Mountains touch down at Cafe OTO to celebrate their forthcoming recording on Thrill Jockey. Live, Mountains present a soundworld of rich, constantly renewing detail and subliminal propulsion. They're joined on the night by the psychedelic modular synth of Room40 artist John Chantler and Simon Scott's low-light melodic shimmer.

MOUNTAINS

Mountains is Brendon Anderegg and Koen Holtkamp, friends since their middle school days. The duo were brought together by mutual artistic and musical interests, and both ended up at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. It was during this time that they began exchanging musical ideas and compositions which led to them founding the Apestaartje label in 1999.

Mountains is often compared to artists such as Brian Eno and Fennesz citing their extended melodies and their unique broad guitar work. They seamlessly blend pastoral electronic sounds with both field recordings and a plethora of acoustic instruments. The resulting soundscapes are broad in scope and rich in detail. The effect is incredibly sublime and hypnotic as the sounds slowly wrap themselves around each other and alter themselves in the mind of the listener. Choral (2009), their third album, is a uniquely soothing and addicting listening experience and an aural crazy quilt: warm and inviting with many details to discover and explore.

Mountains photo by Jon Leone

Mountains - Thousand Square (from Air Museum, Thrill Jockey, 2011) by cafeOTO

"Choral pulls off the difficult trick of constantly moving forward without ever seeming to, and all of Choral seems to travel without moving, introducing new elements, sounds and melodies carefully enough you never notice them until it swells to occupy center stage." 9/10 Pop Matters

"How to describe and evaluate music that causes time to run in place and transforms space from optical to sensuous reality?" Treble Zine

Mountains live review by Mapsadaisical
Mountains Live Review on The Line of Best Fit




JOHN CHANTLER

John Chantler is an omnivorous recording artist/musician based in London. Starting out as a drummer, John still keeps loose time for Outshine Family (Black Maps) and The Balky Mule (Fat Cat) whilst exploring his own solo synthesizer works and occasionally convening the Organ Octet - a massed organ ensemble of eight reed/chord organs. He also plays synth in a trio with Tujiko Noriko and Lawrence English and as Holy Family - a duo with Lawrence English. He has also played drums and/or electronics for Tenniscoats and Maher Shalal Hash Baz.

In 2003, John relocated to his current base in London, playing regular live shows mixing guitar, laptop, and drums into increasingly rough-hewn and psychedelic shapes. He then started working with Carina Thorén on a series of uncategorisable sides that culminated in the duo’s ROOM40 LP ‘New Days’. His most recent solo work 'The Luminous Ground' will be released on ROOM40 in 2011.

"Restrained, dynamic and melodic while also at times totally blissed-out... Instrumental, experimental music rarely gets better than this – 9/10" Foxy Digitalis (on For Barry Ray - 'New Days')

“Hypnotic without the head-lulling stuff and sincere to the bone, “New Days” is a treasure of the best anti-climactic proportions” GAZ-ETA (on For Barry Ray - 'New Days')

“Unique, bizarre and incredibly rewarding … some of the most beautiful psych-tinged dronescapes I’ve heard for ages” Boomkat (on For Barry Ray - 'New Days')

John Chantler - Live @ The Step Inn, Brisbane (16 Dec 2010)

SIMON SCOTT

Simon is the former Slowdive drummer who puts out international experimental music with integrity on his label KESH Recordings. Through Simon’s dimly-lit soundscapes, we encounter shimmering melodies that gather and disperse through apocalyptic rhythms, surrounded by layers of harmony that hover over found-sounds. Simon has also collaborated under the moniker Seavault (Morr Music) with A.Ryan from Isan, and also goes under the name Televise.

His debut album Navigare was released on Erik Skodvin’s (aka Deaf Center / Svarte Greiner) Miasmah label, to great acclaim, and is due to be followed by the Nivalis EP in early 2010.

“Scott is particularly adept at layering coolly shimmering guitars and dark churning currents of noise into something vast” THE WIRE

“…as we approach the end of the ‘Navigare‘ tale the listener is left in a state of exultation knowing they have just listened to what has to be one of the best Miasmah releases to date.” 10/10 - FLUID RADIO

Spring Stars by Simon Scott