pilole 2015 ottobre/novembre

OTTOBRE 2015	NOVEMBRE 2015
OLAFUR ARNALDS AND NILS FRAHM "Collaborative works" The music on this 2-CD set is a collection of our studio collaborations from recent years. We would meet in Reykjavik or Berlin with the intention to share some days off work, hiking, swimming or eating pizza. That is great for a couple days, but after a while we would always end up back in the studio, fiddling with synths or pianos. This collection of recordings cannot be an album. It will remain a collage of our studio experiments of the past. [ file under: contemporary ]		LEO ABRAHAMS "Daylight" Producer and guitarist Leo Abrahams has always been hard to pin down. There can’t be many people who have collaborated with both Paolo Nutini and Leafcutter John, while his four previous albums have run the gamut from folk (Grape and the Grain, 2008) to art-rock (The Unrest Cure, 2007), ambient electronica (Scene Memory, 2006) and songs (Zero Sum, 2013). Daylight, released by Lo Recordings, is similarly uncategorisable, its 13 tracks existing right at the edge of song form. [ file under: Lo recordings ]
RHODA DAKAR "Sings the Bodysnatchers" Rhoda Dakar came to prominence as lead singer with multiracial all-girl band The Bodysnatchers on the legendary 2Tone label in 1980. To celebrate The Bodysnatchers’ 35th Anniversary, Rhoda assembled an all-star cast to record in effect their debut album. Lynval Golding and Sir Horace Panter of The Specials star alongside members of Pama International, The Sidewalk Doctors and Intensified. [ file under: ska steady ]		BING & RUTH "City lake" Brooklyn pianist and composer David Moore originally released City Lake in limited release on Happy Talk in 2010. In 2014 the acclaimed sophomore effort, Tomorrow Was the Golden Age, showcased controlled expressive music that contained a modern crossover between classical music, encountered ambient and new age. By contrast, City Lake is a more physical offering, but no less beautiful. This is due perhaps to the fact that it was performed by 11 members rather than the septet from debut album and features two clarinetists, two cellists, two vocalists, a bassist, a lap steel player, a tape-delay engineer, and a percussionist with Moore's piano. [ file under: ambient kranky ]
JOHN GRANT "Green tickles black pressure" Now comes Grant’s third album, the invitingly titled Grey Tickles, Black Pressure, a veritable tour-de-force that further refines and entwines his two principal strands of musical DNA, the sumptuous tempered ballad and the taut, fizzing electronic pop song. There are newer musical accomplishments across its panoply of towering sound, like the title track’s new steely demeanour, while the ominous drama of Black Blizzard echoes both John Carpenter and Bernard ‘Black Devil Disco Club’ Fever’s beautiful and icy synthscapes. [ file under: indie pop ]		DEEPCHORD "Ultraviolet music" Dub techno master Deepchord returns with his fourth album on Soma, a collection of otherworldly transmissions from his laboratory. With Ultraviolet Music, Deepchord returns to his proprietary formula of atmospheric heroin-house (after 2013's more cinematic 20 Electrostatic Soundfields). A hallucinogenic amalgamation of deep emotive textures swimming around 4/4 kicks and sub-bass, middle-of-the-night atmospheres, hypnotic repetitions, shortwave static, and slowly evolving textures that envelop the listener in warm blankets of sound. [ file under: basic channel ]
IKO CHERIE "Dreaming on" Marie Merlet was born and raised in Bordeaux, where she maintained a close, continuous relationship with music while she was a film student, playing in various bands and Djing weekly on the local radio station Nova Sauvagine. Everything changed the day she met Laetitia Sadier. At the time, Marie was involved in a thousand projects: a girl-group doing covers from the sixties, a Washington DC-styled punk combo and a few experimental electronic ventures. But when the then-singer of Stereolab asked her to join Monade and they started recording and touring together, there was no turning back. The result is this Dreaming On an album mixed with Schneider TM in Berlin and mastered in Barcelona by Xavier Alarcón. [ file under: elefant record ]		FLOATING POINTS "Elaenia" Floating Points releases his long-awaited album debut, Elaenia marking the inaugral release on his own label, Pluto. Eschewing the more sequenced syle of some if his previous releases, Elaenia flows with live instrumentation, calling upon a host of musicians to help bring this vivid, animated musical masterpiece to life. Essential! [ file under: break & beat ]
INNOCENCE MISSION "Hello I feel the same" Don and Karen (McCullough) Peris formed the innocence mission with school friend and bassist Mike Bitts while the three were students at the Catholic high school in their hometown, Lancaster Pa, where they still live. Since the late 90s, theyve released a dozen albums while making a conscious decision to devote themselves to raising their two children. About this album title and first song (Hello I Feel the Same), Karen Peris explains: I'm thankful that writing songs can be like joining in a conversation with people. I love listening to someone else talking, but for me, speaking is not easy. [ file under: indie folk ]		GOLDMUND "Sometimes" Goldmund, aka Keith Kenniff has apparently had great success squeezing his music into films and adverts and such, which makes sense in some ways: he writes very elegant, dramatic piano music. But also, most of Sometimes is just as dark as the sleeve art suggests: I can’t imagine many of these tracks making me want to buy any lifestyle accessories. On Western Vinyl. [ file under: new electronica ]
NECKS "Vertigo" The jazz-minimalist trio from Australia return with a singular, inprovised piece entitled Vertigo. Performed on piano, double-bass and drums, Vertigo ebbs and flows from hushed to clattering; the melodic to atonal. Highly recommended. [ file under: improv jazz ]		WENDY JAMES "The price of the ticket" Wendy James new solo LP The Price Of The Ticket recorded in NYC, mixed in Berkeley CA. The players on this album are a bona-fide line-up from all-time Punk and New Wave bands Lenny Kaye (The Patti Smith Group) on guitar, Glen Matlock (Sex Pistols) on bass, James Sclavunos (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds) on drums. All songs are written and produced by Wendy James, tracks 12 and 13 are cover versions of songs written Fred Sonic Smith (MC5/Sonic’s Rendezvous Band) and Bob Dylan respectively. [ file under: indie pop ]
PORT-ROYAL "Where are you now" Where Are You Now is the fourth proper album from Italian widescreen dancegaze trio port-royal. It's been nearly six years since their previous full length Dying in Time. Where Are You Now spans the six year gap effortlessly with the band's familiar and reoccurring themes ever looming while adding newer complimentary components to their soaring tapestries. A blend of post-rock, dream-pop and dance music. [ file under: post-rock ]		KANGDING RAY "Cory arcane" New concept album by Kangding Ray. Expect clipped, tensile techno and sound designer gymnastics [ file under: transgressions ]
DUNCAN SHEIK "Legerdemain" Legerdemain, released two decades after his debut album, may carry some of the sighing melodicism and soft, hazy surfaces that turned him into a AAA smash in the late '90s, but appropriately, it is a closer companion to the work he's done in the new millennium, playing like a hybrid between his Broadway work (since 2002, he's composed no less than seven) and his 2011 salute to the '80s. Certainly, at a stately 70 minutes, Legerdemain carries the gravity of a stage production, although it's hard to tell if the songs of heartbreak and longing amount to a song cycle. [ file under: electropop ]		LIBEREZ "All tense lax now" Hermetically sealed and reveling in tumult, All Tense Now Lax is the most significant and developed work yet forged by Liberez. Based in main orchestrator John Hannon's remote studio No Recordings in Rayleigh, England, Liberez have expanded their palette from previous outings on Alter to produce a perfectly engineered machine that consumes the beholder. [ file under: experimental ]
SHUTTLE 358 "Can you prive I was born" The first in several different upcoming works from one of 12k’s most revered and respected artists, Shuttle358’s long-awaited new album Can You Prove I Was Born is a melancholic bedtime story; a familiar aura. A mobius strip. Created and mastered for vinyl with artwork featuring Polish photographer Ada Augustyniak, whose forest landscapes echo the cosmic motifs of the album. The jacket is beautifully printed on heavy-weight stockwith a silver foil inlay and the pressing is on 180g virgin vinyl. It is limited to 500 copies. [ file under: 12k ambient ]		MO KOLOURS "Texture like sun" Mo Kolours is back on One Handed Music and reaches out with some of his more experiemental rhythms to date. Looping patterns inspired by jazz, african music and hip-hop, Texture Like Sun takes on a new form to Mo Kolours' adroit production ability. Including a cover of Stranglers' Golden Brown. [ file under: broken beat ]
ST. GERMAIN "S/t" St Germain is the stage name of Ludovic Navarre, a French musician. His style has been described as being a combination of house and nu jazz music. Navarre’s album Boulevard was released in July 1995 and has sold over 1 million copies worldwide. His second album, Tourist, was released in 2000 and sold more than 4 million copies world wide. His new eponymous album is said to be a colorful and exceptional musical journey. Recorded with the participation of African musicians, the album features traditional Malian instruments like the kora, the balafon or the n’goni, that mingle with electric guitars, pianos, saxophones and electronic loops. [ file under: frenchafroloungetempo ]		RECONDITE "Placid" Winter is a coming and the world is getting bleaker. It’s the perfect time then for a new release by Recondite. The German producer excels is frosty soundscapes that capture a particular downtrodden mood of monochrome indifference. His sound is techno (I guess) with heavy acid influences yet it is slow and carefully constructed. This record is brilliantly understated, the production is crisp and clear but Recondite holds back on dynamics and each track subtly shifts mood around this pastoral, sad techno. [ file under: deep techno ]
TUXEDOMOON "Blue velvet revisited" Crammed Discs are happy to present a new volume in their revived Made to Measure composers' series: the original soundtrack written and recorded in 2015 by Tuxedomoon and Cult With No Name for the Blue Velvet Revisited documentary, based on footage shot by Peter Braatz in 1985 on the set of Blue Velvet, at the invitation of David Lynch. [ file under: original soundtrack ]		SYSTEM 7 "X-port" The ambitious twin release of X-Port and N-Port celebrates the 21st anniversary of the twin release of System 7's Fire and Water albums. The perfect blend System 7's live dancefloor energy with classy arrangements and Steve's unique guitar style. [ file under: electronica ]
NICOLE WILLIS AND THE SOUL INVESTIGATORS "Happiness in every style" Nicole Willis is back with her Soul Investigators and tilts the mood from the heartbreaking soul music heard in the past with some upbeat emotion in the hard-hitting funk rhythms! [ file under: modern soul ]		MARK VAN HOEN "Nightvision" LA based UK born artist Mark Van Hoen continues to contribute to the electronic music fields and fabrics from the inspirations, observations and movements experienced in the past three plus decades. From earlier Eno, Industrial & Krautrock affinities found in the earliest output going back to 1981, to entering the rave and post-rave cultures of acid-house, dance based pulses with his R&S affiliated imprint Apollo Records debut in 1993. With a background working in the media realms of television, radio, film; Mark's foray into the new electronic etched realms of drone and dance pop saw releases from Touch, Editions Mego, City Centre Offices, The Tapeworm, to Saint Marie Records, and still counting. [ file under: electro gaze ]