EMVELOPE NINE - 'Melt Canal' CD (Split Femur Recordings)
'Melt Canal' is a beautiful and haunting piece of work from Birmingham-based artist Alan Daly. Using guitar, pedals, synths and field recordings, the pieces seem to stay in one place, creating a sonic environment that allows the listener to furnish themselves. The album is reminiscent of Vladislav Delay, Fennesz and Tim Hecker, but still manages to hold as a piece of work on its own.
UK 10£
Europe 11£
World 12£
QUANTITY
FREIBAND - 'Stainless Steel' LP (Ini.Itu)
What Freiband proposes here is 2 sides of radically reworked gamelan. Side A seems to progress through an acid bath and take the magnifying glass to enhance the digital decays, evoking various stages of textural corrosion. Through these aggressive and irreverent treatments, the naturally metallic harmonics are by twist and turns abruptly dismantled and fractured into crunchy, dense and fuzzy fireworks. On side B, through some arcane wiring, some machines end up spitting out shifting binary patterns with a somewhat alienating feeling. Dry and uncompromising “Unerforschtes Gebiet” between minimal beats and Steve Reich’s early tape compositions. File alongside Hecker, Pita, Mika Vaino, Fennesz or Alva Noto's Xerrox LPs. Features 2 locked grooves. Ltd x 250 numbered copies.
GENGHIS TRON - 'Board Up The House Remixes Vol. 5' 12" (Crucial Blast)
If Genghis Tron's frayed and sparking mix of aggressive mathcore and electronics wasn't innovative enough, they've embarked on an ambitious multi-label remix project following their first album, "Board Up The House". The three tracks on the fifth and final edition comes wrapped in layers of distortion at once atmospheric and damaging. Tim Hecker's take on the title track is a slow thaw of icy electronic texture, and the Nadja remix of "I Won't Come Back Alive" stretches it out to fifteen minutes of buried drum hits and chilly synths. The final track is a distorted electro remix of "I Won't Come Back Alive" by Dudes You Can Trust. Ltd x 1000 copies on magenta / mint green marbled vinyl.
Rock-A-Rolla 30 features Seattle Doom-Droners Earth. There are also interviews with Machinefabriek, Six Organs Of Admittance, Tim Hecker, OvO, The Skull Defekts, The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble, Mugstar, Iroha and Igorrr. This month's Label Focus is on Riot Season. Also included is the usual vast selection of news, music, DVD and live reviews from the avant-rock, metal, noise and experimental scenes. Highly recommended!
UK 5.00£
Europe 7.50£
World 10.00£
QUANTITY
VA - 'Saite An Saite' CD (Licht-Ung)
Guitar-based CD with long tracks from Aidan Baker (Nadja), relapxych.o and M. Sandbleistift (Licht-Ung). "Sandbleistift's gauzy drones hover above a thick amplifier hum, coupled with metal-on-metal scrapes, electrical interference directed into the pick-ups, and spidery textures that wiggle into the mix as he plucks away at the bridge of his guitar... Aidan Baker steals the show on this album. Even with his esteemed catalogue of ethereal ambience and doomdronedirge excursions, "One Step Ahead, One Step Behind" is pretty exceptional. A desolate guitar melody repeats throughout the entire track, alluding to the doom of Nadja had he kicked on the distortion pedals. But without, there's a sadness which permeates the track, accompanied by ghostly flickers of complimentary drones, bursts of static, and a slow-burning roar of distant distortion that eventually consumes the entire piece. Relapxych.0 holds his own in creating a series of guitar-meets-the-laptop abstractions that looks to Fennesz and Tim Hecker for inspiration, and does a pretty good job in the way of an homage." (Aquarius). Ltd x 300 copies.
