Germany

[Music] Ocean – Ocean

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My friend Henning Küpper is the impresario of Lollipope Shoppe, perhaps the first indie label whose work introduced me to everything from psychedelic music and weird Russian rock. For this, I owe Henning a massive debt.

Continuing his amazing curative abilities, he released an album New York-based psych-folk band Ocean. This mellow folky freakout was released in 1969, but the stereo tapes were lost thanks to their label, Apostolic Studios, went under. Thankfully, guitarist John Townley saved a mono recording, and after Lollipope Shoppe polishing, it is available again after 51 years.

[Music] Various Artists – Meticulous Midgets Magazine 2020

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Meticulous Midgets is a magazine out of Russia who did me one of the kindest honors by doing a sketch on the blog. I am delighted to return the favor by covering their survey on not only the Russian electronic, avant-garde, experimental and indie music, but a few tracks from the United States, Spain, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Finland, Croatia, The Netherlands and Great Britain as well. This is a compilation whose broad scope equals that of my colleague Raffaele from Unexplained Sounds Group.

I expected to hear good headphone music, and I am happy to say that the comp delivers handsomely. There are three standout tracks for me:

The whole comp makes for solid listening, but just by hearing these three tracks, you can hear the depth and scope of the sort of music Meticulous Midgets covers. They have made a fan out of me.

[Music] The Durgas – Shut Down

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It’s hard to believe a band which now sounds like a contemporary of Neil Young or other rock stars at their most reflective (and yes, that’s a compliment, as I still have a healthy respect for rock & roll music’s transformative powers) began their career as an utterly brutal agit-punk band, A Subtle Plague, whose first demo was produced by Beastie Boys legend Adam Yauch, if memory serves.

This particular song has a rather personal meaning explained to me by my dear friend and damn near older brother, Ekke. It’s perhaps too personal to get into here, but let’s say it’s a song based on the oldest of topics – love and loss.

The core members of The Durgas, Christopher and Benjii Simmersbach, have managed to maintain high music quality despite many personnel changes, genre changes, location changes and more. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting them, and of course, I wish them continued success. They’re good lads from a good, good family.

[Music] Passepartout Duo – Ólafsfjörður

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The Passepartout Duo are pianist and keyboardist Nicoletta Favari and drummer/percussionist Christopher Salvito.  For such a minimal setup, they manage to put together a sound that is cinematic in scope.  There are elements of contemporary classical music, but a bit of jazz slides in there as well.  Quite a profound release from them.

As an aside, the artwork was made by a Chinese company, as the Bandcamp website indicates:

This item is produced in China by the arts organization AnyOne Workspace, and all the proceeds from this sale go to the artists Yannis Zhang and Yumo Wu.

Though the limited edition set is a bit out of my price range, it’s going to a worthy cause.  As someone who is currently residing in Beijing, it’s good to see local artists collaborating worldwide.  There is a wealth of talent locally, and they need exposure.

 

[Music] Conrad Schnitzler & Bernhard Wöstheinrich – 20070709

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Conrad Schnitzler was a legendary electronic music composer who passed away in 2011. Four years beforehand, he collaborated with a young fellow German musician called Bernhard Wöstheinrich, who was well over 30 years his junior. The collaboration produced one hour-long track which builds, grinds, throbs and swells in a way that is abrasive, yet pleasant.

The release is on Iatepus Media, and you can read notes from their album on the label site.

[Music] Iancu Dumitrescu / Ana-Maria Avram in Berlin

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Berghain, February 3d at 10 pm
Iancu DUMITRESCU
Ana – Maria AVRAM

HYPERION INTERNATIONAL

Tim HODGKINSON, Yoni SILVER Tijana STANKOVIC, Diana MIRON, Zsolt SÖRÉS, Albert MARKOS, Andrei KIVU, Shmil FRANKEL, Laurenţiu COŢAC, Guillaume OLLENDORFF Cătălin MATEI, Gilly MOCANU, Colin HACKLANDER, Eduard GABIA
special guest
Stephen O’MALLEY

Program:

    Iancu Dumitrescu “Quasar light” (I) – (II)- (III)

for percussion and computer sounds

    Ana-Maria Avram “ Polarities & Ambiguations”

for two bass clarinets

    Iancu Dumitrescu “Blue Shift/Red Shift”

for strings and percussion

    Ana-Maria Avram “Heteromorphies (X)”

for e-guitar and ensemble

    “Murmur”

for ensemble

    Iancu Dumitrescu “Distant Supernova”

for e-guitar, ensemble and computer sounds

    Ana-Maria Avram “Signals”

for e-guitar, ensemble and computer sounds

    Iancu Dumitrescu “Collisions of Galaxies”

for ensemble and computer sounds

world premières

Concert realised with the support of the Romanian Cultural Institute-Berlin

A photo posted by Rudy Carrera (@racarrera1) on Jan 13, 2016 at 7:27pm PST

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A photo posted by Rudy Carrera (@racarrera1) on Jan 13, 2016 at 7:27pm PST

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