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The Garden of Forking Paths is a compilation of hypnotic, haunting and beautiful solo stringed instrument based music selected by folk Guitarist James Blackshaw and unlike a lot of compilations he's managed to make this cohesive and flowing album that makes you want to return to its beautiful and atmospheric shores often.
Rigor Sardonicous make raw apocalyptic doom thats often reduces to a crawling sludge pace with highly impressive and downright terrifying guttural utterings that sound like a demon talking just at your ear. Add to this some creative and experimental touchers that makes this rather blackly pleasing for much of it’s running time.
The power station picture on the front cover of Here is very apt for the three tracks that appear With-in, as they are all in places touched with the feeling of powering up and building electronic tension and textures.
Eternal Jewel is a collection of atmospheric and cinematic guitar scapes primal composed on Baritone Guitar. Mixing together doom, metal and ambient elements to creating dramatic and mysterious guitar based instrumental unfolds.
One of the oldest traditions in music is the drone and one country doing well in preserving it, it resounds even in modern popmusic (even when encapsulated into a hip r'n'b beat) is Albania. One of the the ensembles that preserves it best is the Lela dynasty from P�rmet, Albania.
I’ll have to admit in the past Philip Jeck's take on ambience and soundart has always underwhelmed me, it just felt too vague, too out of focus and wish-washy. But Sand has really impressed me, there seems a lot more focus, depth and listenability here; the tracks invite you in and make you want to stay and revisit them often.
Coleoid is a collection of eerier, hope smothering, bell & bass like harmonics drone tracks, which seems to drill deep into ones psyche souring and greying your mood. As the covers illustration suggests like the slow melancholy and hopeless crawl of slugs in endless dank tunnels.
Jahrtal make rich, soothing and sometimes sombre but always beautiful folk music lined with an earthy and warming 70’s spirit. All finished off with sleepy and hazy mainly male but sometimes female German singing.
One of the most compelling & clever things about We are all guests in the house of the lord is you can interpret the emotionally searing material with-in from several angles. It can be seen as a statement of decline of a once great civilisation or a personal and mental decline- the clever thing is they let you add your own angle and interruption on to it.
I apologise for the brevity of this review, but rather than bore you with a long winded attack on something which I consider to be a part of the problem with music versus an antidote for drone-ish conformity, I will go straight to the heart of the matter. This is not the Target Market is a title that would lead one to believe that Steriogram are a band attempting to defy conventions, but unfortunately that could not be further from the truth.
ORCHESTRAMAXFIELDPARRISH is Mike Fazio, a composer, as well as a member of New York City's Black 47. The Silent Breath of Emptiness seems miles away from the Celtic inspired rock of Black 47. It's important to note then, that Fazio, and a couple other members of Black 47 originally backed up Avant-Garde musician and poet Copernicus (Joseph Smalkowski). Maxfield Parrish was a Philadelphian painter and illustrator, who lived from 1870-1966. Though he was a commercially successful illustrator, his paintings were quite often fantastical. I'm not sure how his work ties into Mike Fazio's project, but Parrish's art is well worth exploring.
Electricity is a great introduction to the weird and wonderful world of Captain Beefheart, this double disk set brings together a fine section of tracks from his first two albums and approachable rare odd ‘n’ ends from the same period leading up to his avant classic Trout Mask Replica- without which the experimental music scene of today would be very different place.
The rather unimaginative entitled Untitled 1-3 offers up some of the best work either of these two sounds/ ambient artist have ever produced. It mixers together elements of each others work to come up with something very distinctive, earthy and nocturnal- really keeping you well and truly lost-in, and focused on it’s unfolding dank harmonic and mysterious trail for the whole of it’s just over 70 minutes playing time.
6°Fskyquake is an new and welcome collaboration between Stephen O'Malley & Attila Csihar- the audio composition was original designed in 2001 but explored and grown in conjunction with the American sculptor Banks Violette's solo shows during summer 2007.
Zombie Zombie make pulsing, throbbing and locked groove retro synth music come Krautrock with more than a few nods towards the likes Goblin, John Carpenter and late 70’s early 80’s dramatic and horror filled soundtrack music.
The previous release by Fluorescent Grey was a rather hectic affair, you’d find yourself lost in a confusing hurricane of electronic bits and pieces. Robbie Martin seems to have found more balance on his new creation, Gaseous Opal Orbs. Still a lot happening, but there’s a little more air left to breathe.
The blues usually concerns heartache, loss and pain, whether it be inflicted on you by others or that of existence itself. Swedish slide-virtuoso Jimmy Ågren takes a different route. His brand of blues is upbeat, uplifting and vibrant with energy.
Soriah is a performance artist right out of the same neck of the woods as the label which represents him at the moment, Beta-lactam Ring Records. The location: Portland, Oregon. Soriah's known for his ritualistic performances involving strange costumes, and decorated spaces. The spiritual/ritual atmosphere is something that's often difficult to transform to the recorded media, as the visual aspects of the performance play such a huge part. Ofrendas de Luz a Los Muertos is my first exposure to the work of Soriah, and it's an intriguing listen.
Raoul Sinier make old school imd/ retro touched electronica in the melodic mould of say Plaid or Boards of Canada with offten more hectic and manic break beat & drill ‘n’ bass rhythmic attack, with smatterings of guitars and hip hop like sampling here and there too.
Wrath of the Weak make an enjoyable and atmospheric if not particular distinctive or original mix of lo-fi mid-pace black metal, doomy post rock-ism and ambience. Alogon is their second album and first for the Profound Lore label.
Rakennus shows Circle in their live element, rocking, genre mixing and general Circle weird and wonderfulness- the whole hour long recording is taken from last years performance in Charlottesville USA.
True to the albums title Government Alpha takes you deep inside the roaring heart of Oblivion. An inferno roaring, earthquake ripping, tornado smashing sonic melt down of the most ferocious and devastating form.
Polar Nights live brings together near on 70 minutes of noise, chaos,and surprisingly cinematic in places sound attacks. Recorded over two nights at last years All Ears Festival in Oslo.
Bowline gives the listener four tracks of often doomy,stormy and improvised drone works. The projects brings together David Maranha(Organ Eye,Osso Exótico,plus solo work) and Francesco Dillon(Alter Ego, plus various collaborations).