I’ve seen books by Andy Goldsworthy, but I didn’t know there was a DVD out about his work. I saw this on the mailing list for Numerology, a music package I occasionally use for jamming. His sensibilities remind me phonographers:
I enjoy the freedom of just using my hands and “found” tools–a sharp stone, the quill of a feather, thorns. I take the opportunities each day offers: if it is snowing, I work with snow, at leaf-fall it will be with leaves; a blown-over tree becomes a source of twigs and branches.
The DVD has only been released in America, which isn’t really an issue unless I get caught out by import tax again!
I found an interesting drone project by The Shipbuilders, a curious group of artists and musicians on a small island near Scotland, on the ambient mailing list.
The Shipbuilders is a group of musicians/artists from Easdale Island on the west coast of Scotland. This website was created to bring our various projects to the ears and eyes of a wider audience.
Their Dronezone project consists of layers of sounds contributed by various musicians. Anyone can contribute, so the piece is becoming quite long. They even have a nice definition of drone:
Drones are used in musical traditions the world over. Drone-based music is relatively unchartered musical territory, which we think deserves more exploration. Some drones can create a peaceful ambience (eg tampura) while others have a more aggressive presence (eg didjeridoo). Our natural and artificial environments abound with drones (eg the hum of a bee, the whine of a powerdrill, the whistle of the wind).
I’m visiting my father this Christmas. I spent my teenage years near here, he’s moved since then though. So I had a chance to visit my old record shops in Nottingham and Derby. In Selectadisc in Nottingham I found Ventill/Poki by Stafrænn Hákon, which I’d been wanting to hear for some time. A friend often sends post rock albums my way, and this combines the uplifting electronica I occasionally listen to (Ulrich Schnauss for example) with the epic post rock my friend likes. I can’t help feeling that some of the tracks have an icy quality in the background, reminding me that it’s Winter. Am I imagining it? Perhaps if I listened to this in the Summer I’d notice the warmness of the guitars. It’s an excellently produced album that even my pop/rock friends could be persuaded to listen to.
On the subject of record shops, I was reminded of how many there used to be in Nottingham and Derby. They both had Wayaheads, which seem to have gone down hill. Selectadisc used to have two stores, one was where I bought a lot of drum and bass vinyls in the mid 90s, but this seems to have changed to some kind of secondhand shop. My sister DJs hard house and trance, and she pointed out that the last independent record shop in Derby, BPM, is closing down. She’ll still be able to buy her records for DJing off online shops like Boomkat, but this only adds weight to the theory that online shops are killing independent record shops. My sister thinks everyone is just downloading music instead, which is of course partly true.
It’s sad that those old shops are closing down, and yet I buy a lot of music online. You can buy direct from artists and labels, and shops like Boomkat and Juno are certainly very good. Perhaps if the other independent record shops saw this coming, they could have capitalised on it and opened their own websites? Boomkat’s high-street shop is Pelicanneck Records in Manchester, but will the website outlive it?
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I found Marco Lucchi via the Microsound and Ambient mailing lists. His site features a lot of music, with some interesting live ambient pieces. From what I’ve listened to so far his music feels quite gentle and thoughtful, everything I’ve downloaded is excellently produced. He seems to be able to mix melodic ambient music with more experimental sounds very effectively. The live ‘Tantra’ pieces are definitely pleasant on the way home after a hectic day in the office!
I saw this on the phonography mailing list, from Mike Hallenbeck:
Here’s a montage of audio highlights from the Holidazzle parade in
downtown Minneapolis on December 16, 2004:
http://www.juniorbirdman.com/archive/mp3/holidazzle12_16_04.mp3
It really brought back the sounds of being lost in London at the weekend with my girlfriend. We went everywhere from Carnaby Street to the Millennium Eye, although I didn’t take time to make any recordings this time (I have a few of the Millennium Eye that I should post somewhere).
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I’ve got a new computer at work (Powermac, dual 1.8ghz G5), which has an empty iTunes library. So, in between hacking and bug fixing I’m downloading freely available music to fill it with. The first thing I found this morning was ST - I’ll Meet You There EP on Monotonik. The vocals are very strong in this release, like disenfranchised pop songs. ST balances this feeling well by occasionally breaking down into lofi drum sounds (dropping the bitrate), and lofi guitar riffs (the first track uses this excellently).
The melodic development and phrasing is dramatic (rather than ‘epic’ as the write up suggests), reminding me of Ulrich Schnauss. It’s amazing that archive.org says ‘Heard 40 times’. I don’t often buy releases that are as good as this, and it’s free! There’s no excuse for not listening to it!
I went through The Wire’s MP3 library on Friday (prompted by their new email newsletter), and found a few things I liked. I wouldn’t have expected Douglas Lilburn there, which was refreshing next to the other music. It’s funny how some of the sounds in White Noise Study remind me of a few things I’ve heard on Skam in the last few years.
Douglas Lilburn - #1 (Five Toronto Pieces 1969)
Douglas Lilburn - White Noise Study (Five Toronto Pieces 1963)
These are from ‘Some Paths Lead You Back Again’, Highpoint Lowlife’s new compilation:
Accrual - Dodgson’s Pleasure
Daigoro - Sleepy Fish
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On the BBC’s experimental music site they’ve recommended: Icarus, ‘I Tweet The Birdy Electric’, Fennesz, ‘Venice’ and Art Bears, ‘The Art Box’. Some of the people who have posted their personal favourites for 2004 are much more in tune with my own tastes.
I noticed the London Musician’s Collective and Sprawl have events coming up in January:
IN NEW YEAR: our 29th Birthday Celebration: “about last night…” on the 8th January 2005: a gala concert featuring numerous special acts. At the Jerwood Hall, LSO St Luke’s on Old Street. And it’s free. Watch this space for full details.
January 05 and we are celebrating NINE YEARS of Sprawl: - 9 years of literally hundreds of different amazing acts and sounds, whether on a regular monthly basis (and the odd weeklies) or hosting special events at a variety of venues.
Wed 12th Jan 05
Pirandèlo (live)
Katzo (live)
J-lab (live)
o.acam (DJ)
As always, we are presenting a selection of oddbeats, impro, soundscapes & cutting edge sounds:
I got The Wire today, and noticed an article on Dälek (I posted about their collaboration with Faust recently). I was having a conversation with a friend recently about the state of rap metal, because we’d been listening to Faith No More, Tomahawk and reminiscing on Rage Against The Machine. It turns out that Dälek are signed to Mike Patton’s label, Ipecac.
Manual’s track on the Intelligent Toys compilation came on my iPod randomly today, and it was so good that I decided to find out more about him. I noticed that Manual & Syntaks - Golden Sun fuses noise and hiphop too.
After reading The Wire a little bit more during my commute, I found Afrirampo. Two crazed Japanese girls making rock/punk and performing, disturbing and entertaining people. They’ve played with Acid Mothers Temple too, which I keep listening to lately.
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My friend Todd was in Burundi a few years back reporting on yet another war there. He brought a little dictaphone with him and made a whole bunch of mini-recordings of interviews, music and the sounds of war. I recently listened to his “best of” CD of these recordings and picked a few of my favourites for the site.
The most interesting, in my opinion, are Burundian president Buyoya’s little speeches…
I found this weblog post yesterday, that strangely coincides with political debates I’ve been having recently. My argument was that the old style of investigative journalism that seems to have died will come back in full force with native people reporting on the situation in their own countries using modern technology. I’m well aware that not everyone has access to such expensive technology (or even electricity), but since the media and politicians continue to gloss over events in so called ‘civilized’ countries, things may begin to change.