Cyess Afxzs is a relatively new harsh noise project from Belfast-born, Swiss-based artist, Stuart McCune. Over the past year, McCune has released a string of highly acclaimed tapes and CDs on many of the most vital noise labels currently active, including Rural Isolation Project, Satatuhatta, Abhorrent A.D., and White Centipede Noise. Much has been made of McCune's use of sounds and structural elements not commonly associated with contemporary harsh noise, and the project's conceptual alignment with abstract art (most obviously through releases directly referencing Max Ernst, Antoni Tàpies, Alfred Kubin, and Daniel Richter). While it is true that contemporary harsh noise has mostly shied away from overt art world influence (with some obvious exceptions), it is worth remembering that noise has a long and existential relationship with abstract art, Merzbow being perhaps the most obvious and literal example. And, although occupying a very different sonic terrain, the likes of P16.D4, Achim Wollscheid, and Rudolf Eb.er, to name just a few examples, all have long histories of incorporating conceptual or abstract art practices in their work. All that is to say that there is nothing that warms my cockles quite as much as when this lowly genre called "noise" that we love so dearly (with all its inherent contradictions) reaches out of the gutter and pulls influence from otherwise "respectable" art forms. Whether that elevates noise or debases art is open to interpretation.No Bull One Left Behind was recorded between August and October 2022 and expands upon techniques explored in previous releases, offering perhaps the widest palette of sounds and compositional approaches to date. The album opens with what my grandmother, as a lifelong harsh noise aficionado, would have described as an absolute banger, a roaring behemoth of joyous blasting, before subtly shifting gear to more experimental ground. There is a very singular musical quality to each of the tracks, each containing its own distinctive character. And while the album as a whole certainly falls within the harsh noise realm, the lines between noise and musicality are continuously blurred.  Released: Krim Kram 2023

Recording of the premiere performance of the "Weihnachtsoratorium" (Christmas Oratorio), an organ concert composed and played by the four hands of Daniel Löwenbrück & Fabian Löwenbrück. Performed December 26th, 2006 on the Hugo Meyer organ of the Evangelische Kirche in Lebach, Germany.Daniel Löwenbrück (b.1974) is a German performance- and sound-artist, creator of tape-music, curator and (sometimes) visual-artist.As a performance artist and composer of tape-music he performed internationally since the late 90's as part of the Schimpfluch-Gruppe (with Rudolf Eb.er, Dave Phillips, Joke Lanz), as a duo with singer and performance artist Doreen Kutzke, as part of Ohne (with Tom Smith, Dave Phillips, Reto Mäder), with Swedish conceptual artist Leif Elggren, with Brazilian video- and sound-artist Marcellvs L. as Stallgewitter, and solo as Raionbashi and under his own name. He performed in New York, Sao Paulo, Bordeaux, Paris, Moscow, Minsk, London, Oslo, Stockholm, Helsinki, Chiang Mai, Tokyo, Osaka, Rotterdam, Vienna etc. Released: Krim Kram 2022

Andy heck boyd, b 1981, lived in new hampshire for 40 years, permanently moved to kentucky in 2021, attended college in boston for tv/film production and filmmaking in maine dropped out of both classes in spring and then winter 2001, diagnosed with schizophrenia in 2002, worked at a gas station for several years before going on disability in 2010, took up drawing and painting and video making and began making cassette tape recordings in 2017, living hermit type life in small room in exeter nh for 11 years before moving to kentucky, took up tape recording to "be a writer" to write novels, chronic tendinitis from overuse of computer mouse making animation and daily painting and drawing with no stretching exercising etc, wanted to write but typing caused too much pain, and began to experiment with tape recording after getting into it around early 2017, never performed live, has had some painting exhibitions with galleries, a few in seattle wa at season gallery, a few with buoy gallery in kittery maine, a few in nyc one with serving the people ran by lucien smith, has a few comics published, casper the french inquisition named blob, and my name is greg, dracula citgo a screenplay, and slot of banji 2 by wilt press in maine, currently lives in mt sterling kentucky with his wife, kasper heckOn 'blondie - thanks for sharing':i go out every day with a tape recorder and a new tape all the time, i record daily things, but i also give it a little break every now and again and switch tools to my super 8 camera or drawing or collages etc, and come back to tape recording with fresh perspective and new ideas etc, for this album its a mix of different things, the first two tracks were part of a five song recording i made in june 2022 using an amp and sk-1 keyboard, and microphone, i came up with lyrics on the spot and picked samples on the spot too

Since reactivating in the wake of the essential 2009 archival BUFMS box set, 'Induced Musical Spasticity', Bren't Lewiis Ensemble have released more than 40 titles of the finest avant ear wonk around. Much of this activity has proceeded with relatively little fanfare. Perhaps the number of releases is intimidating to some, or maybe well-adjusted society simply has little need for (in their own words) "screeches, recitations, injured vocalizations, inexplicable flurries of bleeps, bloops 'n' splats, and general oh-my-god-how-long-does-this-go-on-for" (personally, I find this latter scenario difficult to accept; hence the desire to release yet more of these bleeps, bloops 'n' splats into the world). Or, and this is the hypothesis that I am advancing, it may be due to the fact that much of this material has been released on that most maligned of formats, the humble CDr (the disdain for which, I emphatically do not share by the way). So, to test this hypothesis, here is a brand new Bren't Lewiis Ensemble album on the Mark Knopfler approved "real" CD format.The sound of this CD is classic latter day Bren't Lewiis Ensemble: heavily edited sound collage; plenty of Orchid Spangiafora style word play; the sound of malfunctioning, sputtering machines; instruments/objects that are blown, shaken, scraped, and generally sabotaged in various ways; et cetera. If the CIA had access to this kind of arsenal during MKUltra, who knows what kind of damage they could have inflicted. Krim Kram - 2022

Debut solo CD by Wuhan-born, London-based artist, Zheng Hao, who also performs in the duos Oishi (with Ren Shang) and ecm (with Joseph Khan). Four lean and sinewy improvisations; the sound of tightly controlled buzzing and rippling electric currents, pointillistic splintering rhythms and textures, sparse jagged incursions, and wiry static blasts. In the artist's own words, Breaks explores "rhythmic patterns from dusty potentiometers and dirty electronic circuits in modular synthesis improvisation". Possible signposts include Jake Meginsky, Voice Crack, etc. Maximal results with minimal means. Should appeal equally to EAI and noise nerds alike.Released 2024 - Krim Kram

Before any instrumentation, Francisco Mela addresses his fellow musicians, pianist Matthew Shipp and bassist William Parker, with a sense of anticipation and affirmation, “Okay guys, ready? Rolling!” The sense of camaraderie and his artist-focused approach is heard throughout the album’s majestic improvisation—as well as in its inspiration, dedicated to Mela’s longtime musical partner, the legendary jazz musician McCoy Tyner. Tyner was well-known for his boundless musical talent, and perhaps best-known for playing in John Coltrane’s quartet, which revolutionized the jazz world and reverberated through the music world at large. But it was his mentorship that truly touched Francico Mela: Tyner encouraged him to explore the boundaries of both his personal expression and his musical ability, affirming the philosophical conviction that music was a gateway to liberation. That pursuit of freedom was a lifelong aspiration, and one borne from community. Mela recalls performing at New York City’s Blue Note with McCoy Tyner, on a specific night when maestro Cecil Taylor came to listen to McCoy’s trio. Tyner and Taylor shared a conversation, and afterwards Tyner returned backstage, gently confiding in Mela, “I wish I were that free. We play music to free our souls.” Likewise, Tyner encouraged Mela to pursue his broadening interests, inspiring Francisco to embrace experimentation and musical freedom. In Music Frees Our Souls Vol. 1, Mela, Shipp and Parker compose an album that is equally innovative and welcoming, offering the best of experimental jazz and paying homage to McCoy Tyner’s indelible creative influence. This is the first chapter of Francisco Mela’s Music Frees Our Souls trilogy dedicated to McCoy, always featuring William Parker on bass but with different piano players on each volume. The album, Francisco Mela’s second from 577 Records following MPT Trio (2021), will be available on limited edition blue vinyl (100 copies), black vinyl, CD, digital. Music Frees Our Souls Vol. 2 & 3 will be released in the near future.

Can music liberate us? Francisco Mela, who worked and partnered with the legendary jazz musician McCoy Tyner, believes so. On this album, the second volume of Music Frees Our Souls, Mela collaborates with pianist Cooper-Moore and bassist William Parker to build a 2-part extended track project of advanced dialogue between 3 of the genre's most important instruments. Tyner was well-known for his boundless musical talent, and perhaps best-known for playing in John Coltrane’s quartet, which revolutionized the jazz world and fundamentally influenced the music world at large. Despite his indelible, wide-reaching impact on experimental jazz, it was Tyner’s mentorship that truly touched Francisco Mela: Tyner encouraged him to explore the boundaries of both his personal expression and his musical ability, affirming the philosophical conviction that music was a gateway to liberation. This album is again dedicated to Tyner’s mentorship and encouragement, suggesting we all embrace experimentation and musical freedom. This second volume/album will be available on limited edition burgundy red vinyl, black vinyl, CD, or download in January 2023. Music Frees Our Souls Vol. 3 is also planned for release in the near future. Cooper-Moore - Piano William Parker - Bass Francisco Mela - Drums Recorded November 13, 2020 by Jeremy Loucas at Douglass Recording, Brooklyn, New York

The Intercommunal Free Dance Music Orchestra was created in 1971 by an “old hand” of French free jazz, François Tusques. Free Jazz, was also the name of the recording made by the pianist and other like-minded Frenchmen (Michel Portal, François Jeanneau, Bernard Vitet, Beb Guérin and Charles Saudrais) in 1965. But, six years later Tusques had had his fill of free jazz. After having wondered, together with Barney Wilen (Le Nouveau Jazz) or even solo (Piano Dazibao and Dazibao N°2), if free jazz wasn’t a bit of a dead end, Tusques formed the Inter Communal, an association under the banner of which the different communities of the country would come together and compose, quite simply. If at first the structure was made up of professional musicians from the jazz scene it would rapidly seek out talent in the lively world of the MPF (Musique Populaire Française).{French Popular Music, ndlt} As with L’Inter Communal a few years earlier, Le Musichien follows on from the group of varying musicians that Tusques had conceived as a “people’s jazz workshop”. In 1981, at the then famous Paris address, 28 rue Dunois, the pianist sang with his partner Carlos Andreu an “afro-Catalan tale”. Over a slow bass line (exceptional work from Jean-Jacques Avenel) backed by percussion from Kilikus, saxophones (Sylvain Kassap and Yebga Likoba) and trombone (Ramadolf) which presented a myriad of constellations. The sky has no limits, let’s make the most of it. The following year, at the ‘Tombées de la Nuit’ festival in Rennes, bassist Tanguy Le Doré would weave with Tusques the fabric on which would evolve an explosive “brotherhood of breath”: Bernard Vitet on trumpet, Danièle Dumas and Sylvain Kassap on saxophones, Jean-Louis Le Vallegant and Philippe Le Strat on… bombards. With hints of modal jazz inspired by Coltrane or Pharoah Sanders, the Intercommunal Free Dance Music Orchestra is an ecumenical project which speaks to the whole world.

'If I don't make it, I love u’ is Still House Plants’ third LP and the fullest embodiment of their sound to date. Where ‘Fast Edit’ formed with quick attachment and jump cuts, ‘If I don't make it’ is shaped by persistence - a commitment to the songs that makes the music solid, warmer and accepted. Marking the trio’s decade of friendship, this is the first record written whilst all live in the same city since 2017's ‘Assemblages’. The band rehearsed it relentlessly, playing for nobody except themselves, consistently building support for one another and growing the way they play. Jess’ voice is deeper. Fin’s guitar is full size, richer. David drums harder. Focused on one point together, everyone gets bigger and nothing falls apart. The guitar and the drums blend, raise the voice, make room for what is being said, what is felt. When able to finally record, production allowed layers, gave elasticity, a chance to fully stretch. Playing with length and connections, the band brought in analogue techniques - a Lesley cabinet on ‘Headlight’, sidechaining the snare with the guitar, pushing vocals through cheap DJ software - each process an attempt to bring one instrument closer to another, to give bass, body, backup. ‘If I don't make it, I love u’ seeks beauty, holds feeling maximum and builds surety with its sound. The most generous SHP record to date, the music is wide open, demands less. Play it again, it will come clear. --- Finlay Clark / guitarJess Hickie-Kallenbach / vocalsDavid Kennedy / drums

his music and its exponents defy categorization. The word 'band' doesn't cover it. Concept; project; workshop; experiment; energy; assembly; community; association. Black Top is all of the above and more, and although the music industry would call the British multi-instrumentalists Orphy Robinson and Pat Thomas a group that is augmented by different guests for their performances there is too much imagination and unpredictability in the results for the term to be really a propos. Black Top is its own thing, or something, or some kinda ting for our times, if one adapts the zeitgeist that the visionary dub poet Linton Kwesi Johnson has referred to as 'tings an' times'. Since its genesis in 2011 Black Top has been through significant changes in sound and personnel so that any signature they present is most likely to be soon rewritten. Two previous recordings have seen two great British saxophonists, Steve Williamson and Evan Parker, respectively, each become the third point of the triangle, but on this session it is two stellar American improvisers, drummer Hamid Drake and double bassist William Parker, who join the fluid fraternity. They duly cement a pivotal transatlantic exchange in creative music, a kinship that builds on Robinson's work with such as Lester Bowie in the early part of his career and Thomas's with Butch Morris in his. As much as the four players in this latest incarnation of Black Top represent iconic spaces in the world of western music – London and New York, whence they emerged during the '70s and '80s – they also have non-western common denominators. Thomas and Robinson maintain a deeply rooted interest in Caribbean folk that chimes with Parker's avowed love of calypso – heard in his own bands and in collaborations with Trinidadian-American vocalist Faye Victor – while all three and Drake have immersed themselves in African, Middle Eastern and Asian music. This vast amount of information permeates and percolates in pieces that fearlessly uphold the principle of spontaneous composition. When the players convened at east London's Café Oto in August 2016 during Black Top's two-day residency there was great expectation over what the meeting would produce, but the extent to which they deeply personalized the myriad vocabularies housed by the word 'jazz' was gripping. A reprise of Moanin', the anthem forever linked to drum-star pioneer Art Blakey, drops rakish dissonance into the gospel-fired theme to present hard bop and avant-garde as cousins at play rather than brothers in arms, while the 42 minute opus For Joe Harriott investigates the kind of skilful mutation-elaborations synonymous with the Jamaican legend. Yet amid all the fiery disruption there is sensual dance. This is where the ensemble unveils its most boldfaced dynamic range, turning a two-beat tick-tock of marimba into a time-stretch suite whose vigorous rhythmic invention sees clavé, shekere and cabassa phrases swerve around hammer-headed keyboard syncopations. Stark shifts in tempo and attack push the music into both floating freeform and a groove broken free of a 12 bar shackle before Sun Ra's space organ skanks into view and the music fades to black over a tantalizing roots reggae surge. Histories rather than history are in effect. Traditions rather than tradition are in vivo. Black Top is a laboratory of sound, and in this third offering of its evolutionary trials four audio scientists play with notes and tones as if tomorrow's blues had come today. - Kevin Le Gendre, London, 2017.

Tracklisting: A1 The Solar Model - 13:51A2 The Laws of Motion - 03:28A3 For George Saliba - 03:42B1 The Oud of Ziryab - 04:46 B2 For Ibn Al Nafis - 04:17 B3 For Mansa Musa - 03:44 B4 The Birds are Singing - 06:01  Pat Thomas returns to OTOROKU for his fourth collection of solo piano improvisations, this time recorded in a studio setting at London’s Fish Factory.  For 25 years now, beginning with Nur (Emanem) and continuing through Al-Khwarizmi Variations (Fataka), The Elephant Clock of Al-Jazari (OTOROKU), and now The Solar Model of Ibn Al-Shatir, Pat Thomas has drawn on the Arabic world for titles for his solo piano work - specifically the long-standing Islamic tradition of astronomical invention. For Thomas, the work of the polymaths he dedicates his music to has been sidelined by Eurocentrism, just as the Arabic origin of “jass” and the scalar, intervallic and polyphonic contributions made by Arab musicians have been routinely overlooked. Islamic innovation is at the heart of Thomas’ solo projects and draws a direct link between his Sufi faith and a totally unique style of playing. Each of his solo piano records is a dedication - not just to the innovators Thomas names but to the beauty of the universe in all its complexities.    Starting standing up with one hand inside the piano and one on the keys, ‘The Solar Model’ begins with single staccato bass notes appearing like chondrites in the darkness, occasionally tumbling towards a rhythm and then falling out of it. Metallic string work starts to pull towards an unseen centre and eventually notes from the upper registers appear, clear and light. With both hands drawn to the keys, Thomas builds towards scintillating beauty, carried through “The Laws of Motion” and propelling us towards the A-side closer, “For George Saliba”. Notes fall rapidly, colliding to form a crowded core with a warped sort of bebop in its middle - distinctive Pat with a nod to the Duke’s groove. The whole landscape of the A side swings with this one movement, until its energy is spent on one last sweeping rotation.  On the B-side, “The Oud of Ziryab” notes to the instrument maker who added a 5th pair of strings to the Oud. The single bass notes of the first side are swapped for clusters, bursting together and decaying in space. Making use of the sustain pedal and the silence of a studio setting, it’s one of the most open, lush recordings of Thomas at the piano we’ve heard - more Muhal Richard Abrams than Monk, the lower end thundering under rapid, crystalline blues.  “For Mansa Musa” brings back a swing instantly recognisable as Pat, with a huge euphoric lift halfway that crowns the record but the album’s end title “The Birds are Singing” is more celestial, more chromatic - a reminder that the spiritual matters just as much as the physical for Thomas. --- Released in an edition of 500 LPs and 500 CDsRecorded at the Fish Factory, London on Wednesday 6th March, 2024 by Benedic LamdinMixed by Benedic Lamdin Mastered by Giuseppe Ielesi Photographs by Abby Thomas Pressed at Vinyl Press UK

Recorded in 1989 and only now released, this studio album includes Pat Thomas on keys & electronics in a sextet with guitar & bass, synth, turntables, electronic wind instruments, drum machines, samplers, &c.;, merging ea-improv approaches with disruptively odd asides, fragmented voices, and swelling interventions, making something otherworldly out of then-revelatory technology. Keyboards, Electronics, Composed By – Pat Thomas Drum Machine, Samples, Electronics, Producer, Composed By – Geoff Serle Electric Bass – John McCullough Electronic Wind Instrument [WX7], Composed By – Pete McPhail* Guitar, Composed By – Richard Chapman Turntables, Composed By – Neil Palmer

CD version containing Baroque Jazz Trio "Orientasie / Largo" as bonus tracks Mixing Baroque, free-jazz and world music, the unique album of the Baroque Jazz Trio (which is in fact 3/5 of the Bach Modern Quintet) is a difficult-to-label sound object which is far from being typical of the psychedelic sounds associated with the early 1970s. Because, although fusion with Indian music (amongst others) and jazz (but also pop) was popular at the time, rarely had all this been mixed together with Baroque music. Even mentioning Jacques Loussier adapting Bach does not come close, as here, all barriers are broken down, with an audacity which begins with the highly original and extraordinary use of the harpsichord, an instrument which it is unusual to hear in such a context, even though indicated by the ‘baroque’ in the title. Of course jazz specialists will mention Johnny Guarnieri in the Gramercy Five with Artie Shaw, Martial Solal playing "Four Brothers" in 1965, or Lalo Schifrin in his homage to the Marquis de Sade… But no, none of these references really makes sense, as they pale in comparison to the wild adventures of Georges Rabol, probably closer to Call Cobbs with Albert Ayler, or, better still, Odile Bailleux in another remarkable French group, Armonicord, than anyone else. With George, the rhythm section is no less outstanding,: Jean-Charles Capon, who, two years later would record the magnificent L'Univers-solitude on the same label, is a flying cello virtuoso, while Philippe Combelle, a great drummer rarely heard in such experimental circumstances, plays daringly mixed percussion. Also noteworthy is the presence of flutist, Michel Roques on one track, who was also behind a Saravah album, the splendid Chorus. In France, whether or not groups like Moravagine, Confluence or Synchro Rhythmic Eclectic Language, working in similarly unusual areas, are taken into account, it is rare to find a group which, like the Baroque Jazz Trio, have been able to so blur the boundaries, especially by adding an exotic breath of fresh air inherited from the Third Stream. This record, alongside the album by Brigitte Fontaine with the Art Ensemble of Chicago made Pierre Barouh stand out as a pioneering producer and destroyer of stylistic frontiers.

The Story of Rêverie Luca and Markus began playing together in 2005, when Markus formed an international ensemble to play at the Suoni delle Dolomiti festival. One year later they performed as a quintet in St. Maternus in Cologne, Germany, where they recorded a live album, which initiated the project called “Flowers of Now”. (Intuitive Music in Cologne, Horus Label, 2008). Later on Markus played on two tracks of Luca’s Tacet (Extreme Records, 2008) and on the double album Songs/Signs of Luca’s project Flos with Stefano Castagna (Ritmo&Blu;, 2018). More live performances followed. On July 9th, 2021 Markus visited Luca while traveling to some concerts in central Italy. They set up in Luca’s studio and recorded a fully improvised set, where nothing was previously arranged or agreed. The full set is captured on this album: four takes without any overdubs. The music reflects the meeting of two different musical stories, each musician reacting to the other in a continuous flow of inspiration, tension and release. Their dedication to listening to each other is tangible and yet they still maintain their personal presence - to call or answer and to move together into unknown territories. You can almost grasp the musicians’ wonder at the evolving and unpredictable sonic landscape. Acoustic sounds interweave with electronic parts in constant exploration with the spontaneity of intuitive composition. A deep sense of space and dreamlike atmospheres emerge from the music, the dimensions of width, depth and time seem to expand.”

Irish Traveller, Singer, Storyteller, Thomas McCarthy comes from Birr in County Offaly in Ireland. His family are the McCarthys who settled there generations ago.Thomas McCarthy come from a long line of old traditional singers and musicians who kept the tradition of singing strong.Thomas McCarthy’s CD Comfort features 10 songs handed down through his Irish Traveller family tradition. Only a few are commonly sung, and most are particular to Thomas’s family branch.

FP 03 Vega by Andrew Chalk in handmade slipcase with wooden spine