Souffle Continu Records present the first vinyl reissue of Cohelmec Ensemble's Hippotigris Zebra Zebra, originally released in 1971. The Cohelmec Ensemble celebrate, above all, the pleasure of collective music-making. A group without a designated leader, they base their approach on reciprocal listening, but also on a dialogue between written and improvised material, in which all members have an equal responsibility whatever their instrument. This is even demonstrated in their name: COH as in Jean Cohen (saxophones), EL as in Dominique Elbaz (piano) and MEC as in the brothers François and Jean-Louis Méchali (respectively, amongst others, bass and drums), joined for this album by Evan Chandlee, known for his participation in Love Rejoice (1969) by Kenneth Terroade, and accepted, of course, as a full group member. Fitting together like hand in glove, the five musicians build something together, rather than trying to destroy an established order, as was the thing to do at the start of the 1970s, leaving the expression of an openly political agenda to others. In France, there was a tendency to explore an imaginary folklore which allowed certain elements of free jazz to be circumvented without being ignored. Which is why it is reminiscent of, in the melody of "Hippotigris Zebrazebra" when played with collective intensity, the best of American cosmic jazz, while also occasionally hearing McCoy Tyner or even Cecil Taylor under the fingers of Dominique Elbaz, or the vibraphone of Walt Dickerson evoked by Jean-Louis Méchali. Globally, however, their identity is original (even seminal), a fact which was to be confirmed by their next two recordings. For the record, it should be noted that the first album by the Free Jazz Workshop (from Lyon), another French group with a similar approach, would only be published two years later. Licensed from Cohelmec Ensemble. Deluxe reissue with high definition remastered audio; 12-page booklet on 200 gsm art paper. Includes liner notes and rare pictures; Gatefold LP with obi strip; Edition of 700.

Souffle Continu Records present the first vinyl reissue of Cohelmec Ensemble's Next. The Cohelmec Ensemble celebrate, above all, the pleasure of collective music-making. A group without a designated leader, they base their approach on reciprocal listening and equal responsibilities. This is reflected in their name, created from the first syllables of the founding member's names, which would remain unchanged in spite of the subsequent personnel changes: COH as in Jean Cohen (saxophones), EL as in Dominique Elbaz (piano) and MEC as in the brothers François and Jean-Louis Méchali (respectively, amongst others, bass and drums), Evan Chandlee joined them after they had already been playing together for a while, at the time they recorded their first album, 1971's Hippotigris Zebra Zebra (FFL 019LP). The follow-up (appropriately named Next) saw the original pianist leave, to be replaced by guitarist Joseph Dejean, who had already played with the Full Moon Ensemble, known for having accompanied Archie Shepp at the Antibes Jazz Festival in 1970. In spite of the personnel changes, the understanding and cohesion remain total within Cohelmec. They also maintain their trademark ambitious mix of written and improvised material. From this point of view, Next is even more audacious than its predecessor Hippotigris Zebra Zebra. Relatively brief tracks follow hot on the heels of one another, bolstered by a poly-instrumentality which stands out even more than in the past, giving the album the feel of a contrasting suite. There is a lot going on, leading to evocative atmospheres in which rigor and fantasy go happily hand in hand. Which is enough to say that this album should please fans of a style of free (chamber?) jazz which includes intelligent composed structures, a form in which French musicians have always demonstrated a personal approach, as in the example of Oeil Vision by Jef Gilson in 1964 (OI 012LP). Profoundly original and, it has to be said, seminal. Licensed from Cohelmec Ensemble. Deluxe reissue with high definition remastered audio; 12-page booklet on 200 gsm art paper. Includes liner notes and rare pictures; Gatefold LP with obi strip; Edition of 700

Félicia Atkinson’s Ni envers ni endroit que cette roche brûlante (Pour Georgia O’Keeffe) is approached as a meditation, not as meditative music, but as a reflection on the art of creation: how to inhabit one’s creation, how to convey it, domesticate it and live with it. Drawing inspiration from the artist Georgia O’ Keeffe, both in her work as a painter and in the houses in which she lived in New Mexico, and even in the landscapes that surround them, Félicia Atkinson has composed a piece that evokes and celebrates, in a poetic and holistic way, the mystery of art, the somnambulic oscillation that accompanies the act of creating. Blending fragmentary voices, islands of piano, electronic textures and patterns, and field recordings, Félicia Atkinson’s music is sincere and inspired, a meditation, then, but also a lesson we sometimes forget: being an artist is not an activity, even less a profession, it’s a singular way of approaching the world and, in so doing, densifying it. Richard Chartier’s music takes up residence at the frontiers of the audible, on the edge where sound diffracts into an inter-dimensionality where sounds, space, listening and silence recombine in an arborescence of becomings that present themselves to us and then disappear. The space-time in which Richard Chartier’s music unfolds is a stretched space-time, barely emerging in the world of sound. The delicacy, precision and accuracy of the composition Recurrence.Expansion lies precisely in this dialogue between a shape that is exposed and developed in an inspired and masterful way, and the sonic biotope in which this shape develops. It is from such an encounter that the singularity of Richard Chartier’s music emerges, music of attentive listening, but also sensitive, inhabited music, a music of discreet metamorphosis. —Francois J. Bonnet, Paris, March 2023  Multichannel electroacoustic piece for electronics and voice (stereo version) Can be performed in concert with additional live voice, grand piano and/or Fender Rhodes Composed and performed by Félicia Atkinson Published by Mute Song Limited Mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi Cut by Andreas Kauffelt at Schnittstelle, Berlin, February 2023 Photos by Éléonore Huisse Sleeve design by Stephen O’Malley /// Stereo reference of original multichannel work for 26 speakers premiered at INA grm’s Présences électronique festival, Maison de la Radio et de la Musique (Paris, France), April 16, 2022 Formed, composed and recorded by Richard Chartier Richard Chartier is published by Touch Music/Fairwood Music UK Ltd.

XKatedral Anthology II is the second installment in a series of archival releases dedicated to presenting music by composers affiliated with XKatedral working within the realm of slowly evolving harmonic and timbral music. This double-vinyl set contains an array of pieces written from 2018 to 2020 by composers Kali Malone, Jessica Ekomane, Mats Erlandsson, Theodor Kentros, Wilma Hultén and Maria W Horn. This collection of pieces focuses on the use of synthetic sound and algorithmic composition languages as tools for precise work within the realm of spectral exploration. In addition to this, the electronic instrumentation in many of the pieces is augmented by acoustic instruments.

“F(r)icciones is a complicated piece of miscellaneous works. A set of experiments in preparation for a gig at a noise convention in Orozco that never happened, an 18 women choir piece composed for a soundtrack to a documentary that doesn’t have a release date yet or trying to create a drone piece by accumulating guitar noise. The result? Burnt psychedelic blues with electronics ” Partly an official soundtrack to “Durangas”, a documentary focusing on women and heritage, discussing civil war, education, sex or violence in the town of Durango, Basque Country. And partly a non musical accompaniment to an imaginary movie, F(r)icciones is the new album by A. Maiah. Self described as Guitarist / Composer / Improviser of Idiomatic Noise / Microtonal Blues Ist or Psychedelic Populist, Asier has been self-releasing albums for nearly a decade now, focusing mostly on prepared guitar or improvised noise. Durangas was composed by Asier, arranged/conducted by Garazi Navas, performed by an 18 women choir from Durango and recorded live at San Agustin Cultural Centre. All of the other tracks were recorded between 2021-2022 in between portable recorders in Burgos or at Estudios Nomadas.

As the mist clears from their Sift LP (hop9) Eyes of the Amaryllis return to Horn of Plenty with the equally enigmatic Perceptible to Everyone. Recorded in various remote locations around the northeast of the US over a few warm months in 2022, Perceptible to Everyone maps the band's poetry in nebulous song forms that dance on their constant fission between pastoral and ghostly inner galaxies. Its eight tracks utilize a wide range of instruments and techniques to span an alien, ritualistic territory where melodies and rhythms appear from meandering passages of sound and ramshackle sci-fi settings. The culmination leaves Perceptible to Everyone gesturing as if it were an alluring otherworldly ethnographic document. EotA’s non-idiomatic methods make comparisons difficult but traces of Smegma, early D.D.A.A, Garbage and the Flowers, The Tower Recordings, and Flaming Tunes will get you some of the way there. The rest is uncharted.

The intimacy of Akiyama’s Thaumaturgy is immense. In nine short through-composed pieces written over a ten-year period, Akiyama captures something melodic, simple, and utterly transfixing. In his first instrumental solo acoustic guitar record in more than a decade, Akiyama, widely known for his improvisatory collaborations as well as his hypnotizing boogie-drone guitar pieces, here works without effects and maintains a strict harmonic palette throughout. Every note is given ample space to ring out and decay, together slowly and deliberately building the frame that is to become the completed structure. The resulting atmosphere of his pared down grammar threads each individual track to the next as the songs work together with the gravity of a single object. In fact, one might think of each track like a room in a house. The record, as its name hints, is suffused with phenomenological magic. The pieces function architecturally, in a Bachelardian sense, sheltering the daydreamer and encouraging charged stillness. The record envelops like a long-vacant shelter, made sacred by memory. Repeated motifs, like building blocks, waft through the air, exacting the psycho-durational and transportive power of a music box. And while, like a music box, the music lends itself to the tracing of inner landscapes, critical listening reveals that this is no mere background music. The acoustic field is richly ornamented with combination tones that are intensified by a pacing in step with Rothko-philes, Morton Feldman and Loren Connors. While the enclosure of home serves for many as refuge from the world, Akiyama’s Thaumaturgy speaks to a basic drive for a sense of place in an epoch dominated by the disassociation of global nowhere-culture. The simplicity-bordering naivete of the pieces evokes a discomfiting nostalgia and melancholy pointing us home or, as Bachelard would suggest, to the “miniscule phenomenon of the shimmering consciousness.”

First LP from Donna Candy, the bass-vocal-drums trio trawled from the sub genres of experimental rock and busy pushing to the front of heavy music. Nu metal bass riffs, switch-pitched fuzz vocals and big, splashy drums layer over unsettling narratives and extreme loops to bring a bit of the pit to the dancefloor.Begun as an off the cuff party band with the idea of finding a live sound that would fit between 4am trance sets, the trio soon found themselves addicted to the euphoric sludge they created. Swapping their usual guitar for a bass, JS Donny drives Donna Candy with simple riffs, split half clean and half shredded with Boris / Sunn O))) like distortion. Head-banging the whole way, they’ll switch speed or stop suddenly, bending and drawing out notes to ratchet things up for release. Nadja's vocals tear through the top layer - heavily processed and warped with weird imagery. Together there’s a feeling of what it might be like to see Sightings slowed by codeine but with Elvin Brandi on the mic.Always set up facing each other, off stage and surrounded by the audience, Donna Candy encourage catharsis - reciprocally transforming energy between themselves and the crowd. They build a queer euphoria that pulls apart metal’s narrow dichotomy of nihilistic machismo vs. hyperfemininity, and begins to make the visceral faux-hybridity of nineties nu metal feel possible this time around. ‘Blooming’ brings us six offerings from the band on a four way split release that speaks for itself - once on board with the DC energy you’ll want to be a part of it.  --- Music by Donna Candy Alex (drums), Js Donny (bass), Nadja Meier (vocal) Produced and recorded by Anotine Nouel at Sound Love Studio, Grrrnd Zero (Lyon) Mixed by Anotine Nouel and Js Donny. Mastered by A.P. Mastering and Post.

Fresh output from John Chantler's 1703 Skivbolaget - the new duo from two masters of very different string instruments. ‘The Air Around Her’ beguiled its audience when recorded live in a bakery at Edition Festival in 2016, and carries beautifully through to this release. Microtonal timbres meet gnarled defiance - the result is surprisingly symbiotic. Ellen Fullman’s Long String Instrument has been a long-term life-work of incredible ambition and dedication. The result is immediate, exciting and inspirational. Okkyung Lee has completed rewritten the possibilities for the cello in solo and group improvisation whilst maintaining a steadfast defiance to the many attempts to contain her work within pre-defined genres. ‘The Air Around Her’ was recorded on 20 February 2016 during the First Edition Festival for Other Music in Stockholm, Sweden at Kronobageriet — the former bakery to Swedish Royalty that dates back to the 17th Century and is now the site of the city’s Performing Arts Museum. The Edition Festival was given access to the space while renovations took place and Fullman allowed the requisite time to install and tune her long string instrument along the full 26 metre length of the room. --- Music by Ellen Fullman and Okkyung Lee. Recorded during the First Edition Festival for Other Music, Stockholm on 20th February 2016. Concert producer: John Chantler. Recording Engineer: Maria W Horn. Mixed by Ellen Fullman and Thomas Dimuzio. Mastered by Andreas [LUPO] Lubich at Calyx, Berlin. Artwork by Bill Nace. Made possible in part by a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists (2015). The title, "The Air Around Her" is a quote from "Vermeer Interiors" a poem by Margaret Rabb, from her book, "Granite Dives". This release has been supported by the Swedish Arts Council. © 2018 Ellen Fullman (BMI) / Okkyung Lee (ASCAP) Released by 1703 Skivbolaget in cooperation with Ideell Edition

Debut full length release from the UK/Italian duo of Ecka Mordecai and Valerio Tricoli, working together as Mordecoli. Individually these two travellers have carved out a path of ghostly musique concrete (Tricoli) and textural cello wandering (Mordecai). Alter is proud to present the album Château Mordécoly, a result of two musicians (and friends) coming together to explore the middle ground of their individual investigations. The results of a red wine induced residency at London’s Cafe Oto, Château Mordécoly is a panoramic audio field exploring both the physicality of sound, informed by the voice, cello and pictish harp of Mordecai, and the artificial manipulations of Tricoli’s revox tape machine. The delicate tension between the physical ‘real’ and the distortive ‘new’ leverages this release far beyond a tipsy residency and shifts it into a top tier electroacoustic take on the zeitgeist. Solo cello and voice appear rooted in the timbre of time. The magnetic tape is both a friend and covert manipulator. The physical elements open themselves to disfigurement as a means of propagating the fantastical audio that unfolds from the initial enquiry. There’s no witchery or wizardry on part of either player but rather a symbiotic passing of the baton as the line between the real and the non-real flow in and out of themselves. The results are at once sedate, shocking and subversive. Château Mordécoly is a disembodied sonic landscape; a phantasmagorical world of fantasy unfolds as the delicate beauty of Mordecai’s playing and singing is transformed into a playful and unusual landscape. Epoch’s are evoked as the visual stimuli resulting from these alchemical transformations conjure everything from a haunted house to the Middle Ages. At once sleek and modern mental images of a marriage between the ultra present and the deep vast past. A heavenly cloud unveils a clear symbiosis of the Italian church and all of its cobwebs frolicking amongst pagan Britain.

Available as a digital download in 320k MP3 or 16bit FLAC Recording of the stunning first set performed by the trio of Peter Brötzmann, Steve Noble and John Edwards at Cafe OTO in January 2010 during Brotzmann's first residency at the venue. This was also the first time the trio had played together. Recorded at Cafe OTO by Shane Browne, mixed by John Edwards and Mastered by Andres [LUPO] Lupich at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. REVIEWS "On an east London side street, Café Oto hosts a programme of international experimental sounds to shame subsidised arts temples, drawing demographic-defying crowds of all ages through its doors. The first release on Oto's own label, available as an authentic vinyl slab or a slippery download, is a 40-minute splurge of sax, drums and bass skronk, live at the venue in 2010, from the German free-jazz giant Brötzmann and two stars of the London improv scene. Unrepeatable moments of collective inspiration and sudden sunlit shafts of modal near melody punctuate the continuing energy blur. Business as usual down Dalston Junction." Stewart Lee, The Sunday Times  "Since it opened in Dalston in April 2008, Café OTO has become London's new music venue of choice for the likes of the Sun Ra Arkestra, Joe McPhee, Mats Gustafsson – and Peter Brötzmann, whose first residency at the club in January 2010 yielded this inaugural release on OtoRoku, Café OTO’s new in-house label. The night in question was the first time Brötzmann had played with bassist John Edwards and drummer Steve Noble, and the decision to team them up was inspired. With Alan Wilkinson, or in Decoy with Alex Hawkins and NEW with Alex Ward, Edwards and Noble have a deserved reputation as a thrilling high-energy rhythm section. And as Brötzmann is no slouch when it comes to high-energy playing, the combination is explosive. Right from the start of the set – the first that evening – it's obvious why this was selected to christen the label. All three players jump straight into top gear, with Brötzmann setting a cracking pace, his torrent of sound characterised by that hard-edged tone which makes him such compelling listening. ...the worse the better sets a high standard for subsequent releases to match. But, as every night at Café OTO is recorded and there's a wealth of fine music waiting in the wings, including quality recordings from Otomo Yoshihide and Wadada Leo Smith, OtoRoku looks like a label to watch." John Eyles, Paris Transatlantic "These two extended improvisations, recorded in January 2010 during Brötzmann’s first residency at OTO, finds the group attaining near-telepathic modes of interconnectedness, despite this being the trio’s first outing together. From the off, Brötzmann’s gills are gurning, throwing up torrents of molten roar, while Noble’s mule-kicking at the traps reels out ride hits like a baby sporting a bonnet of bees." - Spencer Grady, BBC Music "Does the world need another Brötzmann album? Probably not, but as the inaugural release on Cafe OTO's in-house high quality vinyl-only label, this one is cause for celebration. Recorded there - superbly well, too - during Brötzmann's residency in January 2012, this is no frills straight-up free jazz, solos and all, pitting the Firebreather of Wuppertal against the might local rhythm team (yes, they can and do swing hard) of John Edwards and Steve Noble. All three are on outstanding form, from the opening yelp - when it comes to Big Bang beginning, nobody does it better than Brötzmann - to Edwards's snarling drone 38 minutes later. Shame engineer Shane Browne slammed thos faders down so brutally: for once, you feel like joining in with the whoops and hollers of the punters." - Dan Warburton, The WIRE

Poetry and reality. The music goes in and out of, and away from, and into again. Reality and poetry. The music is uninterested in genre denominations and ideological markers. Music grows and is shaped by and out of realities, living and artistic. Sound is an audible reflection of you. Even you in silence. And you from sound, from the particular music that invaded your way of life; the ever-increasing global audible pressure chamber in which your spirit falls again and again in a Sisyfonian way ... Titles, on the other hand, are single-living creatures. Sometimes pointing to other titles, other phenomena, but usually standing entirely solitary, like pillars of stone in a desert, like rocks in a forest area. Over, under and around, the music is moving and moving unobtrusively. On Leiber Heiland, Laß uns Sterben historical events intersect right into the contemporary sound making, slit through their titles sharp cuts in our listening present era and pry our eyes towards the seemingly inexplicable backyard of history; which nevertheless created the plateau of disintegration and opportunity that we now seem to live on. At the same time all the sounds on this recording - all the scrunching, the breathing, all the tones, all the composed-processed material - completely and fully give themselves to the listener, escaping all human epithet making and denominations, as the sound becomes manifest, becomes apparent. This is my wish. To contemplate names and sounds, around music and the name of music. A couple of measured hours during a wondrous and almost tropical evening in May 2016, Jakob Riis and myself were in the Crypt of the Lund Cathedral, while student orchestras rehearsed with open windows near the old monastery park, birds were screaming and hot spring -high people raved just outside the crypt's small, low windows . The crypt is perhaps Sweden's oldest room still existing.  And precisely in this mysteriously echoing room, we were still in a hair-rasing now, rinsed clean by the music as big and tiny sounds ran in rays along the stone floor from the year 1121 providing some relief. - Martin Küchen, April 2017

Future music by NKISI, ancient music by NKISI: ‘Ndombola’ (A) was commissioned for A Journey to Avebury, STANLEY SCHTINTER’s shot-for-shot remake of DEREK JARMAN’S film of the same name. ‘Centripetal Vortex’ represents its own parallel ritual, made as part of the same sessions.numbered + handmade in an edition of 250 copies only; 180gr vinyl in custom-made screen-printed outer (sealed), containing two risograph inserts with a specially commissioned essay by SUKHDEV SANDHU(Video will be exhibited on-site at Avebury henge and stone circle throughout March 2023. Record release date is the winter solstice, December 21)

FRANS ZWARTJES’ studio remains untouched since his passing in 2017. In early 2023, we returned to the studio and discovered a trunk of unlabelled 3/4 inch tapes, containing completely unheard music by ZWARTJES. These works, largely synthesiser-based improvisations for films either unmade or unfinished, were played and recorded by ZWARTJES between the late 1960s, through his most fertile filmmaking period in the 1970s, and continuing in to the early 1980s. Unlike his previous releases, these recordings have been transferred directly from the original source tapes, newly mastered and available to hear for the first time as a double LP release. A comprehensive new interview with TRIX ZWARTJES, the life-partner and collaborator of FRANS is included in a booklet accompanying every copy of the record.numbered + handmade in an edition of 300 copies only; 180gr 2xLP 12” vinyl in custom-made screen-printed outer (sealed), with an eight-page xerox-printed booklet containing an interview with TRIX ZWARTJES and lots of previously unseen photographs from the ZWARTJES family albums; no digital

Available as a 320k MP3 or 24bit FLAC download.  Born in Tbilisi, Nargilə Mehtiyeva aka Aşıq Nargilə has been playing saz (long-neck lute) and singing since the age of 15. Fluent in Azerbaijani, Georgian, and Russian, Nargilə represents the cosmopolitan heritage of old Tbilisi, a city once known as a meeting point for multilingual aşıq bards who would travel through the region serving as conduits for news, ideas, music and culture. Nargilə is currently the only female aşıq living and performing in the ethnic Azeri region of Georgia, and has been teaching the art to new generations. This is a recording of Aşıq Nargilə's first concert in the UK. Recorded live at Cafe OTO on the 18th October 2014 by James Dunn. The pieces performed are named after the traditional saz aşıq havası (melodies) they are based on. Lyrics are taken from destan epics, regional poetry and Nargile’s own lyrics to match the rhyming patterns of these melodies. Yanıq Kerem (1) and Ruhani (7) are both instrumental pieces which depict their own stories without words. Ay Ceyranım (5) is a popular song performed at weddings across Azerbaijan. Aşıq Nargilə Mehtiyeva: Saz (long-necked lute) and Söz (vocals) --- Tracklisting: 1. Yaniq Keremi 2. Yurt Yeri 3. Ibrahimi 4. Dubeyti 5. Ay Ceyrani 6. Bas Saritel 7. Ruhani 8. Orta Saritel

besom presse announces "ask the axes," the first collaborative release by the duo of experimental bagpiper david watson and famed percussionist of the necks, tony buck. watson and buck’s premiere recording documents two twenty-plus minute tracks featuring the hallucinatory sound palette of the highland bagpipes, drums and percussion. ask the axes leads with watson blowing out a grounding and sonorous fundamental tone. moments later it’s redoubled with the serrated buzz of a higher register saw wave, suggesting a startling revelation of the untapped potential of the highland pipes. as watson steadily accumulates layers, the sound takes on a prismatic effect. from the droning choir of reeds, phantasmic overtones suddenly surface and are submerged in a fizzing backdrop like aural phosphenes. when buck enters he manages to do so without interrupting watson’s uncanny suspension of time. his toms and snare splinter with a giddy phasing effect as he shakes a number of bells into a thrumming substratum. on side b, the duo evolve into an ecstatic kinesis, expanding and accelerating sensations of space and time. buck’s measured crescendo conjures the trance-inducing meditations of the sufi dervishes while watson’s pipes peal out glossolalic spasms that sound like a long lost maclise ritual. as the record closes in heaves and gasps, a warm afterglow settles in ahead of a startling conclusion.

besom presse is pleased to announce the release of "processions," a double lp by composer, performer, and instrument-maker werner durand, with amelia cuni and victor meertens. recorded and mixed in his home studio in berlin from 2012-16, durand offers four just-intoned drone works distilling global influence into compositions of singular beauty. the pieces presented here are rooted in durand’s past work with meertens (an australian visual artist), a partnership that dates back to the early 90’s. performed on an unlikely array of instruments including various self-made wind and reed instruments, sarod, mirliton, bi (a vietnamese free reed instrument), trumpet, and hammered electric guitar, the result is narcotic. each piece is a rich tapestry woven by timbral combinations that cut clearly defined swaths of the spectral field, yet cradle each other with mandala-like elegance. processions opens with meertens’ hammered guitar percolating within the glacial flow of durand’s omnipresent hum—like an embryonic dreyblatt excitation set adrift in the bardo of lamonte young’s eternal music. dhrupad singer amelia cuni’s voice enters, beckoning like an oneiric shepherd. as the record proceeds, durand doubles down on his elemental sound—before long the listener, without realizing it, sits straddling a borderline in a hypnagogic state of fleeting consciousness.

Absolutely amazing, large ensemble wildness from American born, London based intermedia artist, Dustin Ericksen, via Copenhagen's Polychrome (run by Blue Lake's Jason Dungan), channelling the Circle Jerks, Camper Van Beethoven, and radical methods of spontaneous composition and performance. WASTED JUDGMENT - LP - 2022 The music on this album was originally conceived to elaborate in specific spaces through specialized placement of musicians during performance. Using a collage of compositional and stylistic methods determined in a rules-based manner, each part was performed in self-arrangement. The melodic, rhythmic and sometimes dronic ‘free music’ techniques overlapped in combinations surprising to its makers. Through mixing and mastering by Pape Arce, an attempt has been made to carry through the spatio-temporal effects of these rules and the musicians’ personal contributions, but mostly to produce something new we’d like to listen to. LPs have two sides, are made over a period of time and their grooves are articulated through a process that resembles casting. They have a detailed, engraved surface texture, and these details reveal something through turning or moving around the object. Plus they’ve got a great tiny hole through the middle to look through. It all makes me think about sculpture. This vinyl album is an analogue for two sculptures made about five years ago. The problem was raised: to make music which plays through the formal elements of sculpture. My own interest in sculpture comes out of a political interest in agency. Agency is in this case about what it means to develop ways for informed individuals and groups to constantly renew an active set of formal relations. To accomplish this, making something in which the viewer’s relative position is aestheticised is paramount. A unique experience is molded by the viewer’s specific position in space. How? By distributing the players throughout two buildings and timing their soundmaking in a series of sensible order. This music was made in 2017 and 2018 by performers from all levels of musical ability. They volunteered their time and materials in some cases, to make the performance happen and, in turn, this album. I am totally grateful to all of their hard work, seriousness and support towards a nondenominational international notional freak disconsortium. Recorded on: Roland R26 Zoom r16 Zoom H6 Mixed bag of mics WASTED The performance took place at the midpoint of the exhibition: NAMING RIGHTS AT THOMAS DANE GALLERY 13 September 2017 Thomas Dane Gallery 11 Duke Street St James’s London SW1Y 6BN Instructions: The music is loosely based on Camper Van Beethoven’s cover of the song Wasted by The Circle Jerks, (lyrics below) which was chosen because it related to the theme of the exhibition: How the artist’s life is evident in the artwork. Performers: Laurie Anderson, Music Director, conducting, viola Jason Dungan, clarinet Dustin Ericksen, voice Damian Griffiths, guitar Felicity Hammond, voice Paul Hookham, drums Lee Johnson, bass guitar Julian King, guitar Gary McDonald, guitar Carolina Ongaro, voice Sam Porritt, electric piano Philip Serfaty, voice and guitar Jue Sota, pvc tube Jan Hamilton Sota, fiddle Jameela Yaghoob, voice WASTED Performance Section one - solos The players form a circle on the outer edges of the largest room of the gallery. Viewers are able to enter and leave the circle of players comfortably. Each musician plays a phrase from the song as a solo with a simple, dry, minimal sound. Singers sing a verse. Performers are encouraged to diverge from the music and improvise if they would like to. The conductor will indicate when to play and help to keep in time. [There will then be a 10-15 sec pause before the next section which is part of the performance] Section two - performance of “Wasted” Everyone plays the solo together (no vocals) Verse 1 I was a surfer I had a skateboard I was so heavy and I lived on the strand I was a dumb shit And I was a fuck-up I was so napped out I was out of my head I was so wasted Verse 2 I was a hippie And I was a burn-out I was so wasted I was out of my head I was a punker I had a mohawk I was so gnarly and I drove my dad's car I was so wasted Everyone plays/sings the solo, ending with an extra, quicker “ I was so wasted” ©Greg Ginn & Keith Morris 1979 Section three - drone Players disperse through the other four rooms of the gallery moving as independently as possible with their instruments. Drone plays for ca. 10mins. There is then 5 mins of solo drone after which performers sporadically improvise/interject on their own accord. Though the intensity of the music can build, the music should not get louder. __________________________ JUDGMENT A soundtrack performed serially by multiple musicians, spread out in earshot in a circuit. 6 September 2018 The Averard Hotel 10 Lancaster Gate London W2 3LH [Text Wrapping Break][Text Wrapping Break]Instructions: The performance creates a sculptural soundtrack for a still image. The soundtrack elaborates a musical, melodramatic theme in a sculptural, and architectural manner by ‘moving’ around the space. The music is a simple chord progression with a basic rhythmic composition, lyrics and the music is self-arranged by the musicians. The spatial arrangement of the players in the building, and the order of their playing is intended to create movement of sound around the viewers to develop a complex and unique experience; sometimes tuneful, sometimes noisy, often silent. The musicians are spread, distantly, but within earshot of each other, over two floors, 15 rooms and connecting hallways. They are arranged in a circuit. The performance begins with one player or singer playing one note or ‘hit’ of music, then the next player (in space) plays the same (first) bar and continues. Each time around the music gains notes until several bars are played as a theme. The theme overlaps for each player by one bar. In this way, there is a serial expression of sound or quiet throughout the space in both start, playing and finish. The music travels through the buildings like a giant snake with a belly full of canon. This spatial experience of the music mimics the sweeping sound effects in melodramatic cinema, but in this case, the metaphorical ‘sweep’ is replaced by a coordinated physical movement of production of sound across and up and down the building. Performers: Aaron Allerton - guitar Adam Bonser -double bass Emma Christian - vibes Chloë Dichmont - voice Myles Egan - software Dustin Ericksen - banjo Anthony Faroux - drums Damian Griffiths - guitar Paul Hookham - drums Marc Hulson bass Lee Johnson - bass Julian King - guitar Henri Kisielewski - chargé d’affaires Gary MacDonald - guitar Leonardo Muller-Rodriguez - bass Edward Nash - Music Director, guitar Fabian Peake - alto saxophone Neena Percy - alto saxophone Rob Pratt - drums Jue Sota - singing pipe Hugo Trouiller Varaldi - guitar Isabelle Utzinger - keyboard synthesizer Martynas Vaikasas - guitar Alex Vaos - percussion Katie Wilkes - keyboard synthesizer Jameelah Yagoub - voice Maria Zahle - electric piano and voice