Our friends Destruktionsanstalt make their fourth appearance on the blog with one of the most brutal post-Industrial music releases I’ve heard in a while. Per Najbjerg Odderskov is one of the few composers working in this genre who understand the original Industrial music ethos thoroughly, and it shows in his (very brutal) work.
Ambient
[Music] Ambient Landscape – Veronica III
Long, slow, elegant, nearly neo-classical ambient music, courtesy of the most appropriately named Ambient Landscape.
[Music] Chihei Hatakeyama – Journey To The End Of August
It is very good to welcome Chihei Hatakeyama back to this blog. His new offering, Journey To The End Of August, will be released on April 16 by Ukrainian record label Hidden Vibes.
[Music] Leila Abdul-Rauf – Diminution
The first time I came across San Francisco, California resident Leila Abdul-Rauf’s name was when she was playing with the all-female avant-garde metal/dark ambient band Amber Asylum. She has become a far more powerful musician as time has passed (if you know anything about her previous work, that’s very high praise), and, given the brutal darkness of the one track shared, this new album should end up quaking my speakers rather badly (and yes, I’m looking forward to that).
The album is due to be released on April 13.
[Music] Jeff Gburek – FLOOPS
FLOOPS marks the sixth appearance of American expatriate composer Jeff Gburek to this blog.
His latest release is a collection of loop-oriented pieces played on a prepared guitar. Though Bandcamp is horrible for this sort of work, I recommend buying the album, putting the tracks into “shuffle” mode, and letting the sounds wash over you. You may hear the same pieces over and over again, but the context will feel different.
FLOOPS ends up becoming several hours’ worth of intensive listening, reminding me somewhat of Brian Eno’s generative music or Adrian Belew’s recent flux experiments.
[Music] Alessandra Celletti – Sacred Honey
My old friend and former business partner, Michael Sheppard (who passed away a few years ago far too young), did me the honor of introducing me to the work of Italian pianist Alessandra Celletti. His label, Transparency Records, featured four of her works including a collaboration with German/Austrian Krautrock legend Hans-Joachim Roedelius.
I’ve had the pleasure of keeping in contact with her, and she has graciously notified me of her latest album, Sacred Honey, her second album dedicated to the compositions of Georges I. Gurdjieff and Thomas de Hartmann. It is available on Bandcamp as a CD (though not as a download, unfortunately) and for streaming above, courtesy of Spotify. For the first album inspired by Gurdjieff/de Hartmann, listen to it at Deezer.
The CDs ship out on April 15, just in time for Tax Day.
[Music] NERATERRÆ – The NHART Demo[n]s
NERATERRÆ is the dark ambient/drone project of Alessio Antoni. He graces these pages with a release very much reminiscent of early Lustmørd but made on modern equipment.
Though he classifies this under Power Electronics, there’s something more elegant to his compositions than what I normally find in that genre. This is Power Electronics for the thinking man.
[Music] Sturqen / vÄäristymä – Atonia
Nervu is a Portuguese ambient music record label who debuted with this split release between their countrymen Sturqen and Finnish brothers Janne Liimatainen and Jarko Hedenius (who operate under the monicker vÄäristymä).
This release reminds me of the gorgeous minimalism of Pan Sonic and their side project Ø. Perfect headphone music.
[Music] Various Artists- Heresy Records: A Map Of The Kingdom Of Ireland
Though not as long in the tooth as INA-GRM nor as exotic as the scenes in places like Egypt or Iran, it seems that Ireland has developed a venerable electroacoustic music scene which has spanned over five decades. This compilation, A Map of the Kingdom of Ireland, a compilation of Irish Electro-Acoustic music featuring works by Ireland’s most celebrated Electro-Acoustic artists, was released on March 2, 2018 by Dublin, Ireland-based Heresy Records, is quite a gem of not only electroacoustic music, but of pure, non-theoretical music of many stripes, including contemporary classical and even new wave/post-punk.
The comp starts off gently with a cut by Paul Morrin. It is a bit like a boat taken off its moorings, and drifts along until about the two-minute mark, when the tempo changes to something a bit more lively and focused – one could even say it has a post-rock feel to it, reminding me a bit of the band éf.
Tóirse Ó Ríordáin comes up next with something that feels slightly like an early Penguin Café Orchestra piece if it were composed somewhere near the border of Brazil and Colombia.
It is Daniel Figgis’ piece, Timothy Cream’s Crown of Wines, which really gets into a more freeform composition, referencing avant-garde music and perhaps Krautrock. There is a lilting, marching quality to the composition which allows one to drift off into the ether while.
Even freakier are the two pieces turned in by Dublin mainstay Roger Doyle. This is a bit away from the avant-garde – this feels more like a cleaner, more updated sound referencing Tangerine Dream. As my old Kraut friends would say, “sehr Kosmisch…”
The fun surprise of the compilation for me were the two tracks included by Princess Tinymeat (a reference to actor Montgomery Clift’s… er… shortcomings in the boudoir, I’d imagine). His (her?) back catalog is screaming for a re-release, as I haven’t come across this name since I was collecting cassettes in the late 1980s.
Finally, Spooky Ghost gets a mention for some of the most pleasant guitar work I’ve heard since Vini Reilly was in peak form with the Durutti Column in the early 80s.
There isn’t a duff track on the compilation. If you find this collection enjoyable, you may want to also consider purchasing On The Nature Of Electricity & Acoustics, another remarkable compilation curated, this time, by Figgis.
Track Listing
1. Compass – Paul Morrin
2. Atop D’Seefin (Educution remix) – Tóirse Ó Ríordáin
3. Timothy Cream’s Crown of Wines – Daniel Figgis
4. Avant Garde Your Grille – Deep Burial
5. Little Train To Heaven – Richard G. Evans with Daniel Figgis
6. Eighties Rampwalk – Roger Doyle
7. Sleep Circus (remix) – Paddy Hunt vs. Charles
8. Richard Harris Blesses The Dawn Flotilla At Guilvinec – Cathal Coughlan with the Grand Necropolitan String Band
9. Finale from The Room In The Tower – Roger Doyle
10. handsinmyhead – GREETINGS
11. DriftDin – Vincent Doherty
12. Arcticus – Donald Teskey
13. Your Majesty – Princess Tinymeat
14. Stutter – Spooky Ghost
15. Unscan Ó Malley – Tóirse Ó Ríordáin
16. MegaMix – Princess Tinymeat
17. Wandering Compass – Paul Morrin
* The digital version of the album includes the following four tracks
18. Old Piano – Vincent Doherty
19. Reverse – SOM
20. Audacity – Deafector
21. Rampwalk – Roger Doyle / Olwen Fouéré
[Music] Richter Scale – A Ripple on the Richter Scale
In 2008, Legendary Pink Dots members Edward Ka-Spel and The Silverman trekked over to Chile where they made a collaboration of Michel Leroy of Un Festín Sagital, Chile’s finest experimental neofolk group.
This hazy, drony, Krauty improvisation is the fruit of their meeting. Stunningly hypnotic work.
A Miscellany Of Tasteful Music 