differences between them. Do you have any else monikers?

I don't know if people know me more under my real name or under my moniker
changing my name was for me a possibility of mutation, like a werwolf would do for example.
I like this idea of having several different names, like bluesmen or soldiers.
It gives me a certain of kind of freedom.

2.
Please describe your most busy day!

my days are pretty buisy everyday: i work in the bookstore, i cook, i draw, i make music, i answer e mails…
what i love the most is when i have free time to do endless walk until the city touches the forest.


3.
Do you like to perform live? What gear do you use in your live shows?

I like to play live. Most of the time I improvise. Those days i am playing with a microkorg and different pedals effects. I used to perform with a guitar. It may happen again.

4.
You are also a famous visual artist. Tell a bit about the directions you move in and the fields of your interest. What inspires you to make your drawings and installations?

My drawings and installations or a way to communicate with the invisible, as is my music too. I call the ghosts and they come.
My installations are more like little reminders of their passage, like little memento mori.
I use watercolor, paper, wood, it is made also with a sense of improvisation in the meaning that they answer to the present moment and the feeling of the space itself.

5.
Some time ago you launched the Shelter Press. What is it? Is it supposed to be a platform for any kind of art or is it rather a mix of label and chapbook publishing?

Shelter Press is the second part of Kaugummi, the publishing house that created Bartolome Sanson a while ago.
We decided to create Shelter Press together to shelter our visions and the visions of certain precious people we wanted to invite.
The name is inspired by a book by Lloyd Kahn, about building your own shelter.
The first book we published was a book of collage of Julien Langendorff, then a re-issue of an LP by Pete Swanson and Renee Hell.
We want this publishing house to be more than that! It will host records, books and art shows. It will be a moving and utopian structure that will be the thresholds of our dreams.




6.
I bet you have lots of plans. However please share a few with us – most secret please.

Well, just right now i am releasing with Shelter Press and La Station radar a new LP as JSLPC, called An Age of Wonder that I recorded in Ohio last summer.
I am very excited about this!
Late a tape on  the great Sic Sic Tapes will be out i think!
Then under my name i will release a 7 inch on this wonderful newzealand label called Cooper Cult.

I am working also on a book of my drawings. Should be ready in for summer-fall 2012.

7.
Describe your most free day.

Well, if it's a completely free day, it should be also a completely secret day! :)

8.
How often do you listen to other’s music? What stuff impressed you most lately?

I listen to music everyday.
I love the last Ilyas Ahmed on Immune. Can't wait to listen to the new Motion Sickness of Time Travel on Spectrum Tools.
I listen to a lot of 70's folk music too, like i love the compilations they put on the rootstrat blog sometimes.
When i am at the bookstore i listen to Sonic Pieces records such as Ryan Teague or Pantone, and some jazz music such as Horace Silver or Ornette Coleman.
  
9.
This question may sound stupid but, what is more primordial for you? Art or music? Image or sound?

LOVE is the most important!


10.
Next question I will ask to every person in DDb interview series.
What has changed in independent music world with the developing and spreading of the Web?
Any positive improvements? Any negative repercussions?


I feel intent helped a lot the music! It is easy to discover and exchange music, i love it! I LOVE INTERNET!

the only thing i don't like with internet is when people stalk you and forgot that internet doesn't allow you to bother people or speak theme as they know you wether you never have met them.
It;s just that the words "KNOWING" is pretty vague on internet: it can mean " i haven't listened i just saw a post" or " i just know his name through Facebook" or " i read the two first lines about it on wikipedia".
I guess you need to stay humble about "knowing" something when you consult the internet.

But beside this, it is very very helpful! I have more people supporting my music in the United States, Russia  or Japan than in France where i come Framce! it's funny!

MI AMI “DECADE” LP - 100% Silk

MI AMI “DECADE” LP


I want to present you one of my favorite releases as of today.
Pure electronic madness. Without any adornments. Clear and simple beats composed in a perfect way are mixed with equally clear and simple electronics. Strangely - no reminiscences. Strangely - nothing at all. You know what I mean? Nothing at all in my head except for this music. And now, get lost you all!
Grab it fast from 100% Silk.

Lichen Gumbo “Zoom Zoom Ohm Umpha” Cassette - Full of Nothing

Lichen Gumbo “Zoom Zoom Ohm Umpha” Cassette


One more positive dollop of sound for today. This cassette is full of lo-fi guitar, happy melodies, spring atmosphere and tropical tones. A bit sad vocals buried under the mess of sounds make the whole thing more diverse and uncertain though the acoustic guitar on the track named Bertha leaves no doubts. We have stumbled across a fresh and good portion of sunny lo-fi pop songs. Turn off all your devices and remember the best moments of your life. All the holidays, dances, love affairs etc. This music will help you.
Buy from Full of Nothing.

GNOD – Chaudelande Volume II LP - Tamed Records

GNOD – Chaudelande Volume II LP


This gorgeous record begins with meditative chorals and transforms into a mesmerizing psychedelic collapse. Awesome juicy drums and abruptly appearing voices accompanied by rough guitar riffs blows listener's mind.  The battle begins. Gods fight in the skies and mortal onlookers hide in the caves. Industrial theme protrudes from each sound phrase and makes this unkempt record even more sexy and punk. I have danced.
And you should.
Buy this LP from Tamed Records

Floris Vanhoof - Hootcha! Cassette - STENZE QUO

Floris Vanhoof - Hootcha! Cassette


Very uncomfortable release... Very unstable sound... It seems that the whole planet is tuning up and can't find the proper channel... Perfectly built atmosphere does not let you go anywhere until the music stops. But even then you anxiously stare at your radio and tv...
Plastic, tasty and scary. I love it!
Released by Stense Quo.

Nuojuva - Otavaiset Otsakkaha Cassette - Hooker Vision

Nuojuva - Otavaiset Otsakkaha Cassette


New project from Olli Aarni (known for his project Ous Mal). 6 tracks packaged in a tape recently released by Hooker Vision. Pop melodies, greasy contorted vocals, amusing synth vibes: this is what you will hear on this record. The sound is extremely righteous. Birds are flying around and singing. Sun is shining. Fuck. This is too good, isn't it? Can't believe it, but maybe you could...
Released by Hooker vision.